HUMOR

I’ve heard from women who experienced pregnancy that a baby in the womb does strange things to strangers:

They get handsy. They get talky, saying whatever comes into their weird and wild minds.

Imagine you’re out somewhere, anywhere, and you feel a hand on your stomach. You look. You’re expecting to see a psycho, a pervert, but it’s a relatively sane and semi-moral looking woman with rabid joy all over her face, a face that whisper-shouts, “When is your miracle taking place!”

You return the gesture: You touch her belly.

“What are you doing?” she asks.

You say, “I thought that’s what we were doing.”

Then you stick your finger in her mouth or butthole, whichever’s handy.

She says something like, “AHHHHH!”

And you say, “Easy, I’m just taking your temperature! Let me! I demand to know what’s happening inside your body! It’s my right!”

Though I can’t know what pregnancy’s like, I do know what it’s like to have people rush up so they can bathe me in their weird.

It’s been happening a lot lately.

Because I applied for a sabbatical and got it.

You’re right, having a sabbatical is nothing like having a baby, but hear me out: Both cause alarming behavioral issues in the people around you.

To be fair, some folks are nice. They understand that for a writer, sabbaticals are heaven, a dream come true.

But mostly, people have been confused, insulting, and pissed.

A few of my students act like I’m going away to have a terminal disease.

“I’m so sorry,” their eyes say. “We’ll be praying for your survival.”

The pissed ones accuse me of disloyalty and treachery. They don’t want me going anywhere.

So I ask them, “If you had a chance to follow your dreams right now, even if it meant leaving me behind, would you do it?”

“Leave you?” they say. “We’d kill you to follow our dreams.”

“So you get it?”

“No,” they say. “You’re a teacher. Your life is about making my dreams come true. Have a nice vacation, Judas.”

I run a storytelling event on campus called The Reading Series. It’s been going for almost 10 years. My sabbatical will cause the first ever Reading Series break (not counting COVID), but a student of mine wants to keep it going in my absence.

The event always has a theme:

The Reading Series: Homecoming
The Reading Series: Dynasty
The Reading Series: Pirates

My student said, “How would you feel about The Reading Series: Abandonment? Or what about The Reading Series: Betrayal?”

I laughed.

He smiled.

“Wait,” I said, “you’re not kidding?”

“No.”

I thought about it then said, “I would not like that. Maybe it could be The Reading Series: Teachers Are People Just Like You Except Older And Sadder But They Have Dreams Still Which Are The Only Things Keeping Them Going Beneath The Crushing Weight Of Burnout.”

“I don’t get it,” he said.

But it’s not only students. It’s everyone: friends, family, colleagues.

When I told relatives at a recent gathering, “I’m going on sabbatical!” they said, “Cool. Are you going to get a job?”

They also said, “So you’re a homemaker now? Professional dishwasher? Ha! Ha! Ha!”

They also said, “What are you going to do?”

“Write!” I said, “and read. And work on a book! And most of all, write and read and work on a book!”

“Yeah,” they said, “but what are you going to do?”

I pivoted: “I’m going to get a job?”

“About time,” they said.

“It’s going to be a big job,” I added. “Huge. So big, I’ll never have time for reading and writing and books. I don’t even know if I’ll have time for sleep, but when I sleep, I’ll dream I’m at the job, doing the job.”

“I like what I’m hearing.”

I share each sabbatical attack and misunderstanding with my wife. Why? Because she gets furious on my behalf, and this fills me with joy.

The best story took place a couple days ago at a party for a retiring faculty member.

I was chatting with a friend when a colleague bounded up, his eyes shining with excitement, and he said, “I’ve been wanting to tell you something before you go on sabbatical…”

And I thought, There’s a 95% chance this is going to hurt.

But I had some hope that he’d be nice, because he’s a wise man, old and full of study. Not only a professor. A pastor. Maybe, I thought, he has some beautiful, inspirational words that’ll bless my magical journey into sabbatical Neverland.

Here’s what he said, bouncing on the balls of his feet with elation, wiggling like a boy tripping balls on Pixy Stix:

“You know, the last writing teacher who went on sabbatical was the teacher you replaced.”

“Oh yeah?” I said.

“Oh yeah,” he said, breathless with smiles. “The thing that happened to him, it happened during his sabbatical!”

I’d heard the stories. The guy I replaced got too close to a student, fought her boyfriend at a bar, and was fired. But I didn’t know it happened during his sabbatical.

“Oh,” I said.

“Yeah!” said my colleague, “I had to tell you,” then off he went, bouncing away to share who knows what with other innocent people.

I was confused, insulted, pissed, and shocked.

I was overjoyed.

I couldn’t wait to get home and tell Mindy.

I got home and told her.

“What the HELL!” she said. No, she shouted. It was wonderful. “He said that?”

“Yes!”

She leaned forward and pointed at me, which she does whenever she’s mad, and she said, “What is wrong with everyone?” And when she’s mad and talking to me about it, it feels like she’s mad at me, even when she’s not.

I love it.

She shook her head and said, with disgust, “People.”

“I know!” I said.

“Are they jealous?”

“Probably!”

“Are they stupid!”

“They must be!”

“Everything makes me SICK!”

“Me too!” I jumped up and down, clapping my hands, tripping balls on her anger.

My sabbatical will last a full school year. During that time, I’ll get to write and read and work on a book.

Also, I’ll get to hear over and over what people think of sabbatical.

But best of all, I’ll get to bring it all home to my Mindy and bask in the warmth and light of her beautiful, inspirational rage.