A year after graduation, I was offered a position teaching a writing class. Teaching was a profession I had never seriously considered, though several of my stories had been published. I accepted the job without hesitation, as it would allow me to wear a tie and go by the name of Mr. Davis. My father went by the same name, and I liked to imagine people getting the two of us confused. “Wait a minute<” someone might say, “are you talking about Mr. Davis the retired man, or Mr. Davis the respectable scholar?”
The position was offered at the last minute, and I was given two weeks to prepare, a period I spent searching for briefcase (公文包) and standing before my full-length mirror, repeating the words, “Hello, class. I’m Mr. Davis.” Sometimes I would give myself an aggressive voice. Sometimes I would sound experienced. But when the day eventually came, my nerves kicked in and the true Mr. Davis was there. I sounded not like a thoughtful professor, but rather a 12-year-old boy.
I arrived in the classroom with paper cards designed in the shape of maple leaves. I had cut them myself out of orange construction paper. I saw nine students along a long table. I handed out the cards, and the students wrote down their names and fastened them to their breast pockets as I required.
“All right then,” I said. “Okey, here we go.” Then I opened my briefcase and realized that I had never thought beyond this moment. I had been thinking that the students would be the first t...
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