Making all the wrong decisions, or perhaps the right ones

Wow. By the Grace of God, I made it through yesterday. I had stayed up reading until about 12:30 getting through massive Properties and Con Law readings, along with two chapters for Lawyering Skills. When I tried to get to sleep, I was so nervous about yesterday's Streetlaw lesson, that I wasnt able to sleep until about 1:30. Great. That makes the day easier by far. Grrr... But somehow I made it.

Classes were sparce and the conversation dull. We are all at the point where this isnt fun anymore. We just want to make it through. But I made it through classes, ran around to take care of some small stuff (like copying out my taxes for Financial Aid, intercepting my new partner for Streetlaw, etc.) stopped into an MJF meeting, and then went to go teach my Streetlaw class.

First of all, my "supervisor" was there. We met beforehand with the teacher to ask what the HELL I should be doing to get better control of the classroom situation. My supervisor later said that this teacher's supervisory style is "not optimal" but that the situation isnt lost.... Totally cool... At least he knows that there is someone watching out for my interest in this thing. And he was at least a little more hands on yesterday during class, even if there were still times that conflict urupted (between students) when he wasnt even in the room.

Anyway, as we were starting class, the oung lady with whom I had the conflict last time calling me "the asshole" loud enough for me to hear her. You all know that I dont take insult well. Any other situation, I would have been right back in her face, telling her exactly where insults like that will land her in life. I dont take a punch to the gut very well... Anyway, I gritted my teeth, put on my best "tour guide smile" and proceeded to apologize to the class for my previous week's behavior:

"I need to start off by apologizing for losing my cool last time we were together. Im not that much older than you guys, and this is one of the first times in my life that I have to act like "an adult." I am used to responding as you would, returning disrespect in kind. But I cant do that here, and I am deeply sorry for any disrespect I showed last time I taught. I hope that you all will forgive me and that we will move on from here." At the end I was looking almost pleadingly at the student in the front of the class who had just been calling me an asshole. Well, it seemed to at least remedy that.

As for the rest of class, we found a student who was willing, in fact offered to, get "ghetto" on the other students, silencing them for us and commanding their attention when there was no way for us to do it ourselves. We went over housing law and had probably the best session I have had so far.

Sooooo... I made it through that. Now just to come up with a lesson plan for next week.

After that, back to lawyering skills, then worked on a research project for a little while, turning it in about 5pm. Then read in the library till 7pm, then went to the Minnesota AIDS Project to stuff condom packets. My motives for that were varied, but essentially I am exploring new ways to meet people. The only person I really met while there was a fairly loud queer who got extremely competitive with me when he said, "Just once Id like to have a Saturday off," and I said, "Tell me about it man." Apparently he thought I was trying to start something as opposed to just being friendly. So he started rambling off loudly everything he does in a week. I let him take that one. "Im sorry sir, your insecurity is showing."

Afterward I went home to cook dinner with like the zero amount of food I have in my apartment. Time to shop for sure. Finally got the rest of the dishes done, and was just passing out in bed from exhaustion when one of my new friends (of the couple, see below) called to see if I wanted to go out. Initially I was asleep when he called, but after his call woke me up I couldnt get back to sleep, so I figured, what the hell, and joined him out for a while. God, its nice to have new buddies. He and his BF are just good people.

So... I have an excrutiatingly long day today. But after making it through yesterday, I feel like I can take on anything. Go me!