Undecided

Undecided is the end-of-the-semester collection of writings from the Creative Writing Class I’d lobbied for, which was created in time for half my senior year, and which, I was told, didn’t last beyond that. Too bad. The class was taught by Amy Glazer Connolly, the drama teacher. (What she’s up to now.) She was a lousy teacher, I thought. I remember comforting one of the sweetest girls in the senior class when Amy made her cry. Amy didn’t think much of my acting when I was taking her drama classes – I remember she tried to talk me into cutting my hair for a one-act, using the example of Vanessa Redgrave who’d shaved her head for Playing for Time, a movie in which Redgrave's character performed music for the Nazis at one of the death camps.

Amy was a teacher who had pets, the student(s) who could do no wrong. Everybody else got short shrift.

When I heard who’d been signed to teach the Creative Writing Class I almost didn’t take it. Amy didn’t have many ideas for the class, was impatient with students, and would often ignore us and conduct drama business. I became a sort of assistant teacher. I remember one time a student went to Amy for help and Amy, busy with some drama thing, waved the student off with, “Go talk to Glenn.”

I’d become her pet. Having been on her shit list in drama class, being her pet, I discovered, was much easier but rather creepy. I was glad enough to become a sort of assistant teacher because I thought at least I cared about the topic and listened and tried.

Of my own work in Undecided -- a short story, a couple poems and prose poems – there is one I still like, “The Man in the Pinstriped Suit”. I’ll probably post it over at the LuvSet blog for revision.