This is from a draft I'm working on:
We paused in front of a glass-covered shadowbox with feathers, beads, bones and shells. I commented on the artist’s obvious influence by Joseph Cornell.
Adrian squinted as he looked at me and said, “A woman who knows Joseph Cornell’s work. That’s a first for me. I’m impressed.”
"You shouldn't be. I was an art major, so I better have picked up something here and there.”
We walked into the next studio.
“And," I continued, "not too many people recognize Richard Brautigan's name either, but you did."
“Yes, mon chou, but I was living in Berkeley in the ‘60s, so how could I not know Richard Brautigan? Besides, everyone’s heard of Trout Fishing in America.”
"No, not everyone. Certainly not the guys I’ve been going out with lately. Let’s look at one more studio before we get coffee, OK? Wow. Check out those paintings.”
The sign outside the open doorway, painted in bold brushstrokes, read Erve (with an accent on the final ‘e’).
“How to you pronounce that? Irv?"
“Air-vay,” Adrian corrected.
(The Joseph Cornell thing; just a coincidence, no doubt.)
What can I say. I am consistently amazed by the synchronicity of it all.
Posted by Van der Leun at October 22, 2003 11:46 AMYou'd be terrified of mine, very similar notion but uses credit cards (mag-stripe, not chip) as a substitute.
Posted by Chung Hendriks at November 7, 2012 2:46 PM