By Darren Johnson
Campus News
It’s 9:20 a.m.; my wife and daughter have left for work. My elderly dog is settled down on the plush gray sofa we had delivered during the pandemic. A squirrel dances on the porch railing outside the window, red leaves on a fading tree as a backdrop, eliciting a halfhearted yelp from the dog. I’m still in the T-shirt I’d put on yesterday, an oversized cotton advertisement for a charity walk we did, pre-pandemic, now with some food stains, and I probably could use a shave. My Journalism class is at 10:20 a.m.
I figure I can squeeze in a shower, though, once in, I realize the tub can use a scrubbing, and, to save time, I bring the razor with me and shave, figuring it’s OK if I miss a few spots.
I think about my upcoming talk. I’m going to go over the difference between international, national, regional and local news. I’ll show the class a copy of today’s paper.
Current events. It’s obligatory to talk about the latest Trump antics, in an impartial, objective way.
The towel is a novelty towel we’d gotten on vacation once, with cartoon bears on it, pre-pandemic, maybe from Atlantic City. They have those bombed-out bargain stores on the Boardwalk, in between billion-dollar casinos.
I grab random clothes – a Mickey Mouse shirt, some sweatpants, the socks don’t exactly match – both are black, but one has a thin orange line near the toes, the other doesn’t. A gray flannel jacket is zipped over Mickey Mouse. It’s 10 a.m.
The dog snores as I put a Columbian coffee pod into my machine, setting it for 9.5 ounces. I wonder if the Native Americans drank pre-Columbian coffee as it drips. I check my phone to see if my college will hold classes on Columbus Day, which still is a thing in parts of Upstate. (They aren’t.)
At 10:15 a.m., I power up the big silver Mac all-in-one desktop that has been on my kitchen table since the pandemic. I check my emails; a student wrote she will miss class due to a migraine. “Get well!” I write. “And check Canvas later for the next assignment.”
I post an alert to the whole class with today’s Zoom link, and mention we’ll have a guest speaker. I send the guest speaker a message through Facebook, reminding him of his upcoming appearance.
I started teaching at colleges 1997, supplementing my journalism income, and had taught 1-4 courses per semester – sometimes even summers and wintersession – until 2018. However, Campus News was growing – pre-pandemic, of course – and I took the 2019-20 academic year off from teaching. I guess I missed all of the excitement. The catastrophe, actually. Where mere mortal instructors had to suddenly claw to survive in some new shelter-in-place, cyber-reality. Yeah, I missed the whole Zoom thing everyone was complaining about.
But then I got the callback – “Hey, can you teach five credits?” – and, uh, yeah, considering we’re in the midst of an apocalypse for print media, as well, that may be prudent. Financial gurus tell us to diversify, after all.
It’s 10:25 a.m. and my eleven students start to appear as square icons; mostly blackened screens. I don’t make them show themselves – I do buy the argument that their home is a safe haven and nobody’s business – and they answer my journalism questions well enough – I am able to show them the e-replica of my local newspaper on their screens. The paper that is also yet untouched, in pulp form, sitting on my porch, near the dancing squirrel. They are able to differentiate which stories are local and not, and discuss how this paper makes money. “They charge for obituaries? Seems shady.”
My Facebook beeps. It’s my guest speaker – he’s now a national radio personality, but once was the sports editor for a student newspaper I’d advised. He’s having technical difficulties. Eventually he appears, from his car, escaping a screaming baby, he says, bald now with gray in his beard. My hair is still wet from the shower, so my grays are slicked and don’t appear on camera, I theorize.
The students turn on their cameras and are regaled by the riveting guest speaker. He is a big to-do now. I record the talk by pressing a button, so that the student with a migraine can view later, when she’s feeling better.
Cue to dog barking at the mailman. Cue to the guest speaker telling a brush-with-celebrity story that has all of the students in little boxes smiling and nodding. Cue to goodbyes, and leaving on a high note.
Cue to exit. In sweatpants. My cup of coffee needing a refill. An elderly man dressed as a baby winning a Ford Fiesta on “Let’s Make a Deal!” He doesn’t know he’ll have to pay the taxes on that, I say to the dog, my feet now up in a recliner, as I’m looking at my one sock with the orange line.
I’m not sure what the complaints are about. Zoom is the best!
Darren Johnson (bio) is publisher of Campus News.
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