I've really had a short fuse lately. I'm getting sort of worried about it. People are irritating me much more than usual, and possibly much more than they should be...
This guy came into the Writing Center today while I was working. He had an appointment with the other girl who was working, but SHE had shown up late, and was about 20 minutes behind schedule. First of all, this girl pisses me off, period. She's completely unfriendly ALL the time. Hell, even when she's at her other job, she's fucken rude. She NEVER smiles, she NEVER laughs, and she's so fucken aloof and stuck-up that you can see her brain through her nostrils. Plus, she's always fucken late, so I either have to explain to students that their tutor simply didn't show up for work, or I have to work with them myself.
Okay, so already I was a tiny bit cranky.
Now, I started the session off with this guy fairly well, I thought. I introduced myself, asked what he was working on and what the assignment was... (You wouldn't believe how many people come into the Writing Center with a work-in-progress that has almost nothing to do with the actual assignment.) And then I asked about what he'd like to work on in particular. So far, so good. He said he wanted to make sure his thesis matched up with the rest of the essay.
It sort of did.
Also, it sort of didn't.
I said: "Will you please show me which sentence you think is your thesis?"
He showed me.
It wasn't a sentence. It was a big mess of words. He might as well have taken the fifth word out of each paragraph, dumped them all in a pile, and called it a thesis sentence. I mean, if it had BEEN a sentence, it would have matched up with the rest of his paper...
So I told him that. Pretty much anyway. I told him that the idea sounded right, but that it lacked clarity.
Now, in order to correct a problem with clarity -- and one really ought to learn this before one enters middle school -- one should first figure out what on earth he or she is trying to say. Then, one should assure him or herself that all of the essential components of his statement are there. Then, he or she should arrange them in such an order as to make sense within the context of the English language and its rules. And finally, one edits out anything irrelevent. This really isn't rocket science. We at the Writing Center don't do rocket science; that's for the folks next door.
This guy had NO idea what he was trying to say.
So I said: "What I think you're trying to say is..." Then I looked at his paper, very hard, with a sort of grimace, as if I were constipated. Usually, the student will fill in the blank for you if you look constipated. Then, they start thinking about their paper, and they tell you what they're trying to say, so you don't have to puzzle it out on your own. Then, a lightbulb goes on for them, and they're deliriously happy about life, and they bring you cookies the next time they come in.
But instead of telling me what his sentence was trying to say, this guy summarized the entire paper. And not very succinctly. He added in some research that he hadn't written about. He was about four seconds away from telling me about his fifth cousin's second divorce before I could get a word in to shut him up. I put my hand in the air as if to say, "alright now, that's enough." I said, "I see." I said, "well, maybe we can go from there." And STILL the guy would not shut up. He just kept going on and on and on about... oh, who KNOWS what? He was talking about all the research he'd done. And while his research was obviously impressive, I sort of felt like telling him to shut the fuck up. But that's not in my job description, so I sat there and let him babble at me for like, ten minutes.
Now, I'm a patient person, sometimes. But it really fucken irritates me when people do not listen, but just talk, and talk, and talk...
My program's seminar is like that. Someone will say, "I wonder what this book is about?" and within two minutes, everyone is screaming about how he or she went to a private school, or how his or her dog is so fluffy and cute, or how he or she is so very smart because he or she learned in school that "colonialism" was caused by "Americans wanting land from the Irish." And if you actually want to talk about the book, too freakin' bad for you. If you want to talk about something having to do with the class, too bad for you. If you want to talk about ANYTHING, too bad for you, because everybody else is having hysterics and telling stories about their own personal problems. Nobody THINKS. Nobody just stops and takes a breath. They just gotta keep talking, as if it's keeping them alive.
There are, of course, notable exceptions. But they're few and far between.
My professor advised me to listen to several long pieces of soothing music before class on Mondays.
I may just do that. I may also go to class with a bullhorn. Not to be a fascist or anything (a "text-Nazi" as one of my classmates -- a notable exception to the rule of annoying people -- would say), but I swear, sometimes people simply need to be told to shut up. Don't they?
I wonder if people ever think about WHY they're talking?
I really think many people -- perhaps even most people -- just talk in order to be talking. Maybe it's like breathing for some people; they'll die if they don't keep blabbering. And I mean this very seriously: it seems that almost everywhere I go lately, somebody's got to be speaking incessantly about themselves, or something they've done, which means little or nothing to me. I swear to gahd, I could get hit by a bus and lay bleeding in the road, and somebody would walk up to me and start talking about their new boyfriend, or their grand knowledge of American colonialism, or the extensive research they've done on dangerous fish... or whatever...
It occurs to me that nothing I say makes much of a difference to anyone, except perhaps Jake, and perhaps those of you who are reading this journal entry.
It occurs to me that the world is so full of talking -- and talking, and talking, and talking... -- that nobody has one single second to spare to question what I think. It occurs to me that my voice is no contribution to anything.
...And I'm really very angry and frustrated.
