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Take one. Then slowly let it out.
Go ahead...take another deep one. It's Friday evening. Blow it
out and think of the richness of the nothingness before you tonight.
Just like me. We can almost taste it.
Hi. You may have noticed that I've
been skipping a lot of days lately. November was a pretty demanding
month, especially near the end. I never seem to get the knack
of staggering assignment deadlines. Everything always comes due
at once. Then I have a predictable bit of shell-shock in the
wake of this paper explosion. That's the toughest moment, just
before I begin - a large window of opportunity for Procrastination.
I know to expect it; I incorporate it into my plans. This time
around I did well with it; I guess you could call it Creative
Procrastination. I celebrated Thanksgiving with some lovely people.
I listened to Etta James. I developed My
Books page and found a ton of links to favorite authors with
the help of some quick and dependable search
engines. I did some laundry. I set up this tasteful page
for December entries. I joined an Emily Dickinson e-mail list.
I swatted flies in my room. I wrote a letter. I read a mess of
Miss Emily's poems and found a great site with the
complete Johnson texts. I thought about Christmas presents.
I ate a few cookies. For I knew that soon it would be time to
READ PAPERS.
Well, you may ask, what didn't I
do during this time? I didn't attend too well to the cat's litter
box or fuzz-brushing needs. I didn't call my brother. I didn't
exercise. I didn't shave my gorgeous skull. I didn't go shopping.
I didn't read Thomas Pynchon.
And then I decided it was time to
work. I acccomplished a lot, read all the papers that were turned
in on time. Now I face a sizeable stack from kids who were absent
or flat-out late...to say nothing of all the regular assignments
of this just-passed week. But I'm not complaining; I can do this.
But not tonight. Tonight is Friday.
I talk too much. Some sophomores
help me to see this. I get too enthused about something - maybe
a figure in a poem like "Because I Could Not Stop For Death"
(How can you be moving and standing still at the same time?)-
and I start thinking out loud and end up leaving many of the
paying customers in the dust. "Is this gonna be on the exam?"
I feel their pain.
I've got to get more interactive.
Perhaps, I could become a tele-tubby teacher with a wide-screen
monitor implant. At the appropriate moment I could rip off my
shirt and take us all on a video tour of, say, Miss Emily's hometown.
Yeah, I've got some ideas. Just ask me. I'm gonna be Mr. Student-Centered
Classroom With a Vengeance. Seriously.
All together now. Breathe in...breathe
in. Hold it hold it hold it. Let it go. Let it out.
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