Summary

Chapter 5 – In the first part of the chapter, Rich describes an affair with an unnamed student at the conference (married with children) that began the previous summer; that continued over the subsequent year, via email and in person; and which, he says in narration, he was unsure would continue this year. He then joins his fellow teachers at their usual table, listening to the usual domination of the conversation by self-centered novelist Dennis and avoiding the attentions of painter Vicky (a cartoon inserted into the narrative illustrates a comment Rich makes about imagining Dennis being pushed off a cliff). He also doodles a drawing (middle-aged Batman on the beach) and worries about how to protect his kids from so far away. There are references to the self-isolation felt, chosen, and experienced by Rich and other artist-teachers, that isolation existing despite potentially significant developments in...