An art classmate of mine named Christian is a unique, intelligent person.  I had met him at a Fourth of July party at Mark and Kristin Hoke’s house.  He tagged along with a friend (party crasher) and I never learned his name that night.  Everyone referred to him as “McLoven” and he just laughed along with the rest of us.

That fall I found myself sitting across from “McLoven” in creative writing class.  He wrote a crazy and silly story titled Gerhard Wintsler: Chicken Snatcher.  The class enjoyed his circus story and with Christian’s permission, I will post it on my blog in the near future.

This fall, I found myself sitting beside “McLoven” in art class.  He can not resist picking on me and I get a huge kick out of him.  Today he felt the need to comment on my age multiple times and I threatened to write about him in my blog.  He didn’t seem scared until I mentioned his nickname.

On lunch break, the cafe’s credit card machine was down and I didn’t have my student ID to pay for my coffee and bagel.  Christian insisted on paying for it and I said “Awww see you are nice to me!”  He immediately denied this, of course.

When we got back to class and he resumed his constant chatter, changing his mind what his sculpture looked like multiple times.  The sculptures we are working on are not supposed to look like anything, so I’m not sure why he was so worried about it.  He slipped back into “pick on Pattie” mode and I said in front of our classmates, “I think you like me and that’s why you pick on me.  You even bought my lunch.”

“Oh no!” he said, quickly denying the thought.  “You are not in my age group!” he explained.

“Really?” I asked in a serious tone.  “I’m 31, so I guess I am to old for your age group.”

He paused and said, “Oh, that’s not old.”

I don’t know how I should feel about our conversation.  Happy that he believes I am 31 years old, or bad because otherwise, I am old.

Like fine wine…getting better with age,

~P.