Teeth, Love, and Growing Up

  “She really wants to meet you,” he said one night. “She asked if you’d want to go down to Florida, just the three of us.” “Oh,” I replied in mild shock. Meeting my boyfriend’s mother for the first time on a trip? In Florida? A fun idea in theory, especially when posed against the backdrop of Boston’s blustering wind rattling against my apartment‘s windows.  But what if she hates me? I could envision it perfectly, rolling my suitcase and failing to meet her expectations upon first glance, answering her questions with ineloquent responses as my sweaty palms rested in my lap below the dinner table, deflating the hopes of my [inevitably future ex-] boyfriend with each rambling sentence, disappointing myself, fighting back tears, a sip of wine, a tightness in my throat. “I’d love to!” So there I was, standing in a stall of the Fort Myers airport bathroom to take a few deep breaths and pray to some higher power that the weekend would not unravel into the personal hell I envisioned...

  Auld Lang Syne “It is a serious thing / just to be alive / on this fresh morning / in this broken world”  Mary Oliver, Invitation  I am trying to describe what I feel when I look at a painting I love. Specifically the first glance, when my stomach drops and my breath stops for only a moment. It is like the love at first sight written about in romance novels, the realization that my life has been irrevocably changed by only a glance.  I have experienced this with other art too, when a statue is so much bigger than I expect it to be, its presence in a space indisputable. Or, when a sentence is crafted with such attention to emotion that I feel like my own mental fortitude has received cracks from at least a seven on the Richter Scale.  This year, in recovery from my previous year, I am very intentionally spending time with art. (It helps that I am currently employed by two art museums). My favorite moments are the unexpected ones, like when I walk into a gallery...