Homebody

This here bit of off-white softness is my salvation this weekend. After coming home to Home City at my post-midnight hour on Thursday night, and having to be out of the house from 7:45 the next morning till after 5 in the afternoon, I realized that I hadn't had any down time all week. Literally. My weird schedule and living arrangement in Uni City makes it so.

It wasn't till I was doing an errand in a shop yesterday and saw this throw, and thought, "I MUST have that," that I realized how much I crave doing-nothing, in-the-house-goddammit, cozy, pyjama-wearing time. I bought this thing - it is one of the softest, coziest things I've ever felt - took it to bed with me last night, and have been sitting with it draped over me ever since I managed to rouse myself this morning. It incarnates coziness.

Last night we were supposed to have friends over for dinner. When GF came home and found me crying as I tried to clean up the disaster of an apartment - with no plans for what I'd actually cook, less than two hours away from their arrival - we decided to take them out for dinner instead. This was a hard call; I get pretty worked up about entertaining, due to some family history in this area, and felt as if I'd failed by not being able to pull off this dinner - which was supposed to be reciprocating after they'd had us over for dinner, all Martha- and Nigella-like (as always). But I just couldn't face it - I needed not to be madly dashing anymore, please please please.

All I want to do is nest. I'm cancelling my trip to last year's Uni City next weekend. I just don't have the energy to do that. I am "on" way too much of the time - I don't need a long weekend of cooking and entertaining and running from one engagement to another. Next weekend, I plan to stay in my pyjamas as much as possible. And look at Mr. K's cheeks as rejuvenating therapy.
And right now, though I've been out of bed for last than four hours, I'm going to crawl back in. With my throw.

Quantifying greatness

I ran into a student yesterday. I had given her an 83% on her first critical reading response, worth 5% of her mark in the fourth-year seminar (there are eight of them). She's a very good student, obviously - she got the highest grade on that first batch of responses, and contributes very thoughtfully.

She said, "Oh, I'm glad I ran into you. I wanted to talk to you about my response paper."

I thought, "??" And said, "You did very well. It was great."

And she replied, "Yeah, I wanted to know how I can improve."

So I told her I couldn't remember her response paper off the top of my head, and that she should email it to me, which she has now done.

But the thing is, how do you explain what distinguishes a 90% from an 83%? This is difficult work, much more difficult than explaining what distinguishes a 70 from a 90, or whatever. Part of it, I have always maintained, is ineffable - it is about originality and boldness of thought. (When, as a TA, I once said this ata workshop - that there inevitably remains something subjective and unquantifiable about grading - I was given dagger eyes by the facilitators.) I do try to quantify and clarify for students as best I can - I use a marking matrix for larger assignments. And I have indicated at some length in my syllabus what distinguishes the best critical responses - I have quantified it as much as I can. I don't know how to explain the thing about sparks of genius that I find in that very rare A+ paper. Which she indeed might have the capacity to give me - I don't know yet.

I have looked over her paper and told her that there were a couple of places where she had given herself short shrift - she could have expanded her argument so that I could really see her original ideas and critiques.

But still. How to explain originality?

The problem of the 2-hour class

In the summer, after I had planned my courses and submitted my syllabi and had reprotexts prepared, I discovered that one of my classes - the fourth-year seminar in the precise area of my research - was only two hours a week. I thought, then, "lucky me". There are very few two-hour courses out there, in my experience, at any institution - and I didn't expect ever to teach one. I was pleased because I sometimes think three hours is too long to hold students' attention. And two hours should be fine when it's a student-driven seminar.

I was wrong.

The class has met three times. The first was, of course, the hour-long introduction - the only work to be done was to get acquainted with the students and their interests. At the second class - the first one with readings, theme, and substance - I got only 2/3 of the way through the points I wanted to cover, since the students were so chatty. I don't mean to really lecture much, given that this is a seminar course, but there were some very important, foundational concepts I needed to introduce that day - in a dialogic, questioning way - to set up the remainder of the course. This is crucial because it's a topic to which people bring all sorts of weird commonsense assumptions and no notion of how to think critically-academically.

