Tutoring seniors in computer literacy can be frustrating or rewarding. This week was rewarding.

My new client is an 89-year-old woman who is severely limited in seeing due to macular degeneration. This condition slowly eliminates the ability to see the sharp things at the center of vision, but generally leaves the ability to see peripheral things. My new client had an old W98 computer with what at one time was probably the largest CRT made. She wanted to update and get better accessibility features.

As we got to know each other on the first visit, I was astounded by her good nature and happy outlook on life. She is still living by herself, unassisted (her husband had died years ago), and her house was immaculate. Her office was organized and neat. Later I realized that neatness was part of her secret of being able to live a reasonably normal life. She knows where everything is. Her walls held a variety of oil pictures. She had painted them in her younger years when she could still see. You would think that an artist robbed of sight and living alone would sink into a terminal funk and have a terrible outlook on life. She was cheerful and getting on with it.

I learned several things from her. For instance, she had learned to set up her display with a black background and white letters (large letters!). She did this experimentally, but there is a good reason for this. With poor sight, one is better off to prevent extra photons from entering the eye and rattling around, destroying the desired image. With a white background, most of the energy entering your eye is from the background and not information. The information is contained in the absences of light. With a black background, the incoming photons are primarily information-carrying. Those of us blessed with normal (or correctable) eyesight are not worried about such distinctions. Another effect comes into play. The area affected by macular degeneration also in the primary source of color information. Our peripheral vision is primarily monochrome and more suitable for night vision. You can test this yourself by looking at stars. You can see them better by looking alongside them rather than looking straight at them. This is particularly true of faint stars.

After we discussed her needs, desires, and budget, she commissioned me to purchase a large LCD monitor and new Vista computer and set it up for her. This was on Monday. I promised to have it to her Friday afternoon, but she called me several times during the week to let me know she was available if I got it sooner. She was like a little girl.

When we set up her system, she was all over it. She kept saying that there was so much to learn. And she seemed to be anxious to get on with it. So many older people just stop growing and just give up. Then you run into someone like this new client who has a great attitude, has overcome a variety of handicaps, and wants to learn new things! Helping such people is a pleasure.

However, a business is a business and sooner or later you get to the issue of how much to charge. In this case, that was not much of a problem. The client and her husband had planned carefully for their old age and she was reasonably well off and well able to afford both me and a new computer. However, that gets balanced by the obvious fact that this will be a recurring client. She will need help for many sessions until she feels comfortable. I do not know how other tutors charge, but sticking strictly by the clock with a fixed rate does not work for me. She got a significant discount, realized it, and was grateful. Her last words as I left her house this week were that she wanted me back next Tuesday and she was going to refer me to several of her friends. That is a good client.

In response to the interest my original tutorial generated, I have completely rewritten and expanded it. Check out the tutorial availability through Lockergnome. The new version is over 100 pages long with chapters that alternate between discussion of the theoretical aspects and puzzles just for the fun of it. Puzzle lovers will be glad to know that I included an answers section that includes discussions as to why the answer is correct and how it was obtained. Most of the material has appeared in these columns, but some is new. Most of the discussions are expanded compared to what they were in the original column format.