Today I wound up talking to a
retired professor of history for twenty minutes instead of just zipping out of
the adjunct office space. He is a fascinating guy, and he offered insight into
teaching students in our area. When he started teaching, he made a lot of waves
by giving Ds and Fs instead of just passing students during a time when
branches really earned their bad reputations. He talked about challenging
students who really needed it, and not sweating those students that you just
don’t reach. He also praised me for showing students how there is more to the
world beyond Ohio. I felt accepted and worthwhile, and I do hope that at least
a few students leave my class aware of a larger sense of human culture.
I realized that maybe this was the
frame that I've been missing. I hit a wall when I made a feeble attempt at
writing about local art; that wall was made of a mixture of self-doubt and inspiration
without direction. I thought it would be
arrogant to think my express purpose is to spread culture to these students. As
if I have returned from Manhattan, climbed down from the mountaintop, to preach
my secular religion. But hearing another teacher chatting about the opportunity
to bring my New York experience into my work as a positive made me realize that
it’s all about the frame. I’m not here to impose my views, but to help other
students replicate the same kind of journey I made: outward, beyond, further.
Perhaps coming to terms with
leaving New York could also bring me to terms with my new purpose. I want to
encourage critical thinking, literacy, self-expression, and above all,
curiosity. I hope that, eventually, I’ll write some of my own personal insight
about local art here, but I’m going to frame it with the differences between
home and the outside world. Zanesville to New York, Ohio to the East Coast. And
maybe I’ll prove to a few students that they truly are connected to the world
beyond this town, all while proving to some people outside that there is more
to this country than its coasts.
