One of the trickier parts of being a teacher is how the work you do seeps into life beyond the classroom.  It is not uncommon to hear teachers say something like “sometimes I wish I had work that I could just leave at 5:00 and not think about again until the next morning.”  Jedidiah Purdy touches on the odd dynamic between public life and private life in For Common Things.  On some level, it’s part of his overall argument, especially in relation to politics.  It also reflects something of the atomization of American culture in general.

Our emphasis on the private is a concession that many of the good things we cultivate alone are unavailable elsewhere. Private life is so much a reprieve, an emotional and erotic haven or temple of self-improvement, partly because many of us feel the need to retreat from other reaches of our lives . . . it is difficult to see much of the work we do as something we would want to bring home, that would enrich our most intimate connections if the two realms were woven together. It is even less plausible that public matters, like our degraded and disappointing politics, could make our private lives better. Admitting these into our homes would only color the intimate realm in the grays, or the garishness, of those alternatingly bleak and absurd arenas. Private life becomes the sole place where we can exercise trust and care, the sense of good purpose, that seem to have little safe purchase elsewhere.

It’s too easy for the frustrating, uninspiring part of any job to become that part you talk about most after punching the clock.  We run from it and find it waiting for us.  But is there a way to rethink the divide that works in a better way?  I can’t help but think that the answer is “yes,” but how to get there?  As with so many other things, it probably requires creating (or re-acquiring) a particular language broad enough for both public and private (the eschews both the creepy and the defeating).  Why do work that can’t be brought over into the private life?

Purdy goes on to argue that our vacating of the public sphere ultimately puts our private spheres at risk.  One ultimately protects the other.  He’s definitely on to something there. How, then, do we find the better way between?

(image from forcesofgeek.com)