Little Gifts

A few weeks ago, at the Mark Rothko opening in our local art museum, I attended a lecture by the curator of modern and contemporary art from the National Gallery in Washington D.C. Harry Cooper spoke eloquently and freely about Rothko's history and evolution, from a young artist experimenting in different styles to the iconic rectangle guy we know today.

He had a slide show and a lot of facts, and an interesting disdain for a particular early Rothko, "Man with Green Face." He mentioned it more than once in an unflattering way.

When the lecture ended, there was the requisite Q and A, and a bunch of poser types had to show off their knowledge of All Things Art, asking incomprehensible questions loaded with jargon. After five or six of these meandering topics leading nowhere, I raised my hand.

"How come you don't like the 'Man with Green Face?'" I asked. I'm proud to say that Harry Cooper was speechless for a moment. Then he chuckled and said, "Well, I don't know, really. Why do you like him?" I chuckled back and said, "I'm not sure I actually like him. I just wondered why you didn't." I paused, and then continued. "Maybe I do kind of like him. He reminds me of Frankenstein, a little." This got some nervous laughter from the posers, and then Harry said, "Well, there you go. I just don't like Frankenstein."

I only mention this because of a series of little gifts I've received lately. My friend Sherry was also at the lecture, and a few days later we met on Main Street for First Thursday.  She had a gift bag for me. In it: a Frankenstein serving tray and cocktail napkins. Then an article out of the Houston Star arrived in the mail from Lu, about a whole movement in Generation Y toward bringing back the lost art of written correspondence. (Picture me, green as the green-faced man with envy of the 25-year-old who's collected about 1,000 postcards and sent more than 800 in two years.)

Just this week, a small box arrived in the mail from Evette. Inside: 10 notecards and 10 Forever Stamps of 20th Century Poets. (Evette likes to think of me as a poet, has always encouraged me as a writer, and I know she must've seen this gift pack and immediately thought of me.)

Oh! And maybe best of all! Evette included a stamp dispenser. One that reminds me of the old-timey stamp dispenser that used to sit on my Mamaw's cedar-smelling sideboard where she kept all her mail and her address book.

(What the hell has someone like me been doing all this time without a stamp dispenser?)

And how did someone like me get so lucky as to have friends like these?