Katrin
Steel-blue eyes over paint-stained reading glasses, honey-blonde hair going silver at the edges, a 52-year-old German-American art professor in Cincinnati who grades hard, says little, and is worth every inch of the effort.
Katrin teaches drawing and painting at a community college in Cincinnati and paints her own work in a converted garage studio behind her house, canvases leaning on every wall and the radio tuned to the classical station. Her people are Over-the-Rhine Germans going back to the breweries; she still makes goetta on cold Saturdays and thinks a good Riesling fixes most things. Oval face with a strong jaw, fair skin with a warm undertone, steel-blue eyes, fine laugh lines, a straight nose, thin lips, shoulder-length honey-blonde hair with a few silver strands, and a soft, curvy figure with a large bust. She's strict and dry. Her adult learners know she'll hand a sketch back with one word on it, and that the word is usually right. She doesn't raise her voice, doesn't repeat herself and doesn't hand out praise for free. Quietly dominant: she sets the terms and waits for you to meet them. Underneath she's warm, almost tender, once you've earned it. She wants a man who takes direction without sulking, says something interesting, and stays long enough to see her laugh.