Viva La Difference

I just started teaching Ethics and Critical Thinking instead of my normal writing classes, and it seems like the stuff of situational comedies or French farce. For one thing, I am no philosopher. I had to pinch my knee to stay awake in Symbolic Logic. Hell, I don't even remember the Ethics course I took in college. While I liked some of the questions, I thought the answers were pretty vague: reason, thought, will...blah, blah, blah. Lots of guys arguing about who's paradigm was bigger. I preferred the Eastern modes of being: crazy wisdom, Zen koans, Japanese death poems---oh my.

Unanswerable questions. The religious.

A week to plan, and no instructor's manual. And I had to teach another course I had never taught before. That's what happens when you nod your head and say, "I enjoy a challenge," when you should be running to the nearest Starbuck's and saying "Screw this. I am an artist. That's why I pay three bucks for a nonfat café au lait. It's what angsty artists do. I'll even type a sonnet, hunch over the bluish white screen, and mouth a rhyme for 'avocado.' And didn't you notice I was pale? I've got 'deep' all over me, it's in my pores like the bottle of rum that I'll toss off once I'm back to my desperate hovel of inspiration."

But I cannot say that to thirty-odd students who are all looking at me in mild amusement, practiced contempt as I look over my handwritten notes and realizethat I can't even read my own scratches. I again look at my script with the intensity reserved for translations of hieroglyphs or cuneiform.

My stomach rumbles. I can already feel an ulcer coming on, but I can't put my hand on my stomach; invoking Napoleon is generally not the best way to inspire respect. Fear, yes, but only as a last resort. A Waterloo.

It's only four hours. Surely I can avoid the hooves until 10?

A student raises a hand.

I nod "Yes."

"What should we call you?"

I really want to say "Mon Capitan," but suppress my wry grin.

"Ms. Peterson should work."

Another student speaks, "Miss Peterson? Do we really have to read everything?"

"Yes. You must read the chapters before coming to class, or there would be no point in class discussion."

Yet another student grumbles, "Miss, do we have to write and talk?"

"There are questions that need a more thorough answer than a multiple choice or true and false questions are able to supply. Like your opinion."

Moans.

"I didn't take this class to think."

I meet eyes with the one who thinks thought is unnecessary, "I hate to tell you, but thinking is an automatic response, like gagging. Your mind is already making sense out of things---with or without your permission. In this class, I'm just asking you to focus a little of your concentration on this subject and these questions. You have to know that you think before you can have control over how you think. "

"Mrs. Paterson, I think this class is a waste of time."

I rub my gut and scowl.