"Yeah..." Ned agrees, absently, though he doesn't share quite the same impulse. It is strange to him, though, being in the proximity of objects that he knows are so ancient. He feels all of a sudden very small, very insignificant. It's a nice feeling, though. Quite a few of the placards inform him of who the statues depict - dryads and heroes and goddesses.
"I used to love Greek myths when I was a kid," he admits, snapping out of his reverie and turning a small smile towards Ginsberg, "Well, any myths I could get my hands on, really. The library at school wasn't exactly big, and the didn't have anything that had been written in the last fifty years or so in there, and most of the stuff was pretty boring, but... myths weren't. Everything in them is so much larger than life."
But what is he doing, rambling on about something so inane? Ned stops himself, biting the inside of his bottom lip, keeps walking with Ginsberg.
If he thinks Ned's rambling is inane, he certainly doesn't show it, and instead, turns a smile on him in return, nodding. "I liked myths, too. I'm not sure I'd want to live in one -- bad stuff always happens to people who defy the gods in old myths, right, and I'd definitely be the guy who defied the gods -- but they're fun to read about. I did a lot of reading as a kid. That probably doesn't surprise you. I bet you did, too."
Because he remembers that Ned had said that he, too, hadn't talked much as a child, and he always somehow imagines that people who don't talk much as children, the way he'd been himself, had probably spent a lot of their time in books or otherwise ensconced in their imaginations. To some extent, he'd always lived in an imaginary world; he'd just expanded it to include advertising, when he'd needed to get a job.
"I never know what to think about paintings," he says, moving from the room full of sculptures to the room Ned had indicated he wanted to go to, shrugging expressively. "I admire people who can paint. I can't. I mean, I can storyboard stuff for ads, but that's not real art. I'm just not sure I understand painting. I can look at something and see what they're painting, but not why, you know? Like that one..."
He points randomly at a painting close to them. "It probably has some kind of symbolism, right? Do you get it?"
Ned can't help but laugh when Ginsberg says he wouldn't fare well in a myth, because he's That Guy who would sass the gods. Ned isn't sure who he'd be, in a mythical setting, but he thinks he might do better in some ways. Not because people typically did all that well in myths (and he certainly doesn't fit the type of the kind of guy who did), but because at least freaks were explicable in myths. If one day you realized you could just touch dead things and bring them back to life, chances were you were actually a demigod and your mother never told you. How easily ancient civilizations explained the unexplainable.
Not that he's going to explain any of that to Ginsberg. Instead he just says, "Yeah, I did read a lot."
When Ginsberg starts asking him about symbolism Ned feels put on the spot. He looks at the painting in question again, wonders if he's missed something. "It's... just a portrait, right?" It must be a trick question. Ginsberg is testing him, or teasing him. "It doesn't always have to have a hidden meaning behind it. Maybe... sometimes people just wanted their kids and grandkids to know what the looked like when they were young. Like a photograph, only they hadn't invented it yet."
At Ned's comment, he looks back at the painting, frowning slightly. "So it's not an allegory for..." He gestures helplessly, trying to come up with what the portrait could possibly be an allegory for, but he's fresh out of good ideas. "Okay, maybe you're right," he concedes, studying the painting intently, as though by staring at it long enough it will impart some kind of meaning to him beyond the obvious. "It might just be a painting. But people always act like art is so..."
Another gesture, wider this time, expansive, as though he's gesturing to the whole room at once. "People act like art is so above all of us. Like artists see something we don't, And maybe they do, who knows? You're kind of an artist, right? I mean, cooking is art, in a way. Does that mean you're better at understanding human nature than the rest of us, or something?"
He likes to think someone out there understands human nature; the prospect that nobody knows why people do the things they do is a bleak one indeed.
Ned nods, because he knows what Ginsberg is talking about. He'd actually, for a moment or two, expected him to be one of those people, to judge him for just liking what he thought was beautiful and not really looking for anything more complicated than that. Ned's willing to entertain the notion that there are more layers of meaning in some works of art, he's just never seen the appeal in leaving people to puzzle them out on their own. Why did it have to be a challenge? So that there could be an in-crowd and an out-crowd, so that the elitism was built into the art itself? That's not the kind of art he enjoys at all.
"I'm not an artist," Ned says, though it's with a little laugh. "Baking is baking, and art is art. They might both involve making something, but the result is completely different. I mean. Art's supposed to last, right? That's the whole point. It's supposed to be something that goes on after the artist is gone and their name is on a plaque. It's about preserving. But... cooking can't last. Food goes bad. Sure, you can pass on recipes and techniques and traditions, but as for the pie itself, you've got to eat it while it's hot."
He has an endless capacity for pie-related wisdom, Ginsberg. You have only scratched the surface.
"As far as human nature goes, I'm not exactly an expert. I know that people with low blood sugar get cranky. I know that some people always order the same things and other people don't. I know that there are people who hate when people watch them eat and people who can't stand hearing other people eat. I know that everyone likes pie, and anyone who doesn't shouldn't be trusted."
