Author and Artist
Off Kilter
A fictional travelogue; four minutes to read.
From the conscientious way my high school students study the classroom wall clock I should probably switch to teaching a time management course. Or retire.
I need this holiday to rethink my career, my life. I’m as off kilter as a lopsided tower in Pisa, Italy. The tight feeling in my throat hasn’t loosened, yet.
When Galileo taught here at the University of Pisa, I’m guessing he dropped two unequal weights of the same material off the top of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, not to debunk Aristotle’s claim that heavier objects fall faster, but to grab the attention of his students. Prove me wrong.
Last school year, I assigned Pisa-born Galileo—father of the scientific method—for a class project. Ever since that debacle, my home base—at least where my daydreaming takes me—has been a Tumi suitcase.
I should’ve read the room. Even with their president trashing science, my students take scientific advancement for granted. No need to know about Galileo, or falling objects, or gravity, or the history of science.
My best students are openly asking why learning history merits their time. My worst students sit silent in class, mute.
I can’t let go of the knowing looks my students share when they are bored to tears. I wonder if Galileo ever had flop sweat.
My school year is a slog turning the pages of textbooks that even I find insipid, dated, dull. In the faculty lounge—a monastic mini-retreat from campus life—I hunch over teacher manuals like a Florentine cleric poring over illuminated manuscripts.
Maybe the Leaning Tower of Pisa will capture their imagination. Five million visitors, year after year, traveling to look at a mistake might be on to something. Can I get my class thinking about the meaning of imperfection, or how the flaws and diversity among us are a source of wonder and awe? Maybe.
The engineer wannabes could, uh, lean into learning about the soft clay subsoil, using steel cable harnesses to stabilize the tower, installing lead counterweights. When I reveal the tower started tilting only five years after construction began and continued tilting for 800 more years, their cynical ears are sure to perk up. I can already hear them murmuring when they learn the restoration returned the tower to its original angle, not perfectly upright. A class wag will certainly make a phallic joke.
Would that work? I should have a clue, a teacher’s instinct, a Renaissance insight. Using Galileo’s trial-and-error methodology to test out lesson plans is torture, my weekly burning at the stake.
For lunch, I’ve stopped in at All’Antico Vinaio to devour the immodestly named Fabulous—sbriciolona salami, pecorino cream, artichoke cream and eggplant on Tuscan flatbread. Note to self: If I keep eating these behemoth sandwiches, I’m going to need Pisa-quality engineers to keep me from toppling over.
At the next table three girls, the age of my students, are gabbing, giggling and sharing their sandwiches. Of course! That’s it! Teens are always hungry. Why not start with food?
A discussion about globalization and cross-cultural gentrification using a family-run Florentine sandwich shop with locations worldwide could be a case study. Why not? I could even sneak in some Italian pastries.
