My first disappointing semester at OLLI. Course selection started in a constrained circumstance. Yom Tovim constituted most of the Tuesdays and Wednesday's for the semester's first half. Still, acceptance in two attendance restricted classes was greeting with a satisfying nod. I'd only taken one class in the past to learn a new skill, watercolor. This had been presented online, which limited personal attention. At least everyone else sharing the screen also had not done this before, or at least since Art Class as youngsters. Ir lacked the coaching that I would have expected in a live low enrollment class. This time around, I enrolled in live sessions. Cartooning and Crocheting/Knitting.
My course selections included a science class, or so I thought. The world of physical science, my college major, had long since passed me by. An online course on Thermodynamics entertained me when the DVD professor did his experiments, left me befuddled when the two retired, highly accomplished DuPont scientists did their own explanations. A live course on The Universe engaged me more, though I could tell that if I had taken this in college, I would be doing a lot of studying in my dorm most evenings. No exams, the standard for the University's Seniors Program, made this unnecessary but also limited the mental yield to a small fraction of what our expert professor had presented. Biology seemed more my rightful place, having made a career from what is largely medical applications of biological science. Evolutionary expressions of modern biology seemed worth a weekly session each Monday afternoon. Moreover, this would allow me a break between morning and afternoon classes to do other activities on-site, from lunch from my kitchen toted in an insulated bag to a portable office in the form of a cross chest carrier purchased for a previous European vacation. My fourth live course taught me about National Parks. The professor prepares the presentations well, has previous series on this very favorably received by me, and engages my mind enough at each session to provoke a question to him.
I selected two online courses as well, each on a Thursday, each running a different half-semester. These reflect a fundamental shift in my state's OLLI program. Pre-pandemic, the available courses nearly always took place near my home, on the state's northern campus. The building would crowd with seniors who would stayed for lunch and enrichment lectures. Quarantine by Covid brought Zoom into the program. My state's experts on assorted topics had either retired from one of the international conglomerates or from the medical center. As this was happening, a demographic shift also took place. People of great accomplishment began retiring in big numbers to the beach towns of my state. Once sleepy places where I took my kids for four days some summers became the home of retired lawyers, broadcasters, diplomats, some medical experts. Expertise and willingness to share it relocated a hundred miles from my home. All available on Zoom. Much of it in past semesters outstanding. Thursdays would go to a series of five weeks on my state's contribution to the American Revolution the first half and to an analysis of Justice System snafus the second half.
My initial enthusiasm got mugged by reality quickly. By the end of Rosh Hashana, just a few sessions into the semester, I wondered what great learning I had sacrificed to attend shul on each Yontif. My selections left a lot hanging. Sure, I could count on the National Parks series on Friday mornings. Absolutely worth doing my scheduled treadmill sections a half hour earlier than other days, even at the price of some soreness to follow, not to mention a feeling that I had put myself off schedule. Biology instructor more than qualified, a retired professor from the State University. He assigned us a book, which I purchased as a Kindle. No electronics for me on shabbos or yontif, so I quickly got behind. Not that it mattered. He envisioned this class as the free-form senior seminar he used to offer his PhD students. For a class of senior citizens of diverse backgrounds, many with little science education or experience, the discussions became quickly unstructured. The sessions lacked a beginning, middle, and end. My attendance became optional. The cartooning class has the opportunity to excel. I have no art background. As much as I like visiting the grand museums, and I've taken an OLLI art appreciation course, I still depend on my left cerebral hemisphere. Art classes ended in 8th grade for lack of talent that screamed public disclosure. I could never draw a cat or a realistic person. That should have made cartooning attractive, as there are no artistic musts. In class I like taking my pencils to a sketch book that I purchased for the course. But people do cartooning professionally. We delight in the funnies, the wit of what The New Yorker selects for publication, political cartoons that meet or repel our personal notions. Lecture segments include this history. They also touch the different landmarks that students must master to get proficient. Faces, bodies, animals, motion representations, anthropomorphism. All pertinent, all contributing to the delight that readers feels. But none of these elements acquire mastery from one week to the next. I am still toying with faces when the class slides and exercises have moved along to depictions of characters in different types of weather or getting electrocuted, or falling off a cliff. The published cartoonists we seek out spent years honing their craft, mostly with professional instruction and feedback of their work from other masters or editors who decide publication. I will do what I can from week to week. Maybe I would find the class sessions more gratifying if I practiced one or two nights at home.
Knitting/crocheting went less well. Nearly everyone who occupies the assigned room at the assigned a time already has a personal portfolio. I purchased some yarn and a crochet needle set. With the help of YouTube, I got the hang of a slip knot to start and a basic crochet loop stitch. This creates a linear length of loops. To go from one dimension to two, I needed help. A substitute instructor got me on track, at least transiently. The regular instructor seemed too occupied tending to the experience knitters who use this assigned time and place as protected time to allot to their work. Not a place for novices. Enough of a disappointment to stop attending. YouTube will get me started when I am ready.
The online sessions served their purpose. The Revolutionary War class invited guests, who I found mediocre. In fairness, Yom Kippur fell on Thursday and I drove to a destination three hundred miles west on another Thursday. So I only signed on to half the classes. Justice gone wrong just had its first session. I left after 15 minutes, judging it a woke echo chamber. I try again in fairness to the instructor who seems to have worked hard assembling a complex subject, though probably missing some key points, which I could question if the second session resembles the first.
So, halfway through, the enthusiasm for acceptance into courses of limited attendance soon gave way to the disappointment of being there. As a real University student, I would have taken my obligation for studying content and practicing skills more seriously. I still can with half the semester remaining. But impressions of content and experience come quickly. It seems hard to reverse initial impressions. And my own receptiveness to what comes my way needs a tweak, perhaps. Other than knitting, which I'm convinced is a lost cause, I'll do my best to get more out of the semester's second half.
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