New Class to Suck My Time!

For my internship I have to teach at the lay school my seminary hosts. Makes sense. So I go in to interview for a position and the director asks what class I'd like to teach. I reach for the list of standard classes on his desk and he pulls it away and says, "no, not what class of our normal roster you'd like to teach, what class, if you could design one, would you like?" Well, it just so happens I'd been dreaming. So I describe this class looking at the New Testament cannon and the various criticisms it's come under recently from everything from the Gospel of Judas to Bart Eerhmans' questions about scribal corruptions and next thing I know I'm down to teach The New Testament Cannon: Do We Really Have God's Word? next semester. Over the next few months I need to get together either a textbook or selected readings, a schedule, and a syllabus for this brand new class. Eeep! And, at the same time, very, very exciting!

In other news there's no way I can teach that class, take 4 classes myself, and still put in the hours they need me at work. So something has to give and it looks like work is the one that will. Financially things work out if I just bring in a couple hundred a month and so I began thinking ... is this the year to finally do what I've been wanting to do and start teaching sewing classes? There's been a bit of a convergence of stars here with more people living near campus, a woman donating new sewing machines, an increase in interest among those I've talked to, and our apartment is just right for a class of 6 people and sewing machines. It's not spacious but, well, neither are the places that my students will be sewing in. First on the docket - get caught up with classes so I can dream without guilt! But after that I need to do test runs of the class projects, get tables for sewing on, rearrange the living room, advertise, and, I'm sure, so much more. But I'm excited and, after a string of jobs that have left me more worn out and discouraged than anything else, I don't mind a bit.