Tag Archives: class

Castle

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Just the other day, I was walking back to around my old stomping grounds, where, finally having only four years between me and a real life, a real career, and owning some real estate, was very imminent.  I could spend those four years partying and celebrating my imminent status, or, I could spend my time, studying, and eventually, buying my way into some status.

The truth is, no student is every the “perfect student.”  As soon as you get the letter in the mail, you immediately start ranking the courses, and the classes.  There will be those that I will spend an hour a week on, outside of the three hour lecture, and there are those, where, I will go to every lecture, do every essay, write every exam, and even send my Professor email about.  Which is of course the equivalent to waiting, preying, and pouncing on the poor Professor at the end of lecture.

Well, this is how it starts, and it is, I guess, a plan that should work, but then, facing reality, I never really attended every lecture, I only listened to what I wanted to listen to, and I only wrote what I thought was the truth, or, should be the truth.  Why?  Because I was “partying for four years” my just accepted, imminent status.  To this day, I am unsure what it is that should come from a four-year-degree.  I am appreciative of my status, as it is a sieve and a sorting machine to everyone, including those who do not attend college and university.  How true?  Maybe true.

As long as I am not dependent on the public to garnish my wages, which is dependant on my ability to look beautiful to the general public, then , I consider myself lucky.  Having people who are the educated, the qualified, to hire and fire me, makes me assured, and confident, that “yes” I do have a job, I do, have talent and enough brains, and smarts, to be worthy of it all.

So, back to the other day.  I just happened to have to meet a client near the University, just off-campus.  As I was leaving and walking back to my car, I happened to notice a new cafe lounge. I was in the place where a cheap dive was.  This place used to attract students in the area almost every night of the week.  Lots of bands, and sometimes just a DJ, so, Rave-like, anyone could spend $5 and dance the entire night.  Well, now, there was a place called “Castle.”  On the sign, was the “subtitle,” Board Game Cafe and Lounge.  It seemed to me that some student, like me, who used to hang out at the students’ lounge on campus, like me, thought it would be cooler to walk off the grounds and visit a place that could offer board games.  My question, immediately, is … “I can play a board game while drunk?”

As I was in a hurry that day, I did not open the door and walk in.  But, in my imagination, is that two possible things can happen…..  The interior could be completely quiet, much like a library, where gamers will play with each other on the board games, whispering all their moves, muffling their cries of victory, or there could be nice “lounge music,” a darkened interior, and a sea of voices, a clink of glasses, and the sounds of gamers playing with each other at a board game.  Both can fact the same result: not enough of either type of student.  I am not sure I can make it off-campus in, let’s say, the extra two or three hours I have between classes.  And Saturdays, back in my day, were the best day to rush my homework, so that I could drink myself drunk that evening and sleep in the next day.  There were times I even consistently invested in Sunday Brunch for a semester with one of my other classmates. So, in any case, I feel “Castle” is caught in between two groups of students.  Those who are quiet and those who want to get drunk doing something different, like cow-tipping while drunk, if you’re in the country.  The people who truly have the time and money to just “drop by” Castle, are those who are newly graduated.  Those, perhaps, not quite into the starter-job, yet, but still have some money, and time, and are sill keen on that student-single-fun lifestyle.

As for myself, I saw this store front, and felt nostalgia for that two-storey dance pad.  I loved leaving all the books, all the paper, the computer, and the laptop at home, in my rented room.  The thing I would love to go to Castle for, is any drink I can’t have at home.  But, nowadays, this place has come too late for me.  I am owning a car that I cart my kids and husband around in.  All those extra hundreds that could be spent if I were more frugal?  I buy trinkets–jewellery, cute-toy hangars, a chocolate bar, appetizers, desert, and the prettier body wash and body lotion.

I wonder, when there will be no more babies born, what will happen to these “Board Game Cafe and Lounges?”  I have curiosity to go in, but i also have the experiences to know that these novelty, niche, experiences, tend to disappear.  It is too quiet or too much activity.  I move slowly now, and even in my middle age, I will only move at any speed, if I am not distracted by silence.  It’s funny.  I have yelled at my kids so often, to be quiet, and here I am admitting that I don’t work, that I don’t do anything, if all I have is silence.  The radio will always be on.  The typing from the next cubicle keeps up pace.  The phone rings.  And what I call silence falls in between.  This is a world I work in, and I have found, it is a world that I love.  So, kids and husband!  Keep it down!!

