The dismal swamp

That's where I spent the holiday weekend. Not only did I not get everything done that I hoped to, I didn't come close to getting done what I really needed to. Instead, I moped about the house, lachrymose and revolting even to myself. It's November. April may be the cruelest month (debatable point), but November is certainly one of the gloomiest. The diminishing light gets me down, and then there's the appearance of utter futility in all my teaching attempts. My logical brain tells me otherwise, but emotionally, I can't help but feel that I'd be just as productive if I were to sit in the classroom and read to myself and let them indulge in whatever mayhem they like. (Maybe one semester I'll try that. I'll just give them a bunch of paper assignments at the start of the semester, collect and grade them as we go along, and leave it at that: no lessons, no readings, no comments, zero effort from me. OK, not really, but part of me seriously wonders if the net result would be appreciably different.)

So I was too mired in the sludge of my own mental states to mark assignments, or work on next semester's syllabi, or figure out readings for next semester's 102s, or anything remotely useful. Blah. Blech. I feel mentally covered in goo and am trying to get it washed off so I can be my usual self, with my usual sense of mission.

The students are remarkably patient with all this. I tell them that they won't get assignments back and they just roll with it. I know they want to know their grades (and I don't blame them) but when I tell them they'll have to wait, they just take it in stride, bless their pea-picking hearts.

I did have a lovely moment at the end of the short story class today. I turned the students loose almost immediately: three had read the story I'd assigned, which actually was three more than I anticipated, as they were working on their final paper proposals. I stayed to talk to a few who are struggling to pass--and ended up having a lovely conversation with one young man. He is the first in his family to go to college, and his parents don't understand why it's so much more work than high school was: they put a lot of pressure on him to do things for the family, believing that his protestations of work to do are just an excuse to get out of his chores. But he also has fallen in love with psychology, finds it fascinating--and feels he has to pursue a degree in accounting. I talked to him a long while about that. I encouraged him to go ahead and get the degree in accounting so he could get a job that would pay for an advanced degree in psychology--but first, to talk to a couple of accountants, and to a couple of psychologists, and to ask them what they actually do in their jobs. Not what their lifestyle allows them to do, but what their actual work entails--what the best things are about it, what the worst things are about it. I reminded him that he can change his mind at any time along the way. I urged him to go with a field that awakens his passion, not just that will give him a decent paycheck (though the paycheck does matter). We probably talked for 20 minutes, about how hard it is to make a decision, especially at his age, when stopping to think deeply is anathema. But he's aware of that, which is a very good sign indeed.

And I confess, that's a part of my interactions with students that I love beyond anything: when I can just talk to them about life, about becoming adults, about choices and why we make them--and that they cannot live their lives for their parents but must live their own lives, for themselves.

In that light, I was delighted, amused, and not entirely surprised that a number of them have decided to write about the "coming of age" stories for their final papers. Hit a chord there. And I think that has helped me decide the stories to use for 102.

Today's 101 was a different story in a way. I made the remaining reading journals extra credit. I told them the plan for the next few weeks--which is mostly that they'll be working in their groups, interspersed with some work on technical aspects of writing and some general discussions, not based on any readings (some of those discussions about becoming an adult, and adult decisions, and stopping to think and why it's hard to do). I looked over three of the four proposals (the fourth the students were writing in class, so they'll have to do it again--if nothing else, they'll have to type it up). I was dismayed that the group I had the highest hopes for came up with a proposal that was much too huge, much too diffuse to work--but I took their ideas and kept pushing them smaller and more focused until I think we finally got something that will work. I look forward to seeing it when they get it pulled together. Only one of the four groups got approval on their proposal right away: good for them.

But now I have to mark the proposals for the short story students so they can pick them up tomorrow, then turn my attention back to the papers I've been putting off (and putting off and putting off). I confess, the levels of saurian ooze I've been wading through have diminished significantly now that I'm simply back in the groove: classes, meetings, office hours, full weeks, no breaks, just doing the thing until the semester is over. It does help not to have much more work coming in until the end, too.

It helps to remember to breathe, too. I tend to forget that part.