Early. Can’t sleep. Just brewed some coffee. I’ll go out later this morning. It’s inviting out there. South Georgia has returned to its senses. The weather channel says it’s in the balmy high 50s. No more heavy grubbies. Shorts and a t-shirt are the order of the pre-dawn morning. I love that time of the day. It’s my meditation time, a time for me to get quiet and go within. It’s a time I bring my music inside me outside; when I listen to my intuitive inner voice, when I connect with the passion that stirs my soul, and when I tap into the forces of love and living.

Things are kinda quiet around here. It’ll be almost a month before I start once again doing what I love and loving what I do–and making a living loving and doing it! Final grades are in. All last week I had to use two tiles of my Spiritual Alphabet each day to keep me high during that downer of that very uneducational and unrewarding and unfulfilling process. Maybe quiet is the wrong word. Susan will be handing me rolls of paper today to wrap the Chanukah gifts for our west coast grandkids. It’s not enough that we’ll need a separate suitcase for all that stuff, she went out yesterday and came back after too many hours giggling with an armful of more girly stuff for the girls in both San Mateo and Nashville! I think this year Chanukah is going to need fifteen days of candle lighting and gift giving.

Anyway, this morning, I’m thinking of a Bar Mitzvah that’s going to occur at the synagogue this weekend before we leave for the west coast. I just found out that the bar mitzvah boy, Jacob, as his “mitzvah (good deed) project” had created “There is Hope” baseball caps that he had given each patient at the regional hospital’s cancer center. He’s going to present me one during his bar mitzvah speech. That brought back memories of a real-time, on-line conversation I had had a few weeks ago with a student from the spring semester of 2005 when I was recovering from my cancer operation. Hers was the class that gave me the blue band I now wear on my right wrist. She discovered three weeks ago that her mother has a “tiny lump” in her breast and is going in for a biopsy. She had e-mailed me just to talk. At her request, I had sent her copies of the four Random Thoughts I had written specifically about my cancer beginning with, “I Am a Cancer Survivor” and finishing with “What Really Matters.”

She “called back” and we had a long conversation. I had saved it and have been reading it every now and then to keep up as I was dragged down by final grading. This is the tail end of some of our long exchange, mostly my part of the conversation. With her permission, I’d like to share it with you. It has to do with renewal and resilience:

“….Some Christmas gift, huh? How were you able to talk of your cancer in your classes with your students or anyone? I remember when you came back to class. Damn, you weren’t embarrassed or ashamed. If anything you were as upbeat and open with us as hell. Remember, you told us about your catheter and to tell you if we saw it or your bag was leaking and it was like you gave _____permission to talk about her cancer. And, there was ____who shared with us her struggles about her father’s death from cancer that December before and how it was effecting her concentration, and _____ who could think of nothing but her mother who was stricken with colon cancer….Why did you do it?”

“I respected you. You know that. You were in class.”

“Yeah, but I need to hear it again. Somehow I just can’t get the words out of my mouth like you and they did. I am so scared of what might happen that I don’t want to get out of bed in the morning….I just don’t see how it can be merry around here….the lights, the tree, the shopping, the gifts, all just don’t seem right, at least, not as bright and cheery….I just feel as cold inside as it is outside….”

