Tuesday Morning Coffee

I'm studying for midterms. I have two quizzes and three tests, plus two journal hand-ins that all have to be completed by the close of day Wednesday. I've taken one quiz, one midterm, and turned in both journal assignments. I've also met with Amy over my Independent Study project, which is like having "class" for my book research. She keeps coming up with good suggestions, which is great.

I've got a test this afternoon and a test and a quiz tomorrow. Feels like school. I stayed up all night memorizing the artists, titles, dates and styles of art Sunday night. I'm doing the same again now. I can tell you it's a tedious process, but I'm happy to see that, for the most part, my brain can still pull it off. Memorizing the night before, taking the test and knowing the material.... lucky for me—though clearly my brain is more taxed by the process than it was when I was in my twenties and thirties.

I lost the most points (on the quiz) identifying this wonderful piece of sculpture. (This is my picture, taken from behind it.) Trusting Wikipedia, I decided it was called Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss. Had I bothered with my text, I would have seen that it's actually called Psyche and Cupid. Plus, I spelled the artist's name wrong, one of the very few I did. It's Canova, not Cadova. And I got the date wrong, although it was within the window. I said 1800; it was actually commissioned in 1787, though not finished until sometime in the 1790s. I had memorized the dates and knew the others, year by year.  I also called the sculpture Romanticism, which must have been because I was tired and secretly think of it that way.

In fact, it's Neoclassicism. The reason I did not have the answers at hand for this wonderful piece of sculpture is because it wasn't on my list of pieces to study. We had a list to work from for the midterm and another list for the quiz (which for everyone but me came first). The midterm list eliminated several of the items from the quiz list and not thinking it through, I didn't worry about them. Canova's sculpture was (fortunately) the only eliminated piece that actually made it onto the quiz. So, I was guessing, pulling from my casual memory of it. 

None of this is that important. I'm taking all this pass/fail. But it annoyed me. My instincts to do well are, as per usual, aroused. I am the perpetual student. I love to learn; I love to compete academically. I love to do well. One of the most pleasant aspects of my life, actually, as been how much of it I've spent in academic settings, either as a student or as an instructor. I love them both.

I've been reading, for another of the tests, about the French educational system. It's centralized, and the author discussing it, who is Canadian, finds that fact pretty unacceptable. There really isn't an equivalent to a state in France. It's not a group of united states. It's a single state, the state of France. There are no local governments with local authority. They are all acting under the authority of the central government, what we call the Federal Government. France is not a federation. One of the consequences of this difference is that educational standards are set centrally and are the same in every corner of the country.

I actually like that. I think the fact that the Far Right in the United States has been focused for years on taking over School Boards and, in my opinion, undermining educational values by trying to prevent students from learning about things like evolution (for example), is deplorable. I think it has undermined civic life in the United States. In my opinion the Far Right is pretty medieval in its thinking. They want their religion to be the governing power, like the Church (and the divinely appointed Kings) of old, with their inquisitions and all the rest. No. I'm not impressed by that form of governing.

The French also have the best health care system in the world. So, I'm on their side. I think it makes sense. One of the main things the author I'm reading fails to consider, among the many, is that both the United States and Canada are huge in comparison to France, which is more the size of a US state or a Canadian territory. I'm not sure what advantage there would be in having a loose federation of states rights advocates in such a small region of territory. And, as I watch the US deteriorate while the Far Right yells about taxes and flushing government down the toilet, I'm not sure Americans are making the best choices they can, about our collective state and governing it. It seems to me we are moving towards a corporate theocracy of sorts. So there you have it.

In any event, I'm going back to my books and my own education. All my work will be completed on Wednesday and on Friday, Toni arrives and we'll be heading off to Provence next week. I'm six weeks into my stay. It's gone by way too fast. We all knew it would.