We are taking a family vacation in Cleveland, Ohio, birthplace of Bob (huge Cleveland Browns fan) and home to the Sheffler-Megerians of Shaker Heights, who we are visiting. Lynne Sheffler, a physiatrist at Case Western Reserve University (see What is a physiatrist), and I worked together at Harvard a number of years ago.
We went to the famous Cleveland Museum of Art. Among the phenomenal paintings there, this Monet, called the The Red Kerchief, especially caught my attention.
This painting represents one of the first occasions that an artist ventured out from the then-standard to paint still and posed subjects. Claude Monet had initially planned to paint two seated subjects in front of these windows. That was what was expected. But instead he painted this woman walking by, casting a quick glance in through the windows. In this instance of movement, all is communicated. The caption reads “a radical departure from convention.” Indeed, just like OESH.
Then we went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which is currently celebrating Women who Rock. (At first I thought it said Women who Walk, ha!). The museum, with video clips and paraphernalia from Elvis, the Beatles, and Madonna, is a must see. We watched a clip of the all-women band, the GoGo’s, read about Tina Tuner’s story, and saw Lady Gaga’s meat dress.
But Lynne is the real woman who rocks. A physician, researcher, mother, and wife to renowned surgeon Cliff Megerian, Lynne is a good buddy. Our children are about the same ages, meaning that Lynne and I were pregnant at the same time. At lunchtime, we would often bring into our sanctuary (my office), four trays of cafeteria food, from which we would pick off the few items that wouldn’t make us nauseous. Lynne’s responsible for, among other things, the spelling of all our daughters’ names. “It is important that the formation of letters allows for the creation of a distinct signature.” Which undoubtedly led to our spending way too much time today admiring the signatures of the inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Which somehow led (with Michael Jackson’s Beat It in the background) to my doing the moonwalk…
P.S. Did you notice my version of the moonwalk was facilitated by the prototype OESH-ogs that I was testing? Never mind that all the children started walking away.
