October 13 to October 15, 2006Jennifer and I planned this trip to be the last one for 2006. For such a short excursion — only a weekend — it was intended to achieve no less than three separate goals. First, we hoped it would “overwrite” my first trip to Atlanta, when I attended a hypnosis conference way back in August 2003. That particular trip, which I undertook alone, was chaotic, lonely and included my getting shnookered by a panhandler. I left Atlanta back then with a metaphorical bad taste in my mouth that I was eager to metaphorically “swish” out. Second, this trip would act to carry on one of the themes of the Travelin’ Thornberries, that being the frequenting of art museums that are reasonably close to home. The High Art Museum in Atlanta seemed vast and exciting, and we thought it might help finish out the year on a more positive note than some of our experiences at the last art museum in Indianapolis. Finally, it would give us a chance to meet up with our great friend-turned-landlady, Gena, and her main squeezy-toy, Jim (aka Mr Boston or Mr “B”).
Ultimately, to our delight, this trip would meet all of those expectations and more.
Friday October 13, 2006—A Day for the Superstitious
Once again, we decided that the best way to relocate our corporeal manifestations from our cozy doorstep to the entrance of the High Museum would be to use an airplane. We reasoned that a direct flight of only about fifty minutes was a better option than slogging through abysmal traffic on unfamiliar roads for seven hours by car. So Jennifer and I took off work on Friday, spent the day finalizing our plans and then headed off to the airport. Alas, after our delightful discovery in May that we could carry on everything and save ourselves the headache of going through the baggage claim, another group of stupid idiots, this time in England, had to go and try to sabotage a plane in the recent past. Airline security was on high alert, therefore, and we had to check all of our hair gels, lotions and our delicious bottles of bourbon and red wine. But having done that, we had hoped for a relatively uneventful flight.
The Usual Plethora of Airport Hassles
But of course, you know that’s not the way it happened. We the Travelin’ Thornberries have gone to enough places by now that one would think we’d experienced and recorded everything there was to say about the headaches that come of getting from point A to point B. But apparently, the vicissitudes of the human condition are nigh infinite; we once again found ourselves confronted by novel annoyances that were bad for us, if imminently entertaining for you, our beloved Readers.
First of all, we learned in the ticket line that our flight was delayed by two hours. Since this was theoretically a short, direct flight, the delay essentially tripled our travel time and extended how late we would arrive in Atlanta. That sucked donkey loaf because we had plans to do some shopping in the Lenox Mall and the late arrival time threatened to squash those plans.
Second, as we went through security, I had the crap flakes scared out of me by a guard who saw fit to stop me and do for me what our lovely city government failed to do; let me know that my driver’s license was expired! Yes, I suppose it was my responsibility to look at the expiration date periodically, but who thinks to do that when their license is only one year, eight months and fifteen days old? Why the hell was it due already? I was to later learn when I went to renew that truncated license that apparently, any time you get a new one in between the four-year time period of your last, one, it gets designated “a replacement.” Such a license is only given a life span up until the next official time when the license would have expired. In my case, that was one year, eight months and fifteen days later. *Snort*
At any rate, the guard was not going to let me pass through the security gate. Not to be deterred, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, called on the Force and waved my hand before his face, saying, “I am a psychologist. You will let me fly.” A blank look came over the guard’s face, his eyes glazed over and he said mechanically, “I will let you fly.” So in my stocking feet, I walked through the scanner, before he could realize I had used a Jedi “mind trick” on him.
Okay, actually… [BEGIN DISCLAIMER]
…Technically, I’m not a psychologist; I’m a psychological practitioner [END DISCLAIMER]. And the guard just asked if I had any other form of identification given to me by the state of Kentucky. I flashed my license to practice psychology, and he accepted it. But that’s so much less interesting, isn’t it…?
Back on track and feeling like we’d had a brief brush with the Gestapo, Jennifer and I set out to locate the gate designated for our flight number. Looking up at one of the omnipresent monitors, we noted that we were supposed to be at Gate…Zero? WTF? How does one find Gate Zero? Anyone? Show of hands? C’mon, don’t be shy! The only gate we did find had no one operating it, of course. So back and forth Jennifer and I moseyed, looking for information like alms for the poor. We weren’t the only ones; we stumbled onto a couple of other passengers who were just as lost at the idea of finding a non-existent gate. Eventually, we encountered an employee who acted like we were inconveniencing him by asking him to act like an employee, but he told us where we needed to be, if not where in a warm metaphysical realm mostly discussed in Abrahamic religions that he’d rather we go.
