versectitude

Well, another summer has nearly flown by, and I'm no better a blogger than I was this time last year. Sigh. Some great things have happened this summer, however, and I want to get some of them down while I can still recall them. It'll happen piecemeal.

This past June, I was in Louisville, Kentucky spending my sixth (count them--six!) year scoring AP English Literature exams. I know what you must be thinking: "how do I get in on this gig?" Well, you have to be either a high school or college English instructor, and you have to be willing to give up the first week or so of June to sit in an overly-air-conditioned conference center and grade essays for eight hours a day.

My previous years as a reader were spent in Daytona Beach, which sounds glamorous unless you've actually been to Daytona during the first week of June. The only folks there that time of year are leathery beach bums and very pathetic frat boys who seem not to have gotten the memo as to where and when Spring Break was going to be. Daytona does have a fine beach (if you're into that sort of thing--I'm not much of a sand guy, myself), but the only other attractions include a Bubba Gump's and more souvenir shops (think alligator heads and Confederate flag-wear) than you could possibly imagine. OK, I'm sure there are other charms, and most of the people I hung out with really loved it there.

But moving the reading to Louisville was a step in the right direction, as far as I'm concerned. In Lousiville, there is a real downtown with some pretty good restaurants, museums (not just the Louisville Slugger one, but art museums, too), watering holes with many kinds of bourbon, several gay bars that stay open really late, and a view of the Colgate Factory across the river in Indiana. (It's cooler than it sounds.)

The real reason I keep returning to score essays for Educational Testing Services, however, is to see my same-time-next-year AP English Lit reading pals. For the past six years I've spent my birthday (June 5, in case you hadn't yet marked your calender) with these folks, and this year I turned the big Four-O with them. John even came out to meet them and celebrate this milestone with me. We had a party in my hotel room--a suite, in fact--and the hotel management was called up to tell us to keep it down. You know it's a party when party-pooping authority figures come a-knocking!

As far as the essays were concerned, there weren't near enough howlers this year. I was scoring the third essay or open question. Students were asked to choose a novel or play and discuss how a past decision played a pivotal role in a character's present state. In other words, choose a work with a character and a plot, and you've got it made. By the end of the reading, I felt certain I never wanted to even think about The Great Gatsby, Death of a Salesman, or Beloved. Ever. Again.

There were a couple of bright moments, however, and I'm happy to share them with you.

Here are some of the most interesting coinages I came across:

poingrent
peripety
vermit
versectitude

and--I kid you not--Se la V.

I read about the "great ball and chain of being," and discovered that The Great Gatsby was, in fact, written by Ella Scott Fitzgerald. I also encountered examples of insightful character analysis, such as, "Lady MacBeth wasn't very nice at all," and "As a young man, Gatsby was not well endowed."

But the prize for most entertaining response goes to the poor young writer whose essay was comprised entirely of this observation:

"I've only read one work on this list. A Streetcar Named Desire. I think it's a kind of Volkswagon."

Mock me and my choice of summer activities if you must, but really, folks, you can't find this stuff on the Comedy Channel. And I haven't even told you about the cafeteria food we're served thrice daily.

Stay tuned for my harrowing tale of the expiring passport.