Sept. 5, 2012 Part II

One of my professors is from out of the country and speaks with a pronounced accent. I must admit, however, that she speaks English very well, knowing all of these esoteric words that takes years to learn if you’re not a native (and well-educated) English speaker. She’s also very gesticular, and sometimes, it seems as if she’s translating a native idiom into English because it doesn’t make much sense when she says it. She also exhibits some signs of awkwardness, but that just might be her struggling to articulate her thoughts. It’s actually quite impressive, the way she’s able to form sentences and use advanced vocabulary. I gotta hand it to her, the woman’s got skills.

I was walking to my last class of the day when a young woman hurried past me in the hall. She was headed towards the last classroom down the corridor and I deduced that she must be one of my classmates since I was also headed for the same room. I’m going to sit next to her, I decided. I thought she looked interesting, dressed in a snappy suit and wearing a red button-up shirt. I was also wearing a red button-up shirt so I immediately felt some affinity with her.

Imagine my surprise when I walked into the classroom and the young woman was standing at the front of the class, BEHIND THE TEACHER’S DESK. I was so surprised that I just stood there, wide-eyed and jaw hanging to the floor. 

“Hi!” my teacher greeted me enthusiastically. 

“H-hi,” I replied, my voice faltering. 

“How are you!”

 “I’m…I’m good,” I said, swallowing and taking a seat. Boy, I’m never making that mistake again. 

Coincidentally enough, during class discussion, the teacher brought up the fact that she looked a lot younger than her age and so she tries dressing up in pant suits and wearing glasses to look older. She also mentioned that she had an interaction with a superior last week, and he called her “young lady.” It just got to her. She said that it made her feel lowered, bumped down a few notches.

I'm a lot like her in that I also look a lot younger than my age. Lots of people, when they guess my age, shoot about five to ten years below the mark. I’m okay with it though. It means that I’ll look young for a lot longer. My teacher said the same thing—she said that she’s fine with looking a lot younger than her age. Then, right after she said it, a look came over her face, and she realized that the statement might have been an ageist thing to say. 

I suppose that in a society where people are culturally conditioned to prize youth and beauty (especially in women), looking twenty when you’re really thirty-five is supposed to be an asset. I wonder what that says about us as a society. Apparently, my professor might have been thinking the same thing.