He listens to what Ned says, practically rapt with attention. There's something so appealing about the way Ned talks about pie, and he knows that that's because it's what Ned loves to do, that he has a passion there that allows him to speak so eloquently. After Ned finishes speaking, he's quiet for a minute, just thinking about what he's said, and then he shrugs. "That sounds like a whole lot of knowledge about human nature to me. At least, it's more than what I know. I know that people are confusing, and frustrating, and that people find me just as confusing and frustrating as I find them. And I also know you're right -- people who don't like pie shouldn't be trusted, they're probably up to something suspicious."
He keeps walking through the room as they talk, never pausing in front of one painting for too long, simply taking in what he finds aesthetically pleasing and moving on. He'll stop if Ned wants to, but he doesn't always see the purpose in gazing at art for a prolonged period of time, doesn't think he'll learn anything new or groundbreaking from trying to puzzle out what it all means. There are ways that he's elitist, too, he knows, but when it comes to art, he's anything but. If something's good to look at, then that's all that matters, in his opinion. He likes that Ned seems to think this way, too, yet they can both enjoy being here, looking at the art, being unpretentious about it. It's a nice change.
When they reach one painting, though, at the very end of the room, he stops in front of it, gazing at it far more intently than he's gazed at any of the rest so far. "This one's my favorite," he says, although maybe he doesn't need to say it, from the way he's looking at it. It's a portrait of a dark-haired woman, one that might not seem particularly striking, but there's obviously something about it that he likes. He looks at the woman in the portrait again, who has a sort of wry, unimpressed expression on her face, and then at Ned.
"I used to come here and look at this one and imagine that that's what my mother looked like. I wouldn't know, really. It's just a fantasy. But that's why it's my favorite, anyway. Is that weird? I'm pretty sure that's weird."
Ned notices the intensity of Ginsberg's attention, has seen the way he's seemed to anticipate coming to this particular painting in his body language as they approached. The first thing he thinks is that he likes it: the woman looks interesting, animated, as if she's about to open her mouth and say something at any moment. There's a kind of life to certain portraits, a way of capturing personality in the lines and color of the face that Ned likes but doesn't understand.
Then he hears what Ginsberg says and he can feel his heart beat a bit faster, knows this must be a delicate topic and he should proceed with caution.
"I don't think it's weird," Ned says, quietly, seriously. He looks at the portrait again, with this new information, wonders what it was about this one in particular that convinced Ginsberg as a child to grant it that particular meaning. Perhaps he shouldn't push any further, but he's not the one who introduced the topic, so perhaps he can venture a little further.
"You don't have a picture?" It's a neutral question, as far as he's concerned. Not asking what happened to her - if she abandoned him or died, or whatever else. Not asking how he feels about it, not asking for a story if he doesn't want to tell one. And, Ned realizes after he says it, it makes sense to him as a question, because he has a picture of his mother. Just one. But it's something that he treasures.
"No," he says, and it's an uncharacteristically taciturn answer for him, who's usually prone to going on at such length at any question posed to him. It's not as though he doesn't plan on saying more, it's just that he has to take another long moment to study the portrait, to memorize the expression on the woman's face, as though it really is a portrait of his mother, and not some portrait of a rich woman he's never heard of.
His attention is finally drawn away from the portrait and back to Ned, and he shakes his head, as though reaffirming the answer he'd just given moments before. "She died when I was little. Sometime between the time I was born and the time I was five months or so, I guess. There aren't any photos. I mean, maybe there are, somewhere, but I don't have them."
He's aware that he's letting Ned into what must seem like a very personal side of his life, but it seems only natural to him, that he explain himself fully to Ned. There's no sense hiding any of the facts about where he comes from, and he doesn't necessarily feel that he can miss his mother when he'd never known her to begin with. Still, there's something that keeps him coming back to this painting, and he looks at it again, briefly, then back to Ned, smiling slightly. "She must have been good-looking, though. At least, I like to think so. Why not, right? I can make her whatever I want her to be, since she doesn't really exist."
That answers a few questions, for Ned. He knows better than to ask how, though he feels a brief pang of curiosity (followed, naturally, by a wake of brief but intense self-loathing). It seems strange to him that Ginsberg wouldn't know the exact date when she died, but then, maybe his father doesn't like to talk about it.
"She must've been, to have you." A line which would probably come out flirtatious, in a different situation, with a different person. Ned just states it in the manner of a logical fact. He thinks he can see why the younger Ginsberg fixated on this picture. She doesn't look unlike him, and there's a quirk to her expression that reminds him of Ginsberg, a little. He wonders if he unconsciously modeled it off the painting, or if it is a coincidence.
He can see why Ginsberg would think of her as a person who doesn't even exist, if he remembers nothing about her, if their lives only overlapped for a few months and he doesn't even know something as basic as when she died. Ned wonders which is worse - to have never known a mother, or to know one briefly and lose her.
And since Ginsberg has shared this thing with him, Ned feels like he ought to reciprocate. He doesn't have to, he knows. But he might as well trade the skeletal framework of the story. It's much less intimate than what Ginsberg's done, by showing him this picture, by letting Ned into his thoughts like that.
"Mine... died when I was nine." There's an almost imperceptible hesitation as he says it. It's easy enough by now to recite the rote fact of it. He's had to do it often enough, for enough crass and pushy questioners, that he can get it ought without undue struggle.