“….That’s the point, isn’t it? I told all of you, and I live my words, that if you are thinking about, talking about, and spending energy on what is missing in your lives, what is wrong, what you don’t like, what you are afraid of, or what always has been, then you’re going to continue to attract those negative and limiting, even paralyzing, things into your life–and your going to miss a lot of beautiful things both inside it and around it. They, I, you, we become what we think about. When you see beauty, you’ll become a more beautiful person; when you see fear, you become a more fearful person. Remember, I asked you that first day, ‘What do want in your life, nightmares or dreams? Do you want to feel drained, sad, and bad about yourself or energetic, happy, and good about yourself?’ I don’t have to tell you what your and everyone’s answer was. Did you forget that I told you that you’re in a class with that energy that creates a space for exactly what you want? Remember the piece of paper I handed out with the words I have taped on the shelf over my computer? I’m looking at it right now as I look at it every morning. I don’t know where I got it. It says, ‘Attitude is everything. So, pick a good one.” So, I ask you now. What do you want in your life? �.Teaching as a teacher, learning as a student, and living as human being is all in the same mix, aren’t they? Attitude creates your intention; it focuses your focus; it’s the fuel for your performance, and cancer has affected my attitude as it is yours. It’s a simple formula: change the way you look at yourself, others, and things around you, they change the way they look and you change; when you change, you change what you believe you can do; change that belief and you’ll change what you do�.Jump out of bed and grab hold of that life, don’t waste it. My cancer has made me realize even more than I had that each day of life is important. Every moment of each day is a moment of grace. As a teacher, not to share that grace, not to help others see that no day is ordinary, not to serve others is a betrayal to every hour I’m offered. I’ve become an unstoppable me to hold on to and soar with the no-limit feeling I was born with, had lost, and have now rediscovered. So, I write and talk about having had cancer to keep myself conscious of and to awaken yours and everyone’s consciousness to the simple truth that we must professionally and personally live each day to the fullest in the service of others. Elie Wiesel once wrote, “No one is as capable of gratitude as one who has emerged from the kingdom of night.” I think I would say I come from such an emergence. I had cancer; in that darkness, I saw the light. I saw how fragile life is; I got hit square between the eyes with that reality of not knowing how many tomorrows I had; I had and still have to face the reality of my mortality; I have to live with the consequent physical side-effects of having had cancer. That realization created a transcendent wonder of myself, others, and things around me. It helps me not to lose my joy for life, to stay at peace within myself, to be grateful for the day’s promise. My emotions are on the surface more acutely than they ever had been. You saw me choke up when I told you all the story of Kim and my painted pinky nail. You saw me tear up when you gave me that cancer band. I was not embarrassed to tell you I loved each of you. I was not ashamed to have you stand and applaud your own ability after the ‘Neil Diamond Project.’ What turns me on is a clue to who I am and what I can accomplish. Trust me, if you concentrate on finding whatever is good in every situation, of finding the light in the darkest of dark, you will discover that your life is filled with a nurturing feeling of gratitude. Doing that makes me into a walking postal service.”

“Walking postal service?…..”

“Neither rain nor snow nor cold nor heat nor gloom will stay me from loving each day and seeing the reasons to be happy all around me. I just told some e-colleagues when we have feeling and thoughts that include others–a thought of kindness, or a thought of love, or a thought of belief, or a thought of hope–we draw on the powerful power of intention�.

“Is that why you still tell your students about your cancer, and your epiphany fifteen years ago, as well as the story of your painted pinky nail, when they ask during your “What do you want to know about me” session at the beginning of each semester?

“Yeah. You know it’s always one of the first parts of my week-long “Getting to Know ya” classroom community building process.” It’s one of the three strong connecting threads we use to start weaving community. And, it proves to be powerfully lasting, doesn’t it�.

“Yeah. That’s why I’m talking with you. I need to hear your voice. Tell me again, please…”

“When students ask me about the yellow and blue bands around me right wrist, I tell that I am a cancer survivor and I choke up when I tell them that the blue band was a “we’re here for you” and a “we’re glad you conquered the sucker” gift from all those in your class. I tell them the same thing I say to myself, “inspire myself to aspire” is a better way to put it, each day I awake and plant my feet firmly on the carpet and whisper to myself so I don’t wake up my angelic Susan, “what a day this is. There are great things to do today!” I tell them that I learned from having had cancer not to waste the only thing I’ve got: this moment of today. Today is a new day and it is a good day. No, it is a great day. You see, this day is unique; it’s irreplaceable. There’s no such thing as an ordinary day. I, everyone, every thing is different from yesterday. It’s all new! It’s all adventure! It’s all exciting. It’s filled with untold opportunities and possibilities�.Don’t take anything for granted today. Be surprised today, be curious today, be fascinated today, and love yourself and others with all you have today. Be grateful for today and you’ll never take anything for granted, you’ll never be unresponsive, you’ll be constantly awakening to new wonder, and you’ll discover the beauty and goodness around you, inside others, and inside you today.”

“….It sounded so easy back then. Now, it doesn’t….”

“Well, it still isn’t, never was, and never will be. You’ve forgotten what you had to do. You’ve forgotten that you had to work at it each day.”

“Coming to think of it, it was like taking an attitude one-a-day vitamin pill. But, I also had to go for a daily spirit, soul, attitude, emotion, feeling, and action workout. That’s what the journaling was for, wasn’t it? Man, I sweated at doing that….”

