So many things were flying around in my head at once that I had a hard time answering her.  I didn't really know what to say.  What I wanted to say—the truth—was different from what I could or should tell her.  What I wanted to tell her was that I wasn't interested in teaching composition, it was just what was available to me in this situation, was what I "had" to teach and that I wasn't really enjoying it; that in ten years I would be no where near the university, that what I really wanted to do was write and be a mom; and that it wasn't such a stretch for me to imagine my last CO150 class because if my instincts about it were right, she would be there to hear for herself what I would have to say on that day.

What I actually told her was that I had considered teaching high school and was going to get an M.A.T., but changed my mind and decided that I wanted to teach at the college level (which didn't really answer her question about the specific subject); that I hoped in 10 years that I could say I had something published, maybe even be writing "for a living" and have kids (all true, but I avoided saying anything about teaching); and that if it were my last class, I would probably have them do some more fundamentally creative writing, stress how all writing is creative and how important it is to have a voice, to discover it for one's self—things that I admitted to her probably would have less to do with composition than with the process of writing and becoming a confident person.

© Salahub 2003