Rock the cradle at the MIA

Erin decided that the family needed to get out of the house for a change, so on Sunday morning her parents came over and we piled into the van to head down to the Minneapolis Institute of the Arts for the “Rock the Cradle” event. Basically they have bands, story telling and other things for kids to do which is hosted by “The Current” radio station.

I wasn’t really that into it. The band that was there played music that wasn’t really for kids, it was sort of middle-of-the-road music to appeal to parents, but safe enough for kids. I guess that when I go to a kids music festival I need the kids music to be more ‘kidsy’ because then I can put everything into context. Otherwise I feel like I’m waiting for the opening act of a band I really want to get off the stage. I know, I’m a dick. I felt bad that I was standing around while there were a sea of kids trying to see around me, so I offered for Erin’s dad to come with while I walk around the gallery.

We looked at old paintings of aristocrats and marveled at how well preserved they were, and awkwardly hurried past 1800’s impressionist paintings of nymphs ‘frolicking’ in a glen. I found a painting my 3rd grade art teacher showed our class which has always stuck with me, Jean Leon Gerome’s “The Carpet Merchant”, I wasn’t struck for any specific, lofty reason that will impress you with how much of a genius I was at such a young age, actually I was surprised at how it looked like a photo. Am I still impressed by that? No. But I have s soft spot since it was the first painting I saw where I wanted to study it for hours. Completely defiant of any ‘rules’ on taking pictures, I pulled out my phone much to the “what are you doing, idiot?” of Erin’s dad.

We returned to the band where Erin, her mom and Audrey sat happily clapping their hands to the music, Margo on the other hand didn’t look as good. She looked at me nervously with raised eyebrows and those damn puffy cheeks, so I scooped her up and took another tour around the galleries. It was really cute, I held her up in one arm to show her statues, medieval swords and things taken from Egyptian tombs. There were rooms either recreated or made from the real material of period homes. She liked the french and medieval english living rooms because she was convinced that they were where princesses live, and every time we saw a nude painting or sculpture she’d point at it and whisper “He’s naked”. She even tried to slap the butt of one of the iron statues when we walked by.

When my arms were tired from carrying her, I finally put her down to walk with her while holding hands. We walked up two flights of marble stairs which tired her out so much she basically collapsed at the top with her hands laying flat by each side of her head and her nose to the floor. I asked, “What are you doing?”

“I’m tired.” She said quietly.

“Are you playing around, or are you serious?”

“I’m serious.”

I wanted to say, “You’re tired, I’ve been carrying your huge self all over this place- Get up. Get up you son-of-a-bitch…” But instead I picked her up and found the rest of the family who had moved to the story-telling theater.

The story telling was fun, it’s what I’d expect a kids event to be. A woman from the station sat on stage in an over-stuffed chair and a reading lamp, behind her was a projection screen which showed pictures and animations of the book she was reading while other kids sat around her. At one point while reading “Green Eggs and Ham” she made the mistake of asking if any of them had eaten green eggs before. The next few minutes degraded into children shouting all sorts of info about previous meals, and misunderstandings on the difference between the books definition of green eggs and those found in an Easter basket. Feeling obligated, she tried to answer each one of them in a show of benevolence. The woman sitting next to me started laughing, “She’s losing control” I said. “I don’t think she’s going to recover.” The woman replied.

After that we went home and laid around. Audrey watched the “Peter Pan” play for the millionth time on Netflix streaming, while Erin took Margo out to Costco. Later I took the kids down to the clubhouse so they could play videogames while I rewired things so I could get satlight T.V. down there. I installed windows 7 to start working with ASP .NET and was enjoying a quiet night completely content. But, after the kids were asleep I was supposed to meet Brian to play World of Warcraft.

Ever since I decided to close out those accounts, he’s made a push to keep me playing. My reasons were that I couldn’t play with those guys, because their characters are so much better than mine. So they’re bored standing around while I do my quests, and I can’t join any dungeons or quests with them. The guilt of never playing when I’m paying the monthly fee was weighing down on me, so I wanted to wrap it up. Last night he had me playing with him in a way where I was able to level up faster, along with the added carrot on a string being that the next night I’d be riding on a flying mount. “This is all fine,” I said “But what happens when I have my flying mount, I still can’t play with you guys.”

“I’ll make a character that’s just for when we play together.” He replied. Grudgingly I’m slowly becoming committed to keep playing the goddamn thing. But, like any breakup where one side is coaxed back into the relationship, I continue to remind him that I could leave at any moment.