Reply #14: I have no idea. I've been lucky. But

[skip fox]

teaching at the college level is extraordinarily rewarding. I've been doing it for 25 years and though I'm not natually suited for public speaking (or thinking), the classroom has become a site of intellelctual excitement and joy for most of students and myself. I've learned how not to think of it, I guess, as public speaking.

There's also an age difference (which grows every year, of course), and that helps me not be self-conscious, especially as I realize how little they know of my field (English) . . . and the very brightest are not bored because they like to speak to and listen to someone actively using his intelligence (it not that common away from the cities in the Deep South).

I want to re-open its possibility in your mind as one who did not think himself suited for teaching but who has found great delight in doing so. I went into it because it seemed the least boring, or it was the only thing I could project doing without loathing the work and probably beoming a drunk. I felt a lack of options like yourself.