Semester II

Well, I should be doing some of the vast amounts of reading that I have been assigned, but I've been reading for the last four hours (with some small breaks) and I'm just so sleepy that I need a breather to try to wake up.

On Sunday, Monday, & Wednesday nights of last week, I went to bed and could not go to sleep. I don’t know if it’s because I had caffeine before I went to bed or because of New Classes Anxiety. Caffeine has never really affected me before (that I know of) so I’m inclined to think it was the anxiety of going to school again. I know that, even though I hadn’t consciously been thinking about being nervous about school, subconsciously it has been bothering me. The week before school started, I managed to chew all but two of my fingernails (and I took care of one of those last week) to mere nubs. On Sunday night as I lay in bed trying to sleep, I felt rather sick to my stomach, a symptom I frequently have when I'm nervous.

My first class last week was Introduction to Sociology on Monday evening. I hiked down the hill and found the right classroom only to have to wait in the hall for nearly 30 minutes until the instructor, Dr. K, came and opened the room. I have mixed feelings about that class. On one hand, I think the content will be interesting; on the other hand, I think the homework will be awful…lots of reading, self-analysis, several papers, etc. We had to get into small groups of three and discuss the three theories of sociology: the conflict, function, and symbolic interaction theories. Sounds awful, doesn’t it? I think the two girls that I grouped with will be okay. They didn’t seem to be quite as giggly as some of the girls I've met up with.

My Tuesday class was Western Civilization Since 1648. The teacher, Mrs. B, is a 65-70ish woman that I think will be fairly interesting. Once again, I think the content will be interesting but the homework…terrible! One nice thing is that instead of writing a lot of term papers, she wants us to go to the Kentucky Library on campus and read some old newspapers and write a two-page paper on what we’ve learned. She also wants us to read some manuscripts (hand-written) and write a small paper on those. The manuscripts will be of people that were in the war and either kept diaries or wrote letters home. Her goal is to get us to read some of the old stuff from longer ago. Then we have to watch three movies from a list of about 30 and write a small paper on what we see, how people lived, etc. Sigh! It’s going to take sooo much time.

After Mrs. B took role, she asked if there was anyone whose name she hadn’t called. I raised my hand and she asked for my name. I told her and then she went on to the next person. The man sitting in front of me turned around and whispered, "You from Franklin?" I confirmed that I was. He gave me a street address that was just two digits off of my hom address. I corrected him. He nodded his head and turned back around.

"How’d you know?" I asked him. He looked back at me and said, "Post office." "Oh," I said. It was kinda freaky to have someone that I didn’t know knowing where I live. (I saw him in Staples on Saturday and he told me that back when Martin & Dad were working for a company from California he helped Martin figure out why they weren’t getting their checks on time.)

On Wednesday night, I went to my Business and Professional Speaking class. I timidly entered the room and sat in a desk at the back of the class. Slowly people trickled in and about 10 minutes before class started, a man stuck his head in the door and asked what class we were taking. We told him. He wanted to know who the instructor was. We told him. He turned and left and then came back in carrying his briefcase. It turned out that he was the instructor, Mr. Y. He normally taught in the classroom next door and when he got there and waited for a bit with no one coming into his room, he figured that something was up.

I think that he will be a good teacher. He acknowledged that most of us are there simply because the class is a requirement and said that he will try to make it as painless as possible. Hooray for him!! After he went over the syllabus, he had us put our names, e-mail address, and a unique thing about ourselves on a 3x5 card. Then he had us put our desks in a circle and he redistributed the cards. He told us that we needed to pay attention and that we could take notes if we wanted to. He started with a girl across the room and told her to read the name. The person whose name she read was supposed to raise their hand and then she would read their unique thing. We went around the circle and everyone read their cards. After we were done, he gathered the cards back up and read the unique items again and we had to try to remember who was who. It was kind of interesting. It was much better than introducing someone like I had to in my Personal Health class. I don’t think that class will be too bad except for the presentations that we have to give. That is already giving me ulcers.

On Thursday, I went to my Introduction to Literature class at the High School in Russellville. When the instructor, Mr. K, finally arrived, we went into the classroom, and he started arranging desks in a circle. I’m not sure if he plans to have a circle every time but that could be a pain. When it was time for class to start, he launched into a lecture that has frightened me beyond belief.

"You will NOT get an A or B in MY class and not do the reading," he said. "This class is too big. There are supposed to be 24 of you but we really need to have only about 15 in order to have a really good class. But some of you will drop out so we may end up with a good class after all. And we WILL stay the full class period so you can get your money’s worth. They say that this is automatically a C class but some of you, if you work hard enough, might be able to get a B or a few of you might even get an A. But you WILL learn about literature in this class." (His actual lecture wasn't quite this disjointed; I just pulled out the highlights.)

I’m thinking, "Rip me off and let us out early. Cheat me and don’t teach me anything about literature. If you'll give me credit for the class, I'd be happy to drop out." Then he proceeded to assign more than 200 pages of reading to be completed in 1 week, 11 short stories and approximately 48 pages of instructional reading. Aargh!! I seriously considered dropping the class and seeing if I could enroll in someone else’s Literature class or even dropping it altogether. But then Pride reared his old ugly head and said, "Are you going to let HIM make a quitter out of you? Are you going to let him know that he has successfully intimidated you?" To which I replied, "But is it worth getting a B, C, or D just so you don’t have to take a beating, Pride?" I did some serious soul-searching and, because of the inconvenience of trying to get into an already closed class (all the Literature classes are full by now), came to the conclusion that I will stay in the class but I’m probably going to have to take off early one day a week in order to make sure that I get all of my reading done.

My heart is heavy with the burden of an awful semester ahead.