Francesco Hayez, The Kiss
I stumbled upon an image of this painting again today, just like I did the first time around when I was looking for a suitable picture for this blog. It was a nice day to trip around on the net. It was cold yet unnaturally beautiful in it's starkness, in it's crispness. A friend of mine, who, up until recently was out of work, said that her six months off was time off well spent, that it was a grand opportunity to find herself, all that. Today must have been an example of that grand opportunity stuff, I suppose. I was able to take a nap, talk to the Estranged One on the phone about snow predictions and new shoes and Christmas gifts for the youngest, find and send off yet another online application for a job in Idaho, groove on the mindlessness of internet surfing, find a couple great art blogs and once again find an image of the print that I carried for so long on this site. I suppose that painting was meant to be found again. It was strange, serendipitous, happenstance. I fell upon it by looking up a reference to another piece I found a few weeks ago that wasn't quite large enough for wallpaper (Hayez's Odalisque Reclining). I did a wider search on that piece and up popped the painting that graced this site for so long.
What's truly crazy about that image is that it is burned into my mind from the day I had to do that exam in Seattle for the company I once worked for. What did they call it then? A fitness evaluation? It had nothing to do with emotional or mental preparedness, as I found out all too quickly, once the talks began, what the fuss was all about. Once the doctor pulled out the sheaf of photocopies they shot from my blogs I knew what "communication" issues they were talking about. I saw immediately that there was precious little pulled off of my Accumulate Man blog. It was all about the Librarian's Fifth Wife.
I suppose they couldn't quite hang me the way they wanted to with these words. I made it clear that they weren't about anyone else, that they written for someone by the name of Jane. I suppose it was easy to want to unload me after that, knowning that, in a supervisory capacity, that I full out loved a fellow staffer and then went and hid that love story in words, words embarrassingly open to the world. Was it an embarassment to them because they couldn't control that base emotion? That they couldn't keep this man in place? That their employees exercised free will and loved not only the job but each other, too? That a man would lose his heart and then, along with all common sense, all interest in the job as well?
It was the image of The Kiss that I immediately saw when that dossier was opened. It was you I thought of immediately after that. I knew that to say your name, to tell more than what was already there in print, would have been out of line and full out dangerous to you. So I never did mention who Jane was in the stories, but then again, I suppose it didn't matter much if I did or I didn't. They pieced together what they wanted with the words that were in front of me and with damning words of others.
Funny, I think of all the times over the years that my words have gotten me in trouble but never ever have love letters like the ones I wrote to you bothered so many. It felt all too much like grade school. It was all too much like the school bully intercepting a note in class and reading it out loud. The bully never gets love but due to his (or her) muscle and power gets respect and fear. The note, well, it can be instrument of either humiliation or power. In this case, I opted for power. I took those words and walked, never bothering to explain, never once begging for forgiveness, never grovelling before power, never confessing, never copping the Tiger Woods plea, nothing. I saved you from having to explain yourself again. You'd already done enough of that beforfe the tribunal at home. This time it was all about me. My words, my love, my endless desire, my problems, my trouble.
The Kiss by Hayez. I will never ever be able to escape that painting, for not only is it beautiful, but it represents my line in the sand as to what I am able to put up with. That day, that image held in the hands of others represented the ugliness and fearsome power of the heavy handed bully. They attempted to sully our love by making it an administrative issue and darlin', it was never any of their business. In fact we were at our best at work when our loved flowed. Bullies can't see that nor feel it for their job is to suppress and repress those kinds of things. They walk the halls of life largely unloved, by design or decree, it doesn't matter much to me. I just knew that I couldn't do with that outfit anymore. I left on my own two feet and would have never walked those floors again even if they asked me to.
Nothing has dampened my ardour for you, love. Nothing, not the cold outside my door nor this lengthening spate of unemployment nor the five hundred miles between me and my children nor the millions of miles that lie between us. Look at The Kiss and you'll see and understand the power of that love we once shared, that I still treasure. Timeless, beautiful, courageous. Just like we were once, back in the day.
