“In place of ideas and curiosity and the beautiful blooming of young people discovering life, I felt as though I was dying in front of them.”
Edited by Cliff Williams from a recorded and transcribed conversation with Matthew on December 13, 2023. He was in his early thirties when we talked. “Matthew” is a pseudonym.
Becoming a Teacher
Matthew’s road to teaching began four or five years after he finished college. “I had studied writing when I was in college, but didn’t know what I wanted to do with it. I worked as a barista for a while. Then I spent several years doing various marketing jobs. I did copy writing, I wrote blog posts for businesses, and for a time I was a brand manager.
“After spending a few years in the world of marketing, I got jaded with it. I didn’t believe that more things needed to be sold. So I left marketing and started working at a bookstore.
“When I was in college, one of my professors had us read Marilynne Robinson’s novel, Gilead. I wasn’t ready for it at the time, but when I read it again after college, I fell in love with it. Then when a friend who also worked at the bookstore told me about Robinson’s new collection of essays, What Are We Doing Here?: Essays, I read it too.
“That book expresses Robinson’s frustration with the way the humanities were treated by government institutions and businesses, even by the educational system itself. She advocated for the beauty of reading and writing, and wrote eloquently about deeply human things.