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7 de Abril 2009
meat: in anticipation of half an hour with Dan Allender
sometimes graduate school makes me feel like a piece of meat
the president of the graduate school sends us audio files of his comments on certain papers for certain classes he teaches. soon he will not be the president anymore--he was never really into that job anyway, he will just be a prof come May.
I scheduled office hours with him for today and, now I can't sleep.
it is 2:42 in the morning, the time i usually wake up, freak out about the economy, children's word or my class load, then say the Jesus prayer until I go back to sleep.
I am sitting in my kitchen, listening to his comments, to prepare myself for his cadence and vocabulary. I think if I can be at least a little prepared I won't just sit down on the leather couch in his disheveled office, and stare silently at the fly fishing art until I can't help but cry.
in the commentary he says, "does anyone take you seriously?--I am trying to... yet we don't have permission. ...there's a whole lot more being said than you have chosen to write and I don't fault that... I just want it to be engaged with someone, sometime."
which, of course is where you come in, as my practice audience, the one I don't really have to interact with, the reader I can try to tell the truth to. so hang in there...
because
What I really want is to plop down on his couch, meet his penetrating gaze and ask him what he knows about me. I want to ask him something like, do you know who I am, or maybe, do you know which one I am? (in fact, this is what I want to do to lots of people in my life.)
I have been at this for almost three years, I have put stock in his reputation and theory, (I have literally invested thousands!) I have listened to his lectures on heart stopping topics, and read his books. I have contributed, in my way to the school community--I have not tried to hide this time. Even the paper he commented on was, as he said, "a courageous paper" and quite revealing per the assignment's requirements. I have shown up and only had a very one sided relationship to him: listening to his comments and lectures, frustrated by his busyness and absence and importance, and so tomorrow I will make one more move toward him
and I am scared shitless.
there is a good chance it won't matter to him, that there are too many students, too many papers, too many stories for mine to matter. to that I know I might just say
phooey
but I am still out of my mind with fear that I will not matter and rather than just keeping my mouth shut and pulling away I will have put myself in the mix, been overexposed and needlessly courageous and he will get away absolutely unencumbered by my feeling as though I don't matter at all, in spite of my best attempts, I am just a piece of meat.
And then there is this: perhaps I am using him, and I ought to confess. maybe I want to show up and just tell him that I have completely objectified him. he is no more than a lecture, an audio file, a comment, a face, a name and I have not needed him to be more than that, thank you very much.
probably, it is a little of both and then some. and I will most definitely feel like rotten meat, if not shit when I leave his office and head to staff meeting. I will not know what to tell myself to preserve my dignity, I will not know whether I shared too much or held back, whether he understood or didn't. And it will feel awful, but because the only framework I have for relationships like this is built from experiences of confusing all my relationships with each other:
I mean, for someone like me, if there is such a person, there is very little difference between dissociated office hour conferences and bad breakups, insincere lectures and angry love letters, gradebooks and gradeschool crushes. In my mind it is all the acceptance/rejection game. As awful as it sounds I am willing to accept it, if only in hope that I will one day move past it, and I am willing to confess it, if only in hope you will find it helpful to you, and I am even willing to type it out, if only in hope that I can finally get it all out or down or something and get some sleep.
just in case | By crymytinyflood | 2:38 AM
Comments
well, i think a lot of the caring is just a connection to art or to brilliance*. i like to look at pretty things that have depth, and i like to read things that are smart and funny and not too cynical. maybe it feels super personal, but really it's just a shimmery paper that could be dusted in gold.
*me me!
jk, they're in love with us.
the dog; she is sooooo nice. she is the nicest dog i've ever met, and everyone agrees that she's nearly perfect. she's very sensitive and gentle, and likes everyone. almost sounds boring, right? but then she's a puppy, so imagine all that in a fluffy puppy. love x 100000000000000.
Posted by: lm at 13 de Abril 2009 a las 07:06 PM
yeah. of course and are they? why would they take us on, why wouldn't those people to whom we make that appeal just act like all the others who have shut us out or down? either he is really good at pretending to care, or he really does care... and what does that difference mean to me, when i have such a great need?
anyway, how is your dog?
Posted by: . at 11 de Abril 2009 a las 09:38 AM
oh gosh, i just want to say i know what you mean. i really know what you mean about confusing relationships with each other. most of the teachers i have had have doubled as parents or therapists, whether they knew it or not. to the ones who did i was that "special" student. "special" like "needy". but in the end, i think that's what we're trying for a lot of the time-- to blur those boundaries. right?
Posted by: lm in wnc at 10 de Abril 2009 a las 09:34 PM
