Hi. It’s me. That guy who sits in the front row and does things that are completely disruptive, but which are sneaky enough that you can’t really bust me for them. I know what you’re thinking. “Did he really just whistle the first measure of ‘Pop Goes the Weasel' while I was having an enriching and animated discussion with a student in the back row?” Why yes, I did. And for the record, I really do sing songs under my breath when you aren’t looking, giggle for no apparent reason, and on my best days, stare at your wardrobe in a way that is bound to make you uncomfortable.
Why do you let me get away with it? I rely on your integrity as a teacher. I know that you’d rather spend quality time with the rest of the class while I clown around and make you feel flustered, helpless and angry than confront me directly and openly. In a way, it’s like vandalism or road rage. Your inability to think like me renders me invisible in your class.
You have trouble considering me even to be of the same species as you because I do things that violate every rule of politeness and decorum that you know of. You plan, and plot, and render yourself apoplectic thinking about what you’ll do to me during class tomorrow—the “pre-class one-on-one” (ah, but I’ll be late that day) the “stop what you’re doing and shout me down” (but once you get up the nerve, I will have stopped and you’d look like an idiot) the “couched reference within a lecture to immature students who act in a certain way without direct confrontation” (which only validates my control over the class)—each of these will fail.
Why? I’m a sneaky little shit, and there’s not a damned thing you can do about it. I just thought I’d rub it in a bit more.