Once we found the spot, it was stuffed like a bag of marshmallows with the people scheduled for the flight preceding ours. People groaned like the damned, twisting atop each other, with myriad limbs sticking out in all directions. Blue faces. Wordless mouthings, like fish out of water. The suffering. Oh, the humanity. Not wanting to have to compete for oxygen in such a crammed area, we ended up going to the nearby café so I could have a beer (at 2:30 in the afternoon, but hey, it was vacation!) and Jennifer could galvanize herself with a cup of crack-caffeine.
Other than the waiting, we had no further problems boarding and getting out of the airport. It is worth noting, however, that we seem to have an uncanny knack for booking flight seats that sit on the damn engine! Yes, on both our departure and arrival flights for this trip, Jennifer and I were all the way in the very back, sitting with the plane’s vibrating engine up our buttcheeks. Meet the Travelin’ Thornberries: The last boarded and the last to de-plane. Perhaps we should get away from online booking and just let AAA handle it; on our honeymoon, they, at least, put us in the middle of the plane! *Grumble*
We touched down at the Atlanta airport about an hour after takeoff. Despite the headaches of the airport, it is quite nice to go more than 350 miles in only about 17 percent of the time it would take to go by car…and with less traffic hassle. Back during our previously mentioned honeymoon, Jennifer and I both had an abysmal experience with this particular airport, one that involved us basically running from one end of it to the other until we were so winded we vomited up pancreatic juice. This time, we walked nice and leisurely for awhile, more to stretch our legs than anything. Then we caught the transport and visited the Mighty Baggage Clam.
Yes, there it sat, a huge alabaster clamshell, probably ten feet across. It rested with its mouth facing outward, looking like Audrey II from the movie Little Shop of Horrors (1986). Every so often, it would spit out a large suitcase that would fall in a beautiful arc until it landed with a *whump* on top of its owner or innocent passersby. Crushed bodies lay strewn about beneath alligator skin tote sacks and broken backpacks. I don’t know if the Baggage Clam was just malicious in how it treated everyone, or if it simply had trouble seeing what it was doing; after all, it was missing an eye.Okay, actually…
We collected our bags without any hassles, but as we were riding the transport, we noticed that the sign for “Baggage Claim” was missing the “I,” thus conveying the image of a “baggage cla m.” What’s life without a little creativity? ;)
Arrival in Atlanta—Initiate Systemic Overwrite
Jennifer and I boarded the Marta, the public transportation system in Atlanta that would take us from the airport to our hotel. Already, this trip felt better than my first one. Probably just having a detail-focused person like Jennifer along made it less harrowing for me.
As we sat in our crunched seats, I did as much people-watching as I could surreptitiously manage without getting stabbed by someone. Overall, people just sort of sit glassy-eyed and stare into space. But we did spot a couple of Mormon missionaries who looked distinctly out of place with their white shirts and black ties. Are subways in the Outer Darkness? Hm…
Some patterns of behavior had followed us to Atlanta from home…I’m referring here to the public cell phone users.
Indulge me in a rant.
As a technophobe, I tend to eschew “needless innovation,” which is what I call it when newer, more expensive and overly complicated technologies come along to fulfill needs or lifestyle situations that do not really change that much. One of my pet peeves is being forced to have to trouble myself with changing technologies because the world decides what I’m using isn’t good enough any more. And you can never just replace what you need. To use a mechanical example for comparison purposes, it would be like trying to buy a tire for your car and having someone tell you that they can no longer replace just a tire, because the rim also is outdated. And they can’t replace the rim because the frame is outdated, and so on, until it becomes obvious that you’ll have to buy a whole new car just to get four working tires!
Cell phones, represent “needless innovation,” especially the current ones with their 10,000 unnecessary functions, like Internet access, camera and text messaging (don’t even get me started on how TM butchers written language!) I’m willing to concede that cell phones can serve two relatively restricted functions: emergencies and logistics. Your loved one gets decapitated and in need of a skull transplant in the hospital, and immediate contact is necessary? Cell phone. You get caught in traffic and delayed for a preplanned rendezvous? By all means, cell phone. But for frivolous conversation in public places, where other people have to listen? NOT!! Such use is similar to people who smoke in public and then complain when their right to puff poison at others gets impugned.
