The Eighth Date

No no, you're not missing a post! Date seven was last night but today I wanted to make sure I posted about my very special morning Pride Date on Pride Day. Sadly, I didn't finish before midnight and this will be time-stamped for Monday. Alas.

The Time: Sunday, June 27th, 2010 (Happy Pride Day NYC!!!)
The Place: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fifth Ave at 82nd Street, Manhattan
The Girl: Priyanka, 26, Queer-Positive and Feminist Theorist Rockstar of the Universe
What Creative Time Says: Here, culture is public storage.

So, as you can tell my date today was with a woman. The crazy-fabulous Priyanka, one of my very best friends from undergrad with whom I've talked for hours about gender binary structures and our belief in the kinsiean scale vs. sexuality based labels ("straight" "gay" "bi" etc.) We share so many of the same frustrations in dating that it only seemed fair and fitting that allow this out-of-town LGBTQ-ally to share a key date with me on this pride day in New York. I've tried dating women in the past and it never worked out but darn if I don't wish I was in love with the inspiring Pri. Please indulge this one diversion as I actually believe it's worthwhile to discuss.

Priyanka and I dragged ourselves out of our respective beds bright and early this AM to meet at the Met at 9am so we'd be close to the front of the line for when the doors opened at 9 30. True to form, I was running late and Pri, ever dependable,  has saved a perfect spot towards the front of the line. She's been living in India running a steel company and I haven't seen her for what feels like eons so I am sure our squeals of delight when we made contact could have been heard down fifth avenue. I showed her my key and, magically, the line began to move.

We followed the instructions inside my "passport" and made a bee-line for the info desk and I urged Pri to tell them she had the key to the city. She did so, shyly, and we were pointed towards the back where a group was already hovering around a man with a beautiful (but lock-less, sad, no actual key-turning here) music box. Buried inside were tags allowing us free entry inside the museum. There were only a couple left after we grabbed ours and as this was the Met's last day participating in the project, I was glad we had braved the wee hours of Sunday morning to ensure another key adventure!

 I had especially wanted to check out the new roof exhibit at The Met: Big Bambu, by twins Mike and Dough Starn. We followed at least five different guards instructions until we were pointed to an entirely different line to the left of the one we had just waited in. I didn't feel like standing around again but excited to get the hot  tickets to the event. Luckily, someone standing ahead of us showed us the TWO PAGE long list of rules (which  none of the guards had told us about) including the fact that we couldn't wear flip flops. As it was summer in New York, Priyanka and I were both, predictably, bearing our pedicured toes. Saddened ,we got out of line and headed to the roof anyways, only to meet more "Don'ts", "Stops" and "You Can'ts" on the roof. Hilariously the full title of the piece is "You Can't, You Don't, and You Won't Stop" I think maybe they should have taken out the last "you won't".... But really, I know it's art and we want to preserve it and the met wants to relinquish any responsibility but it just felt like it took so much away from what was a really wonderful, wild, frantic, improvisational work. I wanted to dance around the piece, to climb on it, to lay on it, to experience with every sense. So many rules seemed to kill the growth and I had to wonder if such restrictions were what the seemingly playful artist's truly would have wanted.

Luckily there was a wonderful cheery old man on the roof who, seeing my disappointment, pointed out some other exhibits he thought I may like and he was right (besides, you can't really keep a gal down who owns a key to new york). Pri and I danced our way through the musically rigged and themed rooms of the American woman exhibit. I visited the spot where my favorite painting, one of the Sunflower's series by Joan Mitchell, used to hang (It's taking it's highly undeserved rotation in storage, if you can hear me I still think of you and I'm sorry I haven't come to visit in awhile, I don't have a key to the storage room!!!) I found a quote that may explain why I pull out my camera every two seconds, and we documented love at The Met. Following our morning date we discussed marriage pressure, having to "look the part" at work, and my very fun date the previous evening (post coming tomorrow!) at the delightfully named Nectar on 82nd right around the corner. We split ways after a downtown bus ride through the upper east side, taking in the matching khaki kids and adorable dogs through the plated window.

I'm glad I got to "see" the Met's exhibit but found this key cite to be somewhat disconnected to the barefoot, whooping in delight, public yet private, magical sense I have felt at the others. It's like wishing you were in love with a best friend. You want to make it work so badly, because it would be so beautiful and easy to keep it controlled,  and yet, in the end, you wind up yearning for those reckless butterflies.

Still Fluttering,

L.A.