Shaken Iced-Tea, and Banana Nut Bread Loaf
Midterm Assignment: "Who are you? Who do you want to become and how are you going to get there?
"Peaceful Solutions," a TWC course taught by Colman McCarthy, challenges my honesty and integrity about myself! That's a pretty serious observation. I enrolled in the class after doing a closer look at all the TWC course offerings. I was looking for a set of classes that would, well, first maximize my full credit status, but also reinforce one another (e.g., reading and research, etc.). After briefly flipping through the entire catalog, I narrowed it down to my preferred courses, but needed more information. All of the bios of the professors sounded really great; impressive tenure track and actual career field experience. I searched LexisNexus to seek any articles they'd published and Google'd (yes, now a proper noun-verb?) them for their current activities. Colman McCarthy had written for the Washington Post for thirty plus years and I found out he directs the Center for Teaching Peace. This class definitely made it to the top of my course requests—thankfully, I got a spot. I began reading his material and I felt completely reassured that this "Peaceful Solutions" would match well with "Non-profit Management," a Master's-level course I'm taking through TWC at Johns Hopkins University.
I was in for rude awakening because I took the class on the guise that it sounded good. For me, I was hoping for some sort enlightenment just by sitting in his midst. I thought that maybe through osmosis I'd become a great writer because I thought he'd read our writings with fury as did editors for him for thirty years. I wanted him to challenge me to read as much material as possible because I need to be "learned." You know, I think I was a little jaded in what I believed to be a good professor. It's almost embarrassing to admit this, but I thought good professors were the ones who challenged you with a lot of busy work. I definitely am familiar with the ones who don't and also feed you Powerpoint chapter summaries; aren't we all. McCarthy doesn't teach this way.
The midterm paper assignment's topic is left for us to determine. We decide the project type, the tenets, the medium—everything. I chose myself. I think it's the hardest topic to write about. I've been burdened with not wanting to sound preachy, stuck up, and self-righteous. I still am. It's due on Thursday, March 18 and I still haven't started yet. It's not easy being brutally honest with your self. It would be so easy for me to write a typical "impersonal" personal essay, but my gut says no one will care, it's way too deep and won't he just take without care, a nonchalant glance, and not consider it as serious as I? How many does he have to grade? Will he grade mine last?
You laugh, but these are the things that have been keeping me from digging deep. I'm scared to. I've never really been completely open about my views concerning my past, present and future. My responses have been somewhat programmed for those probing questions from people that probably would probably care less about you. You know, the people who walk near you, ask how you're doing and before you actually respond, they're not even in hearing distance. If you don't care, why'd you ask? JK. I don't expect McCarthy to teach me to better understand myself—I expect that from me. You see, this is an example of a great teacher (no, I'm not sucking up, he probably won't read this blog); the one who makes you think for yourself so that you self-learn.
However, I do know that my cup is empty
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