Back to the story, Jennifer and I were forced by proximity to listen to two people jabber incessantly on their cell phones about topics that didn’t seem particularly time-sensitive or crisis-oriented. But they weren’t going to let go of their toys or put their desires on hold for any longer than necessary. I watched one gentleman calmly tell his phone that the train was coming up on a tunnel. He then hung up when he lost the signal, waited ten seconds until the train cleared said tunnel, then dialed right back up again to continue his conversation. This occurred two or three times. I mean, really, was his conversation so important it couldn’t wait until he at least got off of the train, where it would have been more convenient even for him? And did we have to listen to it? My opinion? If the discussion is important, wait until you get home so you can talk in private. If it isn’t, then it can wait. I’d rather not have loud, mundane business foisted on me. Alas, needless innovation moves at a far faster pace than social folkways and mores can compensate. And thus ends my rant.
The J.W. Marriott Lenox Hotel
We arrived at the J.W. Marriott, a pretty fancy hotel with an umbilicus connected to the four-story Lenox Mall. Standing there in our travel wear, Jennifer and I felt just a little intimidated by the bell hops, clerks and the concierge, all wearing their tuxedos and ties. But despite the opulence of the atmosphere, everyone was friendly and respectful to us. Check-in was smooth and hassle-free, and within minutes, Jennifer and I were blowing bloody mucus from our nostrils as the elevator shot us into the lower stratosphere. Dizzy and disoriented from the altitude sickness, we opened the door to our room on the 19th floor.
What a space!!
Yes, in terms of luxury, all that was missing in it were two naked foreign female massage experts to knead fancy oils into the skin of our backs with their shapely bare feet, while we underwent mud mask applications.
Jennifer and I typically aim for accommodations that are easy to reach from the airport (that is,
without a car) and that are conveniently located near food and our ultimate destinations. We do not insist on royal treatment or a classy place to leave our bones while our nervous systems progress through the four stages of sleep. However, in this case, it seemed that those qualities were a windfall. Yes, the bed had a sweater-load of pillows arranged like a huge sculpture, the room was enormous, we had pay-per-view and to beat all, an actual liquor cabinet! We’d never actually seen the latter before in real life, but we were still savvy enough to expect that if we actually touched anything in there, we would probably wake up weak from the three pints of blood the hotel would have sucked out of us as compensation. Still, it gave us options, because (he said facetiously), it isn’t like the Travelin’ Thornberries have ever had any trouble finding a decent beer when they go somewhere new and exotic. [Snicker.]
While Jennifer freshened up, I decided to investigate just how badly the Mighty Baggage Clam had chewed up our checked bag back at the airport. I undid the zipper and beheld a swamp. Gelatinous goo and algae everywhere. And cookies. I simply cannot forget the cookies. Yes, one of Jennifer’s myriad lubricants, creams, lotions, sprays or chum had spilled inside the bag, giving everything a cream-based coagulated finish. Stuck in little tufts atop that gunky mess were the crumbs of the toffee nut cookies we had brought along to help snacking expenses. So much for plastic seal-able bowls. Yeech!
So we took the high road of responsibility and discipline…we blew off doing anything with that whole sludge pile for the time being and decided to head over to the Lenox Mall. Yes, we yearned for some dinner and perhaps a little shopping with the feeble time we had left before the place closed down. To our delight, the J.W. Marriott had an excellent elevator system, so that even as high up as we were, we never really had to wait for one, nor did we have to deal with the hiccuping frustration of waiting for it to stop on every floor. Pretty snazzy.
Even after our experiences at Union Station in
St. Louis, the Lenox Mall was a vast, sprawling and nearly overwhelming experience for us. Four stories of hustling, bustling people threading themselves into innumerable shops. As impressive a place as it was, however, Jennifer and I would ultimately be struck by how little of it was really necessary. We could probably have gotten everything we needed from a quarter of the places they had available. I noted while we were there with how much we as a culture are oriented toward convenience, ease and satisfying as many of our desires as possible with as correspondingly little effort as we can get by with putting forth. Barry Schwartz, in his book The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less (2005), speaks of how our willingness to make decisions decreases as the number of choices we have increases, as does our satisfaction with the choices we do make. Watching all of those people desperately trying to find fulfillment by spending time and money in far too many stores, I could see Dr. Schwartz’s thesis being borne out. Bigger and more doesn’t always mean better. Life doesn’t get more exciting or fulfilling by trying to quench more and increasingly tangential material desires. Happiness lies in eliminating frivolous desires, prioritizing those that remain and limiting choices only to them.
