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Category: a day in this life
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I use ArtGeek.io to learn if and when there is art I want to see. I got one of their rare emails today with info about Impressionist and Post-Impressionist exhibitions around the US this summer.
I am a huge fan of Wasily Kandinsky and there is an exhibition going on at the Guggenheim in NYC into September.
With my kid unemployed due to a layoff and after getting the patio done, I’m feeling kind of strapped. Not painfully broke. But, not free to just fly up for a couple of days, either. I checked MegaBus and I could do a round trip for $204 without spending a night in the city.
I would get on the bus in Durham at 9:20pm, change buses in DC at after a 2 hour layover and be in NYC by 8:45am. Head home that night at 11:30, layover for 4 hours in DC and be home by 1:30pm.
I’m debating with myself if I want to see that art badly enough to take that ride.
Edit to add: We have decided 3 things. 1) Chuck gets to come with me for a longer art trip. 2) We’re taking the train because Amtrak will be more comfortable and is not crazy expensive from Burlington, NC to NYC. 3) We’re waiting until next year to have a little time for our finances to recover from the patio,
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Poet and novelist Margaret Atwood on the universal nature of writing:
“Everyone writes in a way; that is, each person has a “story,” a personal narrative which is constantly being replayed, revised, taken apart, and put together again. The significant points in this narrative change as a person ages—what may have been tragedy at twenty is seen as comedy or nostalgia at forty. All children write. (And paint, and sing.) I suppose the real question is why do so many people give it up?”
I don’t think we do. I think a lot of us just change mediums.
When we were dating, I commented to my husband that I don’t “do” art. I just enjoy it and collect a little. He said he thinks my home and garden is my art. I can get behind that.
There was a Georgia O’Keefe exhibition at Reynolda House a few years ago that was absolutely stunning. In addition to paintings by her, there were photos of her and several pieces of her clothing that she had made for herself before off-the-rack became the standard for how we dress ourselves. Those functional objects were also beautiful. And there’s a lot to be said for creating the life you want. For making things just so because that’s what makes your heart sing. (See also the clothes of Frida Kahlo.)
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‘Valentine’ I had a thriving pink bleeding heart that I tried to transplant. That was not successful. But, this seems to be a good choice.
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When I was little, my dad taught himself to play the guitar. When he was actually able to play songs, we would sing along with him. He played for decades and tended to choose old country music, Hank, Patsy, Waylon and Willie.
One of our favorite songs to sing with him was Butter Beans by Little Jimmy Dickens.
In the Episcopal church, the service on the Saturday between Good Friday and Easter Sunday is frequently when babies are christened. The service starts with no lights and no music and as it progresses. Candles are lit and music is added during the collection, which happens around the middle of the service. Eventually, everyone leaves the church to exuberant hymns with candles and lights everywhere, in anticipation of the joy of Easter.
For 3 or 4 years (if I recall correctly, I wasn’t always there) some of the members of my parents’ church were in a jazz band and they offered to do the Easter Saturday music, giving the choir a break from singing before all the action on Easter. The music was always good and the recessional was a kind of Dixieland parade into the parish hall where there was a party for the newly christened, their families and the rest of the congregation.
The year my youngest nephew was christened, they played Just a Closer Walk With Thee. Just the music; no voices. And my younger sister and I got tickled. In the middle of the service. We tried really hard to stifle the giggles. But, we weren’t as subtle as we hoped and our youngest sister, the mother of the candidate, leaned up and asked us what was so funny. And we told her. So, there were all the daughters of the rector snickering in the middle of the christening of his youngest grandchild. We did manage to pull ourselves together by the end of the hymn and finish the service behaving like adults.
Later, in the parish hall, my father sidled up to me and said. “What had you all giggling during the Offertory?”
And I said, “Because, they were playing ‘Butter Beans’ in church.”
The beginning of the service, before we all processed in, silently. Click through and listen. Then, tell me we were wrong.
He couldn’t.
I am the Audience 