Pat,

Again your corrosive insights force me to reveal something to the Forum and, this time, no kidding around.

I was a teacher: A teacher of the most feared and despised of all academic subjects, from Freshmen to Grad Students. The best I can say about the quality of my classroom performance over the decades, the best spin I can put on my ability as a teacher is this:

I sucked.

And I have the evidence to prove it in the form of decades of SET (student evaluation of teaching) questionnaires. I was like a bad stand-up comic forced to work at the same crummy club, night after night, to an audience of a handful of Teamsters. The only difference between them and the classroom was that the Teamsters would have thrown things at the stage. The kids merely passed out on their desks, or collapsed into the aisle after a night of too much partying.

I had mentioned that I had learned maybe three or four things in life and here is a second: It isn't possible to thrive in a career that you're no good at. You can try, but in the end it will be highly unpleasant, leave you without memories, and take a heavy toll on your health. When I retired prematurely in 2008, a doctor had told me that I had no choice but to retire.

My (no longer secret) reason for being in this Forum is its therapeutic value. Maybe I can crowd aside an empty past by showing folks what I consider "cool stuff" and not suck at it. What a concept!! Instead of the inert classroom - any questions? comments? nothing at all? (silence) - I get serious feedback, real questions, real answers. I think everyone has their own secret reason for being in the Forum, besides just singing a few notes. Here you have mine, and I never got around to addressing your main points. But I will. With thanks to you and all the members of this wonderful Forum,

Dean

PS The single downside of the Forum for me is that I don't get the time to do more listening and commenting. There's fabulous stuff going on here and I'm missing a lot of it. But I'm workin' on that.