The Professor

I feared learning he was dead, cringed at the thought that my professor/mentor/friend, the man I had known for over 25 years, had died. Yet that is exactly what I was told when I went to visit him at his office at the university today. But I knew he was gone; it was one of those feelings I couldn't quite shake or explain.


At first, though, I was relieved to see that the door of his office was opened. I was even more relieved when I saw an instructor who had introduced me to the works of Dostoevsky, when I was still a freshman in college, wave to me from down the hall.  But then I realized that my professor's name was no longer written on his door and there was new teacher sitting at his desk.  She was the one who told me he had died in January. She didn't want to tell me. The news still seemed shocking to her as her eyes welled up with tears from saying it. But it didn't shock me to learn he had died. It seemed inevitable. All the time I knew him, he worried about his health; he battled diabetes, hypertension, skin cancer.  But I thought he would live forever and that I would show up whenever I wanted to talk about his health, writing, great writers. Today, I wanted to ask him how to turn real-life events into fiction.


The professor was the first man who believed in me.  Held up my writings to the level of excellence. Read my pieces in class. Got one of my stories published in a local magazine.  He wondered why I stayed in an unhappy marriage. Offered to give me children when my husband and I were going through fertility treatments. Gave me several kisses in his office, which I resented because I thought him a mentor.  Still, we remained friends and I visited regardless.


When I came down to Florida in December I intended to stop by his office, but I never got around to it. Now I thought that if I had done so I would have seen him one last time. Thinking back, I always thought he loved me and hated himself for it.  Sometimes, he would give me the most brutal lectures in class about my inability to write better, more, consistently - lectures disguised as reprimands for my lack of amorous affection for him. Still, we remained friends.


He considered me his lucky charm, thought  my visits stopped his medical diagnosis from being terminal. He even credited me for getting his book on the New York Times "Notable Books of the Year." He was superstitious that way and made connections between my visits and all the good that happened in his life.


Sometimes we sat on the benches on campus and talked about his students, wife, children. He had three great passions, writing, politics and his health. He resented that life didn't recognize him as the great writer he knew he was (His writings were dark, though, and there wasn't even the slightest air-pocket for brightness). Maybe in another lifetime. Still, he never stopped writing, 4 hours every day


Today, I walked around campus and thought about how our relationship was one of those complex, subtle, misunderstood, and destined things.  I heard the bells on campus ring and I wondered why I had never inquired about the source of such lofty, sacred ringing, even though I had attended the University through most of my 20s.  He was still there in the beautiful gardens and open spaces at the University wher he spent over 50 years teaching creative writing classes. His spirit would always be part of that campus, maybe flitting between its oaks and beautiful green and healthy lawns.