Nice Goals

I visited a couple of art museums yesterday, and while I haven't had any formal art history training, I feel like I'm pretty good at getting the big picture.

Take Henry Matisse, for example. The "bored, rich, white dude that decided to take up painting." Now he's got a museum dedicated to him. The commentary provided for his artwork went on and on about how he really wanted to infuse the colors of the blue, blue Mediterranean sea into his paintings and everything changed substantially after his visit to Tahiti and blah blah blah. I don't know if I buy it. I think he might have just wanted an excuse to stare at naked women all day. (Actually, I really liked some of his impressionism stuff, especially the statues. I love the idea of presenting what you see, not what is visible.)

Or take, for example, the museum of Marc Chagall. The audio tour included with my visit (thank the gods for student discounts!) provided the meaning of every last brushstroke. Do you really think Chagall used the crucifix to represent his father's hat on his 26th birthday, the trials of his people in Belarus, and the end of suffering to the Jews? Or do you think that Chegall, a Jew, was merely including the crucifix because his employers were Christian churches? (Actually, I was baffled and in awe at the incredible woven tapestries he designed. The amount of skill and precision they must have required... Incredible!)

But what gets me even more is that Chegall was actually alive when they dedicated his museum. In fact, he designed the museum and placed his paintings. I would have been fascinated to have him give the audio tour–or at least offer a rebuttal to the current version. What would he have said? Would he have called it a bunch of hogwash?


And then I stumbled across XKCD: explain today and realized that Randall probably has an even harder time. Not only do his comics get critiqued, they often get over-analyzed. And he's STILL ALIVE WHEN THIS HAPPENS. What gets me even more is the discussion section: "And you, sir, are a canonical example of an outlier. Seriously, though, go to http://google.com [hyperlink included, just in case you missed it] and type 'is an acquired taste.'"


Someday when I grow up, I'm going to be a famous artist. And then I'm going to show up in disguise at all the fancy-schmancy art dinners and say, "Oh I heard Nathan talking about how his latest painting entitled 'apple by book' is actually a reference to the Garden of Eden as written in The Bible and in fact suggests that history is a tangled mess to nail down." I'd be the master troll.

Love from Nice, where the water is blue, the houses are pastel, and you can't help but look away from the camera when you take a selfie.

Becoming acquainted

I forgot my bike on the bus today. It felt good.

Not because I had left a (mostly just) sentimental transportation device on a public vehicle that would have been a hassle to recover, but because, as I was walking away empty-handed, the bus driver honked the horn and patiently waited for me to realize my error. This was the same bus driver I had chatted with my entire ride about South-By, traffic, the 30 route, and how more people should take public transportation... This was also the same driver who, when I got on the bus, greeted me with a welcoming smile and a reference to the conversation we'd had yesterday.

I love taking the bus. I feel proud to say that I haven't driven once to school this entire semester, and even though the experience isn't always the most pleasant (sometimes it might smell like an armpit and sometimes your bus might be 20 minutes late...and sometimes both of those things happen in the same day), I feel like I'm contributing to a better environment.

But what I really liked about my experience today was that it had become routine enough that the driver recognized me. I haven't had a lot of experiences like that, and I don't really know why. (It might be that growing up not drinking hot or alcoholic beverages prevented my establishing a favorite coffeshop or bar, or it might be that being a poor college student who didn't want to take out student loans precluded my frequenting of restaurants, but it just as likely could be something else.) Lately, though, I've been looking for some sort of consistency. I've been looking for a diner where I can walk in, say "the usual" and they'll know exactly what I mean. I've been looking for a barbershop where I can say, "same as last time," and they won't bat an eye.

So it was nice today when the bus driver remembered my face, remembered my stop, and even nicer that he noticed I had forgotten my bike.

A time-lapse video taken from the car (loser) in the official Austin Rush-Hour Race–another reason to take public transportation.

It builds character

I was talking with some friends the other night about absolutely terrible experiences that were incredibly profound, but were also terribly painful to go through. I've thought about it some more, and have come up with:

The 9 life experiences I believe everyone should have*^,**

1. overcoming an addiction (and I don't mean something mamby-pamby like a mild fascination with sugar or caffeine or an "addiction to cracking knuckles"; I'm talking a serious, chemically-induced, behaviorally-modifying, possibly-health-or-even-life-threatening one you fight with for several years)
2. coming out of the closet (and this doesn't just include gender or sexual orientation (and could, perhaps, be even more) but any experience that requires you to drastically change the expectations of many–if not all–of your closest associates)
3. a ritualistic burning of the boats
4. a seriously traumatic experience
5. mental therapy and/or counseling in any of its varieties 
6. being heartbroken
7. wanting something so badly it hurts, and then realizing–all in a short period of time–that you'll never actually have it
8. being picked last in gym class
9. realizing you're so strapped for cash at the end of the month that you can either fill up your gas tank or eat dinner, but not both

* but couldn't really consider myself a decent human being if I wished them on my friends
** somewhat in order of significance