Fortunately, Jennifer and I came to Lenox with a predetermined set of goals, ones that automatically trimmed out many of the unnecessary decisions about where to go and what to do. On this particular night, we mainly wanted to scope out the places that would meet said goals and also to baste something edible in our respective internal sacks of gastric juice.
The human experience of the place was part boredom and part anxiety. It seemed like half of the people were like hominid ice floes, bobbing along at nominal speeds, eyes glazed, aimlessly doing little besides circulating blood and letting the planet age under them. The other half were leaving dusty footprints on the buttcheeks of Jennifer’s and my pants; we felt like we were being run down.
These experiences aside, however, a bit more should be said of the employees and the general population of this part of Atlanta. Jennifer and I noted that these people were overwhelmingly in good physical condition. We saw far less obesity here than the lard-bonanza evident in so many of the public venues of home. More, everyone seemed to be dressed in trendy, new fashions that were largely unfamiliar to us (okay, unfamiliar to me, as it was Jennifer who first commented on them). Nearly everywhere we went, people were approachable and friendly. Before we left Atlanta altogether, we would note that it seemed like everyone in the businesses worked 24 hours per day…the people who served us during the day were often the ones we’d seen the night before. Go home, people! Get some sleep!
Back to our quest for food, Jennifer and I briefly thought about going to an open air (to the internal mall air, anyway) pizza joint, but decided we were too hungry to wait on a crowded Friday night. Instead, we went downstairs to the food court, where Jennifer snapped her tongue ten feet across the room like a frog to grab the little sampler meat morsels that some of the Cajun and Asian places were bandying about. Perhaps I did as well, but I’m telling the story here. ;) Samplers aside, though, we ultimately stuck with our lust for pizza by going to a by-the-slice facility and selecting a couple of specimens that didn’t look too mummified. Our loads in hand, we hotfooted our way back to the room, there to engage in shameless gluttony with our cheesy prey and five-dollar canned beers. While we masticated our fare, we watched some average cable television and then finished out the evening with the pay-per-view movie, X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) Then it was to bed.
Saturday October 14, 2006—The High Art Museum
Out of bed on time, we jaunted back over to the Lenox Mall for a snack of Starbucks coffee and muffins, then we boarded the Marta for destination: High Art Museum!
An Architectural Masterpiece
Our luck held out as sour as always, and the Marta dumped us where we’d be certain to walk in the opposite direction from the High Museum. But when we finally got on track and found our way there, what we found was an art museum that was a work of art unto itself. We entered the courtyard to the sound of accordion music being played live to an audience seated on chairs atop a grand red rug. In the background, performance artists acted as living sculptures; one example was a gentleman who affected the form of a stone statue of a Roman centurion.
Jennifer and Thomas pose before this "living statue" of a Roman centurion.Later on, we would witness him standing stoically while tourists took pictures of him and one group of immature idiots touched his fingers and looked up his armored “kilt.” What lummoxes. They didn’t recognize that the man was a work of art and should be accorded the same respect as any other part of the museum’s exhibits.
Once we got inside and figured out which direction was which, we found our way to one of the High’s earliest and most impressive chambers. It was a huge multi-level atrium, with a window at the top that let in just the right amount of sunlight to illuminate a plethora of objects that made up the museum’s permanent collection. To ascend the different levels, patrons climbed up a series of graded ramps that zig-zagged up the sides of the atrium.Security…Finally, Someone Gets It Right
This being our fifth art museum, Jennifer and I came prepared to be cautioned and directed along the way by the staff. Not to our surprise, it didn’t take them long to swoop in on us when they saw that I was carrying our camera. Jennifer and I do not normally mind if the staff look out for the artwork, for we’re loyal enough to the venues of human creativity that we want to see it preserved as much as the next patron. Camera flashes, for example, degrade the works of the great masters, so those works should be shielded from wanton and irresponsible forms of picture taking. But different museums have handled their cautioning role with varying degrees of tact and respect. One of our more recent museum experiences, for example, involved a human bat hanging down from the ceiling and screeching at us with her fanged mouth.
