This takes place during my final year of college, when we’re doing our big project worth 50% of our grade. The professors have created the groups, and I’m the only native English speaker in my group. The professors have decided that this will give the International Students a hand in writing. This makes sense to me since I previously completed an English diploma before going back to school. About midway through, one professor comes up to me.

Professor: “It seems like you do most of the editing in the drafts.”

Me: “Well, yes. That’s what you wanted me to do.”

Professor: “I know you come from a writing background, but maybe give them a chance. They can work on their English!”

Me: “I totally support them to do that, but this is also my grade. You ding us for grammar and spelling. Trust me, I really don’t mind doing it.”

Professor: “I won’t do any ‘dings’ this time around. Just give them a chance!”

Me: “If you insist.”

As anyone learning a second language knows, speaking, reading, and writing are different skills. I have all the respect in the world for anyone learning a second language, and college has a steep learning curve. My project partners can speak English, but their writing uses a different grammar structure. Think, “Paul and I, to the store, we did walk.” I’m pretty sure they wrote it in their native languages and then used Google Translate.

This time, I don’t edit anything but make suggestions on how to improve it. It’s submitted at the start of class, but the professor comes up the me before the end of the class after our break.

Professor: “So… how fast can you edit?”

Me: “Probably an hour, more if I need to get more information from them.”

Professor: “Please do. I just… I can’t read this! It’s so confusing! I’ll give you until midnight to resubmit it

I got it done, and they didn’t question my editing again.

In the late 1990s (before cell phones were widely used), my sixth-grade class went on a field trip to a couple of local museums. Our school was very small, and our class only had around twenty students, so instead of taking a bus, a few parents volunteered to drive everyone.

We spent a couple of hours at the first museum and then loaded up and travelled about twenty minutes to the second museum, which was showing an IMAX film related to our recent studies.

As my group was walking into the building, we saw one of the parent drivers jogging back to his minivan as fast as his chubby legs would allow. As he ran, he yelled back across the parking lot:

Parent: “WE LEFT MRS. [TEACHER]!”

Yes, we had managed to get every child and parent transported successfully, but we left our teacher in the parking garage at the first museum. Since we were in several vehicles, no one had noticed until we all arrived at the second location and someone realized she was missing. (Again, no cellphones to call for help.)

She did finally make it to the museum in time to head back to school with the rest of the group!

The college choir I’m in is rehearsing a song. In this part of the song, one section sings its part and keeps repeating it while the other sections join in one by one. The altos and tenors are already singing, and we reach the point where the sopranos join in.

Director: “Add the sopranos!”

The sopranos join in, but the tenors drop out. The director notices and stops conducting.

Director: “When I say, ‘Add the sopranos,’ that means the other parts keep singing. It does not mean to drop out and have only them sing. That is not what ‘add’ means.”

One of my friends in the soprano section chimes in.

Soprano: “Welcome to kindergarten.”

Director: “When you’re making a cake, and it says to add eggs to the flour, you do not take the flour out of the bowl and put the eggs in alone. Let’s do it again, and make sure you’re actually singing!”

We get through that iteration and reach the bass section’s entrance. This time, the instructions are different.

Director: “Just the basses this time. A bowl of eggs.”

When we are out walking with our four-year-old son, we sometimes encounter an older gentleman in the area. He hasn’t done anything specific that would be cause for alerting authorities, but he gives us a very bad feeling.

The first time we noticed him was when our son was not yet walking but aware of the world around him. The man came up as he was walking in the opposite direction.

Man: “Oh, what a cute little boy! You are so cute!”

At first, we didn’t think much of it other than being a bit awkward as we aren’t very socially outward. But the man kept mentioning our son’s cuteness, to our son, without ever looking in our direction. I tried to think positively, that it was my social difficulties that made a bad feeling about this man grow, and I tried to calm down and smile. However, once I noticed that my son looked terrified, we firmly walked away.

This kept happening. We avoided eye contact and didn’t slow down our walk, yet the man always took whatever seconds he managed to get to talk to our son, even to the point where my husband told him to stop. He didn’t; it was as if we didn’t exist. He never followed us or anything; it was only that creepy behaviour when we happened to walk past each other.

