Rembrandt exhibit

Brother E, his daughter L and I visit the Dayton Art Institute to see the Rembrandt exhibit together. He claims forty years elapsed since the last time he and I visited DAI together. We talk about the bits of memory of that event. E remembers that it was to see King Tut exhibit. I remember that the group was from our Sunday school classes. A link existed between Sunday school teachings and a pharaoh in Egypt’s history. This pharaoh believed in One God and tried to change religion and culture during his reign.
Brother E remembers I bought a brown beetle that day.
“I still have a scarab bracelet. I don’t remember what you bought.”
He speculates, “Maybe the reason neither of us remembers what I bought is nothing was bought for me; maybe only the princess got what she wanted.”

I don’t know what to say to that: he continues to bewilder me when he relives his hurt feelings with every retelling of stories about our childhood. More than forty years elapsed and he sticks us in stories where the characters are no older than 11 and 15. He remains the juvenile victim of the evil princess. Neither he nor the former princess can free him from the emotional tension of the story’s plot because we cannot remember a souvenir.

The paintings on the walls are metaphoric portrayals of anger, jealousy, resentment and disappointment. Art may last 40 or 400 years or even 4000 years. Humans may commission and buy paintings and etchings; but art is not the only metaphoric portrayals of emotions that people buy into.

Now, at the ages of 51 and 55, we try to be more mature observers of the art. E tells stories about how etching was part of his previous job history. E cannot repeat that employment: that business is closed and its building is shuttered. That story is history. E brings up a statement he heard on talk radio: we already lived through our country’s best times, and the best times can’t be repeated because so much changed. He leaves the statement for me to respond to it. He waits to see if I share his worries.

“If we are only talking about employment possibilities for the self-employed or for blue-collar workers in local manufacturing industries, I might agree. Times and markets are different.” Know-It-All-Big Sister wants to roll her eyes and almost tells him to stop listening to talk radio if he imagines opinions to be assumption-worthy truths. I stifle that role. My thought continues, “If the subject is personal lives and individual futures, I disagree. If we do not stay stuck in roles that we outgrew, I believe the best may be right here; right now.”

Mistakes made in the process of etching are likely to show with every printing. When we notice that times are different, we edit stories and tell a better ending. I want to leave Brother E’s childhood stories to echo among the etchings. This time, I want this story to end, “We enjoyed each other’s company.”