The Professor

When I was at the more-intellectual-than-thou college in New Hampshire, I had a professor there named Dr. Arnault. He was awesome and I had a heart-wrenching, weak-kneed, school-girl crush on him despite his gray hair, beautiful wife, and seven children.

He was a tough grader of my papers, but a C with a compliment was worth more than an A from any other professor I have had before or since. And he was so cool. It's hard to explain his coolness, but I'll give it a shot. You know how when you are about 18 or 19, you tend not to have much of an intellectual sense of humor? Sure you can drink and laugh it up, but it was really hard (at least for me) to write anything amusing, and almost impossible to read anything amusing and get the joke. (Aside: I'm pretty sure I'm not alone in this.)

We were doing a class on William Faulkner whom I considered not funny at best, and horribly depressing at worst. It was hard for me as an 18 year old to see any humor at all in Faulkner. But when Dr. Arnault would read exerpts aloud in class he'd start chuckling at something then start laughing so hard he had to wipe his eyes. And suddenly, instead of depressing, Faulkner became 4 dimensional. So I credit Dr. Arnault pointing out the humor in literature (which I have always taken waaaaaaay too seriously).

One of my proudest moments came at lunch one day. A group of professors plopped themselves down at our table and asked us how we were enjoying The Great Gatsby which we were studying at the time. Everyone else started toadying up and saying how much they liked it and pointing out metaphors and all of the rest of the idiocy that comes when people try to prove their intelligence.

When I got a chance to speak up, I said it was alright, but I thought it was kind of overrated. I told them I hadn't read the book previously and it had always been built up to be this masterpiece, but upon reading it, it seemed a little dull.

I wasn't saying any of this to be different or to stand out. I rarely do things like that. I know it may not seem that way, but you'll just have to take my word for it. Anyway, it was my honest opinion. Dr. Arnault nodded his head and said something along the lines of, "I feel the same way. It's alright, but it's not the masterpiece it's cracked up to be."

For Dr. Arnault to agree with you was, among the students, the undisputed intellectual feather in one's cap - the holy grail, if you will. As long as enough people heard about it, it could cement your reputation as an intellectual contender, at least at that college.

I fully and freely admit that I was not and am not any kind of intellectual powerhouse. If I were to define myself in the intellectual sense, I would say that I was quirky with just enough edge to be mildly interesting. Not the stuff of genius exactly, but it's as much as I have a right to expect.

What I'm long-windedly boiling down to is that I'm not going to finish college. I could, but I won't. It is really depressing to me because I wish I could set a good example for the girls. But I won't go back to school on principle. It is too expensive, and any degree I'd get wouldn't amount to JACK SQUAT.