Reason #4,397 Why Kate is a Good Writing Teacher

Wow, I'm so active today! Three posts in one day. You're so welcome.

This is a little story about Kate (not her real name), my coworker, and Sawyer (not his real name), her classmate. (The names have been changed in honor of the coming week's big event--the final season premiere of Lost!) Kate's stories, at least when she tells them, are way better than TV. I only wish I had her on video telling it, because you'd wet your pants instead of being only mildly amused.

Kate's in graduate school earning a counseling degree, and she took a class last semester called Group Therapy. Basically, the students learned how to facilitate group therapy by participating in a "group therapy" of their own.

After the group members had begun to bring up topics early on, such as the death of close family members, the professor commented that he hadn't expected such serious and personal issues to be discussed so quickly. So Sawyer apparently decided to take it to the next level.

Sawyer informed the group that he had a rather complicated and unusual personal life. He shared that he is a "poly"--that is, he and his legal wife are married not to just another woman, but another couple. Big Love + swingers, and then some. Not surprisingly, he's also bisexual. Perhaps polyamory demands it. And last but not least, he's a masochist.

So the professor and the group sit in silence while Sawyer spills his innermost secrets, and when it comes to a close, the professor chooses to ask quiet, sweet Kate her thoughts about all this.

"Well. In my fourth grade writing class, we've been learning about metaphors. And you know what Sawyer reminds me of? A tree. And that's because he's got a trunk, and he's branching out all over the place."

I think that was the end of class that night. Get 'em, Kate.