Fee-grief

I hardly know how to write about this.

Four of our students died last weekend, in a particularly awful and terrifying way. They were freshmen, just beginning their second semester, still in their teens. I didn't know them. I'm sure many of my students did. It is a small college and a small community.

In some ways, it feels like this is not my tragedy to talk or write about. I didn't know what to say in class; I don't, of course, miss them in the way that so many of the students and professors on our campus miss them.

At least one of them would have been my student sooner or later, given her major. In a year or two or three -- I don't know and never will know exactly when -- I will teach a Shakespeare class that would have been slightly different in character, because the presence or absence of even one student changes the temperament of a class just a little.

There are so many would have beens; so much potential. I've just been thinking about how young eighteen or nineteen is, and how hard it is to guess who our freshmen will become. Their families and friends have lost the girls they knew; the rest of us, perhaps, have lost the women we will not know. And for that reason, no mind that's honest but in it shares some woe.

Politicking

I went to the state capital yesterday in Grande Dame Colleague's van, along with a couple of other colleagues and three students. There was also a huge bus of Misnomer U. folks, which filled up too quickly to get a ticket, and assorted alumni and friends from other parts of the state. All in all, we filled up both galleries of the state House of Representatives. A couple of the representatives introduced us, and Sorta-Famous Alumna sang a song. We were going to take the state Senate by storm as well, except they'd adjourned by the time we got there because a water main burst and most of the downtown area was without water, so that part was sort of anticlimactic. So we posed for a couple of photos for the press, and then went to a reception at one of the hotels, where there was also no water, but lots of Wine For Legislators, and fried catfish bits, and mini-cream puffs, and all that sort of thing. So I had some wine and catfish, and tried to talk to legislators (I wasn't very good at it -- politics is not a game for introverts), and then we drove back, getting home at around 10:00 or so. Which wouldn't have been bad, ordinarily, but on top of the first day of classes it was a bit exhausting.

The Capitol building was nice: lots of swoopy art-nouveauish railings and Tiffany glass. I don't think I'd actually been inside a state legislature building since my Girl Scout troop's trip to Richmond when I was ten, so it was interesting getting to see it.

I'm not sure I feel like I contributed all that much, but I'm told that we made a pretty impressive showing through sheer numbers, and the important thing is to show the legislators that they have lots and lots of constituents who care about the university's future.

It's frustrating, though: apparently all kinds of daft public-university-related bills have been introduced this session, some of which have no chance of passing and no apparent purpose except to vent hostility against higher education in general, but at least one of which has me seriously worried.

Anyway, back to business as usual, at least until the next crisis. The classes seem OK, so far; I have a fair number of repeat students in Brit Lit II and Shakespeare, and the general temperature in both classes seemed pretty good. I don't know yet what to expect from either section of comp (one Basic, one regular English 101 but filled mostly with people who started in Basic or else failed it last semester). I hope neither of them is too dire.

Courseblogging: Gearing up

Syllabi for the second half of the survey are all ready to go. (Alas, I finished photocopying them half an hour before I found out that Misnomer U. is getting a writing center this semester -- but I'm not redoing them, and anyway, I'm not sure I quite believe in this writing center until I actually see it operating.)

The big changes from last year are: a) North and South will be our Big Novel instead of Persuasion; b) there will be one full-length essay, a midterm, and a whole slew of mini-papers instead of three essays; and c) we're on a Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule this time. Since there are so many more days of class, I kept getting tempted to toss in extra readings, even though I know on an intellectual level there's not really more time in the semester. Mostly, I restrained myself, although I will be taking a shot at "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" and a couple of Hardy poems. (I may live to regret this, since twentieth-century poetry is way, way out of my comfort zone. Oh dear.)

One unintended consequence of the Great Novel Swap was that the Victorian section of the course started to look top-heavy and the Romantic section ridiculously brief. I've added Mary Shelley's "The Mortal Immortal" and cut "Goblin Market," "The Old Nurse's Tale," and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (none of which I was really feeling the love for, although they teach well). I added a couple of the Sherlock Holmes stories, including "The Speckled Band," so that the students could still have their object lesson in How To Talk About Creepy Sex Without Openly Talking About Creepy Sex. (If I get really ambitious, we might even end up talking a bit about canonicity and Why Sherlock Holmes Is Not In The Norton Anthology, and whether he should be. Or by that point in the semester, we might just end up talking about the movie, especially if I've actually seen it by then. A lot of my ambitions don't pan out.) Anyway, that should give us our requisite dose of proto-science-fiction / mystery and horror / general weirdness.

Should be a fun class. I'm looking forward to it.

re-entry

I'm going back to Deep South State tomorrow. Classes start on Monday; I will be traveling to the state capital later that day to help lobby for Misnomer U's continued existence; on Thursday of next week I have to give a 40-minute talk that I haven't written yet. Instead of thinking about this, I shall post one more picture of the nephew-let, because he is adorable, and because it would be nice if we could all spend our days sleeping in a swing:



I'm teaching Basic (a.k.a. remedial) comp this semester, and I haven't got the foggiest idea what to expect -- but at least there are only two students enrolled, so even if I screw things up horribly, I won't be scarring too many people for life. Wish me luck.

A post of gratuitous cuteness

Welcome to the world, little guy.

Merry Christmas, all!

I'm off to visit BrotherPorpentine in the predawn hours tomorrow (and, I hope, eventually to meet my nephew -- who had better hurry up and get born before I have to go back to Deep South State). More updates to come, maybe, whenever I have Internet access and news.

Happy holidays to everyone!

-- Soon-to-be-Auntie Fretful

notes from Parentland

My mother, after watching the movie Julie and Julia: Well, she was a little narcissistic. But I guess that whole generation is a little narcissistic.

Me: Ahem. What do you mean, "that generation"?

Mom: Well, the whole blogging generation. You don't blog, so of course I don't mean you.

Me: Um.

Oh, dear...