Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Knights Before Bishops

I enrolled in two classes today: a third year class in British Literature, and a second year class in American Literature. I went on campus beforehand and asked for a course overload, so I could take two classes, and then before heading to class, I agonized over what to take.

You see, I’d been talking to a “friend,” (a hot girl befriended on a dating site, who never took the time to actually meet me in person, I’ll call her “Coach”), who teaches ESL on an Indian Reservation. (By “Indian” I mean native, but I resent that term, because *I* am a native. I was born here too, and I sure as shit don’t have a home in England. And unlike “natives” I don’t get a free education. Lucky bastards… grumble…) Anyway, she told me she made 60K a year, plus benefits, and I thought, “damn, now I really don’t feel like going to another country to teach English for the equivalent of minimum wage. Not when I’m this close to going to teacher’s college. So I’m going to keep pushing through the prerequisites I need.

I still haven’t decided whether I want to teach small kids, teens, or just go all out, get a PhD and teach university kids. And if I want to teach high school, it’s strongly recommended, (if not required,) to have two teachable subjects. (Coach only has one, but she teaches on a reservation, so the rules are probably different. You know, like all the other rule for “natives.”) A mere English B.A. would only give me one, so I’m trying to figure out what to do about a minor. I’m considering psychology or history. There are merits to both. But I was torn today about which to commit to. So of course, I didn’t. I took two English classes, because I realized that I could follow a simple principle: Knights before Bishops. When you have known and unknown steps to be taken toward a goal, you take the known ones first. This may seem rather obvious, but today, it was exactly what I needed to solve my dilemma. In chess, when you’re making your first grab at territory, there really is only one ideal square for the knights to jump to. The knight almost always open towards the center. Since you’re going to do this anyway, you may as well do it first, because there are a number of different logical places to put your bishops, and which one is best may not become apparent until later on.

We went over the syllabi in both classes today, and pretty excited about the reading list. Our Brit lit professor is actually contemplating changing one or two of the readings to suit what we haven’t read, or would read. I thought that was a nice touch. We’re going to be analyzing poetry in that class too, which should help with my craft.

Also, there is this girl that I noticed, (isn’t there always?), in both of my classes. So after the second class, I thought, “perfect that’s my ice breaker.” And so I broke the ice with her and we talked about our decisions to take these two English classes, and how unsuccessfully we’d been thus far at getting our educations to work out for us. We parted ways at the bus stop, were she said she was going to the comic book shop. And so I thought, “nerd!” It turns out this girl also has every modern console system, and she… is… GORGEOUS! She’s like the ultimate nerd’s wet dream. I’m going to be sitting right next to her in Thursday’s class, without a shadow of a doubt in my mind. I’ve decided to call her Parasite Eve. Some clever video game humor went into that one. Anyway, though I’ve only just met her today, I have a mad crush on her, and though this will probably only end in tears, for now I choose to enjoy it.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

You choose your own destiny.

I was fated to be a teacher, yet my father tried to stop me to get to that goal. And he was successful.

Now he is dead, and I am now teaching Science and Physics for 7 years already.

Tell us the adventures of you and Parasite Eve soon. PS3 rocks.

Malice Blackheart said...

Hahaha! Every statistic I've seen reports that teachers have the highest percent job satisfaction - the only job enjoyed even more than being a CEO. Now that's power. Why in the world would your dad want to stop you? My dad would do just about anything to get me working. He's really not picky at this point.

PS3 does rock, especially Street Fighter 4. Apparently Parasite Eve got herself a PS3 for free. This girl is SO AWESOME! I'm gonna be so bummed when I find out she's a lesbian or an axe murderer or something. Actually, my money's on her being an alien.

Unknown said...

My father was a teacher. And he saw the evil spark within me when I was small, and knew of my intention of being a teacher. As a decent human being, he tried to stop me.

And now he is no more, so I am free to spread my evil influence over the masses. Mwa ha ha ha ha!
(seriously)

Malice Blackheart said...

Hahaha! I sense a kindred spirit. Here, you'll probably find this as amusing as I did:

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_a7jkcMVp5Vg/SfzRO_pObLI/AAAAAAAAIw8/JCQZi6Bdr2E/s1600-h/trudat.jpg

Unknown said...

Ha ha ha. That's a funny Post Secret. I even outdone that.

I even taught them how to build pipe bombs, ways to kill with most intense pain and other taboo things.

I am a naturally nasty person trying to do good. :)