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MattBurkeSecondEssay 4 - 19 May 2015 - Main.MattBurke
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| | | I continued not knowing her point for nearly fifteen years until my first year as a high school teacher. I was in the office during a free period. I might as well claim to have been making copies or grading, but likely I was just hanging out because the office had air conditioning. A student entered. He’d just misbehaved—sworn at his geometry teacher. The principal was in a meeting, so the secretary instructed the student to wait. After a while, a senior teacher, who I’ll call Peterson, passed through the office. Peterson was something of a mentor to me then, and I watched to see if and how he would engage the student. | |
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< | I watched Peterson’s posture and expression as he deduced the student’s transgression from the student’s posture and expression. “Get into a fight with a teacher?” Peterson asked. The student nodded. Then the student explained: The teacher had mistakenly accused the student of another student’s misdeeds. Peterson gave the student a familiar speech about respect even when a teacher makes a mistake. The speech was right. I understood it, so did the student. But the student also held his justification close, the teacher was wrong, the student was right, and no speech would change that. | >
> | I watched Peterson’s posture and expression as he deduced the student’s transgression from the student’s posture and expression. “Get into a fight with a teacher?” Peterson asked. The student nodded. Then the student explained: The teacher had mistakenly accused the student of another student’s misdeeds. Peterson gave the student a familiar speech about respect even when a teacher makes a mistake. The speech was right. I understood it, so did the student. But the student also held his justification close, the geometry teacher was wrong, the student was right, and no speech would change that. | | | After Peterson left, I asked the student what he thought of his geometry teacher, the one at whom he’d cursed. He told me. I nodded and listened, but I didn’t reply. | | | I saw him again the next year. But this time, when he appeared in my class, he found his seat wordlessly. He seemed older. He raised his hand and answered correctly. After class, he stayed behind. I told him I was glad to see him. He was glad to be back. I asked him about his suspension. He didn’t reply. | |
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< | Then he asked me if believed in heaven. I said: “Why?” He said: “I don’t.” I didn’t reply. | >
> | He asked me if believed in heaven. I said: “Why?” He said: “I don’t.” I didn’t reply. | | | | |
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< | Then he asked me: “Is it okay to join a gang?” When I said "no," it missed the point. | >
> | Then he asked me: “Is it okay to join a gang?” I said, "no," but that missed the point. | | | Conclusion
I put the second anecdote in my law school personal statement. There, it was about society, about "social problems." I didn’t use the word “aporia” because it didn’t fit the tone, but the meaning would’ve been right. As to the first anecdote, this is the first time I’ve joined the two scenes that form it—the realization upon which I premised the story is one I had while writing it, not, as I claim, while experiencing it. Together they relocate the aporia I previously located in society into people—the desire for something from another that none can give.
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