The Wonders of the World

The Smithsonian Castle, a nice slice of the epicness of the area surrounding it.
Photo by Andinarvaez.

I have to apologize for my extended absence, I had some pressing family matters to attend to which were quite nice but meant a week of dealing with the hellhole that is traveling in the modern United States. While I was making this trip due to very important family commitments, it also happened to coincide with my birthday, a coincidence that I was going to take full advantage of.

For those of you who don't know, I grew up in Northern Virginia, a hotpot of community centers and undersized parks with, well, not much else. However, a mere fifteen minutes away were all the wonders of the four corners of Washington D.C., a hotpot of all other sorts of things. The District has just about whatever you could want: the best food I have ever had (be it the in-fucking-credible lobster roll food trucks or the high-end rustic la-di-da French eateries and everything in between), from what I hear a good amount of great club spots (I'll admit, ain't exactly my scene, though if you like ass-less chaps some parts downtown take a certain Fire Island noir after midnight), and some of the best music around (hardcore punk was born in D.C. out of the ashes of every band Ian MacKaye has ever worked with).

Though, for me last weekend, there was one particular facet of the District that I had my mind set on: The Smithsonian. This epicenter of cultural product does a pretty good job of encapsulating why I write what I write here: the collection and public analysis of entire eras of social and cultural production. And I mean entire fucking eras. In a grouping of fifteen blocks you can go from learning why the universe is here, to why biological life is here, to why human existence is here, to why art is here, to why America is here, and by the end of it why you are there in the first god damn place.

I won't bother reviewing what is offered there, the possibilities of learning and exploration are near endless: the National Archives for those who want an in depth exploration of the knowledge and good-ole-Americana that the American History Museum sets a basis for, while those with broader viewpoints will appreciate the all-encompassing history of existence outlined by the Air and Space Museum (I am thinking specifically of the incredible exhibits concerning the birth of the universe and analysis of the planets) and the Natural History Museum. The topics range in tone from the dysphoric Holocaust Museum (I am not trying to be flippant here, try to walk through this incredible monument to human suffering and not fully experience the intense anxiety and melancholy embodied within) to the playful Spy Museum (though their recent ad-campaign that consists of putting secret messages such as "Get Down" and "BOOM" in the metro seems like a clusterfuck waiting to happen). You want art? Sculpture, portraiture, architecture, it is all here.

I do not exaggerate: there is a room in the West Building of the Art Galleries that consists of the original paintings of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, etc. that you have all seen in your history books, placed directly adjacent to the Declaration of Independence. If you have any hint of patriotism, be prepared for an Amerigasm upon entering. I managed to stare at the same John Sloan painting for a half an hour (The City from Greenwich Village is one of the most entrancing uses of the most beautiful color pallet I have ever seen, I wanted nothing more than to live in the world represented within). Even simple things such as rocks and common gems gain an air of the incredible about them through the sheer mastery of presentation: I heard a young kid remark upon entering the gem exhibit of the Natural History Museum, "Oh my God. This is so cool. I'm gonna die." Hell yes.

I don't need to tell you how awesome this is.
Photo by Socalvan.

Though, this post of pure and joyful recommendation does not come without its warnings, be prepared for another accurate example to be displayed in these great places: the inability of a large amount of people to enjoy all of the fucking magnificent things that could ever be presented to them. We are talking about ground zero of human production, everything humanity has ever been about is represented in the buildings of the Smithsonian, and a good deal of the people that were around me seemed to be enjoying it out of obligation instead of curiosity and appreciation. Kids there for school, tourists there for their touristy programs, parents there for their kids (some far too young to even realize what the hell is going on), the demographics are filled with people who merely glance over the amazing exhibits and then puff themselves up with a false sense of intellectual merit. I saw one Asian man (I believe he was with a larger group of Japanese tourists) literally taking a picture of every god damn painting in the Art Gallery, spending more time looking through the camera's lenses than his own. Babies were screaming as their parents were more concerned with finding quiet places than educational areas, and at worst some parents relented to simply exemplifying poor parenthood and general douchery, letting their brats wail away while nice folk like myself were simply trying to read about the first telescope ever built.

Rocks have never been so cool.
Photo by Hendricks Photos.

Now, I'm not saying I'm the most accomplished art critic I know, hell, I've never even taken an art appreciation class. However, this should only strengthen the point that even I know a painting takes a good live viewing, for multiple minutes at least, from different angles, to be fully and truly appreciated. How can you say you've experienced the Art Gallery when you've spent no more than thirty seconds at each painting, aiming for a sort of madcap fuck-rush of a tourist race to see who will be the first to see all there is and then get back to the hotel for an early dinner, capped off by a night of shitty hotel television?

Well, to continue the hoighty-toighty nature of this post, there is only one thing that can be said about these kind of people: C'est la vie. Some cannot appreciate the pure and intense nature of all that can be offered to the viewer in this amazing complex, but that does not mean you cannot go out there and absorb all there is to absorb in the entirety of intellectual production that is available in these fifteen or so blocks of fantastic, unadulterated humanity.