A Child's Perspective

Today I went to play tennis. I play tennis at Clyde Hill, an old elementary school I used to go to. So I was rallying on the wall when I saw the little hallways and steps in Cylde Hill. Some nostalgic memories got to me. When I was a small kid, I was really short so in school it would be a really fun adventure, with my imaginaton thats slowly fading away. Seriously, I remember when I could never be bored because I could alwas use my imagination and actually feel the emotions. So, walking around Clyde Hill's Campus which was designed kind of like a cool strip mall-I used to have adventures beyond comprehending. When it rained in elementary school I would just be with my friends hanging out while the rain was sheeting down two feet away-there were little roofs built everywhere. So you just get his sense of security and when you look out into the storm and start daydreaming it takes you places. I remember the feelings my colleages went through when I was in kindergarten and thats why we are so unpredictable. If we just watch a program on T.V. it could influence us a lot, and so thats why we're mean sometimes or selfish, or even errovocably generous. Being a child is like living in a constant imaginary heaven with your own world.

The Airplane Ride Back

My adventures from New York have been squeezed onto paper until there was only pulp to my eyes. So begins the airplane ride back to Washington. On the subway there I appreciated the heat as hard as I could for I knew in Washington it would be rainy and cold. There were some rude people on the subway yelling at each other and swearing in public. When we got one the plane, we started eating sandwichs halfway through the ride. My mom loves bagles but hers was a really bad breakfast bagel, while I had a mouth watering buritto. My mom kept making really big gestures to get the burrito. In the end "just one bite" turned out to be half the burrito. The leather seats are still comfortable. Before I knew it we were in Washington. The cold of Washington came over me and I shivered. I forgot what it was like to be cold in New York.

Summer Biking

The second thing we did after looking at the musuems was to go biking. Theres this cool biking program that let's you bike around New York's streets. The bad thing is that this process blocks many streets in New York causing traffic jams especially during rush hour. And the program was only free for an hour so if you return just 1 minute late then you have to charge 10 dollars or something so the "non profit" organization is still making money. The bike ride was really cool though because you got to go through tunnels, downtown streets and Central park. They were also giving out free helmets too. In my perspective I see it as driving, so I'm thinking up all these turns where I cut corners and race ahead. The only thing was my bike had a max speed of 15 miles per hour so I got a headache from too much imaginary racing with my rented bike. It was still really cool to bike around New Yorks downtown area.

Montauk Beach

About 4 days of shopping later we were going to a beach on long island. When we drove there I saw all these people with manpurses and pink shirts. The Hamptons were kind of like a paradise farm except with huge waterfront houses and sports cars. We finally reached the beach but I forgot to bring sandals so my feet grew numb walking across the hot sand. It was really fine sand so when you stepped on it your foot sank through and it was scalding to the piont of numbness. Then we reached the waves and they were just the right temperature for swimming in. The waves were around 8 feet high but when we jumped we would be on top of the wave. If you try riding it by doing crawlstroke, you get pummeled onto the ground and you can't move. The saltwater and sand really scrapes you clean so when you get out of the water you feel really clean. The waves just got bigger and bigger, until they broke 20 ft away from shore which was where I was swimming. It was really fun.

Central Park

The Museums kind of dissapionted me, but Central Park was great, for a big city like New York. I was expecting really dense forest and suspension bridges with waterfalls and wildlife. I expected way too much. Central Park is a park with a sparse scattering of trees, with lots of areas for recreation and gravel paths for jogging. A man made lake that also served as a resovoir lay in the center of central park. Because it's a resovoir you can't swim in it or anything. Actually, I shouldn't be complaining. I live in Washington after all, but Central Park is great for the people who live in New York. I think of it as a sort of stress reliever park, where people want to get away from everything and just seek solitude. The first time I went to Central Park was on a picnic with my sister and mom. The thing was our food was horrible, I started complaining so my sister yelled at me for complaining (The food was REALLY bad) and 3 dozen or so baby spiders tried invading my part of the picnic blanket. Central Park was great though.

The Guggenheim Museum

This museuem is a shaped like a giaent cone, thats upside down. The first piece of art I saw was a stage curtain, with colored patches spread all over it so it looked good, and not uneven, The rest of the art was ALL about one person. Frank Lloyd Right. This guy was a really modern architect, stuck in the 1910's to 1950's, so the first few blueprints and houses were pretty cool when you say the time period these buildings he made were in. But because the musuem was deemed unfit to exhibit any art, all the exhibits were about buildings. So the Guggenheim just became a big realtor for a dead architect for me, and I quickly lost interest. His buildings are still amazing. Some of his designs could even be an airport. Thats how modern he is. Frank Lloyd right, the modernist hero of his time.

European Art and it's Complications

When I walked into the Met, they were checking bags. That message made me feel weird. I mean why would people have any bias towards a museum? They're free, and non-profit. Anyways moving on to the art in the musuem. We went through some pieces of nice european art, but over time they looked all the same, because the women always had bonnets and big bulky skirts, so you can't really differentiate from a housewive in europe to another. The men in Europe always had a complicated grimace about them. The painter probably wants me to interpret the sad grave story this young man had, but I can't that. All I see is a man with a twisted mirthless smile, with grave eyes. That man has a story to tell! Then there were these statues that depicted people that could possibly have been petrified while screaming for their lives. But there were some happy ones. Like the guy that beheaded Medusa. He was giving a wan smile, while holding a bloody head like a trophy for all to see.

My Perspective on Art

After all the walking, we go to Musuems. I don't really appreciate art in any form, including cultural. I really do try to appreciate art but to me art is like looking at numbers. Some people say it's fun if you look at the authors message, but I figure it out pretty easily but I'm not interested. Maybe I'm not mature enough. Maybe puberty's hormones change many more things than I thought. For example, now I don't like playing tag that much, when I used to play it every single day, because the goal of outsmarting and cornering the victim just doesn't give me satisfaction anymore. Maybe the time will come when I will revel in the presence of "art".