There are many, many things that I would never write here.  Some bits are too delicate.  If I opened up my hands, they would blow away.  I would lose them.  And many of my judgments are too painful for the interested parties.  Too painful, and also ridiculously temporary, as fallible as all human conclusions.  There’s no sense in upsetting people with one moment’s verdict.  They might be rendered “not guilty” the next time, and then nobody’s better off.

I do like to pluck up a weed in my brain and try to praise it.  Or smack down an insect of my own dervish craziness.  Nonfiction is good for examination.  Maybe someone else can look at it, as awed as I am by its construction and its invasiveness.

Fiction is different.  I’ve written four long pieces of fiction– none of them, perhaps, the least bit publishable, languishing as they do in the netherworld of “novella.”  Since fourth grade, I have wanted to write a novel.  My fourth grade version was also too short.  It was made of diary entries by a black girl in the Jim Crow south.  Whatever possessed a privileged midwestern white suburban girl to write about such things in a big blue binder, during the Reagan administration, is a question I won’t bother going into here.  The point is, after all those years, I’m still waiting to write a novel.

I loved novels from the first ones I read, the way they were more real than reality.  They were my friends, sometimes more reliable and calming than my human friends, and my drug, and my lovers, before I had been in love.

Every time I have tried to build a novel, zap up my own Frankenstein monster, I stitch the final stitch and realize he is about four foot five.  The pieces I had stretched that far.  They made what they had to make.

Four long pieces, over fifteen years of writing, seriously, like scribbling and typing and reading and asking, and semi-seriously, like wearing red lipstick and appearing troubled.  Three-ish years of crafting, and one-ish year of interesting myself in scraps of dead things, collecting.  I’ve been in a collecting phase, lately.  Letting some pieces rot.  Some fall out of my pockets.  Some still have veins in them.  Some are ready to bloom with fresh blood, impossible as that sounds.  Some muscle will wait, energy invested, never drying, never weakening, ready to be stitched and struck alive.

Based on “100 Things Restaurant Staffers Should Never Do” by Bruce Buschel on the New York Times website (see link below), I have compiled the “50 Things Teachers Should Never Do,” from his Part I, which perhaps shows that service is service, or perhaps shows that I am an annoying stick-in-the-mud, just like Mr. Buschel.

I can’t say I follow any of these perfectly, but I think they’re all good goals.  I also fudged and made some of them “should”s rather than “should never”s.

http://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/29/one-hundred-things-restaurant-staffers-should-never-do-part-one/?em

1. Do not let anyone enter the classroom without a warm greeting.

2. Do not make a kid without a partner or group feel bad. Do not say, “Anyone want to work with _____?” Sometimes let the loner kids work alone. Other times, give them support and structure in finding people to work with.

3. Never refuse to help someone because you are annoyed with past behavior.  If they are respectful and reasonable in that moment, help them.

4. If the lesson is not ready or something goes wrong, have a backup plan for something productive to do.

5. The classroom should be as neat and clean as possible, so students are comfortable.  That said, make them participate in keeping it clean.

6. Do not lead the witness with, “So, you didn’t do your homework again?” or “You’re in trouble again?”  Remain neutral.

7. No flirting, no favoritism, no slyness.  If in doubt, just tell the kids you are kidding or being sarcastic.  It’s not a show.  You are not a character on “Seinfeld.”

8. Listen for a second before you interrupt a conversation. Sometimes the kids are working something out, or they are just about to return to their work or correct their own behavior, and you don’t need to step in.  Wait for the right moment.

9. Do not present information too fast or robotically or dramatically. It is not a soliloquy. This is not an audition.  Repeat yourself.  Clarity is king.

10. Inject your personal favorites, but don’t ever make the class about you.

11. Hustle them constantly.  Push, push, push.  You may fall asleep, but you won’t sleep well.

12. Touching of arms or hands or shoulder is acceptable for greeting, expression of sympathy, and waking up a sleeper.  You probably don’t need to do any other touching.

13. Clean the doorknobs, desks, keyboards, stapler, pencil sharpener, and mice (mouses, whatever) like crazy.  With bleach.

14. When you ask, “Does that make sense?” or “Do you understand?” listen to the answer and fix whatever is not right.  Ask another, more open-ended question, if it is obvious they don’t understand.

15. Never say “I don’t know” to any reasonable question without following with, “I’ll find out.”

16. If someone requests a book or a supply, always suggest that they help themselves.

17. Do not offer up the answer just because you’re getting bored with the lesson or the kids. Wait, wait, wait.  They don’t learn anything by you announcing answers like a trained parrot.

18. Know before approaching a kid what their basic mood and approach to school is.

19. Offer students fun supplies to get them going: sticky notes, highlighters, art supplies.

20. Never refuse a reasonable request from a kid.  If you have time, go ahead and think it through: is it going to hurt anything?

21. Never try to teach a lesson that you don’t understand.

22. If someone is unsure about choosing a topic, help him. That might mean offering different examples or talking through his interests.

23. If someone likes a book, make sure he gets the author and suggest he get it from the library, or let him borrow it.

24. Never use the same example if it didn’t work the first time.  At the very least: ask the kids for a better example.  Sometimes they have one.

25. Make sure the handouts make sense.  The clearer they are, the fewer annoying questions for you and the less time spent repeating yourself.

26. Never assume a student’s question or area of confusion. Inquire.

27. Whenever possible, offer students choices and let them choose

28. Do not be up in a student’s face when you discipline.  Your power does not come from physical intimidation.  This also lets the student save face.

