random ramblings, and rants...

There are a lot of things on my mind right now. I've been sick for what seems like eons, and it's a long, hard slog back to health. It frightens me to be this weak and dragged-out, and to take such a long time to feel normal and well.

Much of it has to do with the foul weather. It has been truly disgusting, demoralizing and depressing. It seems that it cannot stay nice for longer than a day or two; sometimes it's lovely during the day and by 6 o'clock, it's dark and windy and threatening rain. Then it rains. It rains all the time. The evenings tend to be chilly, in the 40s. I'm sick of it. I want 10 consecutive days of sunshine and blue skies and temperatures in the 70s. And soft spring evenings. I think I would get healthy again if that happened.

Alas, this seems to be a hopeless hope.

But enough about the weather, and me feeling crappy.

Recently, there was an enormous and important show of Edward Hopper's work at the Art Institute of Chicago. I wanted to go. I checked the hours and the ticket prices and was horrified to discover that -- even though the museum has a free day, and a day that it stays open late, both happy and thrilling bits of information -- it would cost me $20 to attend the show.

Now, I'm sorry, but this enrages me. I am one of those that believe that art should be freely available to all. Large cultural institutions in major cities around the world have an obligation to make art accessible to anyone and everyone. Art is NOT meant to be an elite "sport," only for the rich.

Bah, humbug. And humph. That's what I say. At the very least, the museum in question could have waived the $20 ticket fee one day a week, on the "free" day, which also happens to be the "late" day, when it stays open until 8 at night. Thus allowing many people who work during the day and don't have a lot of money to enjoy a magnificent show like this. (I've actually seen an enormous and gorgeous retrospective of Hopper's work, years ago, in New York, so at least it wasn't something that I had not had the opportunity to enjoy. Still, I would have loved to see those paintings again.)

That's an equal opportunity move that would automatically result in people who wouldn't, under normal circumstances, be exposed to the luminous beauty of Hopper's vision of Americana. It would allow people to see beauty, feel beauty, walk out into the afternoon, or evening, exalted and moved.

I do not want to live in a world where all the beauty, and joy, and exaltation are reserved for the rich elite. We should not be accepting cultural institutions doing this to the populace. We should resist this. I'm disgusted.

A related point -- a man named Tony Fitzpatrick, a Chicago artist who does large "collage-y" pieces (big influences including Hopper and Joseph Cornell's little "box worlds," two of my all-time favorites) about the city where he grew up, a city that he obviously loves, but also a city that he excoriates for its inability to nurture art, to create an environment in which new, young artists are supported and "brought up," where markets are created, not exploited, where art is not just a safe bet, where new artists are gambled upon in a bid to make an exciting, vital city of the arts... this artist has an important show of large pieces from a Chicago series of works. He selected the Chicago Cultural Center as the venue for this show, in large part because admission is FREE. More power to him. I, for one, will be happily and heartily attending this show. (The image at the top of this post is a piece of Mr. Fitzpatrick's entitled "King of Chicago, 2004. I borrowed it from his Web site: http://www.tonyfitzpatrick.com/drawing_collages/index.htm)

Onwards... A favorite topic of mine, grrrrrrrr, in recent months has been political correctness. This state of affairs, this social phenomenon, whatever you want to call it, has always been one of my pet peeves. I am a woman, I am not an infant, I can watch out for myself, I can get good jobs with good pay, I can interact with my male colleagues in much the same way I do with my female colleagues, with respect, often affection and playfulness, professionalism and fun.

I do not have a problem with a male or female colleague commenting on my blouse, on my skirt, on my dress, or on my hair, in a flattering way (obviously, I, like most people, feel bad if I'm told I look like shit). I do not have a problem with playful flirtation, be it with a man or a woman. I do not think it increases my respect quotient if I am a humorless, easily offended bitch who considers a compliment an insult to my equality.

Thus, I am not against men opening doors for me, or lighting my cigarette, or flirting with me. If I think that said man's behavior crosses a line, I do not have a problem with telling him that. I can be firm and tough on my own. I do not need the threat of a lawsuit, or the help of a superior (often a male???!!!), to say where I think the line should be drawn.

