Out of my element

My Biology class is as easy as it gets. Well, as easy as a lower-level science class with a challenging lab component gets. And if that biology class is being taken by someone very easily distracted, even fanciful, then it's actually quite formidable.

Lectures go over something like this:

"Ecosystem dynamics are driven by two processes: those of consumers and those of producers. Producers, like plants, take in sunlight and convert it into energy. That energy is then transferred to a consumer, like an animal. The worms in the soil consume the energy from decaying organisms..."

Oh, no. Those poor worms, stuck in the dark and the dirt. Their lives are so limited, only feeding on decomposing things, never seeing the sunlight, except for one brief moment where they poke their little heads up and are noticed by a bird or a wild pig...

"...and these make up the domain Eukarya. That will be on your quiz tomorrow."

Crap! I hate science. Why am I doing this? I want to be at home, tucking my kids into bed and reading. I really want to read. I love the Twilight books -- now that's what I'd rather be doing. It's weird that I read vampire books, kind of embarrassing, but it isn't the vampirism; it's the humanness of the vampires. One in particular, really. That, and the main struggle is so interesting to me...

What kind of vampire worries about his eternal nature, worries about the fate of his soul? In case he's truly lost his soul, Edward refuses to sentence his love, who happens to be human, to the same fate. That choice both separates and unites the two, and the decision to keep their worlds divided creates security for him, and pain too. Vampire with a heart of gold. Heh.

"...And after many years of research, that's the clearest example I can give of the difference between covalent and ionic bonds. Your book doesn't explain it very well, so there you are."

Crap!!

This is why I might barely pass Biology.

I certainly feel like an English major out of place. And yet, in the back of my mind, I refuse to take all the blame.

Shouldn't these things, emotion and humanity and fascination, be able to coexist with science? Why can't a scientist worry about those poor little worms and still study them effectively?

It would be a serious flaw, in my mind, if these worlds cannot cross, if I must turn off my creative mind so that I can do well in a scientific environment.

Two chapters of chemical properties to study, and then one more chapter of vampiric delights. That's the deal.

Elements, radioactivity, and chemical structures. Before Forks, Cullens, and the dilemma of whether to damn one's true love to an eternity of night.