Then there was yesterday. In which I had 120 minutes (which is really, of course, meant to be 110 minutes) to show a 116-minute film upon which they are writing an assignment due next week, cover those crucial points I didn't get to last week, and tie together the three articles they'd read for the day with the film.

Ha. Except not.

So my provisional solution was handouts: one for the important things missed the previous week, and one for the key points of this week's readings that would set them up for the film. Amnd three minutes of me blabbing.

I just feel sick about it, frankly. I can't stop fretting about it. It is *so* not the way I envisioned this course unfolding. It feels as though it must seem, to the students, chaotic and random. I keep apologizing to students, and can't stop, even though it's drawing attention to the problem instead of minimizing and making the best of it. Hell, maybe they hadn't even noticed - well, they sure have now, because I keep opening my big mouth about it. (Another teaching tic: apologizing like this.) I feel as if at this institution, students' first impressions really matter, as I've written before. All I can think is, this isn't a great first impression. So last night I had to have nightmares about it.

I guess the thing is this: two hours sucks, when you've got the kinds of engaged, inquisitive students that I have. It would have been okay when I taught this course last spring at last year's uni; there, the pomo vanguard had beaten everyone else into submission so they were the only ones who talked. But real talking, adequately surfacing all the issues in the readings as well as gesturing toward larger themes, takes time.

Student connection

I have been thinking a lot lately about the kinds of feelings I have for my students. This first cropped up for a couple of weeks ago, with the shootings at Dawson College in Montreal. That event was extraordinary in that cameras were on the scene immediately, while the event was still unfolding inside. So on the news that night there was endless footage of students streaming out of the college, running, crying, with their hands on their heads at the order of police. The sight of those traumatized students horrified me, back on campus in the first week of classes and surrounded by students who looked so like them. I couldn’t stand the mental picture that developed, of the students I cared about – just by virtue of their sharing this academic space with me – being in danger. Of their fear. It hit too close to home and made apparent to me the true range of feelings I have for my students.

My extraordinary class the other night made me nearly hysterical with excitement. And it was all about the students – even though I had just met them the week before and this was our first real class, I was bursting, just bursting, with pride. I had already fallen in a kind of love with them, it seems to me in retrospect. Maternal? Platonic? I don’t know.

And I think about my grief upon leaving my students at last year’s university, how surprised I was at the depth of that feeling.

I don’t know what to make of this. I think of work on the gendered nature of caring in education, and wonder about that. I think Carolyn Steedman has an essay on how this plays out in universities, and I’ll have to look it up. But beyond that – or maybe in spite of or maybe in addition or maybe woven into that - it seems to me it’s some kind of gift, maybe. That I get to have this much feeling for all these lives that touch mine so fleetingly. And maybe it’s that I’m love with the combination of knowledge and people – with people’s fragile senses of hope and possibility instantiated in knowledge. I think that may be it – in the classrooms I’m in, I watch knowledge-making put people in touch with their best, most genuine selves. It always, always shines somewhere out from at least some students’ inattention and lack of preparedness and disinterest. That’s it – it’s that each time, I teach I see evidence of people’s engagement with something other than themselves. And it’s powerful enough to rise from the murk of boredom and alienation. Seeing that happen – in real time – is amazing. And it shapes how I think about them in general, because it's ultimately such intimate insight.

Friday Recipe Blogging: Desperation Brownies

Here is a recipe I make when I am desperate. Either for something sweet just for GF and I (in which case I quarter the recipe), or when I don't have much time to make something that people will enjoy. It's a ridiculously easy resipe...and it might not have the, er, complexity of "better" brownies - but people don't care, do they. They looove chocolate, that's all that matters. And it's yummy!! People are always on about how good it is.

I have made these today because I am desperate...I have committed myself to bringing tons of food this weekend...GF and I are going to a close friend, A's, cottage with her and her new girlfriend. So today I've made a pasta sauce for dinner tonight, and muffins, and these brownies as a desperation-dessert for tonight. In between shopping for other foods to bring, and another errand, and pulling a job application together to send out today, and going for a long run because I was desperate for burning-lungs feeling (go figure). Gah - I can't wait to just veg at a cottage for 48 hours, with all this food.

