The Smart Young Student

Then a student came up to Him and said, “Teacher, what must I do to get an A?”

And the Teacher said, “Now you want to know? Now you care — and you think I can help? Look, to get an ‘A’ just do the things that get an A: think critically, run the spell-check, yes, you need a thesis. Do these things and you will get an ‘A’.”

The student replied, “I have done all these things since, like, elementary school! I was in honors classes — I was in AP. I do these all the time. Am I missing anything?”

The Teacher said, “Yes. To write the perfect essay you must give yourself fully to the words — cut out everything else (even some of the words), dive in, focus entirely on this new way of writing. Maybe even some tutoring you can do, with all that lifelong knowing you’re about to shed. Then be right there, with me, and follow.”

When the student heard this he went away bummed because he was involved in a ton of extra-curricular activities and had a study group to get to, and figured he could just pull an all-nighter to get ready for the final.

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent

Coyotes and Christians

I am not saying Christians are like coyotes. [For that, some could cut caustically to coyotes are like Christians — tricksters, roaming in the dark, feeding on the dead … ] Simply noticed — somewhat in passing, as it’s said, having attained, apparently … achieved? … some kind of state where nearly anything I hear,

Read More »

And Did Dostoevsky Say ‘Beauty Will Save’

Short answer: he did not. Neither did Prince Myshkin, that we know of. Likely both believed it. Beauty — in the person of Christ — will do so. And clearly D wrote of M in The Idiot to explore art and beauty and ugliness and salvation. But did he say it, and did he believe that

Read More »

What I Recalled Watching Netflix

[Television is educational.]   One Saying the same stuff over and over looks like you have different things to say. Two If you’re ever in a below-average film or streaming series, and you beat the tar out of a guy, in a house, and you gaze down in both some shock as also a certain

Read More »

Seeking the King

A line everywhere misattributed to Chesterton reads thus: The young man who rings the bell at the brothel is unconsciously looking for God. This line is not from the great [several senses of the word] man who recently celebrated his 150th birthday, but the mid-century most unmodern novelist Bruce Marshall. The words — which do

Read More »

Random

For M

The great story is the search by the lover for the beloved. I love M. I am in love with M. [angry as well; in love and in pain, simul.] To love as Christ loves. (ask, seek, knock). God pursues. Christ stands. Spirit groans. I am he. I seek her even if she will not

Read More »

Forget What?

Today is the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks. Poking around, I found this short item, from the Fictional Newswire New York (FN) — Eleven years after the World Trade Center attacks here in September 2001, most haven’t forgotten … they just don’t know why they were supposed to remember. “Uh, I’m pretty

Read More »

Nothing in Common

. [you are not here]   It’s not going to be easy. Thinking of nothing takes longer than one might expect. [In]famously ‘a show about nothing’ Seinfeld ’twas really about nothingness. Nothingness is nihilism and is to the nothing of creation as ‘a live coal dropped in the sea‘. Ours is the God whose ‘strength is

Read More »

The Walmart Fairy

Want to know when you can be sure the economy is in the turlet? It’s when even Walmart’s not hiring. According to this item, the company has hired essentially nobody for the last six years. Nobody says it’s since the bankers ripped us off again and the government let them, and all the oceans stopped

Read More »

Related

Giant in the Land

Dallas Willard revised his affairs yesterday, moving to the headquarters of the Kingdom of the Heavens to live slightly nearer to God, whom he spoke of, served, embodied. The life he continues to live today. Unceasingly infused, this life was and is. For these ideas and Our Lord were everywhere in what Dr. Willard said

Read More »

All You Can Eat Adultery

I get all the adultery I want. It’s true. Ask Michele. Thing is, I don’t want any. You may have guessed this, but others may have thought Wha — ? Aye, and there is the (naked back) rub. I don’t want any adultery because I love my wife. This is true, and it’s the main,

Read More »

Burning and Bleeding

Of mercy’s fire and blood Mercy burns, wrote Mary Flannery O’Connor, by which she meant … well, let’s think on it for a minute or so, before we say. For we have ideas of mercy, several actually, and we must discard them all the time, and destroy them if can, as quickly as supernaturally possible.  One

Read More »

What Price Anger

Anger cost small for years then nearly all. Like decades of tossing nickels and dimes in a 5-gallon water bottle until it can’t be carried anymore not even to the Coinstar or your credit union and if you tried you’d hurt something and badly … or the plastic o’er time has degraded and the bottle

Read More »