He smiles a little at Ned's comment, because it's amazing that something like that could come off as not flirtatious, considering the words, but Ned obviously means it honestly, and that's nice. It's not the kind of hollow thing that most people say, nor is it an attempt at changing the subject or lightening up the topic at all, which he appreciates, too. He knows that he can make people uncomfortable, the way he shares personal things, the way he's not afraid to tackle dark subjects, but so far, Ned hasn't seemed to shy away from that.
Somehow, it doesn't surprise him when Ned says that his mother had died, too, although he's not sure why it strikes him as making sense. Maybe it had been that Ned had never mentioned any family at all, despite the fact that Ginsberg had talked about his father several times throughout their conversations. Maybe it just took one member of the unlucky absent or dead parent club to know one. He thinks it must be much harder to be in Ned's shoes, to have known his mother for nine years -- and nine years seemed like an eternity when you were young, he remembers -- and then to have her gone.
"That must be hard," he says, and it's certainly not pity in his voice as he says it, just bare fact. "Hard in a different way, I mean. You knew her, so you know what you're missing. I never had one, not really, and nobody could ever tell me anything about her, so I have no idea what I'm missing. It's probably harder for you. You can't go into a museum and pick a random portrait and decide it's your mother. I'm not trying to make you feel worse about it, it's just an observation. I'm sorry."
It will doubtless sink in for Ned later that the situation must be slightly different than he'd been assuming, if no one can tell Ginsberg anything about his mother - not even his father. But he doesn't quite think to puzzle through that inconsistency just yet; he just accepts what Ginsberg says is true and tries to imagine how he would have turned out if he had never even had his mother in his life. After all, she's been so important to him, in so many different ways. He tries to be like her (and to be unlike his father), to keep her memory alive in the way he lives his life.
But he's not sure what he's supposed to say to Ginsberg. Yes, it was hard? Without noticing himself doing it, his hands have curled into loose fists at his sides Ginsberg might not be trying to make him feel worse, but he's sadly failing. Ned has to exert a certain effort not to think about how hard it was (and still is), about exactly the kind of woman he's missing, and worst, why he's missing her. At least he's not gushing sympathy or asking a million questions. Ned can appreciate that.
"It's not a competition," he says, simply, then quickly follows it with, "She looks so... impatient," because turning the conversation abruptly back to the painting will hopefully signal to Ginsberg that he's not particularly keen on discussing his own mother's death, "Like he's asked her to stand there holding this flower and she thinks it's the dumbest idea she's ever heard."
He laughs and nods, picking up on how very little Ned seems to want to talk about his own mother, and filing that information away for later. He may be blunt and rude at times, but he knows when not to push a topic of conversation, and the last thing he wants is for Ned to feel bad, especially after he's already been punched in the face.
"That's why I like it, I think. Most portraits are pretty boring, because the people don't look like they have any life to them. I like it when they have their own personalities. It makes it easier to tell a story about them. But I guess I'm looking at it like a copywriter, too, always looking for the story."
With one more glance towards the painting, he heads towards the next room, apparently having decided that the best way to avoid the topic Ned doesn't want to discuss is to go to an entirely different painting. He shoves his hands back into his jacket pockets and immediately regrets it when he inadvertently grabs the bag of frozen peas, which is soaking wet by now. "In case you were wondering," he says, pulling his hand out of his pocket and shaking the water off of it ruefully, "I'd advise against putting your hands in your pockets. These things have completely melted."
Ned follows Ginsberg out of the room, though he takes one last look at that painting, over his shoulder. Ginsberg is right, though; leaving the room, just moving in general, helps him to dislodge his mind from the edge of the rather perilous emotional swamp it had been skirting. He smiles at Ginsberg's mistake, suggests, "Maybe we should find somewhere to throw them away..."
But before he can search for a trash can he experiences the strange jolt of seeing a painting on the wall that he recognizes. Everything that he's seen until now has been beautiful but unfamiliar to him. It's quite different however, to see the something and realize he's seen it before, but printed in a book. He says, "Oh!" in a pleasantly surprised way, turning to look once more. It's somehow smaller than he would have expected. One thinks of these things as monumental, somehow.
"Yeah, there're trashcans all over the place. I'm pretty sure I've iced my eye as much as I possibly can without freezing it off." And, true to Ned's prediction, he is developing quite the bruise. It's already darkening, more purple than red now, and it's going to be blatantly obvious for a couple days. In terms of how it looks, Ned's fared a lot better -- his nose isn't quite as awful looking as it could be, although it's still evident he's been punched in the face.
When Ned turns around to look at the painting, he can't help but smile at Ned's surprise and how pleased he sounds about it. He looks at the painting, too, nodding. "Does it look like you would have imagined it did? I mean, I know sometimes people're disappointed by seeing stuff in the museum, because they've got this idea of how it should look from the reproductions of it they've seen, so I hope this one doesn't disappoint you."
It's strange, how he's almost taking on personal responsibility for Ned's feeling about the painting, and desperately hoping that it doesn't disappoint him, but then, he's always been good at taking on feelings like that.
"It's not disappointing," Ned says, taking a small step closer, slowly, as if it were a living thing and he was trying to be respectful of its personal space. "It's different. You can see the paint standing out, it's not... flat, like it is when you're just seeing a picture."
