Senior year. The end of the curricular chain from Chemistry Junior year back to Sophomore Biology. They really wanted us to learn something.

My Physics Teacher had a Doctorate to his name, college earned, and he showed it. Gave us real. Introduced us to the Wheatstone bridge. Impressive equipment in our lab, they spared no expense, where he gave us some of what we’d learn in college.

Mark Keppel High School. In the 1950s. Other Doctorates on the staff, Head of Social Studies. Great school. They said, “What’s your major going to be in college?”

I said, “Physics.”

They said, “Why?”

I said, you know me, “Because modern physics and modern philosophy overlap, and I should know something about it.”

They said, “That’s no reason to major in it. And, as you’ll notice, you haven’t been doing your homework…”

They tried to tell me. I was tied number one in a class of hundreds until after graduation when the grades came out and I got a B in physics, a gift of kindness I didn’t deserve and hadn’t earned.

And then in college, university, UCR, delighted to find much of high school as a second chance, but absorbed by the humanities classes which I loved more, undisciplined, not keeping up with homework, after a year and a half called in with the question, “Do you want to stay at this school?” I said, “Yes.” They said, “Then change your major.”

So I switched to Comparative Lit. They said, “Why?” I said, “Because all of knowledge and literature will be spread out before me and there’s no limit to what I can learn.” They said, “That’s no reason to major in it. And you’ll need languages. But you’re not doing well in your German classes…”

Of course they were right. Undisciplined was a word that fit me. First semester German we were supposed to go to the language lab daily to practice, and it took me until the end of the semester to bother to find out where the language lab was, somewhere over there at the other end of campus.

Second year German I only passed, I am convinced, because the night before the final I wrote a poem in German and translated it to English, both versions very beautiful, something about weaving experience into a comforter which “we will sleep beneath with mingled feet,” from the German, “meine Fusse deine Fusse neben.” I hope I can find a copy. My teacher, a bright young woman imported from Germany, was standing at the entrance door to the exam room. I gave her a copy of the poem. I said, “Is this good German?” She looked at it. “Yes.” It was a love poem. I suspect she thought it was written for her. She passed me with a generous D.

I’ve had first rate education everywhere I went. I didn’t do it justice. I finally settled on English because that’s where I was spending my time. They said, “Strike out on your own. Don’t just follow in your parents’ footsteps.” My Father’s major was English, he even taught courses at UCLA until he had to drop out get a job and raise a family. I tried to not follow him, but gave in, and English it was, always and ever after.

But that year of High School Physics. They tried to tell me something. Even not listening to them, they helped me find my way.