Something horrible is going on in the world.
It’s called public speaking.
When I had to give a talk a couple weeks ago, I spent hours stressing over what I would say and how I would say it. When I had to teach class on Monday to 42 sophomores about Coleridge’s poems “Kubla Khan” and “Pantisocracy,” I barely slept the night before.
Since when has this been the case?
Did those years of vocal performance, acting, and giving school presentations have absolutely no payoff? What about last semester when I taught a class of college freshmen, or my Sunday school class from the book of Isaiah? What about that speech and debate festival I went to in high school where I dramatically read Sylvia Plath poems to a panel of judges? No? Nothing?!
In place of the smooth confidence I donned in a previous life, I have this nervous imagination. The night or even the hour before I have to speak in public, I fantasize about running away. I throw my notes on the ground, get in the car, and simply drive away. Whoever is depending on me will just have to scramble around because I am on my way out of the state with no luggage and no guilt for leaving. Only an open can of coke in the cup holder. I look ahead to a new destination where nobody asks me about the meter of cryptic English poetry. Usually it’s Disneyland.
But what really happens is this:
I stand up with my notes in hand and just start talking, eying the clock.
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