Thursday, November 16, 2006

I give up

I hate giving up, especially on educational things.  I LOVE learning, I love taking classes, I love going to class and turning in assignments. 
What I currently DO NOT love is my teacher. 
I attempted to get over the fact that she gave no constructive criticism on what I first turned in.  It was bad, I was heading in the wrong direction and I knew it.  I can even forgive her for what she said last night.  Yes, my main character is boring at first.  Heck the whole piece might turn out boring.  I have yet to get past the first draft so I am not that worried about it just yet.  I’ll fix it later.  If I can’t fix it, well then I can’t fix it. 
What I CANNOT forgive is the story she told last night.  It went something like this (I’m going to write what she said from her point of view…)
“So I was doing some research on a novel and I decided I needed to visit and Indian Reservation.  My husband and I went to visit the Quinalt Indians because they are fairly close.  Anyway (blah blah she went on about the weather and scenery for awhile) and then my husband and I were talking to one of them.  And he decided to tell us this story about how he saw Big Foot by the side of the road one day.  I was so shocked, how could anyone believe in something like that?  And I asked him, I literally asked him ‘what were you smoking?’ and he said, ‘Nothing.  I do not smoke or drink.’ Well I just couldn’t believe it.
Later I met with the Cultural Director and told her that I’d like to include this story in my novel but I wasn’t sure if that would be proper.  The director said, ‘Why not include it?’ Well I said, “Because 99% of the world doesn’t believe in big foot.’ And she said, ‘That’s because they have never seen him.’ Can you believe that?”
That’s what did it for me.  That’s what finally made up my mind.  Not only did she call them Indians in a degrading manner, she had the gall to stand in front of the class and question their beliefs.  Seriously, what kind of writer does that?  I wanted to ask her if she believed in God, because as far as I could tell no one had ever sighted him. 
Instead I seethed and couldn’t wait to get out of the class.  I’ll probably keep going till the end of the quarter, because I am like that.  But no more after this.  I have better ways to spend my time.