Your WHMB
I stumbled upon an image of this painting again today, just like I did the first time around when I was looking for a suitable picture for this blog. It was a nice day to trip around on the net. It was cold yet unnaturally beautiful in it's starkness, in it's crispness. A friend of mine, who, up until recently was out of work, said that her six months off was time off well spent, that it was a grand opportunity to find herself, all that. Today must have been an example of that grand opportunity stuff, I suppose. I was able to take a nap, talk to the Estranged One on the phone about snow predictions and new shoes and Christmas gifts for the youngest, find and send off yet another online application for a job in Idaho, groove on the mindlessness of internet surfing, find a couple great art blogs and once again find an image of the print that I carried for so long on this site. I suppose that painting was meant to be found again. It was strange, serendipitous, happenstance. I fell upon it by looking up a reference to another piece I found a few weeks ago that wasn't quite large enough for wallpaper (Hayez's Odalisque Reclining). I did a wider search on that piece and up popped the painting that graced this site for so long.
What's truly crazy about that image is that it is burned into my mind from the day I had to do that exam in Seattle for the company I once worked for. What did they call it then? A fitness evaluation? It had nothing to do with emotional or mental preparedness, as I found out all too quickly, once the talks began, what the fuss was all about. Once the doctor pulled out the sheaf of photocopies they shot from my blogs I knew what "communication" issues they were talking about. I saw immediately that there was precious little pulled off of my Accumulate Man blog. It was all about the Librarian's Fifth Wife.
I suppose they couldn't quite hang me the way they wanted to with these words. I made it clear that they weren't about anyone else, that they written for someone by the name of Jane. I suppose it was easy to want to unload me after that, knowning that, in a supervisory capacity, that I full out loved a fellow staffer and then went and hid that love story in words, words embarrassingly open to the world. Was it an embarassment to them because they couldn't control that base emotion? That they couldn't keep this man in place? That their employees exercised free will and loved not only the job but each other, too? That a man would lose his heart and then, along with all common sense, all interest in the job as well?
It was the image of The Kiss that I immediately saw when that dossier was opened. It was you I thought of immediately after that. I knew that to say your name, to tell more than what was already there in print, would have been out of line and full out dangerous to you. So I never did mention who Jane was in the stories, but then again, I suppose it didn't matter much if I did or I didn't. They pieced together what they wanted with the words that were in front of me and with damning words of others.
Funny, I think of all the times over the years that my words have gotten me in trouble but never ever have love letters like the ones I wrote to you bothered so many. It felt all too much like grade school. It was all too much like the school bully intercepting a note in class and reading it out loud. The bully never gets love but due to his (or her) muscle and power gets respect and fear. The note, well, it can be instrument of either humiliation or power. In this case, I opted for power. I took those words and walked, never bothering to explain, never once begging for forgiveness, never grovelling before power, never confessing, never copping the Tiger Woods plea, nothing. I saved you from having to explain yourself again. You'd already done enough of that beforfe the tribunal at home. This time it was all about me. My words, my love, my endless desire, my problems, my trouble.
The Kiss by Hayez. I will never ever be able to escape that painting, for not only is it beautiful, but it represents my line in the sand as to what I am able to put up with. That day, that image held in the hands of others represented the ugliness and fearsome power of the heavy handed bully. They attempted to sully our love by making it an administrative issue and darlin', it was never any of their business. In fact we were at our best at work when our loved flowed. Bullies can't see that nor feel it for their job is to suppress and repress those kinds of things. They walk the halls of life largely unloved, by design or decree, it doesn't matter much to me. I just knew that I couldn't do with that outfit anymore. I left on my own two feet and would have never walked those floors again even if they asked me to.
Nothing has dampened my ardour for you, love. Nothing, not the cold outside my door nor this lengthening spate of unemployment nor the five hundred miles between me and my children nor the millions of miles that lie between us. Look at The Kiss and you'll see and understand the power of that love we once shared, that I still treasure. Timeless, beautiful, courageous. Just like we were once, back in the day.
Your WHMB
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