Warning: UNhealthy (2 cups of sugar??!)

DESPERATION BROWNIES

1 cup butter
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 cup flour
10-12 tbsp cocoa

Cream butter and sugar. Beat in eggs. Add flour and cocoa. Bake in 350-degree oven for approx. 25 minutes, in 9 x 13 pan.

My amazing students

So I wanted to be the very picture of nonchalance at my theory class last night, as discussed in my previous post – no inappropriate water drinking, and no nervous-nelly early arrival. I would breeze into the classroom two minutes before class started and stay away from my water bottle. Well, I breezed in on that timeline, only to discover that I had left my carefully-constructed-for-hours class notes in my office, or so I thought. So I had to run to my office in another building, to get the lecture. Which wasn’t there. I ran back. It turned out that I had printed out the first few pages of my Monday night class’s prep and stapled them to the later pages of this night’s class. Not exactly the recipe for a nonchalant presence; I was freaking out. (I don’t read a lecture, but I do have to glance at fairly extensive notes, otherwise I can’t keep track of where I’m going.) And then, with the water? Well, I stayed away from it, alright. I took one sip – while a student was talking, and not me – halfway through the class. And choked!

But none of that mattered. Seriously, it was the class of my dreams. I winged the first few minutes, and then students took over, essentially. They had done the reading – not always to be expected, especially in a theory class. And they talked and talked, keeping the readings in view and generating the most astonishing observations and analytical questions. I love questions; I even have a blurb in my syllabus about this being a question-driven course. Usually students are allergic to questions as an approach to a problem or text – they want answers. Not these folks! They were figuring shit out – really, soulfully grappling. This stuff mattered to them. And the best thing? They were talking to each other. They were swiveling around in their chairs to nod at each other emphatically. They were all saying to each other, “Oh, that’s an amazing idea. I love that. That makes me wonder if X”. They were building on their peers’ ideas all over the place. They were polite, respectful and enthusiastic about each other and the material. They were being reflexive about their own practice in the classroom, the theory, the discipline. I couldn’t believe it. Who are these students?*

They had so much to say that I didn’t get to even finish everything I meant to do, chiefly my model presentation. But they collaborated with me to figure out how we’d juggle that next week. And when I worried about too-many-students-wanting-to-present-on-the-same-days-and-would-I-have-to-flip-a-coin, they said, “oh, we’re pretty cooperative and easygoing…” I wanted to kiss them all.

I don’t think I had much to do with this. I mean, I asked questions and introduced concepts where appropriate, but their enthusiasm will take them farther than I will, considering the level of knowledge they already have (another surprise). But it made me think about the importance of tone. I think part of why they were so comfortable was that I made myself vulnerable to them in those first few minutes, telling them I’d forgotten my lecture, and laughing at myself about it. I also was trying out a new way of learning their names – I brought a marker and index cards, and had them write down their names and hold them up to their faces. And I took a picture of each them with my cell phone. They thought it was just hilarious, and I really think that levity set the tone that allowed them to make the class into the great time that it was. Tone, tone, tone.

Man, I love teaching sometimes. I called GF right afterward and she said at first she thought there was something wrong, I was so verging on hysterical with excitement. Nothing else gives me that feeling. Nothing.

*In fact, these students are exactly the reason why this is my Dream Job…I knew they congregated at this uni. And it turns out they’re my class in quantity!

Teaching tics

Do you have teaching tics?

I do. The big one is inappropriately timed water drinking. Sounds ridiculous, I know. And it is. I'm a big water drinker to begin with. And in classes, I can't seem to tear myself away from that water bottle. It wouldn't be a problem if it weren't that I was constantly taking a big glug in the middle of a sentence: "And the key...[glug]...issue here is..." or "What do you [glug] think of [glug] X?"