He turns to Ginsberg then, sees him watching intently and smiles, a little shyly, "That's probably a completely tedious and obvious thing to notice, isn't it?" But Ginsberg hasn't laughed at him yet. Not today, not the last time they'd been together, either. That's... nice. That's something Ned could see himself getting used to, in time.
"I don't think it's tedious and obvious. A lot of people don't even notice that. They just look at it and realize that it's not as large or exciting as they imagined it would be and decide that they'd rather stick to looking at pictures of paintings, because they can do that for free and not have to go to the museum. I like seeing them in person, because it's easier to imagine someone actually painting them. The artist actually touched that painting, and made it the way it is."
Somehow, that's significant to him, although he's not sure he can explain why. For all of his talkativeness, he doesn't always understand the things that are coming out of his mouth, even while he's saying them. Thus far, though, Ned hasn't told him to shut up, or been overly confused by anything he says, and he appreciates that. There's something relieving about not being questioned all the time, about being able to say what comes to mind without feeling as self-conscious as he usually does.
"I know what you mean," Ned murmurs. He thinks maybe that is important to Ginsberg because of what he does for a living, because he is the one behind so many recognizable things, thinking them up, making them with his wits and his hard work. Ned knows that he hadn't ever really thought about the people who make ads, before he met Ginsberg, but he should have. Nothing come from nowhere, after all. Everything has an origin, a history.
He moves on from the painting with a last look, wandering around the room with his hands clasped behind his back, quietly enjoying himself. He doesn't say much more for a while, but his enjoyment is obvious enough. Ned's never been the best at keeping what he thinks and feels from showing on his face, and he likes this. It's so much less pressure than he's used to on a date. More like what he'd always imagined it would be like - less of a contest or interrogation, and just two people having a good time together.
After some time, they wander into a room in which all but one or two of the paintings are of Biblical scenes - particularly gruesome ones, it seems to Ned, all martyrs and crucifixions. He can't help it; he laughs, says, "I'm sensing a pattern, here."
As they wander the room, his eyes are on Ned as much as they're on the
paintings. He's seen all of these paintings before, but he's never seen
Ned's reactions to them, and he likes how animated Ned's face is, the way
he lights up when he sees something he likes, how obviously he's enjoying
himself. As someone who wears his heart on his sleeve far more than he
should, he can appreciate it from Ned, secure in his knowledge that Ned
won't judge or belittle him. It's comforting.
When they step into the room full of Biblical scenes, he can't help but
laugh, too, and he's glad he's not the only one. "Yeah," he says, looking
around, shaking his head, "There's definitely a pattern. A theme, even.
See, I've always thought that this is part of the reason religion fucks
people up -- look at how violent all of it is. Little kids see this stuff,
and I'm pretty sure it gives them nightmares."
It's only after he says it that he realizes that, perhaps, he shouldn't be
so quick to dismiss religion, because he has no idea of Ned's feelings
about it. "Not that all religion's bad, I just think some of this stuff..."
he gestures to the paintings, "... is pretty gruesome and dark for people
to be seeing every day."
Ned can practically see Ginsberg backpedaling and rushes to reassure him, "Don't worry, I'm not religious, at least, not anymore. I used to be, but that was a long time ago, and I agree with you anyway." And that answers the question he hadn't asked: whether Ginsberg is a man of particular faith or not. Of course, there's still the possibility that he is, but something about the way he immediately jumped from 'oh look a room of religious paintings' to 'reasons why I think religion fucks people up' seems to be a good indicator.
They are passing by a particularly sordid and gory rendering of souls burning in hell, which Ned wrinkles his nose at, just for a moment. "Mostly agree. It's not that it's dark, exactly. Life's dark. So I get why religion would reflect that. Life's dark, so you have to... have to work at it, to make it light. I think if people focused more on how to do that and less on the..." he nods his head towards the painting, "...'mess up and you'll be tortured forever' side of things, it'd be a different story."
As they pass by the painting that Ned wrinkles his nose at, Ginsberg goes one step further in expressing his displeasure with it by actively turning away from it, look of disgust on his face. If he's at all ashamed of displaying his visceral reaction to the painting in such an obvious way, he doesn't indicate it; he's never had a problem with sharing his feelings, whether they be positive or negative, and they're overwhelmingly negative here.
"That's sick," he says, and he's obviously talking about the painting. "Sure, life's dark. We all deal with that every single day. But the people who came up with the idea of hell were seriously disturbed, I think, and not just in the way a lot of us are seriously disturbed. I mean, who sat down and really thought that the punishment for doing some shitty things in your life should be... that? It makes me want to throw up."
It bothers him on a level he can't quite articulate, but then, violence of any kind always has, even on an artistic level. He knows it's not real, but that doesn't stop it from being sickening, in his opinion. Maybe it's juvenile to be so obviously affected by a stupid painting, but he is, and he can't hide it. That's why he'd always preferred looking at the paintings that didn't have anything to do with religion, and that's why he's glad that the room they're passing into next is moving away from that kind of thing.
Ned sees how intense Ginsberg's reaction is - how could he miss it really? - and glances back at the picture in mild bemusement. It hadn't occurred to him, that it might be disturbing to someone. He knows that in some ways, he is desensitized to violence. Not the kind of violence that they'd encountered earlier, with fists flying and the active danger of being hurt. But a different kind: to its fictional incarnations, or what it leaves behind.
