Leaf Fall

Lovely on the way into work. A good night's sleep, and I had been tired for several days, up early enough to start a fire and heat water to wash my hair and shave. Then down the driveway, which I normally do out of gear, with my foot tapping the brake; but today, as the wet leaves are so thick, I do in 4-wheel drive, with my foot tapping the brake. Half way down there are a couple of young poplars, right together, with leaves such a bright yellow that I stop and get a couple, as exemplars for how yellow a leaf can be. Even doddering, I'm first at the museum, then D arrives, we have a smoke, and I drive him over to get the rental van, so he can go get the last of the paintings for "Wet Paint", then back for the punch list, and my attempt to stay a day ahead as the big fundraiser always demands time and there is still the big show to install. Tomorrow we start breaking down the doll show, packing it up for shipment home. I had forgotten that I had agreed to docent a group through the whole museum, and right then, wet and shivering from the rain and cold, D arrived with the last paintings. I ask D to docent them through the doll show, it's his show after all, while I put the paintings away; then I take them through the Bird Show, the Carters, and the Native American artifacts. The whirlwind tour, and I tell them to come back, look at these things more closely, ask for me, I'm usually available, I do individual docenting on request. I think I am longer no longer merely the janitor, when I go back to the office space and there's a high-level discussion going on about the provenance of a Miro. This is a great lithograph, and we've been given permission to auction it off. Number six, of the ten signed in colored pencil by the artist, the other 185 were signed in the plate, and I know it's real because I've looked at the signature quite closely. Miro actually signed this, that's why it's worth $15,000. If a print could actually be worth $15,000. I guess, sure, if someone would pay that. I'm wearing Linda's knitted hat and a bathrobe over a full set of clothes, seriously considering the sound an acorn might make hitting the roof of a woodshed. Occupied. This is it, pretty baby. TR asked me to walk him through closing down the museum. It's actually fairly complex, making the next step. Not difficult, but sequential. I've got him through eight steps of the twelve step program when we stumble on Meagan, facing the setting sun, dressed as a peasant, with a snake on her arm. Not a dance, exactly, so much as a single frame from a movie about Adam and Eve. I tend to ignore the obvious and focus on locking the door, other people see the snake first. I consider myself a liberal, I don't care if you only fuck mules, at some point you probably get a coffee to go, retreat to a place that's comfortable for you. I understand that, I go there almost every night, looking for peace. If it's not there, I put it off, looking toward tomorrow. .I couldn't say that better myself. I have books propped open everywhere. It's interesting, nothing means anything, or nothing, depending on your point of view.