WORDS pullulating Confected Discrepant supercilious wherewithal I was young once too Why didn’t I just go to sleep? I feel shabby. How not to? Have answers; need execution. Why difficult? Not. And yet.... Probation Ratchety No, that's not cat piss, that's my socks. Like Pinnochio, I had to learn the hard way about fantasy fulfillment. By the time he found the perfect thing, he was dead. Lapidary Assocriated Spangle God is a fancy word for synchronicity. The post-sexual life glistens with apocryphal dew. Dabbled in marijuana; dabbled in adventurous sex. Dabbled in working hard; dabbled in knowing secret things. Dabbled in the occult & in the upright. Dabbled in righteous poverty. Dabbled in savior-faire. Still don't know, because I dabbled in philosophy as well, "who I am." It's like I woke up and I was old. It really took ten years, but it's like I just woke up. And the drinking, while it seems to help at night, doesn't make the waking any less depressing. It’s getting to me. I need help. It’s not going to come from the students. Can’t expect any practical sympathy from them. Maybe. Well, expect, right, no, can’t. I wouldn’t mind teaching this stuff to other kids who care. But it’s my job to teach it to kids who don’t care, too. And I don’t care enough to do that. You have to care personally, to overcome their personal apathy or antipathy. Just knowing it’s your job may not be enough. For me, it seems it’s not enough. So, what now? One thing I could try though--caring on purpose, but letting go of what you think that means. Treat a class as a family; base everything on that premise. Get mushy. Sacrifice some “instructional time” to instilling it. See what happens. See if you learn any English. See if you change any relationships to mutual effect. In other words, play instead of running inside crying. You could probably even forge a PDP out of that. You know, if you for whatever reason wanted to. I'm a little bit of an autodidact too, but only about useless things. Ha ha ha ha, worthlessness!