A Lesson by John Wentworth Chapin

“We never know what you’re saying to us,” she says. I laugh, because this should be funny, but it’s not. “What a pleasure to know that my pearls of wisdom fall on deaf ears,” I say. “Like that,” she says. She’s the worst student in my Modern Film class and we’re alone at a bar. She is just a few years younger than I, back in college. She doesn’t know how to organize or articulate her thoughts, but she has killer instincts. We watched a film in class and she said something brilliant; the sheep surrounding her stared blankly. So I educed, elaborated, expounded – all the verbs necessary to make her observation an insight. “No,” she said, when I reframed her observation, “that’s not what I meant.” The rest of the class chewed its cud. I was left to elucidate or shut up. “Perhaps you could clarify your point,” I offered. She repeated, eerily verbatim, her observation that prompted my diatribe. “Baaa.” “Moo.” They understood what she was saying. I understood it; but no one understands me. This is what prompted me to follow her after class to this bar and act surprised when I walked in and saw her there. She didn’t look surprised; in fact, she casually nodded me over. “You act as though you expected me,” I said. She shrugged. I understood exactly what she meant.

.

Return to This Week’s Flash