I had a particularly difficult morning class this semester. Attendance, strangely, was not an issue. The students showed. But the attendance was incredible given the appearance of the students. They were pale, green, blue. Eyes not shut were bloodshot. Some, I swore, had dragged themselves from caskets.
Over the semester I made limited educational headway. But on the semester’s second to last class, I encountered accidental success.
It was a rainy morning. I got a later start than usual. Along the route, construction work slowed traffic to a limp. After some waiting and a detour, I arrived on campus and found parking far from the building where I taught. I was, at this point, ten minutes late.
As I, at last, approached my destination, I saw what I’d expected: a handful of intrepid scholars furtively fleeing the premises. But there was a notable difference in these scholars: a lightness in their steps, blood freely circulating in their faces. As soon as they spotted me, they laughed and shouted in exclamation. One student, whose face I had thought to be hewn of stone, smiled. There might have been a curse word or two, but no sighs were sounded.
The class that followed, while shorter, was surer on its feet. There was energy, attention, the rudiments of enthusiasm. Thrown off my lesson plan, I risked more. Students responded.
“I should be late more often,” I joked.
The challenge, of course, is doing the same without being late, and doing it on purpose.