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My love is an artist. He has drawn me a picture. On the phone, he says he has a present for me. I can't wait. He says it's something made by him and it excites me that he has thought of me when I am not there, that he has made the phone call, that he knows how much I appreciate him so he knows how much I'd love something made by him. Last week of school they've taught them abstract art and he gives me two drawings he's brought home. One has shapes on it that have angles and are red. The other has shapes on it that are round and are blue. I've seen much worse in the Modern Art museum. He claims both are his, but while his name is on the back of the red one, on the back of the blue one is one of his classmates'. He has forgotten the names are there. "Which one do you like better?" - he asks and before I can answer, he points to the red one - "I like this one a bit more." I immediately agree. I ask him to sign both on the front. He puts his name below his signature. Now both drawings become his. Now both of us are accomplices in a forgery. I buy two equal frames and he helps me put the drawings in. He sticks one upside down. I don't fix it yet, I will later. Both pictures look perfect next to each other and are about to become the first art I own that I truly love. Sometimes his art is permanent and it makes its home on my walls, in my wallet, in the car - paper boats, a pencil drawing of us that doesn't look like us, a plastic capybara with his name etched in blue ink, googly eyes he has selectively stuck on random places, a red juice stain on my favorite blanket, which I hope it never washes off. Sometimes his art is ephemeral and temporary. Candy wrappers left on the floor. Crumbs in the crevices of his car seat. The lid of the Burger King juice cup with the hole in which he stuck his tongue, and through which he sipped his drink. It still has a yellow ring around the opening. Sometimes the art is not his. It is the orange sunshine through the tiny baby hairs on his neck as he is leaning on the car window and the sun is setting down through the colored sky. Sometimes my love is not the artist but the art. |