Since then, our son has forgotten his first fright of the man, but he does notice that we don’t like to linger when approached by that man specifically. On an unrelated note, but relevant to the story, this man was not of Scandinavian ethnicity looks-wise.

One day, my son came home from kindergarten.

Son: “Mom, we are bad people.”

Me: “Really? Why?”

Son: “It is bad to avoid someone with darker skin.”

At first, I wasn’t sure what he was talking about, but once I understood he meant that man, I explained to him that, yes, you shouldn’t avoid people because they have darker skin, but that we avoided him because he had scared him when he was little and given Mommy and Daddy bad feelings about it. Since we have friends of different ethnicities, even family members, he seemed to understand that we only avoided that man, not dark-skinned people in general.

Of course, we used much simpler terms, but I tried to explain the difference between avoiding someone with dark skin and avoiding someone BECAUSE they have dark skin.

Later, there was a reminder to all parents sent from kindergarten about their policy that they didn’t accept any discrimination of any kind, among some other policies they mentioned. We did not think much of it until we had a meeting with one of the teachers.

Teacher: “I must say, I am worried about what your son is learning. He has told us that you avoid dark-skinned people because they give us bad feelings.”

Husband: “What? That’s not true!”

Teacher: “Look. I need to remind you that we do not accept discrimination here. Your son has several friends of different ethnicities, and that is a good thing.”

Me: “Is this about that man? My son thought we avoided a man because he had dark skin. Did he get that from kindergarten?”

Teacher: “We teach the children not to discriminate…”

Me: “And so do we.”

Teacher: “Then why are you teaching him to avoid a person with dark skin?”

Me: “We avoid that man because he scared our son on several occasions when he was younger and doesn’t listen when we tell him off.”

Husband: “Why would he think it is because of his skin? I don’t even know why he would get that idea?”

The teacher grew quiet for a moment and then excused herself to make a phone call. Coming back, she explained that there had been a misunderstanding. Apparently, our son mentioned the man once after we had met him, and one of the teachers had asked what he looked like. Then, when our son proceeded to say that we always avoid him, she jumped to the conclusion that we were racists and then had a talk with all the children about how it is bad to avoid someone just because of their skin colour. Unfortunately for our four-year-old, he didn’t quite grasp all the reasoning and took that as us being bad people.

We never found out which teacher it was, and I am sure she had noble intentions. But next time, I hope she talks to us before teaching our son that he is a bad person.

I teach at a college, but I’m not on campus every day. One day after class, a student asks to have a meeting with me on a day I’m not on campus. I suggest an online video call meeting, they agree, and I set up a meeting and send them a link.

That day, I log on at the appointed time. The student is a few minutes late and seems flustered when they log on. They’re getting their notebook and book and pencil case out of their bag, and they start flipping through the notebook. I wait, assuming they need to find the page with their questions.

Me: “Let me know what your questions are when you’re ready, no rush.”

Then, the student starts to write. I’m not entirely sure they heard me, so I wait a minute.

Me: “What are your questions?

Student: “Hold on…”

I wait. And wait. The student is still writing. They haven’t even made eye contact yet, which isn’t unheard of since the online meeting format can be awkward anyway.

Me: “Did you have any questions?”

They finally look up.

Student: “Yes, let me just find them.”

And they continue writing. I sigh and pull out my phone while I wait.

Finally, after twenty-five minutes of this, I decide that this is the most pointless student meeting I’ve ever had.

Me: “I have another meeting in a few minutes, so I’ll need to log off soon. Do you have any questions I can help you with?”

Student: “No, thank you! I’m all set.”

And they logged off.

I later spoke with a tutoring center advisor who works with that student, who said they like to do their homework in the presence of their instructor in case they have questions. And I should absolutely sit there in silence while they do that. I was pretty annoyed, since that’s a complete waste of my time.

Fortunately, that was the only time the student did that. The next time they tried to schedule a meeting, I was actually unable to fit them in, so I told them to do their homework, write down any questions they needed help with, and THEN come to me. They never did, though.