a denizen of deans and senior faculty glance at me askance as i wend my way among them , finally stumbling into a room full of cigarette smoke , pipe smoke , elbows , bourbon vapor , ice cubes clicking in tumblers beaded with droplets of condensation , back vowels that seem to be growing longer with each step that i take into the crowd , white shirts and black neckties pierced with silver-studded tie tacks , the aging dcolletage of faculty wives , every now and then the fresh firm flesh of a superannuated emeritus trophy wife , polished shoes , pressed dress pants with cuffs , bifocals , bad teeth and worse breath , a miasma of quiet academic desperation , surgical scars ( some only recently healed ) pulsing pinkly beneath layers of broadcloth and pastels , souls in thrall to long-abandoned dreams of fame .