2 More To Go…
February 15, 2003
Here I am, in booth 479, waiting for an intermediate student to show up for a vocabulary lesson about The Media. It’s four minutes into the lesson and no trace of him has surfaced. Maybe though, I will hear the static-like crackling of background noise that always precedes the student’s entrance.
The event horizon is about seven or eight minutes. If they don’t show up within this time, chances are they won’t show up at all. Before this time though, no light can escape the fact that they might pop up and force you to teach.
It is eight minutes and 30 seconds… NOW!
I’m in the pseudo-safe zone but still I fear. I fear he will break the intensive statistical analysis done by me and other’s before me. This set of vocabulary lessons, for example, has a 10% no-show rate. This rule of thumb has held true for me. In fact, my numbers have even outperformed the norm.
11 minutes…
I breathe a heavy sigh. It’s too late to do a complete lesson for most students now. By rational logic, this student would not come because he doesn’t want an unfinished lesson. Yet I have learned that our world isn’t always rational and logical.
15 minutes…
“Don’t be an idiot,” my brain whispers, “Don’t let your guard down just yet.” Others before have gone mad when their student(s) show up at this point. Even normal curves provide room for outliers. Judging by his profile, he doesn’t quite fit in the area between 2, maybe even 3 standard deviations.
20 minutes…
I’m half through now. Luck or fate has helped me this far. Please don’t forsake me now. Many a teacher have been abandonned by Prima Donna Luck. In their valiant crusade to secure the coveted Three-Way-No-Show, it’s when all 3 students don’t show up, one student will almost inevitably show up. I myself only have had a 7 minute, Three-Way-No-Show. I almost tasted divinity. We have all heard the legends of the forefathers who have felt this glory. The new and therefore naive young ones look forward to one every new day. I personally have gone beyond despair for one. No. Not for me. Not today.
25 minutes…
I begin to see a small, white light at the end of this proverbial tunnel. I’m on the home stretch now but it has been known that shit can happen. They could show up. They have the ability to do so. They paid for this right, this right to torment us. Fire feels like the finest down and brimstone tastes like the sweetest fruit compared to this anxiety, nay, this agony of The Wait.
30 minutes…
The naive would’ve taken off their headsets: our lance and shield at this point. Not I. I have fought off enough foes to know that they attack when you are weakest. These naive fools would be surprise-attacked. They will scramble to equip their lance and shield as the cunning foe launches waves and waves of broken English.
35 minutes…
I’m taking a big risk. I checked off the no-show box. It’s equivalent to planting your flag in the enemy’s backyard. They could show up now and you’d have to unplant your flag and uncheck the box like the coward and fool you are. It takes balls to check it now. Only a few minutes remain. The light in the tunnel is filling most of the darkness.
40 minutes…
The familiar bell sounds. It trumpets a triumph that will ring for all evening. I had a No-Show. Score one for the white knights.
—
Thus is the life of an English teacher.