“Bingo. The first principle of my teaching is to be happy and feel good, to love the place I am in and being in the moment I’m in and what I am doing and serving others. As you take that vitamin, as you do that workout, you’ll have feelings that exclude no one, that are thoughts of abundant love, kindness, faith, hope, and beauty. You’ll get grabbed by a feeling so vital it will expand in every direction without limits. Then, you’ll go on a rampage of appreciation of the new world you’ll find yourself in every single moment of every day. It’s what keeps me renewed and resilient. It’ll work for you if you let it grab you. I’m not always successful. But, doggone, I keep working on me. And, slowly, oh so slowly, I’m getting there.

“Where do the students fit in? Tell me again….?”

“You just said it. To be happy and feel good is the first principle of learning as well. You, for one, were one of those who got caught up in it. It’s what’s a psychiatrist named Carl Jung called ‘synchronicity.’ As I vibrate, everything around me will be similarly vibrated, or at least have the choice to vibrate. It’s about modeling. It’s this attitude I struggle to use as more than a mere guide in my personal life. This is the attitude I struggle to use as more than a mere guide to everything I do in the classroom. This is the attitude I struggle to live. I struggle for it to be me. And, I struggle to model it for others so they, you, can learn to model it yourself….”

“….You know, I just finished watching ‘Actors Studio.’ Now, I’m going to be a James Lipton in ‘Teachers Classroom’ and ask you a form of the last question he always asks his guest. What would like to say to God at Heaven’s gates if you had time for only one sentence?”

I thought for more than a minute and wrote back, “Whew! I have nothing left because I gave it everything I had to touch someone and make a difference.”

“Nice. Thanks. Can I write you again?…”

“….Wouldn’t have it otherwise….Have a happy, merry, and all that.”

And we both clicked off-line.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. It’s 22 degrees!! Only mad dogs and I go out in the freezing dawn. This time of the year always leaves me cold both outside and inside. It’s at this time of the year I feel like the Grinch that stole both Christmas and education. It’s that time of the year I feel like a bah, hum-bugging professorial Scrooge. It’s that time of the year there is no peace and joy at Valdosta State University. It’s that time of the year I nearly convince myself that I am a masochist. It’s the end of the semester. It’s the very uneducational get-the-final-grade-in time. No mindless computer generated, add-’em-up, bell curve, give extra points, take off a point here and there, drop the worse grade, multiply or divide-by-whatever final grades for me. No, instead my eyes are bloodshot; my brain is numb; my butt aches; my body is stiff. My teeth are worn from gnashing. I am sleep deprived. During these past five days, I have been tossing and turning and wrestling. I have been reading and rereading over 800 final week student journal entries, 175 student self-evaluations, 350 community member evaluations, 175 class evaluations. I have been going back to read a host of community project evaluations. I have scoured my daily notations. And, that doesn’t even count reading a bunch of the literally thousands of journal entries students wrote during the semester. My angelic Susan has been hearing me mutter, maybe “snarling” is a better word, less than angelic words as I struggle with the need to come up some mythical “objectively arrived at” final grade–as if that grade has any real and lasting meaning of deep, sticky, and lasting learning–as if I had just descended from the summit of Sinai after having a schnapps with the Almighty, proving my own divine calculating infallibility.

Like Christmas and Chanukah whose true meaning are often diluted and demeaned in a commercialized fervor of giving and getting gifts, the true meaning of an education is often demeaned in a credentialing fervor of giving final exams and getting final grades. It’s disgraceful when Santa and his bag of toys, when dredels and latkes and eights of days of gifts play a more prominent role than the teachings of these holidays, just as tests and grades play a more prominent role than the “educare” of an education. Like the true gifts of these two December holidays, education’s gift should be a spirit, a way of feeling and thinking and living and being. An education should be more than getting a better grade and a higher GPA. It should be more than being better informed, better trained vocationally, and getting a better job. It should instill uplifting and inspiring transcendent values to care for yourself, to care for others, and to live better lives.

