career advice, courtesy of "gossip girl"

It's fifty-three degrees outside right now. I'm wearing a new sweater, I have a cup of coffee and hot breakfast, and the weekend was a lovely laze of shopping and writing and pints (a few too many pints, sure, and I don't know what I was thinking, inviting that bourbon to the party around midnight when it really had no business being there, but so it goes). And yet I'm feeling tired and a little sad and maybe a bit lonely, and really, all I want to be doing is walking the dog through Highland Park with my old roommates and not sitting in the office, doubting my effectiveness.

But there is a phone call with the Chad lined up for tonight. And new episodes of Gossip Girl start up again, after a hiatus that has found me embarrassingly distraught as Monday after Monday ticked by without any new ridiculousness. Look, Mondays are planning days, yes? Long days of thinking about the week ahead and making notes of things to not forget, and frankly, to end those days with an hour of absolutely inane Blair and Chuck drama is like eating a big bowl of Lucky Charms marshmallows for dinner: a little bad for you, sure, but delicious nonetheless.

And even better that Monday nights are Tuesday afternoons, because that's when Daily Intel posts their scorecard of the episode--a lengthy recap that rewards and bemoans the finer ridiculous plot points, the outfits, and tallies the reality-ness of the whole shebang. And then other people comment, and it makes my day. So there you have it. Gossip Girl gets me through Monday and Tuesday each week. Not too shabby for a show that the Parents Television Council absolutely fucking hates.

And if you're still not convinced--and you're not, I know, especially since I can imagine you out in Bushwick gagging your way through this post--take a read through one of the more recent D.I. tallies, in which the writers absolutely nail one of the characters, a sleazy teacher who's desperate for her students to like her:

Rachel Carr is obviously a thin-skinned sociopath. But she's also totally believable as a certain type — the young, idealistic teacher who thinks she is being, like, progressive and that it's going to help her students relate to her but she's really just crossing lines.

Which makes for great television, of course, but also makes me think back to when we were grad students obsessing over our ratings on "Rate Your Professor"--a site that I don't read now, partially because it makes me feel a little like a movie star to say, Oh, I don't read the reviews, they're useless to me, but mainly because it doesn't contribute in any meaningful way to my performance. Instead, it makes me worry about chili peppers. Or it makes me angry. Or sad. And only sometimes happy.

And I read this Rachel thing a few weeks ago, when, like today, I was sitting in my office and doubting myself pretty hard-core. And then I read this, and I thought, Yes. Because I'm not here for them to like me. I am here to teach them things. If they like me, okay. If they respect me, better. And it's so much more pleasant to go to work when we are shiny happy people who are all on the same page. But really, my job is to teach them how to write, and give them things to read that just might stick after our fifteen weeks together have ended, and hopefully get them to produce something that both they and I can be proud of. (And not, clearly, to not end sentences with prepositions [or use double negatives!].) If I become overly concerned with whether or not they like me--well, that's when I've failed them. Because it's really not at all what this whole gig is about.

Good work, GG. See you tonight.