most of my time these days is spent seated, facing a computer screen, trying to come up with something at least moderately interesting to say. it doesn't even have to be imporant, at least that is the feeling i have at this point. sometimes things have to be done well, and that was the case for the visa application i have been putting together in a group effort of endless papers, processes, etc. now that process seems to be pretty much complete on my end, except for the waiting. yes, there is waiting involved. but i guess keeping my head wrapped in the tasks at hand help to keep it from being wrapped and soffocated by waiting, by the void.

so then back to the papers, well, in part. because my day wouldn't be complete without a few calls back and forth from the Netherlands on skype. beautiful woman that one who is managing through an unexpected period in her birth-nation. the reading and writing brings me joy, just never at the pace that the university seems to request, it is as if they have manage to turn education into a training ground for consumption and turn around: one work, then next, and the next... yes, i realize education has always been a certain way, but they are teaching and we are learning, all in a world with significantly more noise that the world where they studied and their professors taught. it also seems as if the process itself, the machanization of education has managed to lower the value of each class, because (as teachers know, as do some others) failing a student is simply not possible. their parents will complain, you will have to defend the fact that they failed, and the process continues until you leave education to make a little more money with a little less stress. that's what you want out of education, right?

there is a book that i have been meaning to read for the longest time now, by a relative of the late Miguel de Delibes. the title roughly lends this feeling, in quotes because of the idea of paraphrasing: "the loss of common sense in education".

if the administrators and (i should be careful not to include all) the faculty of upper education have lost common sense, they there is little to no hope that the teachers that are born from that process become teachers that pass on common sense, and so on. the idea that common sense is passed really has to do with the ability to critically think and develop immediate and natural processes to approach a given situation. just as in writing: if you cannot write, it is difficult to teach writing, or math, if you cannot solve the equation, how are you going to help others find the solution to the ecuation. of course, there are always the parents that can save the children from the hopeless loss of common sense, but when both parents are born of similar situations and both have to work, where are the necesary continual interactions needed to internalize social interaction that at least borders on responsible and intelligent? daycare? where you pay to have someone exchange a system of "knowledges" with your child, community and assistance that must be bought.

ah hell, let's get to some writing. Adrienne, ik hou van je.