Learning
Boogie
Heaven Host
in All Saints
@Gramps49's comment on another thread -
Made me think -
What do you wish you had studied?
Why don't you start now?
And, to Lamb Chops point for seminarians to have a degree in something besides religion. Amen. Wished I had. I probably would have gone into something like geology. It is one of my advocations.
Made me think -
What do you wish you had studied?
Why don't you start now?
Comments
Maybe I should have a go at stand-up comedy?
But I'm an exceedingly slow learner, which tends to put me off doing another degree.
I've looked into it, but Open University fees are pretty steep.
There are many things I'm interested in. I think maybe Horticulture would be my subject of choice at the moment.
More worryingly - I am 55 years old and my short-term memory is absolutely fecked. I really struggle to learn new things at work, where there is generally not very much pressure at all. I am impressed that there are people here who might consider starting anything requiring the kind of feats of memory that we might have been capable of in our 20s and 30s.
I wanted to be an English teacher but in the 1980s people from my background didn’t go to university. I wasn’t even allowed to go to college for A levels as my parents wanted me to get a job and contribute to the family rent. So I worked in a care home on a youth training scheme instead. I assume if I had gone to a traditional uni then it would have been to study English Literature.
I studied my first degree part time while working full time as a nurse. It was a combined degree of Sociology, English Literature and Health Studies (as there was no OU health degree in those days) and I have done a second degree in History since then. It is history that I have really fallen in love with. I am lucky enough to be in a position where I can study for free; I am about to finish a masters in early modern history and I am considering a masters in classical studies next year. I use study as therapy for my bipolar disorder, it gives me a safe focus for my overactive mind.
In my case I also use my health expertise for my history research. My current dissertation is about developments in eighteenth century psychiatry.
I have pondered the possibility of working on something like a Masters in Liturgical Studies, but so far I haven’t found a program that would fit my various needs (location, cost, etc.)
And yes, I'm planning to do this because of my own problems and right now, because of my husband's--because every freaking year, gardening season starts up, and he overdoes things, and for a couple of weeks he's convinced that he has a life-threatening disorder of some sort. Because pain, which is a thing he is mostly unacquainted with. Grrrrrrr.
After retirement I trained and obtained my certificate at Citizens Advice. It suited me well, not only fulfilling a need to help others, but I am a good listener, can quickly focus on what is needed and look up, apply and communicate the relevant information, then write it up succinctly. The key is that you don’t actually need to remember the detailed information - just as well as I don’t retain the detail.
I did this for almost 15 years. I have done enough learning, though I enjoy mastering new pieces of music to sing.
Between theology assignments I’m trying to read The Hobbit in Welsh, which is also a considerable challenge.
(*Occupational Therapy in this case - though on my new course OT usually stands for Old Testament!)
More recently, I wish I had the time and the energy to learn Welsh.
Oh what era of lit?
I was a little bookworm as a child and so ended up in libraries. Now my happy place is in the garden and cutting flowers. It makes me wonder whether I would have enjoyed horticulture or floristry. Mum was an excellent amateur florist, my skills are nowhere near her own, but I do enjoy buying and arranging flowers.
19th century broadly, but with some pre-war modernism thrown in for good measure.
Yay!
Finnau hefyd! Mae'r Hobyd yn eitha anodd, dw i'n meddwl!
(Me too - Yr Hobyd* is quite hard, I think)
*The Hobbit.
Would I actually go to the effort of studying for another degree? Probably not. In order to do that, I would first have to get fed up with my current occupation, then have the financial ability to retire and spend time on studying. Never say never, but it seems unlikely.
It's the sort of thing that fascinates me, it's proper primary research, and I have more time to devote to that sort of thing now, so I'm quite excited.
That does sound interesting @Eigon - I hope you make some interesting discoveries.
When I was a child I remember reading a story about a child in England digging up Roman gold. Mum saw me digging in the garden and asked what I was doing, "Looking for Roman gold," I said.
I was really disappointed to be told the Romans didn't come to NZ and decided that must mean Maori were cleverer than Romans because they found NZ. I also decided NZ was a very boring country. Mum said, "No it's not, we just don't know about it yet."
Fast forward about 55 years - my brother D was visiting from the US, and we went to an exhibition at the museum. It blew both our minds. In a small town further south that I had visited once to go ice skating, there had once been a tropical lake, while in a small country town half an hour's drive north of Christchurch they had dug up evidence of 150 cm tall penguin.
I mentally apologised to Mum, who had died before the discoveries were made, so she didn't get to say, "I told you so."