I feel like an idiot every time I catch myself doing this. Tonight, it's going to stop. I'm going to keep the water bottle far, far away. No more mid-sentence security blanket.

Tonight I'm also going to try tackling the compulsion to arrive too early to class. Especially now, when I'm new here and don't really know students yet, it feels awkward. I get there and then don't have anything to do with myself, if students aren't coming up to talk to me. I can't stand that feeling - it feels like junior high. But I haven't ever been able to stop myself from leaving my office way too early...I don't know what I think might stall me on the brief walk from my office to the classroom. But I'm always stupidly prepared for those non-existent eventualities. No more. Tonight, I leave the office five minutes ahead of class, and get there with two minutes to spare. Enough time to take my coat off, array my stuff on the table, and have a 30-second admin-type chat with someone. I will be the very picture of nonchalance.

Ephemeral friendship

Last year I had an unexpectedly lovely year teaching at another university away from Home City. Certainly the best thing about it was the connections I made – to students, to be sure, but most of all to new (and rediscovered) friends - and one fab aunt who lives there. Of the friends I made, there was one in particular – Faux Girlfriend, my GF soon came to call her – who was the closest new friend I’d made in at least ten years. There are others I’ve met in this decade who are just as close now, but with Faux Girlfriend, it was the speed with which the friendship cemented itself that was rather breathtaking. I was living in that city, and we saw each other nearly every day – and drank a bottle of wine together every Wednesday night, after my night class. Our bond was forged through teaching – we taught in the same department and were both teaching full-time for the first time. We relied on each other to talk through the crazy feelings that brought on.

When I moved back to Home City on June 1, it was Faux-GF who drove me here. Ever since I had decided to take this other job and turn down the renewal at last year’s uni, we had been sad about the upcoming loss of our everyday connection. We swore – she did, in particular – that we would talk all the time.

We were in touch until the end of July. Then GF and I went to this music festival that she goes to every year. I’d considered going to this annual weekend for several years, but it was Faux-GF’s talking it up – her excitement at the thought of us being there along with all the other friends she goes with – that committed me to finally buying the tickets.

GF and I hung out with Faux-GF a bit at the festival, but we certainly weren’t joined at the hip…she was there with such a large crew of family and friends. But it was nice to run into her several times a day, to watch a concert together here and there, and catch up.

I haven’t heard from her since.

GF and I had arranged that Faux-GF could stay in our apartment in Home City the weekend after the festival – we were going to be away – and we left her a clean apartment, fresh sheets, a friendly note and a key in the mailbox. She never showed up, and never contacted us to explain why. I have emailed several times, called once, and had no response. She was supposed to be in Home City for almost a week in late August – I never heard from her. As well, since the spring, she’s been talking about how she is coming to my New Uni City for a conference in September. She was so excited about seeing me there. I think the conference is starting this week, but she hasn’t been in touch about that. It’s been such a profound silence that I’ve taken it for a message and given up.

I’ve thought a lot – probably too much – about this over the last few weeks. You know, the classic racking of the brain: “What did I do???” What I do know is that I was in a pretty bad mood at the music festival – GF and I were having a terrible time together, our relationship felt (very temporarily) precarious to me, and it was about 1200 degrees out. I think I whined to Faux-GF too much, which wasn’t what she needed on this weekend that she loves so. But I realized this toward the end of the weekend and smartened up. And I also sent Faux-GF an email about 36 hours after the festival ended, acknowledging and apologizing for my whiny mood, and also asking if she wanted to go on a one-day road trip with me later in August, when she was in town. To which, of course, I never got a reply.

This has been such a disappointment to me. It really hurts. I imagined this friendship would last, and know that wasn’t an unrealistic expectation, given our closeness and the way she represented it. I would have thought that, even if she had some sort of issue with me – be it whininess, or whatever – she would value the friendship enough to bring it up. That can be awkward, of course. But she is a very straightforward gal – and I had made clear my openness and willingness to self-examine by sending her an email about the whininess.