"It is pretty sick," he agrees, joins Ginsberg in walking away from the painting and towards the exit of the room, to one that contains landscapes. Lovely, intricate, calm landscapes. Ned feels a touch guilty, seeing how bothered Ginsberg is, wants to make him feel more normal for reacting so extremely.
"You're right though. About the kids and nightmares and all. I used to have nightmares about going to hell. All the time. But then I realized it was all scare tactics and bullshit made up by a bunch of desperate people with sick imaginations trying to pretend they got to decide what was right and what was wrong, and it didn't frighten me so much."
He knows they are in public, knows he has to limit any contact between the two of them, but there's no one else in the room, so he sets his hand against the small of Ginsberg's back, just for a few seconds, to steady him, to reassure him, and to apologize for drawing his attention to it in the first place.
"None of us are going to hell, no matter what we do. Because hell's right here, you know? We're in it. I think people made up hell to feel like there could be somewhere worse than the place we are, but there isn't. There's just right here, right now, and all we can do is try to deal with the fact that shit happens, and most of it isn't fair."
He knows that he's too worked up, and he actively tries to calm down as they step into the next room. The landscapes are good, if a little boring -- they provide a calming backdrop to the emotions that are raging inside of him. He's never been good at sitting down and shutting up, and he's not good at it here, either, especially not when Ned's proven to be such a nonjudgemental listener.
The hand on the small of his back doesn't hurt, either, and he tosses a grateful smile at Ned, because he's always found comfort in physical contact, always craved it, and never quite had enough of it from people he really wants it from. The fact that Ned's willing to give it is nothing short of a miracle, if he believed in miracles. "Anyway," he says, back to his usual, relatively sunny self, "You probably think I'm crazy for hating those paintings so much, and I guess on an aesthetic level I kind of appreciate them, because it must take a lot of talent to paint something like that, but I wish they'd use their talent on something like this. Landscapes. That can't offend anyone, right?"
Ned wants to believe that, wants to believe that it's all a lie, that there's no one in the sky watching and judging everything he does, that there's no eternity of fire waiting for him after he dies for things that were beyond his control. Most of the time he does believe it, or at least, he tells himself he does. But Ginsberg, from the sound of it, really does believe it. Is firm in his conviction that there's no afterlife, no other place, just here and now.
Ned wonders (in the way that he always does with new people, as he starts to get to know them) how he'd react if he found out that life and death isn't as simple as he has been told. Would he revise his opinion on life on death, on hell and whether Ned belongs there?
"I don't think you're crazy," Ned says in a voice that is particularly warm, though low, in case anyone should happen to come in and overhear them, "I think it's a good thing they upset you. I mean- it's not a good thing you're upset. That's not what I meant." Now he's the one tripping over his words, awkwardly navigating his way towards his original point, "I meant... if more people were like you and hated them, I think, the world would be a better place."
"As far as I'm concerned, I am crazy. Maybe not about that. And being crazy's okay, I think. I think we're all a little crazy. I know I couldn't do my job if I weren't. Still, I appreciate your reassurances, because I think you're probably right -- if people hated this kind of thing like I do, maybe everything wouldn't be so violent. Maybe we wouldn't be in a war right now."
He thinks about the war a lot. It keeps him up at night sometimes, knowing that at any moment, his number could be up, and he could be shipped off to some foreign country to kill people he had no interest in killing. He knows that could happen to the guys he works with, too, or even to Ned, and it both angers and scares him. To him, the fact that people have always seemed so enamored with violence is concerning.
"On the other hand, if more people were like me..." He shrugs expressively, his gestures large and free as always. "Well, if more people were like me, there'd be a lot less people getting things done in the world. I mean, I can write ads. That's what I can do. I couldn't run a country, or do anything actually productive. I couldn't even bake a pie, probably."
If Ginsberg wants to call himself crazy, Ned hasn't got a problem with that. He knows he has the capacity in him to be more than a little crazy, himself, though he's mostly succeeded at keeping it out of sight, for the time being. At least, if that's Ginsberg's philosophy, and he really sticks to it, maybe he won't leave immediately when he stumbles across any of Ned's less rational thought processes.
Ned's not exactly thrilled with the idea of the war either, that he might get swept up in it at any moment, but his solution is to think about it as little as possible, to take that gnawing fear and unease and shove it into the most out of the way corner of his mind he can.
"You could bake a pie," Ned says, confidently, "I could teach you."
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"I used to love Greek myths when I was a kid," he admits, snapping out of his reverie and turning a small smile towards Ginsberg, "Well, any myths I could get my hands on, really. The library at school wasn't exactly big, and the didn't have anything that had been written in the last fifty years or so in there, and most of the stuff was pretty boring, but... myths weren't. Everything in them is so much larger than life."
But what is he doing, rambling on about something so inane? Ned stops himself, biting the inside of his bottom lip, keeps walking with Ginsberg.
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Because he remembers that Ned had said that he, too, hadn't talked much as a child, and he always somehow imagines that people who don't talk much as children, the way he'd been himself, had probably spent a lot of their time in books or otherwise ensconced in their imaginations. To some extent, he'd always lived in an imaginary world; he'd just expanded it to include advertising, when he'd needed to get a job.
