today was tooooo fuuuuny. I just met with my professor--the one with whom I've been having odd issues—the latest one being contesting a grade on a paper at the departmental level. My conversations with administrators apparently got him a serious reprimand.
As a pre-emption to any further funny business, I finished my last assignment several days early and was meeting with him to hand back a revision of it. But I also asked for suggestions on how to be a better student.
As soon as I finished asking the question, he ducked his head--I think he found it both funny and aggrivating. He was real earnest throughout most of the conversation. He was also majorily pissed as I had challenged him both in and out of class.
Overall, he was rather gentle though in his criticism. I thought he was rather irrational in some of his anger. It made no sense regarding the particular assignment we were discussing. He thought I implied that I thought he was too stupid to understand my paper. I said I just thought that he was unwilling, not unable. He repeated several times that he did not question my intelligence. I found those statements amusing. Academics find intelligence compliments impossible to dole out. He had at first tried to invalidate my thesis on grounds he now admitted as unfair.
Still, he clung to his original decision about my paper. He started quoting some of our e-mail exchanges to prove his points. I contested his reasoning. He got even more angry and said that he always thought I had to have a comeback. He got REALLY pissed off. He seemed rather nervous and angry at the same time. He fidgeted with his hands a good bit during the conversation and his hands did not seem completely steady. I've noticed that teachers when they get really nervous have a hard time keeping their hands still.
I on the other hand was placid most of the time. My eyes were open wide and I tried to look as receptive as possible. We stared each other down several times. I did so with no aggression.
I gave an explanation to most of his questions. He did not really buy it although I thought that a part of him wanted to badly.
He said that he had no idea what my psychological motivations could be behind all my actions. So he verbalized that a separate agenda drove this whole situation---that I thought was hilarity number one.
I then matched my explanation to all of my actions—a desire to learn and to make sure that my work was judged without bias. I mentioned other instances where I had been penalized for not looking out for this latter ahead of time. I also said that I did not speak up for its sheer sake but because I valued forthrightness.
He ultimately--in his anger—nearly yelled that I should just take his word at face value because he is the professor regardless of the context. That was the centerpiece of his argument and hilarity number two. At that point, I fully understood just how uneasy he felt around me. My “challenges” to him seem to actually threaten him.
From the moment he first saw me in class, to our first chat outside of class, to pretty much every meeting henceforth—I saw in him a sense of tremendous admiration for me accompanied by a sort of fear in him which included the dread that I might become privy to these feelings. He is an incredibly--and I emphasize--incredibly sensitive man.
However, many times in class he expressed uneasiness about his masculinity and made obvious comments in class and in conversation that reflected this. I suspect authority is a serious component of this issue.
Oddly enough he brought attention to my multiple requests to meet with him for office hours. I thought the observation was very odd. It matched however his incredibly suspicious look he gave me each time I tried to schedule these meetings. I found his reactions altogether weird because they were always on campus and at public locations.
At one point, he looked into my eyes intensely--but with only one eye--a half turned look I interpreted as defensiveness. He tried to get past my apparently serene demeanor and then suddenly his look turned jocular. As it did so, he searched to see if I would reciprocate.
The issue at stake was my sexuality. I felt that he wanted to shame it somehow yet feared giving himself away if he tried too hard to point it out. I did not react to his elicitation. I think in retrospect that perhaps he didn’t mean to shame but instead to covertly and vicariously participate in it by acknowledging the sexual tension. However, the covert part I took as a desire to shame. Why not just be fucken explicit?
In class, I remember, one time one of the female students made a very pointed joke at his sexuality. She cracked the joke while in a small group conversation. When she hit the punch-line, he immediately dropped his face and just as quickly shot me a very nervous and fearful look. All I could think at that moment was, Who does he think he’s fooling other than just himself?
After his outburst, I apologized for any wrong actions and consequent antagonization. He took some of that to heart. We started to part ways but he felt that something must have been missing because he did not seem to be able to leave. I grabbed my bag but he kept trying to move the conversation forward. I put my water away and still he kept trying to add a point but only repeated "well, then… well, then… well, then".
I stood up, and so did he. He mentioned that I was done with school. I told him my plans and he said that they were interesting. He seemed very confused. He did not know what to do or say.
Finally, I just extended my hand. We exchanged hand-shakes, but as we did, he turned his body to one side. Suddenly, his gaurd came down and some of his confusion turned to openness and perhaps even some admiration—again. I think he turned to one side out of defense.
I was happy with the way the meeting went and I smiled. But my smile came out differently than I had expected--all these feelings of knowing all these issues within him came to the surface and suffused my smile and then my eyes twinkled with this latent knowledge. I quickly recognized the smile--I had been able most clearly to recognize it from my Billy Budd during the Fall semester.
The professor’s mouth slightly dropped open in shock as he did not expect this reaction from me. It was perhaps the first time I had broken out of the naïve student act and actually decided to hint that I knew what was up. I immediately broke away and walked.
Analysis
I found out midway through the course that he has a girlfriend who also works at school. Several odd variables pervade their relationship however and might serve to question the validity of their bond. Of course, that can be said for many relationships. No doubt however his sexuality was complicated.
Having someone be attracted to me often works to my benefit. I have landed jobs, gotten phat free dinners, and been exposed to some awesome sectors of society. At the same time, I've gotten fired, cheated, denied service, and back-stabbed by good&best friends all for the same fucken reason.
Often I used to think that having someone be attracted to me could only be a positive occurence. EEEEGAAAAAHD was I wrong! This belief assumes that the other person finds their attraction towards me desireable. What the hell happens when someone hates, detests, finds contemptible, abhors that attraction??? My answer is that the situation goes nuclear--its a game as to who will strike first. Will they find a way to get at me for it or will I misinterpret the whole situation and spite them first?
I don't think this professor wanted to have this attraction. It disgruntled his paradigm of himself. I had the same thing happen with the boss with whom I fell in love. He had a life he loved and it all centered around his heterosexuality. I would not have believed it had I not heard it from the horse's mouth. He found my company as arousing as I found his---but it did not eliminate the fact that his other life depended on him denying those desires.
Whether its for internally inconsistent reasons, or whether as a result of previous commitments---attraction can be the biggest bitch.
No comments:
Post a Comment