I think this system is one that is paternalistic and infantilizing. Why would women need the automatic protection of lawsuits and overbearing male superiors to assert womanhood, to demand respect. I think we all have the right, and yes, the obligation, to interact with our fellow humans directly.

One example, perhaps a bit off the mark, but still relevant. When I first moved into my apartment in Paris, I had an unknown, unmet neighbor who banged and bashed in the middle of the night (hammers?), and played very loud Eurotrash music at odd hours. I dealt with it for a coupla weeks, but one night, as there was hammering -- bam bam bam -- and pauses when I would think, "ah, it's finished now. hooray," and more hammering, in an erratic and unpredictable way, at about 12:30 a.m., I finally ran out of patience. I got up, put on some clothes, opened my door and faced the neighbor's door.

Tap, tap, tap, I knocked gently on the door. The hammering stopped, the music was turned down, and the door opened a crack. A very lovely girl looked out of the crack. "Oui?" she queried me. "Excuse me," I replied in French. "I'm your neighbor, and I was just wondering, are you gonna keep playing loud music and hammering on the walls in the middle of the night? Cuz it's kind of annoying, you know?"

She opened the door wider and looked at me. Then broke into a big smile. "Come in," she said. I walked into a large airy studio. She was obviously an artist, she was hammering some canvas to the wall, and there were little bits and pieces of material for collages and paintings littered all over the studio. She apologized profusely, saying she hadn't been aware that somebody had moved in next door (it's true that I was pretty quiet when I first moved in there; I was working long hours, coming home exhausted and falling into bed at night). She assured me that she would completely cut out the hammering at night, and we did several experiments, with her stereo and with mine, to see what levels were ok for the other, and which were not.

Then she said it: "I'm so glad that you came over and knocked on the door. Most people here in Paris would have just called the police. No direct interaction. It must be because you're from New York."

Call the police? Your neighbor lives right across the hall from you, this is your neighbor, and you call the police? You don't just walk over there and have a little friendly dialogue?

That's just insane. It's this attitude that lies at the heart of the politically correct thing. This attitude that you can't just deal with people about things, you have to turn to some kind of authority figure. A superior, or legal action, or the police, something really extreme like that. God forbid that you should actually just be a functioning, communicating, mature adult, one who can go over to the other person and discuss things, face to face.

Ridiculous.

So the reason I'm talking about this political correctness issue at this moment is because of "sweetie-gate." The silly story about Barack Obama calling a reporter sweetie, and being raked over the coals for it.

I am one of those warm, affectionate sorts who hugs people, touches their arms, walks arm in arm or arm around or leaning up against my companion, someone who calls everyone sweetie honey baby doll babe, all these things.

I call strangers or new acquaintances honey or sweetie, and often. No one has ever objected. Nor do they look annoyed when I do it. My lovely guy has called me baby and babe since the day we met. The first time I called my mom doll she blushed happily, looking sweet and young and surprised, and then she laughed. Now she calls me doll, and gets a big kick out of it. My guys at Chez Prune, the most wonderful of all cafes in the great big world, would hug me and cheek-kiss me every morning, as they called me bebe and la belle (the beauty), while I responded in kind, calling them beaux mecs (gorgeous guys) and bebe, right back atcha. I lo-o-o-o-oved it, made my mornings very, very nice, and fun, and made me feel happy and beautiful.

I do not think of it as an insult when the cashier at the store calls me hon. I do not mind when the guitar player in a band I've gone out to see calls me babe in a brief conversation we have after a set, when I'm telling him how great I thought the band sounded. I don't mind these things at all. I don't mind the construction workers on a job site near my home saying, "Hey, gorgeous, you're looking lovely today, sweetheart." In fact, I find it endearing, and friendly, and warm, and often it can turn a bad, lonely, sad day into a very nice sunshine-y one. I wish there were more of this sort of "un-politically correct" behavior in the world.

Mike says, "Well put, sweetie."