"I hope that my belated paper finds you with apathetic eyes."

Here in Meridian-land, this is Finals Week, the last week of the spring semester. My e-mail's inbox has been a veritable e-cornucopia of pleadings like the one serving as this post's title (though they usually show closer attention to word choice).
But here we are at the mid-point of Finals Week and, as usually happens with me at about this point, it's difficult to think of a more apt way of describing my eyes than "apathetic." I do indeed care how my students do here in the stretch--and they had better care, for that matter, what with their turning in research projects and revisions of previous papers and final exams. For the most part, I'm able to say that they do care; and (even better) many actually seem to have learned some little something about writing. But as I write this, my eyes ache with strain, yes, but also from the anticipation of have yet more reading ahead. My students are, for the most part, technically competent; stylists they are not. So: given what I've already had to read, I'm afraid the papers to come aren't going to get the sort of attention they usually get. Even the good ones, the engaging ones.
Such is the lot of an English teacher with a 5-course load. It is not a bad lot, by any means. It is merely a lot. And it will soon be over for the spring.

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