coldhearted scientist وداد

I have worked in others and only this university seems like such a rough neighborhood. The jackbooted bosses and the assembly line. Like the oilfield, I had thought to say, but I am not sure; it could be cruder and ruder.

A recent study indicated that Louisiana was the worst state in the union for women. The rural South is a terrible place, New Englanders are mean, and teaching Spanish grammar is torture.

The people who say, in voices reserved for children and the mentally impaired, things like “you are so good at this, dear,” and “do you really think you could be suited to anything else?” will suffer eternally when they get to Hell, which they will do one day.

My student was saying a few things about the local culture and I said yes, this is how it has ruined my life (I do not mean that entirely, I added, as I do not want to say I have a ruined life). Yes, it has ruined your life, at least to a noticeable degree, she said.

♦

Yet you did grind your teeth and condescend in that syrupy voice, didn’t you. You did say that only if I murdered myself and survived would you would at last respect my pain limits, didn’t you. And I did think I could make tenure at Harvard and satisfy you. Then at last I would be free to go to college, and choose my major, and lead my life. I would hide my scars under my clothes.

Take a job, any academic job. Only if you are willing to suffer the worst possible place will we consider you to be a serious intellectual. Stay in school. But the only majors we will not cut and mock you for undertaking are in the humanities, excluding English and History. Except that you must know history, and no amount of history you could know would be enough.

I murdered myself and survived, and now you will have to respect my pain limits.

♦

This is my yearly meltdown about teaching Spanish grammar and you can see how bad it is. There are many reasons why this activity is as painful as it is and the image I have is of it is being hit in the head with a club. But unlike the baby seals I do not die of that so I have to undergo more of it, and more every day.

I am not interested in it but I am very good at it. And I murdered myself and survived, and must respect my pain limits.

Axé.