GF and I are going to last year’s Uni City for our Thanksgiving Weekend, in three weeks. I made this plan back in the spring – so that I could visit with all the people I spent time with there, but chiefly to see Faux-GF. Now I’m not even sure I want to go. GF is kinda insistent that we go – if only to see my most adored aunt and her hilarious family for a weekend of family-style debauchery – but I don’t even know if I can bring myself to contact Faux-GF.

It really stings. I guess I just need to reconcile myself to the ephemerality of friendship. To value it for what it was, and that's that. But it's hard; I miss her.

I shoulda been an engineer...

Hey, all of you who, like me, are on the Humanities/Social Sciences job market this year.

Take a look at this.

They are hiring one hundred new faculty members at once. 100. One zero zero.

When I look at job ads in my field, I get excited when I see that a department is hiring two people. Whew, I think - a banner year. Doing some major expansion over there.

I am in the wrong line of work, obviously...

Week's-End Roundup

Jesus.

But let's start with the good things, of which there are many more than the bad. Like this:

- I taught all of my first classes, and was thrilled with the engaged, excited students I saw in them. I really felt intuitively as though, at this university, first impressions count big time - I don't know why. This made it feel like more pressure. But I think I passed, judging by the feeling in the rooms and the tone of students who talked to me.

- I had several students come and chat with me! Yay! I had made a plea for students to come to office hours - and some did. Just to shoot the breeze, one did, yesterday. How fantastic is that? And yesterday while I was waiting for shuttle to take me to Satellite Campus, a student from the theory course came up and chatted with me about the class, telling me how X - we're reading her for next week - is his very favourite writer. He asked me who my favourite writers are. How much do I love these students? This is what I came here for.

- I ran into an acquaintance I always really liked, a woman from my Grad Uni that I used to see at the gym all the time. I barely knew her, but she was always so warm and friendly, I wanted to be her friend. She is teaching at New Uni, and seemed genuinely happy to see me, and was all about us getting together. Lovely! Maybe we finally will become friends. Frankly, I would like someone to have drinks with in Uni City. I miss Drinks - they were, I have to say, a great highlight of my year, last year.

- My Chair and colleagues continue to be awesome, and my Chair is so good that she is being added to my list of senior-scholar role models. She deserves a post of her own, in the days or weeks to come. For now, suffice it to say that, though she is crazy-busy right now with the beginning of the year and computer/registration headaches, her first priority seems to be helping those of us who are new get oriented and feel comfortable - so, for example, we're all going out for an informal, non-working lunch off campus next week.

- With one sweetheart of a colleague who is not on campus very often, I have arranged to use her office when my officemate is in ours. She is happy to do this, and it is a huge relief to me. Huge.

There were some things that were hard, though:

- This office-sharing, nowhere-to-go situation (which is now largely rectified, thanks to the above) grew just absurd. Yesterday I had 3 1/2 hours on campus in the afternoon when I couldn't be in the office, yet couldn't leave because I was waiting for shuttle to take me to Satellite Campus for night class. I thought, perfect - I can always use this time to write. I am writing a new paper right now. Could I find anywhere in the library that actually had somewhere for me to plug in my laptop? (Require plug-in because battery sucks.) No, I could not. I found outlets in a non-quiet zone, where there were students cackling into cell phones all around me. My options were that, or my Senior Common Room, which doesn't have any table/desktop space and has people just hanging out and chatting (as they should, in such a room). I was crazed with frustration. My afternoon of writing was shot. Hopefully this will work itself out with my colleague's borrowed office, though.

- This schedule is way too tiring. Several days are at least 13 hours long, because of the evening teaching. Yesterday was 15 1/2 hours, including teaching from 7-10pm. I get home to Home City at 12:30am. Not good at all. I feel comatose and all I will want to do, Friday-Sunday, is hibernate...after a week with little/no relaxing. I suspect I will have very little Life this year. That makes me sad.

- Satellite Campus is the pit of Hell. It makes me want to claw my eyes.

But there's lots of good. I just need to be really careful about taking care of myself, managing stress and fatigue...I have to say it: Thank god it's Friday.