“How did it turn out?” I just asked a student coming here to the front of class to staple the pages of his submission. “Uh…fine.” He said. Such exhaustion & surrender. No life, or ardor, electricity in his voice. Opposite of what this writer wants to be. In class, ask them what they want from the day. Have them write about it. I know what I want, or I have myself convinced I do. I know how this day’s to turn out, what I’ll teach myself, what the rest of my life’s to be. In the conference room now, other instructors talking to each other, claiming to have all answers and solutions to writing. How is that possible? HOW? That student in the lot, only a wee pulse of light to see what her pen forwarded to sheet… ideas, ideas, writing now, me, with the same avidity and vehemence. Like Plath with “Daddy”, or Faulkner with ‘The Sound and the Fury’. Hear more “teaching” in the hallways, students rushing to their instructor’s office for brilliant instruction, for solutions, panaceas for writing. Oh, and they have the answers. Or they think they do. All I have are questions and thoughts to generate discussion. My “students” and I solve together, concertedly assemble. I’m that student in the parking lot, rushing to jot musings before I have to be somewhere. This whole day, I’ll be her. Need a new notebook, or do I? One to keep on person. This one in my back pocket’s beat. I don’t like looking at it anymore, really. But I’m going to write in it anyway. Another solution. No store visit. I’ve had my battle with time for the day.
(Reader: Be MAD about the day. Shape it.)