F-Bomb!

I dropped one in class today. I hesitated for a second (should I? which expletive? Oh, go for it), and then said I was going to "fucking force" them to read and understand the novel. We hardly got a chance to talk about it today: they were freaking out about their proposals and about their reading journals and about everything, resisting resisting resisting. But I was not in a sweet and nurturing mood (the real Dr. P is showing her stripes), so, wham. Right between the eyes.

The reaction was funny to observe. One student had started the class sitting to one side of me (the desks being arranged in a vaguely circle-esque manner); when I got into a more in-depth answer to her questions about the topic, she moved to sit almost directly in front of me. When I dropped the F-bomb, she burst out laughing but got up and moved back to her original chair--out of the line of fire. Most of the students laughed, not without a fair measure of shock; one or two remained sullen and otherwise expressionless. But it certainly got their attention. BYM came to the office after class and mentioned how surprised he'd been (perhaps I shattered an illusion he has about my decorum?)--but he acknowledged my reasons for frustration.

Well, yeah.

I also confronted a student who has been bitching about her reading journals all semester but has yet to come see me for help--which I said to her, again, in front of God and everybody. She started to fight me back about it, but rather than getting into a tussle with her, I said--truthfully--that the problem with the reading journals was not exclusive to her. It was like starting all over again: they were acting as if they had no clue what the purpose of reading journals is, even though they've been doing them all semester long. Since when is simply summarizing sufficient? The purpose of the journals is to explain what matters AND WHY--and if you don't know, ASK. Some of them are still going to be off-base (they're going to think the whole purpose is to ask questions they already know the answers to). And I'm going to go stark staring mad.

William's observation has come true once again: the classes that we start out thinking are the bee's knees fall apart, and the ones we think are borderline duds suddenly catch fire. All semester long I've thought this T/Th 102 was the greatest--and they have been--and now, all of a sudden, they're turning on me, not in the sense of becoming confrontational but in the sense of falling down just when I need them to soar.

I do adore these students, so I'm not as bitter about it as I might be, or as pained, but it does upset me, more than they probably realize. It's particularly difficult to face this kind of struggle now, when I'm running low on patience as well as energy.

And I don't understand it, which is another source of frustration. Why is the other class doing so well with the novel, while the class that has always done so well is coming apart at the seams? What's different? Is it just that the novel is long? Or is the "weirdness" of it sending them into a tizzy? The final paper is just a longer version of what they've already done, but it's the same thing, and they're acting like suddenly I'm asking them to perform a Maori haka--in Maori.

Well, shit. Fuck. Gosh darn it.

I still have all their papers to grade, too, and I absolutely must get those back to them on Thursday. If I can't get anything back to anyone else until after Thanksgiving, so be it, but those papers have to get returned. They've been waiting too long. And I don't want to come back from Thanksgiving to any bigger a pile than I can help. It's going to be big enough as is: just because I'm away doesn't mean work won't still be coming in (the subs are collecting assignments for me). Not to mention the review of promotion folders, which there is absolutely no fucking chance I can accomplish before I go.

I seem to have gotten on a very early schedule, which is actually helpful: I was in bed and asleep by 9:15 last night, awake at 4:30 and up by 5 a.m. Partially as a consequence, I got a fair amount of work done today, despite the back-to-back-to-back events of the day. I did get both sabbatical application letters reviewed by P&B and received some very helpful suggestions, which I have implemented: the revised letters are now in the applicants' folders. I got another observation written up (three more to go). And I did get last week's reading journals back to today's class. So, in the next 48 hours or so, I have to grade those papers for the T/Th class, write up three more observations, and if possible, get mini-papers graded for the short story class and reading journals marked for all three classes. Chances I'll be able to do all of that? Vanishingly remote--but a professor's reach should exceed her grasp, whether there's a heaven or not.

But staying here any later will knock that early routine into the proverbial cocked hat, so I'd best wrap this up and ease on down the road.