The DN

GO THE DISTANCE!!!

1  Coincidences.

2  October.

3  I  taught Field of Dreams the past couple of weeks. In the story, the Voice tells the protagonist Ray Kinsella (Kevin Costner) "Go the Distance" towards the end of the picture.

 4  An alert student looked up and asked, "Mr. Harrington, what does he mean, 'Go the Distance'? "

5   I got my pitch. "It means, 'Finish pitching the game. Finish what you started. Meet your challenges.' "

6   I told that to each class. While finishing grading a bunch of papers Saturday night, I finally got to the last paper. It had been e-mailed to me. It was a personal narrative of sorts; the kids got to choose the topic from a list. He chose this prompt: "If you could be any animal in the world, what would you choose to be?"

7   He gave it a lot of thought and chose a lion. 

8   He researched lions, took notes, included citations, and then...

9   He procrastinated. It was obvious he went in with guns blazing, but the idea clearly lost its luster as the deadline approached. 

10  What he sent me was horribly rushed. It contained enormous mistakes all through, even changing the lion to a tiger in his last two paragraphs.

11  

12  I wrote a few more comments than I normally do because I saw his one percent inspiration. The kid had potential, but he turned it into a train wreck.

13   I couldn't hold back on alluding to the Voice. I wrote something like, "You are capable of so much more." I spaced down. Then I wrote, "Go the Distance."

14  It felt a bit corny, but I left it. Field of Dreams. First time I ever worked with it. As one student put it when James Earl Jones disappeared into the cornfield near the end of the movie, "Mr. H, this movie is pretty corny!"

15

16  I laughed. I was actually a bit slow on that one.

17  I finished grading and turned in. Grading papers can be exhausting. 
 
18   When I woke up, I set up for Sunday morning essay grading. This one is a marathon: I assigned three essays per student, turning my sun room into a magazine publishing office:  articles about Anime, teen stress, loss, social media,  drugs and make-up hung off table edges, televisions, pillows and lamps. Coffee cups stood on their heads, with spoons lying by their sides. Staples and eraser shreds streaked across a large folding table. It happens every October. 

19   Not gonna lie. I was already dreading another all-dayer.

20    I got a hot cup of coffee, sat on a wicker chair, stretched my knuckles, looked down at my keyboard and sighed. I stared bleary-eyed when these words materialized:

"...go the distance."

21  I work on a refurbished Dell XPS 14 Ultrabook.

22   The label in the lower left-hand corner says this:

"Designed to go the distance."

23    Coincidences.

24      October.

25      Needless to say my computer haunted me the entire day. Fonts kept changing size and form. Arial Large morphed into Times New Roman Small.

26   Letters jumped up or down lines. 

27   The usual.

28   I worked all through the afternoon and into the night, trying like hell to go the distance. 

29   I'd love to say I succeeded, but papers in the Fall seem to be like leaves descending on a driveway: they don't go away until after Thanksgiving.

30   Ah, my own fault. I want the lovelies to succeed. 

31   Remind me not to do that.

32   I gottago. 

33   I'll leave you with a little bit from Robert Frost:

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

34   Before I go, a couple of shout-outs:

To Jenny Valdez and John Torrey, congrats on your engagement! Sorry I missed the party, but a huge congrats from over in these parts.

To my daughter Caitlin for her success as a Day Of Wedding Coordinator yesterday. Her first, and word on the street is that it was a huge success. Proud of you sweetie!!!

And to our awesome San Francisco Giants: Go the Distance.

35   See you again.

36   Peace.

~H~