29. Do not make noise while students are working quietly.  Protect them from intercom and hallway interruptions whenever possible.

30. Never let students touch each other inappropriately.  Say something.  Observe and explain.

31. Never move on from a pile of failed tests or assignments without spending some time asking: was it them, or was it me?  And: what would I do differently?

32. Never touch a student when you are angry or disciplining, except to stand in front of them to encourage them not to leave the room.

33. Do not bang on things or make loud noises to get attention.  One loud “Hey!” is the limit.   If they don’t listen to that, you have to try something else that doesn’t require noise.

34. Do not have a personal conversation with another teacher within earshot of students.

35. Do not eat or drink during class.  Except water, coffee, or tea.  You are, after all, the teacher, and you need to preserve your voice and to stay alert.  Your job is harder than the students’ (and their job is very hard).

36. Never reek from perfume or cigarettes. You are in the personal space of a lot of people.

37. Do not discuss your own views on alcohol, religion, or politics on the job, even if invited by the students. “I don’t discuss that with students, but we can talk about it after you graduate, if you want.”

38.  Exaggerate your manners.  Be more polite than necessary.  Use “sir” and “ma’am.”  Sometimes call your students “Ms” and Mister.”

39. And be relentlessly polite.  Especially when they are in a bad mood, or when you are disciplining.  It’s very hard for students (or parents or administrators) to get any leverage against you if your tone of voice and your language is courteous.

40.  Describe their work as “effective” or “ineffective,” “working” or “not working,” “clear” or “confusing,” not “good” or “bad.”  The quality of their work is not an ethical issue.

41. When you need to get really harsh, go there.  Then pull it back and get really nice to balance out the energy.  Always try to end class on a positive, or at least neutral, note.

42. Rarely compliment a guest’s attire or hairdo or makeup. Kids spend a lot of time thinking of themselves as their physical appearance, and they don’t need their teachers reinforcing that.

43. Always mention your favorite fields of study, favorite books.  Model academic enthusiasm.

44. Do not discuss your own opinions without acknowledging and explaining the logic of the other side.

45. Do not curse, no matter how young or hip the students.  Model a full vocabulary and a respect for your audience.

46. Never acknowledge any one student over and above any other. All students are equal. You can easily spend half the class dealing with one kid’s behavior or questions.  Discipline yourself to evenly distribute your time.

47. Do not gossip about parents or other students within earshot of students.

48. Ask the kids for help with as many physical and housekeeping tasks as possible.  Say “please” and “thank you.”  They like to help, and it builds community.

49. Never mention how many As, Bs, Cs there are.  Let kids compete with themselves and work with their own abilities.

50. Do not be merciful in passing kids with a 50%.  That’s not mercy.  It’s pity or guilt.  Do a better job of teaching next time, but also let the kids own their mistakes.

“The nuns in attendance reminded me of a phone conversation I had with my father after the autopsy of the young motorcyclist.  Over the course of the conversation, he asked how my time at the hospital was going.  I recounted to him, without going into much detail, that the process of autopsy is quite difficult to watch.

“‘Is it just that the body is being treated so brutally?’ he asked.  I paused for a moment to consider the question, then decided that it wasn’t actually that at all.  The process is brutal, I told him, but the upsetting part of the autopsy is not the way the body is handled, but rather that such handling makes no difference whatsoever.  What one cannot quite comprehend, in the end, is that no matter what is done to the body, it has absolutely no effect on the person who once inhabited it.  The horror is not what is present and cut apart but what has so completely and irreversibly gone.”

–Body of Work by Christine Montross, Penguin, 2007.

There was recently a very spooky “Fresh Air” interview with Dr. Atul Gawande, dealing with how we draw the line between life and death.  He describes new uncertainties that physicians have about the clarity of “brain death,” and what the brain can recover from.  You only have to sit through one medical examination of someone you love to connect with the eerieness of how the body is not the person, and how freeing and terrifying that is.

The interview is at:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113681104

“Evil.  I am cast upon a horrible desolate island, void of all hope of recovery.  I am singled out and separated as it were, from all the world, to be miserable.

“Good.  But I am alive, and not drowned, as all my ship’s company was.  But I am singled out, too, from all the ship’s crew to be spared from death; and He that miraculously saved me from death can deliver me from this condition.

“Evil.  I am divided from mankind, a solitaire, one banished from human society. I have not clothes to cover me.  I am without any defence or means to resist any violence of man or beast.  I have no soul to speak to, or relieve me.

“Good.  But I am not starved, and perishing on a barren place, affording no sustenance.  But I am in a hot climate, where, if I had clothes, I could hardly wear them.  But I am cast on an island where I see no wild beasts to hurt me, as I saw on the coast of Africa; and what if I had been shipwrecked there?  But God wonderfully sent the ship in near enough to the shore, that I have gotten out so many necessary things as will either supply my wants, or enable me to supply myself even as long as I live.”

–Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe, first published 1719.

The vision of a man alone on an island, struggling with himself and methodically building a system of nourishment and protection, is deep in our Western consciousness.  I was making Robinson Crusoe style good/evil lists and charting out matters pretend and practical from a very young age.

There is a lot of crazy racist, patriarchal, colonialist nonsense in the book, but its confessional, sweet spirit still shone through to me.  It’s a great adventure, and Crusoe seemed like a really honest guy to me.  I frequently feel like I am trapped on an island and don’t know what to do with myself.  And I often make good/evil lists without even noticing what I am doing, like so many western thinkers.