"I never know what to think about paintings," he says, moving from the room full of sculptures to the room Ned had indicated he wanted to go to, shrugging expressively. "I admire people who can paint. I can't. I mean, I can storyboard stuff for ads, but that's not real art. I'm just not sure I understand painting. I can look at something and see what they're painting, but not why, you know? Like that one..."
He points randomly at a painting close to them. "It probably has some kind of symbolism, right? Do you get it?"
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Not that he's going to explain any of that to Ginsberg. Instead he just says, "Yeah, I did read a lot."
When Ginsberg starts asking him about symbolism Ned feels put on the spot. He looks at the painting in question again, wonders if he's missed something. "It's... just a portrait, right?" It must be a trick question. Ginsberg is testing him, or teasing him. "It doesn't always have to have a hidden meaning behind it. Maybe... sometimes people just wanted their kids and grandkids to know what the looked like when they were young. Like a photograph, only they hadn't invented it yet."
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Another gesture, wider this time, expansive, as though he's gesturing to the whole room at once. "People act like art is so above all of us. Like artists see something we don't, And maybe they do, who knows? You're kind of an artist, right? I mean, cooking is art, in a way. Does that mean you're better at understanding human nature than the rest of us, or something?"
He likes to think someone out there understands human nature; the prospect that nobody knows why people do the things they do is a bleak one indeed.
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"I'm not an artist," Ned says, though it's with a little laugh. "Baking is baking, and art is art. They might both involve making something, but the result is completely different. I mean. Art's supposed to last, right? That's the whole point. It's supposed to be something that goes on after the artist is gone and their name is on a plaque. It's about preserving. But... cooking can't last. Food goes bad. Sure, you can pass on recipes and techniques and traditions, but as for the pie itself, you've got to eat it while it's hot."
He has an endless capacity for pie-related wisdom, Ginsberg. You have only scratched the surface.
"As far as human nature goes, I'm not exactly an expert. I know that people with low blood sugar get cranky. I know that some people always order the same things and other people don't. I know that there are people who hate when people watch them eat and people who can't stand hearing other people eat. I know that everyone likes pie, and anyone who doesn't shouldn't be trusted."
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He keeps walking through the room as they talk, never pausing in front of one painting for too long, simply taking in what he finds aesthetically pleasing and moving on. He'll stop if Ned wants to, but he doesn't always see the purpose in gazing at art for a prolonged period of time, doesn't think he'll learn anything new or groundbreaking from trying to puzzle out what it all means. There are ways that he's elitist, too, he knows, but when it comes to art, he's anything but. If something's good to look at, then that's all that matters, in his opinion. He likes that Ned seems to think this way, too, yet they can both enjoy being here, looking at the art, being unpretentious about it. It's a nice change.
When they reach one painting, though, at the very end of the room, he stops in front of it, gazing at it far more intently than he's gazed at any of the rest so far. "This one's my favorite," he says, although maybe he doesn't need to say it, from the way he's looking at it. It's a portrait of a dark-haired woman, one that might not seem particularly striking, but there's obviously something about it that he likes. He looks at the woman in the portrait again, who has a sort of wry, unimpressed expression on her face, and then at Ned.
"I used to come here and look at this one and imagine that that's what my mother looked like. I wouldn't know, really. It's just a fantasy. But that's why it's my favorite, anyway. Is that weird? I'm pretty sure that's weird."
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Then he hears what Ginsberg says and he can feel his heart beat a bit faster, knows this must be a delicate topic and he should proceed with caution.
"I don't think it's weird," Ned says, quietly, seriously. He looks at the portrait again, with this new information, wonders what it was about this one in particular that convinced Ginsberg as a child to grant it that particular meaning. Perhaps he shouldn't push any further, but he's not the one who introduced the topic, so perhaps he can venture a little further.
"You don't have a picture?" It's a neutral question, as far as he's concerned. Not asking what happened to her - if she abandoned him or died, or whatever else. Not asking how he feels about it, not asking for a story if he doesn't want to tell one. And, Ned realizes after he says it, it makes sense to him as a question, because he has a picture of his mother. Just one. But it's something that he treasures.
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His attention is finally drawn away from the portrait and back to Ned, and he shakes his head, as though reaffirming the answer he'd just given moments before. "She died when I was little. Sometime between the time I was born and the time I was five months or so, I guess. There aren't any photos. I mean, maybe there are, somewhere, but I don't have them."
He's aware that he's letting Ned into what must seem like a very personal side of his life, but it seems only natural to him, that he explain himself fully to Ned. There's no sense hiding any of the facts about where he comes from, and he doesn't necessarily feel that he can miss his mother when he'd never known her to begin with. Still, there's something that keeps him coming back to this painting, and he looks at it again, briefly, then back to Ned, smiling slightly. "She must have been good-looking, though. At least, I like to think so. Why not, right? I can make her whatever I want her to be, since she doesn't really exist."
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"She must've been, to have you." A line which would probably come out flirtatious, in a different situation, with a different person. Ned just states it in the manner of a logical fact. He thinks he can see why the younger Ginsberg fixated on this picture. She doesn't look unlike him, and there's a quirk to her expression that reminds him of Ginsberg, a little. He wonders if he unconsciously modeled it off the painting, or if it is a coincidence.
