theory vs practice

There’s a small rectangular window in a plain white door that often holds my attention. I can see into the cubbyhole behind the door sometimes, walls lined with books and a cosy workstation in the corner. The cubby hole has an interesting history no doubt. At one point, Richard Sennet’s research assistant occupied it. Another time, it was a library (still is, in some ways). Long before that, it may have been a chapel in a fair town house on Aldwych. Now, however, it has a part time occupant.
Sometimes I can look through the window and see the little office. Other times, I feel my ears reddening at the sight of a familiar black blazer hanging inside the door, partially obscuring a view so gorgeous that I dare not take a peek. The blazer flaps enchantingly, invitingly, but I clutch my heart and make my escape past the window, down three flights of steps, thinking of a certain pair of grey eyes through owlish glasses looking gravely at his class. The grey eyes looking deep into mine, asking me for the time. The devastating smile which torments my soul, completely unnecessary while lending me a boring book. The grey eyes straining to pierce the fog of dullity that has settled over the owner’s students, thanks to the fantastically obscure texts he has set us. The decided chin determined for us to make sense of his seminar series, explaining every time how important it is to see the world of urban design through the eyes of his favourite thinkers – Lefebvre, Harvey, Kymlika – all very relevant and sensible no doubt. But alas for class, my eye is drawn only to the two bright spots on the cheeks so fair, growing redder and redder as he struggles against our mundaneness; ‘kind of you know, kind of you know’, he reiterates in the accent so charming he has brought from Athens, along with his image of himself as a solemn philosopher professor scholar.
I hate the teacher, love the man, giggle endlessly to myself on my way home, and think, well, I was sixteen only 9 years ago…