Ulysses

"How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life!"

~Tennyson, "Ulysses"

I am one those nerdy English teacher types who writes down quotes that appeal to me, and this is one I remember jotting down during my British Lit. course in college.

I thought of it today as I was "rusting unburnished" at my desk at work. My teaching hours are very few these days, (16/week) and even then, classes are cancelled all the time for every reason under the sun. It's as if instruction is the least important of all things at this school.

Friday my classroom is being used to vaccinate students for the H1N1 virus. "Will I be teaching them in their homerooms then?" I asked.

No, they will just use that time as self-study. Because cramming for the tests is far more important than anything I could teach them. Starting next week, the students are taking finals, which means I have a whole week of sitting at my desk doing...nothing.

I'm hoping for a University teaching job in Japan, because at least then, students are over the mad testing phase of their lives and can focus on applicable skills like, I don't know, speaking?

Like Ulysses, I'm getting restless. I have too much time sitting at my desk instead of teaching. There's only so much Facebook stalking one can do before one's brain starts to turn to mush.

I hate this. I like feeling useful. Instead I feel like a waste of space.