In my awesome graduate-level pedagogy course (or “touchy feely teaching class,” as some of my classmates and colleagues have deemed it), we have discussed the value of posing “essential questions” to our students and to ourselves at the onset of a new quarter. I mentioned to my small group last week that I wish I could focus my teaching enough to have essential questions for each week of my English 101 course; this was met with mixed responses, since I guess it could get a little overwhelming at times. But wouldn’t it be nice to know each week exactly what was on your mental plate?
I’ve created some essential questions for my weekend—things I’m pondering at the moment:
1. How can I, an almost-24 woman, tell a guy (or anyone) I like his/her shirt without being told that I’m hitting on that person? I was in Miller Market, the currently-mobilized quick-stop food location near the Humanities building*, the other day when I saw an undergrad wearing a tshirt for a video game I like. It featured incredibly easy to spot images from the game’s cover art, and I instantly wanted to tell him I thought it was awesome. No harm, no lustful thoughts—just niceness! Because I like to be told nice things by strangers, and I assume others do, too.
As I was walking out with my overpriced pb&j, I said “I like your shirt” with a benign smile. This is when Chris, who was on this excursion with me, said something to effect of “hitting on random dudes?” Now, Chris and I are extremely critical of each other, so I took it with a grain of salt, but I, in my awful high-pitched voice that I slip into when being defensive, squealed that it was in NO way a gesture of attraction. Just pleasantries. I need others’ opinions on this…can someone compliment another person’s shirt in passing without it being indicative of some seedy subtext?
2. Why do I love the screaming, damned-souls-of-hell noise the produce section sprinklers make at Haggen? Seriously, it sounds like something from a bad movie. I will take extra time to peruse and poke the avocados in hopes of hearing that terrifying noise. I always laugh a little, but the very serious shoppers never join me.
3. Why does the church on Cornwall have “SHOW ME STATE” on their announcement board outside? For non-Missourians, this is the unofficial** state motto of Missouri. I would get it if there was some clever-ish connection to religion… “SHOW ME JESUS” or something. Well, I guess that wasn’t clever. But what could is possibly mean? Maybe cryptic messages are part of some plan to get more people talking about their church. Hmm…
4. How are cats so bad-ass? Luna just spent the last 30 minutes head-bobbingly following some bug around the room. A minute ago, she flew across my keyboard (I erased the “xxlsssksgjlkllll” that she wrote you all) and caught a mosquito! I was proud of her until she ate it. But she’s still very pleased with herself and laying at my feet staring at the spot where it met its doom.
5. Why am I so in love with the unnecessary tea cups I bought? (featured above)
So, my question to you all is: What are your essential questions for this weekend? Or for this upcoming week? Or for today?
*for my non-WWU friends
**I swear every child in MO is told this is the “official” motto. But Wikipedia claims it’s unofficial. Learn something new every day.