But the High Museum did it right, and they did it well. Someone came up to us discretely and asked us if we had received a “camera pass” yet. When we said we had not heard anything about that process, she calmly pointed us back to the main lobby and explained what we needed to do. We found the uniformed person responsible, and he had us read a list of disclaimers and “told ya so’s” in a book, before handing me a sticky badge to affix to my shirt. From that point forward, any time I took a picture, an employee would come toward me until they saw my badge. Then they left me alone. I learned to proudly thrust out my chest any time they were around, so they would see it well before I brandished the camera, and never have to waste any of our time by monitoring me.
A Rant on Unladylike Restroom Behavior
Throughout the history of the human race, philosophers, theologians and psychologists have lamented how much our species seems to be part angel and part ape. Humans are capable of great feats of technology and compassion, such as landing mobile rovers on Mars and establishing soup kitchens for the poor, yet woefully inadequate for the task of controlling petty emotions like jealousy or eliminating destructive patterns of behavior like violence and vandalism.
Here we were at an art museum, an institution dedicated to highlighting some of the greatest works of human inspiration, a place of creativity and beauty, and yet…well, I’ll let Jennifer explain where this little tidbit is going:
[TRANSITION TO JENNIFER’S VOICE]:
… And yet, the women’s restrooms brought the idea of beauty down a few notches. Now, to clarify and give credit where it is due, the problem did not come from lack of cleanliness or lackadaisical museum staff. They did a great job of keeping the restrooms clean. I even went into one restroom and found the staff person wiping off the sink, and I never had a problem with lack of toilet paper or soap, as is often the case in women’s public restrooms.
No, the problems I encountered were from the other women using the restrooms! They call us the fairer sex, but sometimes female bathroom behavior belies that moniker. Unfortunately, I have encountered less-than-pretty female bathroom behavior many times, and so I make a habit of looking at the seat before I sit down and wiping it off or covering it with toilet paper if necessary. I don’t share the common belief among women that if you sit on a public restroom seat, you’ll end up with an infection. So I don’t perform the move known as “the squat.” If I doubt the seat’s cleanliness, I simply cover it with toilet paper or a toilet seat cover if they are provided, plop down and do what I need to do. There’s no mess for the woman who will be using the stall after me.
On at least two occasions at the museum, I went into the stall and prepared to do my business, but when I looked at the seat before sitting down, I encountered splatters of you-know-what all over it. Eeewwww!! On one of these occasions, I even had to wait for the stall and encountered the woman who used the stall before me. Personally, I would be rather embarrassed to leave such a mess, then look at the next person going into the stall right after me. Please, ma’am, if you must do “the squat,” wipe the seat! Do you really think I want to sit in your bodily waste? Would you want to sit in mine? Sheesh! Have some courtesy for your fellow woman!
And now, Thomas will move on to a much prettier female part …
Buxom Beauties and Bouncing Men
While Jennifer and I were climbing up one of the ramps in the atrium section, we had opportunity to witness an entourage of performance artists dressed in period costumes. Here's an example:
You see, this particular weekend marked the beginning of the “Louvre-Atlanta” initiative, an arrangement that basically shipped classic pieces of artwork from the collections of Louis XIV, XV and XVI that are normally housed at the Louvre Museum in the country of France. These performance artists were arrayed in 18th century clothing, with the ladies wearing daring push-up bodices and the men wearing long curly hair locks and baggy bloomers. The whole team put on a neat drama with music, dialogue and pantomime, which, try as we might, Jennifer and I could not hear from our distant vantage way up on the third or fourth floor; what the atrium boasted in illumination and design, it lacked in acoustics.
Did I mention the daring push-up bodices? Check'em out!
Anyway, it also didn’t help that the employees kept ushering us off the ramps, so we repeatedly missed chunks of what was going on below during our disgruntled relocations. But they were obviously very entertaining to the patrons down there with them. One particularly talented performer did a juggling-esque routine in which he lobbed three to seven blocks in the air without losing any of them. We were impressed.
…Ah, the push-up bodices … makes me glad our trusty workhorse of a camera has at least a humble telephoto lens…
Highlights at the High, the High, the High, High, High
Alright, the above title referencing the High Art Museum is much more amusing if you sing it to the tune of the rock and roll hit “At the Hop” by Danny and the Juniors (1957).