Lately, I've been feeling pretty low. I haven't been freaking out, or having weeping fits in public or anything, but sometimes it's just very difficult to get out of bed. I feel sort of guilty all the time, over all sorts of things that really couldn't be my fault. I get depressed sometimes over happy things. I get that old high-school-loser feeling that I'm kinda ugly and everybody's staring at me. And you know... I really think that most of that would go away if somebody would just come up to me and ask me how I am... and REALLY CARE about how I am. Really take a couple of minutes to notice that I've been hit by a bus and I'm laying in the middle of the street bleeding... I want somebody to just slow down, chill out, stop thinking of themselves for just ONE minute, and ask if I'm feeling like I'd like a cup of tea.
I don't like this feeling of frustration. If it was just ONE person, or ONE class, I could deal with it very constructively. I'd just laugh it off. But it seems to be everywhere. My closest friends will talk about themselves so fast, with such zeal, that it makes me dizzy. And not one of them knows where I live, who I live with, what I do all day long, and how I'm feeling that day.
I could go into a program seminar, and spend the entire two hours in silence. And nobody would notice. Nobody would notice my PRESENCE, I mean, much less my absence from the conversation.
And now the Writing Center... I go in there, ask somebody about a thesis sentence, and get a twenty minute explanation about some research that doesn't have anything to do with the paper. Or ANYTHING, really; it's just a way for this gentleman to keep his mouth flapping.
It really makes me angry. It frustrates the shit out of me. This on top of the fact that a girl I don't like happened to be late to work today, and I had to work with her student because she's a lazy bitch who didn't feel the need to get out of bed on time...
At least once a day, I give somebody a compliment. I say, "nice shirt." Or, "you look happy today." Or, "I liked that paper of yours that I read..." And I don't understand why it never comes back around to me. Do I just look really stupid in all my shirts? Do I consistently look like a little black raincloud? Does nobody read my papers? Or am I just completely invisible? Just a set of ears for people to talk at? Hell, people could even say MEAN things to me, like, "that's a really hideous outfit." Or, "I think you're a real bitch for using my stupid comments in seminar to write a surrealist prose piece." Somebody fucking NOTICE me as a living, breathing human being, who might occasionally have something of my own to say....?
I finally got this guy in the Writing Center to shut up. Not, however, before I'd learned far more than I wanted to know about his subject. I explained to him that his entire paper was about a cause and its effect, and that he could quite easily show that in his thesis sentence. I told him to begin the sentence with the word "Because." Because this, then that. He refused to do that, because, he said, it's incorrect to begin a sentence with "because." I swear to gahd, this student comes into the Writing Center for help, and then starts telling me I'm wrong... As a matter of fact, it's perfectly acceptable, even in formal writing, to begin a sentence with "because." If it's a complete sentence anyway. I told him this. Then I explained why. I used the words "subordinate clause." I wasn't being a bitch; I was still actually trying to help him out. Privately, I was thinking that I was about to reem this kid a new asshole. And then he said, "well, I'll just put it like you said, for now. I have an editor who will fix it up later."
It was a good thing I didn't have anything sharp, or I really would have given the kid a new asshole.
He wasn't really as "kid," actually. He was about thirty, or thirty-five.
So, Helena, what do you think? So, Helena, how was your day? I like your shoes; where did you get them? What did you do over the weekend? What do you think of the Mariners? Helena, tell me how you're doing with 20 credits' worth of classes, 12 hours' worth of work, a relationship, and a bunch of penpals you never write to? What do you think you're going to take next year? What do you want to be when you grow up? What do you worry about? What would you like to do for the rest of your life? Do you ever feel really sad? Would you like to go out and have some tea, watch the world go by, and then listen to some music? Want to talk about the books we're supposed to be reading this week? Helena, how ARE YOU?
That would be so nice...
No one ever listens, you know?
The other day, my professor was giving a lecture on "obedience." As in, the old sense of the word, from the Latin, "oboedire." That is, "to listen." He was saying something along the lines of, obedience means being ready and willing to open yourself up to fully listening to someone else. Something like that. And some girl next to me leans over and starts TALKING at me, asking me if I could let her see my notes, or some fool thing like that. Then, she asked if I was even taking notes, which I was. Then, she just kept talking. And when I didn't look over to acknowledge her, she started talking at somebody else. This isn't even somebody I KNOW. And I missed a couple of minutes of the lecture, because I was trying to politely listen to somebody else...
Fuck that shit. I give up. I'm not currently sane enough to listen to everybody else, knowing that nobody's willing to listen to me. Nobody, that is, except Jake, and you, gentle reader. And so, unless absolutely necessary, I'm not going to listen to people whom I know wouldn't give me the time of day. The next time somebody starts babbling at me, just going on, and on, and on, endlessly, I'm going to interrupt, and I'm going to excuse myself, and just walk away. I'm just not OKAY enough right now to deal with everybody else's joys and fears, everybody else's problems and experiences. And I'm certainly not going to take that kind of bullshit like I took today: twenty minutes of pointless babble, and then, "oh, my editor will take care of your mistake."
I guess... I guess I don't have anything more to say.
Goodnight.
~Helena*