He can see why Ginsberg would think of her as a person who doesn't even exist, if he remembers nothing about her, if their lives only overlapped for a few months and he doesn't even know something as basic as when she died. Ned wonders which is worse - to have never known a mother, or to know one briefly and lose her.
And since Ginsberg has shared this thing with him, Ned feels like he ought to reciprocate. He doesn't have to, he knows. But he might as well trade the skeletal framework of the story. It's much less intimate than what Ginsberg's done, by showing him this picture, by letting Ned into his thoughts like that.
"Mine... died when I was nine." There's an almost imperceptible hesitation as he says it. It's easy enough by now to recite the rote fact of it. He's had to do it often enough, for enough crass and pushy questioners, that he can get it ought without undue struggle.
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Somehow, it doesn't surprise him when Ned says that his mother had died, too, although he's not sure why it strikes him as making sense. Maybe it had been that Ned had never mentioned any family at all, despite the fact that Ginsberg had talked about his father several times throughout their conversations. Maybe it just took one member of the unlucky absent or dead parent club to know one. He thinks it must be much harder to be in Ned's shoes, to have known his mother for nine years -- and nine years seemed like an eternity when you were young, he remembers -- and then to have her gone.
"That must be hard," he says, and it's certainly not pity in his voice as he says it, just bare fact. "Hard in a different way, I mean. You knew her, so you know what you're missing. I never had one, not really, and nobody could ever tell me anything about her, so I have no idea what I'm missing. It's probably harder for you. You can't go into a museum and pick a random portrait and decide it's your mother. I'm not trying to make you feel worse about it, it's just an observation. I'm sorry."
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But he's not sure what he's supposed to say to Ginsberg. Yes, it was hard? Without noticing himself doing it, his hands have curled into loose fists at his sides Ginsberg might not be trying to make him feel worse, but he's sadly failing. Ned has to exert a certain effort not to think about how hard it was (and still is), about exactly the kind of woman he's missing, and worst, why he's missing her. At least he's not gushing sympathy or asking a million questions. Ned can appreciate that.
"It's not a competition," he says, simply, then quickly follows it with, "She looks so... impatient," because turning the conversation abruptly back to the painting will hopefully signal to Ginsberg that he's not particularly keen on discussing his own mother's death, "Like he's asked her to stand there holding this flower and she thinks it's the dumbest idea she's ever heard."
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"That's why I like it, I think. Most portraits are pretty boring, because the people don't look like they have any life to them. I like it when they have their own personalities. It makes it easier to tell a story about them. But I guess I'm looking at it like a copywriter, too, always looking for the story."
With one more glance towards the painting, he heads towards the next room, apparently having decided that the best way to avoid the topic Ned doesn't want to discuss is to go to an entirely different painting. He shoves his hands back into his jacket pockets and immediately regrets it when he inadvertently grabs the bag of frozen peas, which is soaking wet by now. "In case you were wondering," he says, pulling his hand out of his pocket and shaking the water off of it ruefully, "I'd advise against putting your hands in your pockets. These things have completely melted."
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But before he can search for a trash can he experiences the strange jolt of seeing a painting on the wall that he recognizes. Everything that he's seen until now has been beautiful but unfamiliar to him. It's quite different however, to see the something and realize he's seen it before, but printed in a book. He says, "Oh!" in a pleasantly surprised way, turning to look once more. It's somehow smaller than he would have expected. One thinks of these things as monumental, somehow.
"I know this one," he explains, moving closer.
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When Ned turns around to look at the painting, he can't help but smile at Ned's surprise and how pleased he sounds about it. He looks at the painting, too, nodding. "Does it look like you would have imagined it did? I mean, I know sometimes people're disappointed by seeing stuff in the museum, because they've got this idea of how it should look from the reproductions of it they've seen, so I hope this one doesn't disappoint you."
It's strange, how he's almost taking on personal responsibility for Ned's feeling about the painting, and desperately hoping that it doesn't disappoint him, but then, he's always been good at taking on feelings like that.
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He turns to Ginsberg then, sees him watching intently and smiles, a little shyly, "That's probably a completely tedious and obvious thing to notice, isn't it?" But Ginsberg hasn't laughed at him yet. Not today, not the last time they'd been together, either. That's... nice. That's something Ned could see himself getting used to, in time.
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Somehow, that's significant to him, although he's not sure he can explain why. For all of his talkativeness, he doesn't always understand the things that are coming out of his mouth, even while he's saying them. Thus far, though, Ned hasn't told him to shut up, or been overly confused by anything he says, and he appreciates that. There's something relieving about not being questioned all the time, about being able to say what comes to mind without feeling as self-conscious as he usually does.
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He moves on from the painting with a last look, wandering around the room with his hands clasped behind his back, quietly enjoying himself. He doesn't say much more for a while, but his enjoyment is obvious enough. Ned's never been the best at keeping what he thinks and feels from showing on his face, and he likes this. It's so much less pressure than he's used to on a date. More like what he'd always imagined it would be like - less of a contest or interrogation, and just two people having a good time together.
After some time, they wander into a room in which all but one or two of the paintings are of Biblical scenes - particularly gruesome ones, it seems to Ned, all martyrs and crucifixions. He can't help it; he laughs, says, "I'm sensing a pattern, here."