Yet, this educational spirit, like the spirit of Christmas and Chanukah, ignoring the prophetic admonitions in Micah 6:1-8, is hijacked in a misguided spiritless zeal for worshipping the rituals. So, I can understand why so many students find so much of their time in the classroom depressing, boring, offensive, demoralizing, cold, disengaging, unfriendly, dehumanizing, demeaning, stressful, threatening, often frightening and traumatic, and above all, disrespectful experiences. More often than most of us want to admit, on the student side, the whole educational process creates more fearful, “what do you want” dependence than “think for yourself,” courageous independence. It manifests itself more in anger, resignation, surrender, and resentment rather than in a responsible, disciplined, imaginative, thoughtful, “playful,” creative, innovative, reflective, imaginative, and resilient way. So many of us don’t give students the space to be the kids–or, as I call them, “adults in training”–most are; we don’t give them room to make mistakes; we don’t allow them their human fallibilities; we don’t take into account their outside-the-classroom lives. At the same time, I can understand why many academics–having been there myself until fifteen years ago–generally pedagogically untrained, uninformed, and inexperienced no matter how long they’ve been in the classroom or how long their scholarly resume, keep their emotional, and often even their intellectual, distance. But, when the intent of that man-made, professional chasm is taken by students as uncaring or disrespectful or fearful or controlling, it’s a form of educational malpractice.

At the beginning of each semester, I ask the students in class what they want to see more of in all their classes and specifically in “my” class. I always find their list interesting since it’s always nearly the same: respect, caring, kindness, patience, honesty, understanding, consideration, sympathy, enjoyment, and fairness. They are more concerned with who we academics are and how we behave towards them rather than what we know. To live and model those words always becomes the end for me to reach each day from the first day of the semester to the last. I’ll put it another way. I’m going to add something new to both my mid-term and end-of-semester student evaluations. I will have each student, as part of his or her evaluation of me, choose five words to describe me. For me, these five words will be the ultimate evaluation. It will be a challenge for me to see if I have reached the end I had in mind at the beginning of each semester, if I have any blind spots, and if I, to paraphrase Jack Nicholson as Colonel Nathan Jessep in A FEW GOOD MEN, can “handle the truth.”

It’s easy to discount or dismiss student observations or complaints. It’s hard accepting criticism, especially if you don’t truly value their judgment. It is even harder being an effective self-critic. But, if we want to make things better for both each student and ourselves, if we want to become the teachers and persons we each are capable of becoming, we have to fight our inclination to defensively circle the wagons or raise the drawbridge and man the battlements. Our “job” only becomes a lifework of service to others when we realize our purpose is to serve others; that the purpose of us academics in the classroom is not limited to transmitting information or to honing “critical thinking skills” or to preparing a student for a place in the workplace. Maybe equally, if not more, important, our purpose is to educate, to tend to and care for the overall well-being of each student in a way that helps each help her/himself become both a better informed and a better person.

Want to give students a lasting gift? Give them the gift of your time and attention. Give them the gift your, not just of our mind. We don’t have to be educational grinches or Scrooges. We don’t have to be “weeder-outers.” We don’t have to engage in spurious and fearful “negative reinforcement.” Above my computer is taped a famous quote from Dickens to remind me that though my body may be sixty-six years old and my hair graying and my wrinkles deepening, my spirit can remain young and vibrant; and though my time on earth is limited, the result of what I do with that time can be limitless: “Father Time often lays his hand lightly upon those who have used him well; making them old men and women inexorably enough, but leaving their hearts and spirits young and in full vigor. With such people the gray head is but the impression of the old fellow’s hand in giving them his blessing, and every wrinkle but a notch in the quiet calendar of a well-spent life.”

Do we have that kind of graying hair? Do we have such wrinkles? Teachers who do their job best are those who capture the spirit of edcuation; who help each student feel better about her/himself, believe in her/himself, and see who she or he is capable of becoming; who uplift each student’s spirits and expectations, who call forth each student’s potential talent and ability to be inquisitive and independent and ethical by simple acts of human decency — a smile, a kind word, a compassionate expression, a empathetic tone, an encouraging touch — that says, “I notice you; I believe in you; I have high hopes for you; I have faith in you. I care. So should you.”

Like peace on earth and joy to the world, true peace on campus and sincere joy to academia from the feelings of living a worthy life in the company of students we respect and love, and in the service of something bigger than ourselves

As Susan and I are about to depart Valdosta with a suitcase of Chanukah gifts for a joyous time of grand-children spoiling on the West Coast, we’d like to wish each and every one of you joy and happiness during this holiday season, as well as best wishes for the coming new year.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–