Christo's "Gates" & Running

Quoted message said:

Initially I hated everything about "The Gates" in NYC's Central Park
and the notion that it was "art" was laughable to me. My initial
response was "upcale high brow graffiti", "an ego imposed on Central
Park".

Not to belittle your experience, some news commentator
said it looked like cheap shower curtains. I tend to
agree.

Art is in the eye of the beholder. Maybe it was the art
of running you experienced, rather than the art of Christo
(i.e., you likely wouldn't have had the thoughts expressed
below had you not been running...)

Quoted message said:

Tuesday late afternoon I ran in Central park....there was no wind...and
the fabric on the Gates was still. Along the rolling hills of the
North end of the park....they resembled tombstones along the lines of
what you see at military cemetaries. Faceless, nameless orange
tombstones. It hit me instantly....my next thought was 9/11 and the
"Gates" became people.

As I ran and looked at Gate after Gate....It thought about how I ran in
the park that same day, 9/11 at about that same time, twilight, just do
decompress/de-stress from it all. I thought Gate was a person I never
knew....each Gate was perhaps a Gateway to who they were, and where
they are. I thought about how at the end of the day, we're all just
the same (as the Gates are). As I ran, these Gates become souls
returned to NYC, they've managed to plant themselves back in NYC
standing right were they very will might have stood at one point
prior...and may have stood today, if they were alive....but they are
now dead. These Gates became the souls of people.

I knew a couple of people that died at WTC on 9/11 and as I ran....I
wondered which Gate was possibly the person I knew. I looked at each
gate knowing that Gate could be looking right back at me. Kind of
Surreal.

It was a very somber run. Again, I wanted to dislike Christo, his
crazy-ass wife Jean-Claude.....I wanted to rip these damn Gates that
are so easy to ridicule. But I'll be damn if they did not "pull a
fast one on me". They managed to make these Gates be "art" for me in
ways and in a dimension I was not even thinking about.

But that's what good and great art is....no? It's you're challenge to
find meaning in it for you. If it disturbs you...makes you
uncomfortable...all the better.

So today I ran the park...in rain...kinda cold too...Gates all
around...viewed it all in the context of how great it is to be alive
and able to run. My very sore ankle ment nothing to me...a myriad of
business problems and legal BS to deal with took a back seat! I was
running and free. I actually went off my normal running route and ran
under a stretch of Gates just for the hell of it. I suppose I was being
childlike...but it's good to be damn near 42 (1 week and
counting)...and act "childlike".

Just thought I'd share you all one runner's context of these Gates that
are in the news/media...from the context of a runner who has to deal
with the extra crowds in the park, etc....as I deal with my standard
running route. Thanks to bad weather...not a lot of people were on the
pathways of the Gates and I was able to run unobstructed through a good
stretch of them...

"O, yeah.
Old news.

But on a more important note ~ Shoes!
What kind,
O, you're so kind!"
~ Twittering

Interesting perspective. Thanks for sharing it! Man, I wish they were
gonna still be up when I'm in town in April ...

--
Brian P. Baresch
Fort Worth, Texas, USA
Professional editing and proofreading

If you're going through hell, keep going. --Winston Churchill

Quoted message said:

As I ran and looked at Gate after Gate....It thought about how I

wanted to stop, and squeeze one off, so I did.>

You are a fricking pervert.

cool that you describe them in different conditions. I thought they'd
look cool in any weather, any time of day. Most of the pics I've seen
so far were on windy, sunny days. I'd like to see them at night. I'll
probably only see them during the snowflake 4 miler.