insanityBut about three weeks into my vacation, a clerk at the office of student services called me at home.
“One of your students wants to speak with you about his grade.”
It was Wyatt.
“Tell Wyatt that I’m not working this session, that I'm on vacation, and that I’ll talk with him as soon as I get back to work next quarter.” At the start of the second five-week summer session I had to be at the office on the Thursday and Friday before classes began on the following Monday. I could see Wyatt then.
“He’s very insistent.”
I hadn’t the stomach for a grade argument. I’d done the best I could. I checked my student records, which between quarters I always brought home with me in the event of just such a problem. My memory had not failed me. There seemed little if any material basis for revising Wyatt’s grade upward to a B, assuming—and I did—that this really was the topic he wished to discuss. Nor did I sense any special urgency in the words or the voice of the clerk who called to inform me that Wyatt wanted to see me. I had submitted final grades for ninety students, after all, and as only one of so many names, faces, essays, and grades Wyatt had not especially distinguished himself in any academic way. Indeed, I hardly knew him. Though we had been present in the same room at least twenty times and though I had read carefully his paper on waste management several times and had watched it grow and develop, section by section, I did not know well Wyatt as a person—no, hardly at all. I put the matter of Wyatt behind me for the remaining two weeks of my vacation and thought no more about it. When I finally returned to work at 7:30 Thursday morning, I found in my mailbox a note informing me that Wyatt had scheduled an appointment to see me at 8:00; and at eight o’clock sharp, as I was returning to my office cubicle from an errand at the duplicating room, I heard a noise, turned my head, and caught sight of Wyatt pulling open the main doors to the commons, blowing through the opening in long, hurried, determined strides, and heading my way. I barely had time to sit down at my desk and prepare myself before Wyatt was standing over me and shouting in a loud, angry voice.
“What in the holy goddamned fuck do you think you are doing to my goddamned life! C? C? There is no way I got a fucking goddamned C! You know I had a C+! You have goddamned fucking destroyed my whole goddamned fucking life! C? C? C? No way in hell did I get a goddamned fucking C! You are the goddamned fucking straw that broke this camel’s back! You are not—repeat are not—going to get away with this! Never never will you get away with this! Not you, not this fucking college, not anyone! This is my goddamned fucking life you are messing with! My grade was at least a C+! Do you fucking hear me?”
I felt absurdly calm.
............................................
INSANITY to be continued
“One of your students wants to speak with you about his grade.”
It was Wyatt.
“Tell Wyatt that I’m not working this session, that I'm on vacation, and that I’ll talk with him as soon as I get back to work next quarter.” At the start of the second five-week summer session I had to be at the office on the Thursday and Friday before classes began on the following Monday. I could see Wyatt then.
“He’s very insistent.”
I hadn’t the stomach for a grade argument. I’d done the best I could. I checked my student records, which between quarters I always brought home with me in the event of just such a problem. My memory had not failed me. There seemed little if any material basis for revising Wyatt’s grade upward to a B, assuming—and I did—that this really was the topic he wished to discuss. Nor did I sense any special urgency in the words or the voice of the clerk who called to inform me that Wyatt wanted to see me. I had submitted final grades for ninety students, after all, and as only one of so many names, faces, essays, and grades Wyatt had not especially distinguished himself in any academic way. Indeed, I hardly knew him. Though we had been present in the same room at least twenty times and though I had read carefully his paper on waste management several times and had watched it grow and develop, section by section, I did not know well Wyatt as a person—no, hardly at all. I put the matter of Wyatt behind me for the remaining two weeks of my vacation and thought no more about it. When I finally returned to work at 7:30 Thursday morning, I found in my mailbox a note informing me that Wyatt had scheduled an appointment to see me at 8:00; and at eight o’clock sharp, as I was returning to my office cubicle from an errand at the duplicating room, I heard a noise, turned my head, and caught sight of Wyatt pulling open the main doors to the commons, blowing through the opening in long, hurried, determined strides, and heading my way. I barely had time to sit down at my desk and prepare myself before Wyatt was standing over me and shouting in a loud, angry voice.
“What in the holy goddamned fuck do you think you are doing to my goddamned life! C? C? There is no way I got a fucking goddamned C! You know I had a C+! You have goddamned fucking destroyed my whole goddamned fucking life! C? C? C? No way in hell did I get a goddamned fucking C! You are the goddamned fucking straw that broke this camel’s back! You are not—repeat are not—going to get away with this! Never never will you get away with this! Not you, not this fucking college, not anyone! This is my goddamned fucking life you are messing with! My grade was at least a C+! Do you fucking hear me?”
I felt absurdly calm.
............................................
INSANITY to be continued
