First Week

Where was I? Oh, yeah. It’s the end of the semester, and I can’t believe the end of April is in sight. The last couple of weeks have been a blur.

After grading the final exams, I have to say that, overall, I was very impressed. A lot of students wrote the best essays they’ve written all semester, which made me feel good. Believe me, it was hard keeping that information to myself. If I wasn’t forbidden from doing so, I would have e-mailed you just to say, “Guess what you did?”

Granted, there were others who were verging on a crash all semester long and who did a free-fall on the day of the exam. For some reason, people sat for two and a half hours and only managed to write a few lines for both essays. As I’ve said from the first day of classes, I can only grade what’s on the page, and if you didn’t give me enough to justify passing you, then I’m sorry. I have to live with my decisions and to be able to sleep at night. I don’t take these matters lightly. But, on the other hand, if you’re one of those students who knows in your heart you just didn’t give it your best effort this term or on the final exam, you are hopefully adult enough to understand that there are no free passes. There is only a certain amount I am willing to take responsibility for. What’s mine is mine, but sometimes there’s stuff that’s not mine. That’s what helps me sleep, especially when I’d prefer to just give everyone an automatic pass anyway.

But that wouldn’t be fair to those of you who worked awfully hard right to the very end of the term. For some of you, the final exam was your chance to show all that you learned in three months. If you attended classes nearly every day and always came prepared, tried to have an opinion on the literature, honestly tried to understand and to come and talk to me if you were having a problem, then you passed. It’s just natural selection.

Enough of all that. I’m tired. You’re tired. It’s time to move on. Grades are available on line this week (possibly today, though I’m not completely sure), and my part in your life will officially be over. I can’t say I’m always happy about that. I like for the semester to end so that I can get on with other things in my life. But I like it when students maintain a connection over the years ahead. It happens a lot, but not nearly enough.

A special note for my English 1080 class this semester: You were easily one of my favorite classes of all time. Most of you, I will never forget. You know who you are.

For those of you whom I got to know this term on a more personal level, it was absolutely my pleasure both to help in any way I could and to get to know you. I enjoy that part of my job more than any other.

It’s been about a week since my grades were finalized and my part of the winter semester of ’09 was done. Since then, I’ve been shredding papers, organizing files, getting my life together. It all tends to be put on hold while I’m teaching and now is time to move forward, into the great wide open.

I attended a book launch last week. Mike Heffernan’s astounding book , Rig: An Oral History of the Ocean Ranger was officially released. I had the pleasure of introducing the author, as well as speaking to many fine people in the local publishing and writing community that evening, including the indomitable Helen Porter (writer), the gracious and talented Lisa Moore (novelist), the affable and also immensely talented Russell Wangersky (writer and publisher), and several people with direct connections to the Ocean Ranger itself. The story these latter people have to tell is still just as enthralling and just as vital as it would have been twenty-seven years ago, which is why Mike’s book is so important to our culture. Mike has become a friend in the past couple of years and I hope we can find some other project to work on in future. I also met his father at the book launch, and he reminded me a little of my own father—a quick wit and a twinkle in his eye, he seemed like a very kind man.

Attending this event was important for me in another way, too, though. It means I am getting back to my other self—the self I am when I’m not teaching. I’m a writer, and sometimes it’s good for me to surround myself with people who think the same way (more or less) and understand what it’s like to be someone who aspires to put the world into words, to dress it in the language that best describes it.

I will be a writer all summer long. It’s been slow going in the past week, but today I’m off to a good start. Just writing this blog entry is a sign that the fog is beginning to lift from my brain and I’m beginning to see things more clearly. Clarity is necessary in order to write well.

And, of course, writing is necessary in order to achieve clarity sometimes. At least for me it is.

Over the coming weeks of spring and (dare I say) summer, I’ll be writing more about writing. I have a couple of novels to finish, as well as a short story collection that still needs a good story or two, and, if I’m lucky, I have another story that needs telling in the form of a novella. More on these as the days go by. I’ll also likely have a few observations and opinions to share about life, politics, culture, t.v., sports, the movies, and anything else that comes into my head.

For now, I’m just glad the sun is shining and fleeting time seems to have paused for a while.

Have a fantastic summer. Gather ye rosebuds while ye may.

GC