 David Stanford Baker, County Examiner of Schools | I NEVER MEANT TO BE A GEEK. I never meant to be a geek. I always intended to be an artist. To succeed as DirectorCurator of artCentral, developing a geekish, digital skill set is essential to organize exhibitions, prepare presentations, create graphics for publications, navigate a plethora of emails, send out calls for artists, plan artCamp and dance online with all the tasks related to managing our community’s non-profit arts center. Fortunately, two accomplished artCentral artists and genuine digital geeks, Koral Martin and Sarah Serio, generously step up to coach me, when I get stuck or need to learn unfamiliar, challenging applications. To these angelic digital wizards I send a grateful “Thank You”! |
As a small girl, being a geek wasn’t an option, at least not in the way we now use the term to mean a computer nerd. We had only book nerds back then. The world was still using manual typewriters and many high school essays were written out in cursive. We made calls on rotary devices—no screens included. Acquiring a sophisticated push button princess phone was the ultimate status statement. (We still have two in operation at Hyde House—one pink, one beige—bequests from Mrs. Hyde.)
| Becoming a geek today is a process I never imagined for myself while I was a full time artist blissfully painting in my studio, building herb beds with rocks carried from the river bed, feeding chickens and gathering their eggs, planting and harvesting my vegetable garden and hiking with my dogs through the Ozark highlands. During my isolated wilderness sojourn, my adult son and daughter rather firmly nudged me into geekdom. To keep our communications flowing, |  Alice Dean Price Baker with the thirty-nine students in her 1939-1940 one room schoolhouse class in northwest Arkansas. |
they insisted I earn basic computer skills, i.e., email and web navigation. I did learn for the sake of our relationships, never dreaming I was preparing for the encore career I’m now living.
Encore careers are a theme in my family. Both my parents began as educators.
Long before becoming a computer-savvy, skilled number-cruncher for her state’s budget department, Mother, an artist, taught in a one room rural schoolhouse, making noontime stone soup for her students who walked to school barefooted, bringing empty bellies. The artistic installations they created for their classroom took prizes in regional competitions.
Before becoming an attorney advising returning GIs on their educational rights, my father served as Examiner of Schools over an extensive county, then as Postmaster in their small town before going to Washington, D.C. as personal assistant to his state Senator.
My parents’ adaptability and quests for expansive experiences are inspirations to me, as I relish living my encore at artCentral and daily learn new geek skills. Though I never meant to be a geek, I love knowing I’m still an artist, too.
Encore careers are a theme in my family. Both my parents began as educators.
Long before becoming a computer-savvy, skilled number-cruncher for her state’s budget department, Mother, an artist, taught in a one room rural schoolhouse, making noontime stone soup for her students who walked to school barefooted, bringing empty bellies. The artistic installations they created for their classroom took prizes in regional competitions.
Before becoming an attorney advising returning GIs on their educational rights, my father served as Examiner of Schools over an extensive county, then as Postmaster in their small town before going to Washington, D.C. as personal assistant to his state Senator.
My parents’ adaptability and quests for expansive experiences are inspirations to me, as I relish living my encore at artCentral and daily learn new geek skills. Though I never meant to be a geek, I love knowing I’m still an artist, too.
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