Cooler than You: Stupid Things I Say and Do

A few years ago I wrote a mini blog series to in coming freshmen . . . It was September.  Very true.  Very pertinent. Part one .  Part two . Now, as January turns to a bitter, icy grey and colleges reopen a different form of "that time of year" is back.  The spring semester, or also known as "the graduating semester." Le sigh.  Read on, you'll see why. Girls, boys, men, and women come into my office in various stages of fright.  They arrive in my inbox, and the appear in Skype and Facetime meetings, and in classes they teeter on the edges of chair gasping for breath.  Panics about jobs, getting them, getting into grad school, making money...Always the money comes up.  Yea, there's a bit of angsty haze this time of year.  Some good, some . . . well, a few emails this week struck me more than normal.  Amid the "Aw snap, I forgot," "What's going down up in here?" "and "You gots to help me" with arms flailed in the air ...

In 2012 the concept of a woman needing anything beyond her own wit and merit almost seems passe.  Yet, in this world of instant messages, ATMs, debit cards superseding checks, and steel-toes stilettos a women (or, girl if the term--like me--makes you feel a little more hip, at ease, and at peace within your changing skin) should have a little black book–– or a little black digital phone book–– filled with names beyond old lovers, forlorn exs, or divorce lawyers. These are the things, as I tell students, that just make life easier, richer, and full. A list, per se, that I deliver to Women's Studies when I can and to students, friends, and sometimes strangers when I see or feel the need . . . or just plain hate what I am hearing. In no particular order: 1. A former lover, partner du jour if you will, that is no longer a shag buddy.  Just merly a name and number in her book who she can text or call just to say hi.  Why? While not all rel...

Funny thing about college teaching . . . the first week is just that . . . and for the most part a wash of syllabi disbursement, the "this is what you will and will not do" lectures, and then the second class is disrupted by students with little sense of social decorum.  These are usually the ones who do not show up the first day of class.  Eh, don't get me wrong, I do what I love and love what I do . . . but, every now and then social disorder annoys me.   Along with the first week madness, there is the beginning of sign-ins.  Some students begin this task the first week.  Some start it the second week.  Most do it the second week, as the add-drop period ends.  Moments of advising the first week are never anything like the second, particularly if these students are in upper level seminars and grades have started coming in from the first week's assignments.  While advising times are established throughout the semester, any professor worth ...

In 1981 I was a kindergartner, in all my glory.  Back then, my family and I lived in Tacoma, Washington and I went to a school with oodles of other military and working class kids.  None-the-less, there was one day I particularly remember a glimpse of in the forefront of my mind.  I was in the front office, rather ill, and the secretary needed my name to look up my contact info.  I gave her my name, and she promptly told me that I could not be correct.  She added a V to the first name, while subtracting a N, and added a K to the last.  My name is NOT Vanessa Babick.  My name is Annessa Babic, and it always has been.  Needless to say, she yelled at me.  She also refused to believe the phone numbers I gave her.  Mind you, my parents had gotten me an ID bracelet with my address and phone number on it (we lived on A Street, thank-you very much).  My father had made me memorize his work number by the time I was three or so.  Clearly...

Sometimes when you walk into a classroom you can feel the tension in the air. The students are nervous, unsure of their abilities, and hesitant to even try. This is my world in a Pre College Writing class. But . . . As with just about everything I do, I get creative and try my best to have fun. I truly believe that if you have fun your students will too. Hence, grammar lessons are mandatory in my class, but no one ever said I had to teach them in the traditional manner. So no overheads for this grammar diva. Instead, we are using a May edition of the Richmond Sunday paper to hunt for what we need. Essentially, I've got them hunting for usages of grammar each class, in a new section of the paper, and then they have to tell me how that part of speech or punctuation is used. Oh, and don't forget, they have to find and label these things on the their papers too. Seriously, on the day papers are due we go through some grammar lessons and hunt and peck before turning in. G...