The Art of Time and Space

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This summer has been rewarding for me, as the mark of the first summer that I spent time on a new hobby.  I think that my family probably wishes that I did not discover painting, but I do, indeed, love to paint.  I am but a hobby-ist right now, but I can put all my attention into a canvas, and definitely churn out a painting….  From start to finish, in about a month.  It is something I think that I didn’t know or understand as a child and student, even when I was being pre-occupied with the more “artsy” and “socially-oriented” subjects, like music, literature, and drama.  These already allowed me to express my more artistic self without much loss, without much missing.

So, as I attended the first class, nervously wondering if I had everything that I needed, I was surprised that Night School for Adult Learners, is very relaxed.  The place, usually a school during the day for teenagers, becomes a classroom full of art, color, instruction, and usable tools for the trade of painting.  The talk and conversation is surprisingly mature and it is as if we all followed the stream to this place of enlightenment.  Suddenly, a visit to the Art Gallery is much more interesting than the thoughts I had in the past while walking by all the talent.

One of the first subjects we tackled, was the issue, “What do you paint?”  We started listing things that we see all the time: portraits, still life, and landscapes.  Then, there were the more modern, and some would say, more experimental objects, like a lily flower, the foyer of a cafe, a pile of old shoes and boots, and surreal dreams.  Then, the big discussion, “What do you think abstract paintings are about?”  This took us a moment, but then, the thoughts came: irony, balance, color, strength, pride, honor, desire.  Armed, within the first twenty minutes of the class, with these beautiful words that describe painting and visual art, we became more certain that we could do this class.  That we knew how to be painters and visual artists.

This class took me into the summer.  I was very excited, as the end of June approached.  I dreamed of the beauty of our cottage just by the lake.  I dreamed of this beauty with the imagination of someone unsullied by failure or disappointment.  I took time to “picture” the scene, and I started imagining the mixing of paint, to create color, and then, the big decision, should I create texture by adding a gel medium to my paints?  To build leaves of grass that could stand up, and ridges into the wood used to build the house….  I dreamed, and I dreamed.

Then, the first weekend at the cottage arrived.  I packed everything I needed into the car.  Easel, canvas, palette, brushes, and paint.  Everything, including my husband and my children, arrived safely….  I was ready to just jump into my painting clothes and start!  We use our cottage all year round, so there was no need to undo anything and set anything up….  I started to move all my material and instruments out to the back sun room where there is a perfect view of the backyard leading down to the lake.  The sun was still out upon our arrival, and I stood there a moment, deep breathing the scene inside.

It is the most precious moment I have of the this particular view.  To walk into a strength of beauty after a long ride in the car is utterly amazing.  It is like taking that first deep breath on the morning after a big snowfall.  My breath rushes down, and I forget that I breathe.

So, being flexible in work, not only did I have weekends to spend absorbed by my new hobby, I spent up to a week, one week this summer, just lost in painting and relaxing by the small piece of space that most feels like home.  It has been rewarding.  I may not be able to paint the Mona Lisa, but I am able to capture that beauty, that she is associated with.

We have also partly re-decorated the cottage walls.  Taking down anonymous paintings of terrestrial beauty, to be replaced by my own exploration of beauty and meaning.  I am looking forward to the start of the night classes again.  I am already planning what it is I will paint.  Perhaps, still life, this time.  I would want to try to get a painting finished before the fruit rots and the flowers wilt.

I think about ironic things too.  If I can get enough of my paintings together, I would want to have a gallery show, somewhat along the lines of Virginia Woolf‘s style of publishing.  I would have a “Vanity Show,” where my work would be displayed only for as long as I could rent the space, rather than as one of the Gallery’s standard list of artists.  And suddenly, I could find people who could like my work.  Just like writers want to be read, so, visual artists want to be seen.

I am spending the last week of summer trying to title my two paintings.  I have a million titles, but it is hard for me to find a title I love.  And, very silly of me, I think I am purposely taking all this time, to see if I can come up with as many suitable titles as I can.

And so, as I imagine one day being able to paint the thrill of riding in a convertible down the highway, just like I imagined painting the quiet beauty and strength of a view of the lake, I like to imagine that I can do it.