Living Museum of Learning
Someone Saw Her
Enning had essentially zero coding experience five days earlier.
Then she began exploring p5.js.
Donald gave her a simple challenge:
“Draw some circles on your canvas, some beautiful ones.”
He didn't teach her the syntax for circle().
She experimented, figured things out, and produced her own sketch.
Donald shared the story on LinkedIn as part of the growing Living Museum of Learning.
Then something completely unexpected happened.
A stranger named Joe DeNavas saw the post.
Joe is a code artist whose p5.js artwork has been displayed around the world.
He left a message specifically for Enning.
Joe wrote:
“Please tell Enning that a code artist who has had their p5js art displayed around the world told her amazing job on her sketch, figuring things out what to do, and to never stop believing in herself!”
Donald was deeply moved.
Joe wasn't simply saying:
“Nice drawing.”
He had noticed something much more important:
Enning was figuring things out for herself.
So Donald decided the message should not disappear into a LinkedIn comment.
He captured the original comment, preserved Joe's exact words, translated them into Chinese, and sent the whole message to Enning's family.
The encouragement had traveled:
from Enning → to Donald → to LinkedIn → to Joe → and back to Enning.
Something unexpected had emerged from a tiny coding exercise.
Enning was no longer learning only from her teacher.
She had become visible to someone from the wider creative-coding community.
And Joe was no longer simply a stranger reading a LinkedIn post.
He had become, however briefly, part of Enning's learning story.
The Living Museum had created a connection that nobody had planned.
A beginner's first experiments had reached an experienced code artist.
And an experienced artist had reached back.
This exhibit is not primarily about learning circle().
It is about something harder to teach.
Being seen.
Enning is still at the very beginning of her coding journey. She is experimenting, making mistakes, asking questions, fixing things, and discovering what computers can do.
Joe recognized exactly that process.
His message gave her something that a programming tutorial cannot provide:
Someone outside her immediate circle believes she can become good at this.
Sometimes a learner needs instruction.
Sometimes a learner needs a challenge.
And sometimes, unexpectedly, a learner needs to hear:
“I see what you're doing. Keep going.”
Epilogue
Perhaps the most beautiful part is that Joe's message arrived when Enning was only five days into coding.
She doesn't yet know where this road will lead.
She may become a programmer.
A designer.
A mathematician.
A code artist.
Something completely different.
We don't know.
But somewhere near the beginning of that road, there is now a small marker:
Someone saw her.
And told her:
Never stop believing in yourself. 🌱❤️