Counselling vs. occult violence
Monday, October 7th, 2002 12:37 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
robinturnerNalan and I have spent most of our weekend counselling people. One relative who's been unhappily married for about forty years, another who is going through the normal traumas of getting married, and an Albanian friend with visa problems. It gives that warm glow of having done one's duty, but it's bloody wearing, especially since I was planning to spend this weekend planning lessons and brushing up a paper for submission.
It occurred to me that I am much less interested in other people's social and psychological problems than I used to be. Watching Angel tonight, I felt jealous. If I'm going to deal with other people's problems, I want the kind where some nice young woman is being harrassed by a demon/vampire/ex-boyfriend, turn up in my cool black outfit, knock the malefactor into another dimension then go back to my office before the sun rises. That's the kind of counselling I could get into. Picture the scene ...
Professor Solri is sitting in an organic leather armchair in his office, lazily perusing a copy of the "Clavicula Solomonis". Enter a suitably distraught student.
STUDENT: Professor Solri, I'm so sorry I didn't hand in my paper.
SOLRI: Hmmm. If you can give me a good excuse, I won't consign you to an alternate reality where you will suffer excruciating pain for a subjective eternity.
STUDENT: Well, you see, I really wanted to write the paper, because your classes are so intellectually stimulating.
SOLRI (mollified): Flattery will get you nowhere, though it might raise your grade to a C-.
STUDENT: You see, it's my boyfriend - well, I mean my ex-boyfriend. Whenever I try to study for your course - which I must say is the most valuable experience in my life so far - he starts hassling me.
SOLRI (in analytic philosophy mode): What precisely do you mean by "hassling"? Can't we be a bit more rigorous here?
STUDENT: Well, er, he draws pentagrams on my door and leaves dead chickens around the place.
SOLRI: Don't worry, my dear. Give me his dorm number. I'll go round, rip his belly open and suspend him from the window by his intestines.
STUDENT: Oh, thank you, Professor! I knew I could count on you, and by the way, I thought your last paper on postmodern demonology was particularly brilliant!
It occurred to me that I am much less interested in other people's social and psychological problems than I used to be. Watching Angel tonight, I felt jealous. If I'm going to deal with other people's problems, I want the kind where some nice young woman is being harrassed by a demon/vampire/ex-boyfriend, turn up in my cool black outfit, knock the malefactor into another dimension then go back to my office before the sun rises. That's the kind of counselling I could get into. Picture the scene ...
Professor Solri is sitting in an organic leather armchair in his office, lazily perusing a copy of the "Clavicula Solomonis". Enter a suitably distraught student.
STUDENT: Professor Solri, I'm so sorry I didn't hand in my paper.
SOLRI: Hmmm. If you can give me a good excuse, I won't consign you to an alternate reality where you will suffer excruciating pain for a subjective eternity.
STUDENT: Well, you see, I really wanted to write the paper, because your classes are so intellectually stimulating.
SOLRI (mollified): Flattery will get you nowhere, though it might raise your grade to a C-.
STUDENT: You see, it's my boyfriend - well, I mean my ex-boyfriend. Whenever I try to study for your course - which I must say is the most valuable experience in my life so far - he starts hassling me.
SOLRI (in analytic philosophy mode): What precisely do you mean by "hassling"? Can't we be a bit more rigorous here?
STUDENT: Well, er, he draws pentagrams on my door and leaves dead chickens around the place.
SOLRI: Don't worry, my dear. Give me his dorm number. I'll go round, rip his belly open and suspend him from the window by his intestines.
STUDENT: Oh, thank you, Professor! I knew I could count on you, and by the way, I thought your last paper on postmodern demonology was particularly brilliant!
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no subject
Date: 2002-10-06 04:42 pm (UTC)that sounds like my entire college experience up til now.
maybe you should teach at bennington?
My favourite profeessor writes about demonds and satan etc for a living. I really do say those things to him. er, aside from the psycho ex bf.
hmm..
Maybe you are my professor? in a dream-life?!
no subject
Date: 2002-10-07 03:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2002-10-06 08:28 pm (UTC)