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As they wander the room, his eyes are on Ned as much as they're on the paintings. He's seen all of these paintings before, but he's never seen Ned's reactions to them, and he likes how animated Ned's face is, the way he lights up when he sees something he likes, how obviously he's enjoying himself. As someone who wears his heart on his sleeve far more than he should, he can appreciate it from Ned, secure in his knowledge that Ned won't judge or belittle him. It's comforting.
When they step into the room full of Biblical scenes, he can't help but laugh, too, and he's glad he's not the only one. "Yeah," he says, looking around, shaking his head, "There's definitely a pattern. A theme, even. See, I've always thought that this is part of the reason religion fucks people up -- look at how violent all of it is. Little kids see this stuff, and I'm pretty sure it gives them nightmares."
It's only after he says it that he realizes that, perhaps, he shouldn't be so quick to dismiss religion, because he has no idea of Ned's feelings about it. "Not that all religion's bad, I just think some of this stuff..." he gestures to the paintings, "... is pretty gruesome and dark for people to be seeing every day."
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They are passing by a particularly sordid and gory rendering of souls burning in hell, which Ned wrinkles his nose at, just for a moment. "Mostly agree. It's not that it's dark, exactly. Life's dark. So I get why religion would reflect that. Life's dark, so you have to... have to work at it, to make it light. I think if people focused more on how to do that and less on the..." he nods his head towards the painting, "...'mess up and you'll be tortured forever' side of things, it'd be a different story."
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"That's sick," he says, and he's obviously talking about the painting. "Sure, life's dark. We all deal with that every single day. But the people who came up with the idea of hell were seriously disturbed, I think, and not just in the way a lot of us are seriously disturbed. I mean, who sat down and really thought that the punishment for doing some shitty things in your life should be... that? It makes me want to throw up."
It bothers him on a level he can't quite articulate, but then, violence of any kind always has, even on an artistic level. He knows it's not real, but that doesn't stop it from being sickening, in his opinion. Maybe it's juvenile to be so obviously affected by a stupid painting, but he is, and he can't hide it. That's why he'd always preferred looking at the paintings that didn't have anything to do with religion, and that's why he's glad that the room they're passing into next is moving away from that kind of thing.
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"It is pretty sick," he agrees, joins Ginsberg in walking away from the painting and towards the exit of the room, to one that contains landscapes. Lovely, intricate, calm landscapes. Ned feels a touch guilty, seeing how bothered Ginsberg is, wants to make him feel more normal for reacting so extremely.
"You're right though. About the kids and nightmares and all. I used to have nightmares about going to hell. All the time. But then I realized it was all scare tactics and bullshit made up by a bunch of desperate people with sick imaginations trying to pretend they got to decide what was right and what was wrong, and it didn't frighten me so much."
He knows they are in public, knows he has to limit any contact between the two of them, but there's no one else in the room, so he sets his hand against the small of Ginsberg's back, just for a few seconds, to steady him, to reassure him, and to apologize for drawing his attention to it in the first place.
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He knows that he's too worked up, and he actively tries to calm down as they step into the next room. The landscapes are good, if a little boring -- they provide a calming backdrop to the emotions that are raging inside of him. He's never been good at sitting down and shutting up, and he's not good at it here, either, especially not when Ned's proven to be such a nonjudgemental listener.
The hand on the small of his back doesn't hurt, either, and he tosses a grateful smile at Ned, because he's always found comfort in physical contact, always craved it, and never quite had enough of it from people he really wants it from. The fact that Ned's willing to give it is nothing short of a miracle, if he believed in miracles. "Anyway," he says, back to his usual, relatively sunny self, "You probably think I'm crazy for hating those paintings so much, and I guess on an aesthetic level I kind of appreciate them, because it must take a lot of talent to paint something like that, but I wish they'd use their talent on something like this. Landscapes. That can't offend anyone, right?"
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Ned wonders (in the way that he always does with new people, as he starts to get to know them) how he'd react if he found out that life and death isn't as simple as he has been told. Would he revise his opinion on life on death, on hell and whether Ned belongs there?
"I don't think you're crazy," Ned says in a voice that is particularly warm, though low, in case anyone should happen to come in and overhear them, "I think it's a good thing they upset you. I mean- it's not a good thing you're upset. That's not what I meant." Now he's the one tripping over his words, awkwardly navigating his way towards his original point, "I meant... if more people were like you and hated them, I think, the world would be a better place."
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He thinks about the war a lot. It keeps him up at night sometimes, knowing that at any moment, his number could be up, and he could be shipped off to some foreign country to kill people he had no interest in killing. He knows that could happen to the guys he works with, too, or even to Ned, and it both angers and scares him. To him, the fact that people have always seemed so enamored with violence is concerning.
"On the other hand, if more people were like me..." He shrugs expressively, his gestures large and free as always. "Well, if more people were like me, there'd be a lot less people getting things done in the world. I mean, I can write ads. That's what I can do. I couldn't run a country, or do anything actually productive. I couldn't even bake a pie, probably."
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Ned's not exactly thrilled with the idea of the war either, that he might get swept up in it at any moment, but his solution is to think about it as little as possible, to take that gnawing fear and unease and shove it into the most out of the way corner of his mind he can.
"You could bake a pie," Ned says, confidently, "I could teach you."
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Shall we call this a wrap, then~