This museum held a respectable collection of both European and American art pieces. Jennifer and I went through the different eras, styles and variations, greatly appreciating the talent it took to render them. Talent sorely lacking in the tips of our blunt, inarticulate hooves; we’ll never be able to render such beauty with brush, charcoal, clay or chisel. Still, we have an obligation to put our effort where it matters, that being in appreciation.
As always, we generally eschewed abstract, contemporary and landscape pieces, in favor of art that captured the human form. Sure, I always include the nudes, particularly the female ones, but there were plenty of other types of human figures in evidence as well. This museum had perhaps the best collection of sculpture of any we’ve visited. Unlike the Art Institute of Chicago, where it was arranged in a particular “hall,” however, the High tended to “pepper” their marble and bronze pieces all over the different floors, generally by period rather than medium. Now that we have a breadth of experience with art museums, we’ve come to appreciate that many of them have duplicates of certain pieces, or variants by the same artists. Several of the statues, for example, were ones we had seen before, albeit often with subtle differences in the descriptor cards. Sometimes they gave more detailed information, other times, just different facts. One particular sculpture was the same naked female bronze form, but instead of being the bronze color, this museum had it rendered in green.
Frederick William MacMonnies's, Bacchante and Infant Faun (1893), as captured by the Travelin' Thornberries at the Indianapolis Museum of Art in March 2006 and again at the High Museum in Atlanta, October 2006.Sometimes, it is nice to see a graded pattern of similarity, rather than a jagged kaleidoscope of diversity. In his book, The Secret Power of Beauty (2004), John Armstrong notes that beauty exists in our experience somewhere at the midpoint between boredom and exhaustion. Truer words were never experienced in Atlanta.
Randolph Rogers' Ruth Gleaning, 1867 is a replica of an 1858 carving. It's another piece the Travelin' Thornberries got to see at the Indianapolis Museum of Art five months earlier (Above). Fortunately, they got to see it again in Atlanta (Below), without the bitchy staff.Having seen the Hall of Glass at the Indianapolis Museum of Art back in March 2006, Jennifer and I already had some experience with that medium as a form of expression. The High had their own glass pieces distributed in a similar manner to their sculpture, in a “lightly seasoned” dusting. Jennifer and I were both quite taken with the arrangements they offered, perhaps because the lighting in this museum was so much better that it lit up individual works of glass so that they captured, refracted and bent it into beautiful arrangements.
What surprised us the most, however, was our appreciation of the artistic furniture. To be sure, this wasn’t the first museum we had seen that demonstrated a fusion of aesthetic taste with pragmatic utility. But this time, we seemed more…ready for it. There were many couches, love seats and coffee tables that looked perfectly ordinary on the surface, but a more detailed eye would find delicate carvings or shapes of the natural and human worlds.
The Louvre-Atlanta Exhibit
Jennifer and I had taken literally pictures out the proverbial butt for a couple of hours. The time had come, however, to see the Louvre-Atlanta exhibit, mentioned briefly above. This was a special event that had actually cost us extra money to see and for which we actually rescheduled the trip by a week to make sure we caught it. We had kept an ear to the cell phone most of the day, trying to establish contact with Gena and Mr B, but alas, Gena’s cell phone was inoperative for part of the time and we later learned that their logistics had become more snarled than anticipated. But we didn’t worry overly much simply because we knew already that their scheduled time for this exhibit was exactly the same as ours and we could “hook up” with them then.
Returning to the downstairs lobby, we entered Bedlam. Yes, there were people wrapped in straitjackets, smacking their heads loudly against padded walls, while large orderlies used leeches to bleed out the “bad” blood from them. The occasional evil spirit had been released from a madman’s head by cracking said head open with a stone mallet. There was maniacal laughter, people picking at their own scabs and human waste on every wall. I think the Joker and other representatives of the “criminally insane” may have been waiting in line, somewhere…Okay…
Maybe it was just that the entire lobby was crowded. As we noted, the exhibit was featuring art that was over four hundred years old. It felt like they allowed one patron in line per year. Jennifer and I did finally spot Gena and Mr B already in line and moving out, and we struggled to catch up. As his ear was tagged and he was prodded with a stun baton, Mr B even muttered that he had never seen an arrangement so chaotic. We chalked it up to this being the first weekend the exhibit was featured, so the High may not have gotten all of the “bugs” worked out in the coordination of it yet.
