Soon, my classroom, faculty office, and hallway observations will end. When the school term ends, I will go about my business and wonder what effect the people in an institute of learning have on my future actions.
I see a cyclist pass by my window every few minutes as he uses a small circle of roads, including mine, to strengthen his body. He does this sort of thing every once in a while, maybe once a week or once a month. I'm not sure. Or at least someone like him passes by, wearing a bike helmet, a set of "professional" bike clothes covered with corporate logos, a pair of sunglasses, and other gear that obscure his singularity, his individuality. He may be a "she," for all I really know.
My experience as an instructor is the same. I have looked for individuality in my students/customers, the faculty/staff and others I've encountered for the last 10 or 12 weeks. In some cases, I have encountered cardboard cutouts, images that represent people but ones with little to offer me other than physical appearance.
Atmospheric anomalies are the same thing. I call some of them clouds, some of them thunderstorms and some of them tornadoes but such words are only my conventional use of word-pictures.
At 47 years of age, I ask myself, "What have you learned?" Or from another perspective, what have others taught me?
You cannot see my actions so I will describe to you what is going on right now. Other than taking a moment to write these words, I look at nothing in particular, noting the tree limbs outside my window swaying with passing wind currents, the privet and honeysuckle bushes in full bloom, and the bird that hovered over the window screen while snatching moths but I am not contemplating them as specific entities - they are merely window dressings. I am meditating upon my thoughts for a few minutes.
What have I learned?
I have learned that:
- I can get comfortable speaking in front of a group of people, despite remnants of stage fright.
- I have a set of personal thoughts that have no elements of controversy I can share with others.
- I can encourage others to engage one another civilly about controversial topics.
- I don't have to open myself up and expose all my intricate set of thoughts, as mixed up as they are at times (scattered, non-sequential, incoherent, in conflict, not thought out, etc.), in order to get an idea across from my point of view.
- I am not universally appealing.
- I cannot teach everyone because of my lack of patience and subtle intellectual snobbery (pretentiousness, really, because I am not as intelligent as I'd like to think I am).
In what do you excel? I excel at nothing. I have taken the survey course of life, choosing to audit rather than receive an actual grade or pass/fail option. I am satisfied with my observing position rather than giving in to society's expectation that each of us become a specialist at something.
That's why I hesitated so long to complete a bachelor's degree. I do not want a specialty. I need no title. I am happy being the body I was born into/as/with.
After tonight's class, the only classes I have left involve administering final exams and grading homework/lab assignments for students/customers who desire a specialty in their names.
However, twenty-four years ago next month I received an associate's degree: Associate of Science - General Option, Magna Cum Laude (with an emphasis on CAD). Eight years ago I received a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration (Major: MIS; Minor: Math).
I started my professional office career in 1986 so I have been a desk jockey on or off for 21 years (the last two years don't count because they mainly consisted of my mid-life retirement with a few consulting jobs in between).
A professor of mine, Dr. Jones (yes, that was his real name), recommended that I follow his path in a career of Operations Research. He understood that I had a mathemathical/logical mind that I liked to apply to business problems. I think he taught me Business Statistics, if I remember correctly. Of course, he was right. That is my natural inclination when dropped into the corporate world - I tend to analyze people and the methods they use to achieve their personal goals while under the direction of an organization that wants people to achieve corporate goals - it's like breathing to me. It's part of the reason that people management and teaching are relatively easy to me because I like to look at people's faces and hear their life stories so I can help/motivate them to perform activities that satisfy their sense of self.
I am an observer, a diarist, a journalist, and an analyst who dreams of being a writer/author well-known for his insights. I am oblivious to the aspects of living that lead to monetary riches with a wealthy lifestyle. I am not a spendthrift but I am not a big dreamer, either. I am most happy when I am left to think out my thoughts in words.
This spring quarter, I taught two classes with strictly technical contents and one class with a mix of personal and technical content. I am glad to be rid of the two technical courses because the content did not interest me so I tried to make the classes interesting to both the students/customers and me by showing the practical applications of dry technical material. The last class, "Strategies for the Technical Professional," was more interesting in that it helps show incoming students/customers how their personalities tie into potential careers, which I know how to do. However, it bordered on the touchy/feely, which does not appeal to me.
What am I trying to say? Well, what I AM saying is that I'd like to design my own teaching material. In fact, all my books have been about the course content I've developed to describe the ideal life for a person like me - that's why I posted them for free for a while, to give others who may have some personality traits similar to mine the understanding that in the mind-numbing rush of humans toward the mindless future, there is space to be you, even if you carry conflicting ideas in your thoughts like being concerned about preserving unpolluted environmental spaces free of humans that will be overrun by polluting humans anyway, including so-called ecotourists.
Last night, a person in the hallway asked if my first name is Richard. I told him yes and asked him why. He said he was told an instructor with that name also fit the description of me someone had told him went with the name that he then saw in front of him, "older, distinguished and well-dressed." He said that meant he'd be in my class next quarter. I told him if that's true, then I'd be ready to teach him. I didn't tell him that I thought I wasn't teaching during the summer term.
By coincidence, the candle beside me just burned out and it's 12:35 p.m., time to see if the fixative I poured into cracks has sealed the broken flooring of the fiberglass bathtub in the master bathroom. I'll double-seal the crack and then get a bite to eat for lunch. I'll also think more about my future participation in human society and if, as others have observed, including elders like Dr. Jones and my father, my destiny lies in the realm of post-graduate degree work. Or should I follow my nose and continue on the path I see before me, which means I'll continue writing about the meandering path through the woods I walk in my thoughts and with my feet, sometimes leading, sometimes following, sometimes teaching (always learning!), sometimes walking with others and sometimes alone?
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