Spring Waxing Seed Moon
Uh-oh. On my way back from the Institute this morning I felt my left cheek. Swollen. Beginning to ache. I have a funny feeling this may not be a pleasant couple of days. I called Jeff Erickson, the root canaler. His office has closed for the weekend. Not to worry. He gave me his cell. Hmmm. Had to leave a message. He’ll call back, I’m sure, but hasn’t yet.
Tours this morning were good. Very different. The first, from excell academy in Brooklyn Park, had all 4th grade boys, some African and some African-American.
He just called back. The anti-biotics I have will be enough to see if this goes down. The pressure has begun to build. He said if I still had trouble early next week he might go in and lance it. I said, “That crossed my mind. Unpleasantly.” “Oh, no,” he said, “it’s a blessing if you need it.” I’ll take his word for it.
Koran and Mohammed were two of the boys. These were inquisitive, interested kids who’d never been to a museum before. They wanted to look at everything. They asked me we had anything by Leonardo Da Vinci. No. How about the Blue Boy? No. How about Georgia O’Keefe? Yes. We made a game out of figuring out which was O’Keefe’s painting.
It’s a cityscape at night, very different from what the boys had seen. They loved the African masks. One boy had been to Cameroon and seen his father dance a mask that we had. They also asked to see illuminated manuscripts. 4th graders. So we went into the Islamic gallery. We ended with Chinese calligraphy. A big hit. They’d studied Chinese calligraphy and some of their work was in the school hall back at the academy.
Second tour, an Asmat tour, was a couple from Coon Rapids with their 9 or 10 year old daughter. She had just had a birthday and asked to come to the MIA. She showed her parents the Chihully in the lobby. “We studied him in the first grade,” she said. “Yeah,” her mother said, “she’s culturing us.”
We had a good tour of the Asmat show. They asked questions, interacted and learned. It was a fun, intimate family experience.
