Not-Teacher's Day

I suppose I eventually had to face up to this fact. Today, a year and a half after the machine stopped me, I am no longer fulfilling my former ecological role. In the ecology of society, there are places for the 'mass ability developers' known as teachers, and I'm not one of those anymore.

But in some sense, I have migrated to another niche in the ecology. I'm now a 'force multiplier', able to leap tall buildings at a single bound work diligently on 1-6 (or as some of my friends would say, d6) students and produce massive non-linear improvements. It's a specialised niche; I now earn a hundred times more per student per hour than I used to.

In fact, it's a lot like a medical doctor chained to the wheel of existence in a busy general hospital who, after many a summer spent not taking a holiday, suddenly decides to go into private practice. Then, serendipitously, he discovers that many of his former patients have decided to either continue having him for specialist care or recommend him to their friends.

Of course, there's still a sense of loss; there's a sense of being out of the bustle of things. It's not a big loss though, although I miss interacting with the huge and wonderful variety of patients students I used to see. I miss the classroom quite badly. But I'm no longer there.

Today is therefore Not-Teacher's Day for me. :(