Open Window, or: My Insides Look Like A Matisse

this is my favorite painting.

when i was fifteen i visited the national gallery, which happened to be showing a lot of matisse. his colors struck me first. without much thought, i bought a postcard of open window.

a few weeks later my parents separated. walls fell. oh, they immediately tumbled. what was left was the core of me, this very vulnerable but very authentic self that i hadn't ever met before. my internal demolition also knocked the words out of me. i found myself struggling to verbalize, struggling to feel understood. the little postcard hung on my wall.

i went to park city a few months later. in a tiny art gallery on main street, i found myself in front of a picasso sketch. i remember this feeling vividly. i remember feeling bright blue like a mylar balloon. my mind was clear.

so it was then that i noticed the connection i had with art. paintings and i, we both couldn't speak. we were made up of colors. i carefully collected postcards and hung them on my bedroom wall. i laid on my bed for hours just looking at them. we understood each other. they still decorate the walls inside of me.

we often talk about tearing walls down like its winning, like a person belongs to you if you can get past theirs. but walls are valuable. protection is important. walls are meant to make homes. the danger comes when we create our own cages.

it was one of those days, those silent afternoons studying brush strokes, that i began construction.

and here i am. i have walls. they are a gallery. they are malleable. they are the color of roses and emeralds. they are frescoed lavender. and they frame many, many open windows.

i'm still living

in fact, i'm very much alive.
i am looking at the tops of trees again
and noticing flowers. and tasting rain and singing loud to norah jones.
i spent two hours in front of one norman rockwell in the museum the other day. right next to it was two photographs of louis armstrong and ella fitzgerald, and there was a sensor there so when you moved it would start playing "dream a little dream of me",
so i sat there on that stool and stared at that painting of a church in new york city and dreamed a little dream and it was absolutely perfect.
i'm so happy and so full and so me. and so capable.
and life is good.

majors

well, blogging just doesn't seem to be my thing anymore, does it?
is it anyone's?
anyway,
i've been doing a lot of thinking for the past few months. a lot. my mind is constantly going about sociology and feminism and poststructuralism art theory and manet, the painter of modern life, and borromini and japanese botany. this is the first time that i've had to stretch my mind this far. it's very empowering, actually, to learn how to really think. and man is it hard work.
i feel a lot more directed in my career path and opportunities, and i feel a lot more assurance that i can actually do this. there is a lot of judgement passed on majors and i know that when i tell people i'm studying art history, a very small percentage of them actually respect that. but it doesn't matter, does it? because i know what i'm doing and why i'm doing it, and i have never set out to be practical, anyway.
what i am setting out to do is to work hard and to give art more voice and make an personal impression on people that just simply can't be done by good business or whatever else is a "smart" major.
let's not judge people based on things like this. it's hard, because even i do it to others, and i'm in the same situation. but i'm glad when people follow their dreams, whether it is in economics or the arts or science, it's such a great thing to be passionate. i thank the heavens that there's people who want to be doctors and accountants and laborers because if the world was filled with people like me, we wouldn't last a day, would we?
but also thank the heavens that there are people like me, or people like i'm trying to be. thank the heavens that there's people who are so very invested in beauty and truth.