Processed by the museum like cattle, Gena and Mr B turn their tagged ears from the camera.Jennifer and I were handed a little recording device with headphones to be used for listening to lectures on the various pieces, given a feed sack of oats around our heads and herded after our penned friends.
Once we all caught up to each other, our Charleston friends introduced us to Sean, a local Atlantan with whom they rendezvoused and caroused the previous night. We would find throughout the day and the upcoming evening that Sean and his wife, Cynthia, were both quite worldly, accomplished and educated individuals with a great deal of intelligent commentary on art, city life, fantasy literature and the meaning of existence in this seemingly empty and hostile universe. Like Mr B and Gena, they made us think. [Cut to Jennifer and I on our knees in Wayne’s World (1991) style, screaming “We’re not worthy, we’re not worthy!”]
So Jennifer and I, Mr B and Gena and Sean all entered the Louvre-Atlanta exhibit.
Eh.
I won’t say we didn’t enjoy it, because there was a great deal of culture and history evident in it.
Inside the first chamber were lots of big prominent busts…no, not those kinds of busts (get your mind out of the gutter!), I’m talking about a collection of sculptured busts, some going back thousands of years. Egyptian god-emperors, Roman orators, various dukes and marquis, the exhibit had them all. It was nominally interesting, though I have to say that after the first two to three rows, I kind of got saturated by them and didn’t really encode any more about them. Once we went upstairs to where the exhibit continued, there was even more crowded mayhem among the swarm of humanity. Up here, there was a large chamber filled with various and sundry sketches done by the great masters. I observed, for example, an image of an angel that was sketched by the hand of Raphael Sanzio, one of the contemporaries of Michelangelo (and incidentally, the one Mike tried to pawn the Sistine Ceiling job onto, until coerced into it by the pope).
But ultimately, it was Gena who pointed out that what we were seeing was essentially…well, scraps. Yes, these were preliminary drawings, test copies, essentially throwaways the masters used while they worked on the real pieces that are today still safely and securely stuffed into the Louvre itself. While we were thankful to be able to see these pieces of history, there was still a feel that that great French institution had only entrusted their most expendable peripherals for our viewing pleasure. I noted at the time that in some ways, it was like we were being given a tour of Michelangelo’s outhouse and expected to be awed by the contents, merely because they came from him. Sean would later say (to our agreement) that the exhibit could be improved if the finished paintings and such could have been brought along and displayed next to the sketches for comparison purposes. From blueprint to finished product, so to speak.
I do have to say that there was indeed at least one painting that stood out for me as quite impressive in detail and in history. This was the Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, completed by Raphael in 1515. One of the few tidbits of information I managed to beat out of the spotty technology of the headset recording was that this piece is often described as the “male Mona Lisa.” It was true that Baldassare’s soulful gaze reminds me of ol’ Mona. In fact, when that classic work by Leonardo da Vinci was stolen from the Louvre in 1913, Baldassare Castiglione was considered the only work with enough comparable elegance and mystique to sit in the empty spot. It would remain there until the Mona Lisa resurfaced two years later. If you look to the left, you can see what the painting actually looked like. Ultimately, I found a bookmark with the image on it, so persuasive of style was it for me. A Night of Revelry and Disgusting Conversation
We finished up the exhibit and indeed, the rest of the High Art Museum in short order. After standing outside and watching the live entertainment for awhile, our guts got the best of us and we started talking about food. You can see us having the discussion in the video below, with Jennifer, Gena, Mr B and Sean presented in turn (with me making a cameo):
The finding of it, that is. With help from our local tour guide, Sean, we hotfooted our way to a nice little restaurant with outdoor sitting called The Prince of Wales. A story about us eating really wouldn’t be that exciting, and the only other notable event was that Gena tried to experiment by ordering a fizzy alcoholic apple cider that was so sweet it caused her lips to enter gravitational collapse. Yes, those lips shrank inward toward a mathematical point of smallness approaching infinity. The surrounding tables and chairs were starting to be drawn into the gravity well of her compressed lips until she was able to order a more suitable beer that caused those lips to spring back out with an audible reverberating “spopp” sound that caused glassware to shatter four tables away. Gena blushed.
During one interval when Gena was indisposed in the “powder room,” I took the opportunity to heckle Mr B for his diabolical plan of turning our landlady into “a buddy with curves.” After all, two years ago, she would never have consented to drinking a beer of any kind, and we’ve also heard secondhand accounts from her that she’s even started taking the risk of having hot wing sauce smeared from ear to ear by eating that delicious dead bird-delicacy in public. Mr. B gave that Cheshire cat smile of his, and said, “For a girl, she’s the best guy I’ve ever known.”
