Looking back on that course blog and the ridiculous amount of work that I put into it, you might never guess that that was the semester when my world as Sara-whose-Mom-was-still-alive ended. My mom died on September 30th, 2009. I attended class that week, but then missed the entire next week. I partly managed to keep teaching because I had the blog and the community that we’d already developed to support me. I wonder, how much did my vulnerability as someone whose Mom just died and my willingness to express it contribute to the fostering of that online and in-class community? It’s funny how none of that vulnerability was expressed on our course blog. But my announcement that my mom had died in class, the day after it happened, must have opened up some spaces for deeper connections.
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