this is the end

i'm watching my kids take a final now. there's still an hour fifteen to go. hopefully no one will take that long. we can hope. its snowing a lot out there, and i still have to walk across campus back to moore when this is all done. boo.

i haven't started grading the finals, but i have flipped through them, and i have one good (non-mocking) story thus far: there's one kid in my second class (which is always a fun, chatty group) that never, ever reads for class. he tells me so all the time. he's a smart kid, though... catches on quick, always has good criticisms of the arguments we discuss in class... but, since he doesn't read the material, his performance is always mediocre on tests and stuff. so anyway, like i said, my second group is real fun and chatty and i have a good rapport with almost all of them. so i always tease this guy in class about not reading, etc., and he always takes it well. last thursday, he started talking about how he wants to go to grad school. i told him that at some point he would have to start reading, cuz you can't coast through grad school. he didn't really believe me... or didn't want to believe me, and i told him that it made me sad that he never read, because he could do so good if he only went through the actual material... anyways, today they're taking the final, and after he turns his in i pick it up and flip through it. and this is what i found written on one question: since i don't know this answer, i just wanted to tell you that i'm sorry i depress you because i don't read and i don't do anything to my potential.

at first, this comment made me really sad. but now that i've been thinking about it, i think i'm not so much sad as surprised at the effect that comment must've had on him. i mean, four days later, to apologize (in an exam question) about how he's sorry to disappoint me? i can only hope that he actually takes it heart....

i'm waiting on three more kids to finish the exam. one of them is really fishing for answers. its getting to that point...

i should get back to my reading, now. i'm trying to come up with a good topic for one of my final metaphysics essays. i'm thinking about write on music as representation.... i just hope thats metaphysics-y enough. but dilworth normally isn't that picky... and he does love aesthetics... so here's hoping.