Our little group had to break up at this point, because Jennifer and I needed to get back to the Lenox Mall to do a little shopping before they closed. But once we did that, we re-rendezvoused with our little group in the hotel lobby and went for a few cocktails at a restaurant across the street called Houston’s. This time, Sean’s wife, Cynthia, who was like a walking social supernova, joined us. She was so extraverted that we liked her immediately and would find she worked incessantly to draw us into any conversation topic that fell out on the table between us. Like her hubby, she was swell.
Now it was Jennifer’s and my turn to experiment with an alcoholic beverage, also with disastrous results; we ordered a pale ale and beheld the experience of drinking Aqua Velva cologne. Carbonated. We clamped down on our vomit. Carbonated. Yes, the drink was quite wretched and we felt guilt toward our poor waitress, who was doing everything she could to please us, including only bringing us a sample of that swill to see if we would like it. She ended up finding something that we did enjoy and it was a great meal experience overall.
Other experiments fared better. Since Jennifer and I weren’t starved, we only ordered a simple appetizer upon which to masticate. Our decision was a platter of grilled artichokes. I plucked off my first fibrous, stringy leaf and chewed it like cud for forty-five minutes. By the time I swallowed it, every one of my teeth had been flossed. My jaws ached like I’d tried to take a bite out of a football. Cynthia saved the day on that one by modeling for us the proper way to eat an artichoke (which involved only biting into the tender part at the base of the leaves, not the leaves themselves).
To our delight, we discovered that Sean and Cynthia were almost as geeky as ourselves. Yes, they had read a fantasy book series passed on to them by Mr B, which had been passed on to him by the member of the Thornberries with a Y-chromosome. There was something refreshing about venting my entire repertoire of geekiness without having to hold any of it back for fear of bruising others with its oppressive barrage of silly-puddy pummeling. We talked at length about George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire (1996), a fantastic fantasy series that, characteristically, is running on too long with no end in sight. Gena and Jennifer slammed their skulls together in frustration, vowing to either read it themselves or put something in the food of the rest of us in a concerted assassination attempt if we kept our obsession with it.
As with so many good conversations, the amount of intellectualism varied inversely with the amount of booze consumed and the amount of debauchery and the bawdiness ratio varied directly. We ended the evening back in the hotel lobby, talking about potential love matches between the women present and famous female actresses, and discussing the perverse combinations of words some members of the group (who shall remain anonymous), could put together with those themed sets of refrigerator magnets. Apparently, if one uses the “love” set and the “cooking” set, she or he can get such statements as “Nude Love Weiner” and “Meat Banana Looms.” What demented minds we have among our adult friends….
The evening ended with fatigue all the way around and promises to share this narrative with Sean and Cynthia. It was a good day.
Sunday October 15, 2006—Another Plethora of Airport Hassles
Jennifer and I arose the next day, had a second meal over at Huston’s, followed by a delicious bitter-assed tea at Starbucks, then sped via Marta back to the airport. It was only after we got onto the train that Jennifer checked our travel updates to verify that the plane had apparently been delayed an hour from the time it was scheduled when we booked the flight six weeks previously. So all of our rushing to get checked out and back to the concourse was all for naught. Figures.
But it didn’t end there. The flight got delayed again. Then it got delayed some more. They also moved our gate a couple of times, which became increasingly difficult for Jennifer and I to accommodate, our flesh rotting off of our bones from the lengthy wait and all.
Finally, we climbed aboard the plane, where we met our flight attendant, a young woman named Debbie Jean. She was a cute down-homey type with that “girl next door” quality of innocence and perkiness that often finds its way into men’s fantasies. Much like the naughty nurse or the librarian who is a fierce tigress underneath the layer of bookish inhibition. I teased Jennifer by telling her Debbie Jean was one more real life fantasy I could now cross off of my list. Jennifer was so amused she was laughing in silence.
We touched down in our home airport, climbed into the car and drove to the parking lot gate where the mechanical hand zipped out, grabbed both of us and shook us upside down to gather our remaining loose money to cover the parking fee. Then it was home and the conclusion of another fine journey by the Travelin’ Thornberries. Thanks again for sharing it with us!
Ye Ende
