St. John's College, in Annapolis, Maryland, (the Great Books School) taught me that I did not know how to listen.
Always a diligent student, I went to the required, very formal lecture every Friday night and no matter how I vowed to follow the speaker from start to finish, it would never last long, my mind wandering hither and to, about this and that, until the speaker's voice, laughter, clapping, or sudden silence would interrupt my
tangential reveries.
I found it a horrifying revelation, covering my lapses by bobbing my head, laughing, applauding when the others did.
I did the same thing as a child, watching my two older sisters for when to do what, how to look, what to say to avoid the minefields in the land of Oz.
I made a vow to learn to listen, and have practiced, making great strides over the past 30+ years.
I still prefer reading to listening, and writing to speaking because no matter where I go, I can come back and be where I left off, and, I can locate at what point the words became gloss and fodder and read again until I understand.
I still fidget or fall asleep in the time in takes to watch a whole movie.
It has taken me five decades to identify that it is almost impossible to repeat a conversation verbatim, remembering only what I took away.
I also finally realized how often I hear the musicality of speech over the meaning of individual words. I've heard whole forests and not one tree, loved songs my whole life without knowing a single word except in the chorus.
Words can become linked in my head so that I don't recognise the meaning of either word. While my vocabulary included the words "fatally" and "killed," I didn't understand the joke of "Fatally Killed" in a journalism class devoted to headlines until hours later, when I could see the words floating up from my memory.
To this day, I approximate what I think I've heard, the same little girl who was accused of being cheeky when she said "President," instead of "Present" at Bible School roll call, and makes people laugh at her inventive variations of their names. Whether they think I am cheeky or clever, it is usually neither. It is usually quite unintentional.
During my St. John's era, where we had required bi-weekly seminars to discuss our reading, I realized I did not know how to communicate my ideas to others effectively, speaking instead in leaps and bounds that no one else could follow. I was also stricken by nauseating fear when I thought about talking.
The same night Mortimer Adler was carried off the St. John's auditorium stage mid-lecture by a representative of the prankster-loving Junior class, (creating absolute outrage and scandal), he roared at us for presuming we could even hope to understand the Great Books at our tender ages, admonishing us to consider this only the beginning, that learning was a life-long pursuit in our own hands, that the Great Books are great because they will speak to you differently according to who you are when you read them, and that we should never consider our education to be done.
While he seemed crusty and salty, and the last person you would want to carry off stage in a gorilla suit, Mortimer Adler spoke to me that scandalous night and I listened.
I have also learned to accept my way of doing things, using skills I do have, and channeling my quirks to work for me. I think these things are the reason I can write songs, and why I have been compelled to write.
My inner librarian has guided me to seek order within chaos and sparked my interest in how information is grouped and retrieved, for knowledge is power and books make free men.
No comments:
Post a Comment