With Membership Comes No Privilege

I said I would do it months ago. But it's hard to get down there when it's still open and let's face it, nothing moves there, so it's hard to focus my attention. I finally went to the D.I.A. and bought my membership. Now instead of paying my normal $2-pretending-to-be-a-student-by-handing-you-a-high-school-ID, I paid $45 to just walk in and out at will. Actually, I was upsold (just like I always am at the zoo, damnit) and so now a guest and I can walk in and out at will.

So I have to go to the D.I.A., like, twenty-some times in the next year for this to pay off because yes, I still have a current high school ID with my picture on it (and it's kinda cute this year . . . except that I am wearing a sweatshirt from my old employing school in the picture. Just a little ironic. But my former employing school . . . they were all about the sweatshirt) and yes, somehow the D.I.A. people accept this and give me the student rate, even though I look at least 27 and certainly am 35. So you are all going to the D.I.A.. And I don't care if you don't like art.

So it was one of those "Friday at the D.I.A." thingies, which I go to for the drawing in the galleries (good pencils, get to draw for an hour, all good). Read the web blurb. Today the live music was going to be Dan Zanes. His CD is at Starbucks. How bad could it be?

Well, I get there and there are all these couples, with little children . . . and the dreaded thing that comes with arty, yuppie couples and children . . . SUV strollers. I ignore them. Must be a popular family event. I immediately run into someone I know (with little children) and don't want to talk to . . . plus is, she doesn't really want to talk to me, so it works out well. Go down to the cafe to have dinner . . . and still the children everywhere. Like locusts. Running and leaping and shrieking and crying when they bump their heads on the table because their parents are not telling them NOT to run and leap and shriek. (really sounds like I want kids, doesn't it?) Put the Mp3 player on, to drown out the din (which I have to hit to get to work . . . Apple store, here I come). Wonder what the hell is going on? Did everyone want to culture their children tonight?

Turns out that Dan Zanes is somehow a "children's artist". He sings "family oriented" songs. And is on Sesame Street, according to the woman that I knew but we mutually did not want to talk to each other. We ran into each other again, as she was feeding her girls animal crackers, fruit wax and juice and it seemed wrong not to chat. So the fifteen million children were brought for Dan Zanes. I watched him sing for about three minutes. He was wearing an orange shirt with a purple suit and had hair that looked like a cat had died on his head. The song had a lot of quacking. I went to look at the Native American art instead.

As I escaped (I did not draw because the gallery with the adult drawing was lame and the children . . . they were everywhere . . . I was afraid I might step on one) I stopped by the membership desk and talked to the same person. She first tried to sell me another membership. "You already sold me one. When is the rest of the museum going to open?"

There are times when I think I'm just unfocused . . . a little ADD. And there are times when I think I'm just dumb. This is a time for "just dumb". She informs me that the rest of the museum will open after renovation NEXT FALL. I wanted to yell at her that the membership that she just sold me runs out next fall, but it's not her fault that I'm an idiot. I just purchased a membership for a museum that is only a third open . . . if that. (so when you all come with me, we won't be seeing much art) Yeah, their classics are up, but I can only look at the skull painting by Cezanne so many times. And the Gentileschi is displayed too high, so I cannot see it.

(There are certain touchstones at museums . . . the Seurat in Chicago, the Calder in D.C., Warhols in NYC, DaVinci in Paris and Gentileschi in Detroit. I have to go see it if I walk in the place.)

Between the children's music group and the "we're building a museum, but you can't see it", I'm such a space case. Damnit. I have to pay more attention.