Life-Long Learning

When I turned 65 I got some old age perks.


In my previous post I explained how I want to be treated as an old person, and that includes discounts or free stuff if it's available.  My enthusiasm for free stuff and discounts has to do with being cheap more than being old, let me make that clear.  Just don't condescend or patronize me.


One of the old age perks is that I'm not paying close to $16k annually for health insurance.  Between Medicare and our secondary insurance, that number is just under half.  Another perk is that I get free rides on the Metra and CTA, the trains into the city and the busses and El/ Subway in Chicago.  That perk is going away, and I understand why, but it was very convenient while it lasted.


The best perk so far is free tuition at the local junior college.


I'm taking Drawing I.  I have been painting watercolors and oils for years, but the only formal art class I ever had was when I was a sophomore in high school around 1960.  It was very hands-on and I learned not to color in the lines, but other than that I didn't learn very much back then.


I'm learning a lot now, however.  My drawing (rendering; there's one of those new vocabulary words) is improving and the required self-portraits even look like me.  Doing them taught me that I have heavy jowls (I look like my Grandpa Bill) and lots of wrinkles in addition to those dark spots old people get on their skin.  I don't like looking at myself in a mirror for hours while I draw the self-portraits, but I soldiered through.  I'm going to suggest the professor create an alternative assignment for the old people who take the class.


I have picked up all kinds of vocabulary - and half of any new discipline is vocabulary.  I know the difference between saturated and broken colors, I know what contour line is, and I can stipple, hatch and crosshatch with the most mediocre of them - I wish it were with the best, but that may come over time.  If I live long enough.


One of the glorious things is that it's re-connecting me with the "youth of today."  Things have changed.  Big Time.


All but one of other students in my class are young enough to be my grandchildren or, if I had been both precocious and promiscuous, my great-grandchildren.  Some are still in high school, some are regular junior college students, and one is Ann, my wife, who's my age.


As in any class, the students have a wide variety of interests and abilities.  They are all genuinely pleasant, however.


What I notice most is their obsession with being electronically connected.  This takes different forms, but a lot of it includes texting.  Almost constantly.  I am not a fan of texting, but I got a phone that allows me to text without substituting words on my screen.  I text a few people, but mostly my grandsons away at college,on occasion, and I enjoy their responses.


The kids in the class text -  a lot.  They also listen to their own music on ipods, MP3 players, and those tiny, portable play stations.  One student always has ear buds in.  The professor asks him to remove them, but the student doesn't hear him because his music is too loud.  That guy misses assignments and has to ask a lot of questions, which leads me to conclude that when people multi-taski, most of what they do is pretty half-assed.


Despite their fixation with their gadgets, they are nice people and ready to help if I need anything.  I am really enjoying getting to know them.  And the professor is far more patient than I would have been - than I am or want to be.


What is most important, however, is how much I am learning.  One of the assignments is to choose a late 20th Century or 21st Century artist, research him/her, and let him/her mentor us.  We are creating power point presentations (PPP's) on them and presenting them to the class.  It has to be five to seven minutes long, and I've been working on mine.


I used to do kick ass slide presentations when I taught in a previous life, but I'm learning power point, the electronic version of slides.

I chose the living artist Lucian Freud as my mentor.  He is Sigmund's grandson, is even older than I am, still paints, and sells his paintings for about a gazillion dollars.  I fell in love with his work when I saw this painting Sunny Morning - Eight Legs at the Art Institute of Chicago last year when the new Modern Wing opened.  I could stare at it for hours and keep finding new stuff.


I'm going to include the image (I almost wrote slide, how antediluvian of me) of Sunny Morning - Eight Legs in my PPP and talk about all the art-y stuff in it with my new vocabulary.  This painting is about four feet wide and eight feet tall.

This very small portrait of Queen Elizabeth, on the other hand, is only about six inches wide and nine inches tall.  Despite its small size, Freud worked on it for over a year an a half.  You may note she's clothed, but she is just as vulnerable and exposed at the model lying on the bed in the upper image.


After I retired, my grandson David noted that I had been in school - either teaching, taking classes, or both - for all but four years of my life.  That number is now seven, but if I have my way, it's not going to change.


As always, please leave your comments below.  I love to hear from you.