how to fail as a painter and other things

I was thinking about a philosophy class I took in college.  I liked the professor and I liked the class.

The main grade for this class would be made up of a paper we wrote at the end that we turn in on the last day.  Well I ran through some more and less difficult strategies for this paper.

I worked on a few of them, but in the end I suddenly decided on the next to the last day to just give the bum what he wanted, not to try and extend our class into other areas, not to use language which I thought would express diaphanous diamonds of thought, not to challenge his teaching, just write the damn paper...

I worked on it a full day and then rewrote it that night.  I rewrote it again and typed it out and then made minor changes to adjust the flow and rhythm and then typed the final draft.  I turned it in and I felt like a fraud.  It seemed a terrible cynical piece.  I got an A in that class.

And now when I read that paper a gazillion years later, I find astoundingly that I like it.  It sums up everything we discussed in class in one uniform way.  And it makes me believe that I know one way to fail as a painter, that is, to never compromise, to never take what is freely given, to refuse knowledge that appears to easily acquired.

I remember my girlfriend at the time who said she simply always gave the professor what he wanted.  I always rejected that approach.  Now I wonder, what did I think? What is my thought now?