It will soon be time for some changes. And I am excited. I have a job interview at South Charleston Middle School tomorrow, which (if I get the job) will put me about ten minutes closer to home and inside one of the county’s most historical school buildings. South Charleston is a growing community that lies somewhere between big city and small town. I’ve heard some of the same complaints about SCMS as I did about Stonewall Jackson Middle: poor discipline, apathetic students, etc. If any of that is true, guess what? It doesn’t hurt my interest in the school; it improves it. I see situations like that as challenges, opportunities to grow as a teacher and, most of all, to help my students grow.

I stopped by WVSU today to pick up my textbooks for my two classes. As proof that I have grown up, I could not contain my enthusiasm and pulled the plastic off of the books while sitting in my car, grinning as I flipped through the pages. I remember just a little less than ten years ago, I hated school. I loved to read, but usually snubbed my nose at college textbooks (unless they were literature anthologies). Now, I am practically drooling at the opportunity to dive into a Geography text, especially one like this that has plenty of online resources and tons of useful information.

Unlike the army of students who brave the almost endless line to sell back their textbooks, I have always thought of the best college texts as those you could keep and use again. The bookshelf next to my teachers’ desk is filled with grammar texts, anthologies, writing manuals, and other variations. And, yes, I use them for my own resources and even in my lesson plans.

Which brings me to the second text I bought: Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Social Issues. The Taking Sides collection is a group of books that present a list of topics and then show works of writing and/or speeches from different people that discuss that topic. The greatest thing about it is that it is written in debate-style and presents two works of writing with each issue: one “for” and one “against”. The benefits of a textbook like this in the hands of a teacher are limitless. I’ve been looking for a great way to liven up persuasive writing. Looking at two different sides of an issue makes students feel a lot like Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof, weighing the pros and cons of both sides. Now that’s critical thinking at its best.

One of my writing/teaching mentors Gretchen Bernabei says in her book Reviving the Essay, “Many students seem to consider the act of changing their minds equivalent to an act of weakness, or concession, or defeat. This way of viewing thinking is not only immature, it’s also dangerous in a democracy where reasonable, informed voters make decisions for the nation” (12). This kind of book in the hands of a teacher could help students make informed decisions (even if it means changing their minds) as opposed to holding fast to conclusions that are based only on personal prejudices.

So, regardless of where I teach this year, it will definitely be a year of change, both with my attitude, my teaching, and my circumstances. The great thing is that all of these are things I can control.

I’ll close out with a few lines from Andy Andrews’ excellent novel about a down-on-his luck businessman who travels through time and meets important historic figures who all give him advice for personal success, The Traveler’s Gift: “Circumstances do not push or pull. They are daily lessons to be studied and gleaned for new knowledge and wisdom. Knowledge and wisdom that is applied will bring about a brighter tomorrow (155).”

Well said, Mr. Andrews.

Until later — “There’s no turning back now that you opened up to your mind.”

Yours truly bragging about Gretchen’s book, Reviving the Essay:

Nevertheless, here is what I think of as the top twenty greatest books I have ever read. I ranked these by enjoyment, not by importance. Mind you, they’re not the greatest of all time, just my favorites:

1. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

2. Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

3. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

4. A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving

5. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

6. Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut

7. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey

8. Lord of the Flies by William Golding

9. On the Road by Jack Kerouac

10. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

11. Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

12. I Know This Much is True by Wally Lamb

13. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

14. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

15. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

16. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

17. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway

18. Storming Heaven by Denise Giardina

19. Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh

20. The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom

So there you have it. That was every bit as difficult as expected. I hope it wasn’t difficult for you to read or agree with.

Try posting your own list (if you’ve read 20 novels to rank.)

I think I have just stumbled onto the same frustration many people face when reading a Shakespeare play.  No, it’s not the language.  I get that.  Believe it or not, I have been exposed to so much Shakespearean language over the past ten years that I have come to understand it and thus to love it.  But, actually, my frustration does have something to do with the language.  Let me explain.

I am torn, as the alternative title to this blog suggests, by my love of Shakespeare’s language and the almost ridiculous situations in which he places his characters.  I’ve started reading “The Two Gentlemen of Verona.”  An old college professor of mine would ask one of the most intelligent questions I have ever heard:  Why?

Anyone who knows me well is aware that my taste in literature changes faster than the weather.  It is the reason why I take forever to finish a novel, because my ADHD will kick in, I’ll become interested in something else, and I’ll start reading that instead.

So my recent “reinterest” in Shakespeare lead me to reading one play I had not been exposed to, hence “The Two Gentlemen of Verona.”  It begins well, two best friends Proteus and Valentine, arguing over love.  Proteus is smitten by young Julia, and Valentine ridicules him and love:  “Love is your master, for he masters you, and he that is yoked by a fool methinks should not be chronicled for wise.”

Then some other stuff happens, Valentine goes off to work for a duke, Proteus stays behind because he loves Julia too much.  But… gasp… Proteus’ father makes him go to work for the duke, as well.  So, before he leaves, he exchanges vows (and rings) with Julia, swears his undying love and wishing a curse upon every second he does not think about her:  “And when that hour o’erslips me in the day wherein I sigh not, Julia, for thy sake, the next ensuing hour some foul mischance torment me for my love’s forgetfulness.”

The fun stuff starts (note sarcasm) when Proteus arrives at the duke’s “royal court” and learns that his friend Valentine has recently fallen in love with the fair Sylvia.  And guess what…? Proteus falls in love with her, as well, at first sight.  So, right after his meeting her, he begins to devise a plot to forget about Julia, have Valentine banished from the duke’s court, and live happily ever after with Sylvia.  Therefore proving that even in the romantic world of Shakespeare, men are pigs, yes we are, destined to a life of infidelity and woe.

Come on.  I really want to love this play, I truly do.  It has some of the most eloquently written lines I have read in any Shakespeare play.  “What light is light, if Silvia be not seen?  What joy is joy, if Silvia be not by?  Unless it be to think that she is by and feed upon the shadow of perfection except I be by Silvia in the night, there is no music in the nightingale; unless I look on Silvia in the day, there is no day for me to look upon; she is my essence, and I leave to be, if I be not by her fair influence foster’d, illumined, cherish’d, kept alive.”  But man, what a horrible situation he has these characters in.

I have not finished the play (but, oh, I will) but apparently it gets worse.  I’ve heard that Proteus tries to force his love upon Sylvia (yes, that means what you think it means) and Valentine catches him.  It gets better.  Proteus apologizes, and Valentine decides to give Sylvia to him as a token of their renewed friendship.

Wow.

So where is the juxtaposition?  I love Shakespeare so much that I am going to subject myself to the torture of such a horrible situation in order to venture into a world of his I have not yet experienced.  How can you not resist such lines as “Is she kind as she is fair?  For beauty lives with kindness.  Love doth to her eyes repair, to help him of his blindness, and, being helped, inhabits there.”  That’s powerful stuff.  I hate Shakespeare, yet I love him, yet I hate him.  I’m so confused.

Just wish me luck.  I’m off to read Act 3.

Until later– “There’s no turning back not that you open up to your mind.”