I first learned about Dr. Martens in 1992, when my friend Matt, who was cool as all get-out, was wearing a pair on campus at the small college I was attending in New Hampshire. The shoes were Docs, the 1460s, kind of shiny, and not the boots. When I got the chance, I had a pair of my own. Wearing Docs fit in with my developing darker persona in the early-to-mid '90s. I wore mostly black, listened to the Sisters of Mercy, wore an old Army-Surplus field coat, and was pissed off at the world. Living in Boston, and living without a car, I walked everywhere. The city streets are rough on footwear, and my jobs always required a lot of time on my feet, so the Docs were great! --Once I had them broken in. As a teacher, I liked that they were tough and comfortable and fit well with my lifestyle as a young ESL teacher on the make (if an ESL teacher can ever be said to be "on the make"). Then I moved to Fiji, and Docs did not work in that environment at all. They quickly molde...
After 32 years in ESL/EFL, most of them spent teaching and advising, and the past decade spent as an administrator, fighting for what is right, I have been railroaded, PIP-ed, set up with a no-win, Kobiyashi Maru scenario, and I was fired, let go, terminated for failing to achieve the standards they never even set. Let me repeat that: Standards they never even set! I was unfortunate enough to be the only one who was willing to run the program I worked in as a teacher for ten years. Twice before, i had been enticed with managerial positions, but I wisely surmised that these positions ampunted to nothing less than bending over and willingly let them mount me to "service my account," as Carlin would say, on a daily basis. I turned "them" down twice, but this third time, they got me on principle. I wanted to protect my program, my students, my adjunct instructors, my full timers. In the end, that is what they used to unceremoniously shove me out the door. I took that ...
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