The Need to Learn

 

According to Ashley Montagu, one of the neotenous drives of of a child is 'the need to learn.' It's one of the traits that should be lifelong, but which affords me an opportunity to experience again what it is like as a child to learn new things. I remember from my childhood lying in the grass and playing with grasshoppers or crickets, or playing in the deep ditch behind my house and catching crayfish, tadpoles, and minnows. That interest in learning continued in high school and especially college (I almost majored in Biology prior to switching to English) when my interest moved more toward the world of ideas and culture. After college, my interests in learning took many paths: religion, philosophy, psychology, and, of course, literature. It was all self-directed study. I was an autodidact, and as far as I'm concerned it served me well.

Now that I'm older and retired, I've re-entered more structured learning at the University of North Florida. So far, it has been the study of art--drawing and painting. I feel that I've re-entered the childlike experience of the 'need to learn'.

A whole array of study possibilities have opened up to me. I'm looking at all that I can learn and trying to decide which subjects I want to study. Among them are Chinese, various writing courses, computer courses, art history, and of course more fine art courses.

I feel like a child again. It's an exciting time in my life. It's a rare opportunity--to be a child with the experience of an adult. It suits me just fine. You might want to give a try. You might feel young again.

CHASING MATISSE: the right book at the right time

Occasionally, a book comes along that is "the right book at the right time". So it is with Chasing Matisse, A Year in France Living My Dream by James Morgan.

I had been eyeing this book in the library for a number of years, perhaps as many as six or eight, without picking it up. A couple of weeks ago I decided to give it a try. James Morgan, the author, and I are about the same age. He turned roughly sixty when he finished this book. I was almost sixty at the same time. Morgan gave up his livelihood, retired, and he and his wife Beth sold their home and moved to France. But there was a purpose to his journey: to follow somewhat in the footsteps of the painter Henri Matisse. Morgan had always wanted to be a painter (painting has always interested me though I did next to nothing about it, either, until I retired four years ago), and decided that he would start, with very little training, and do so in France while visiting the various places Matisse had lived. (I began taking drawing and painting classes at UNF  about two years ago, and am progressing slowly towards, I hope, respectability as a painter. Be not deceived, I have a long way to go.)

The book is full of anecdotes about Matisse and the places he lived and how they effected his style of painting. And Morgan's reflections about his adventure speak quite strongly to me and what I'm doing. Morgan's idea of retirement is to "Read, write, paint, think, travel: Finally my surface life and my subterranean life had meshed in perfect harmony." That's also my idea of retirement, especially, reading , writing, painting, and thinking. Travel will probably not be much in my retirement, certainly not traveling far from home. But the first four will keep me plenty busy.

This memoir is one that I could have lived, could have written, but...well, it's already been done. But it does have something indirectly to say about retirement and growing older. There is still a lot of adventure for us all, if we only take the chance.

Reverting to my childhood?

I have been reading young adult/children's literature lately: Charlotte's Web, Stuart Little, and now James and the Giant Peach. Why? I want to see what makes for classic children's literature, what children/young adults are reading. I've checked out from the library Deenie and tales of a fourth grade nothing by Judy Blume and a few more recently written YA books. Hopefully, I'll be able to read them. Who knows, maybe they'll tickle my inspiration.

Back in the 1970s I read a book Growing Young by Ashley Montigu. He cited studies that show how as we grow older we become more like children again. I was greatly impressed by the book and read it several times. Now, as I'm growing older, I see it happening in myself. I'm not unhappy about it; in fact, I think it's kind of neat. So, maybe this has something to do with my reading YA. When I was a child/adolescent I never read books. So, I missed all of these good children's books. Reading them now, and finding them somewhat interesting, is a pleasant surprise. And, yes, in the back of my mind I'm thinking "maybe I can do this, write children's books." I'm not sure it will ever happen, but it does offer me a semblance of hope.