Culture Corner – January 2015

I can’t believe it’s been four months since I last did a Culture Corner (September 2014), but the blog wasn’t lacking for culture! With the end of my 30×30 list we got to visit the Somerville Museum, finish touring the MFA with my friend Caroline and I finally attend the Boston Symphony Orchestra again. But since then, I’ve done a lot of travelling and visited quite a few museums.

One of the big things I’ve never talked about as a cultural experience is travelling. I generally focus on what I do when I get there, but driving from Boston to North Carolina and then flying from North Carolina to Omaha, Nebraska and then back to Boston really made me think about the culture of travelling.  I won’t go into it in this post, but I think I’ll probably write about it when I attempt to revive Now Entering Adulthood in the coming weeks. What I AM going to write briefly about and show lots of pictures of are my whirlwind trips in December to DC and North Carolina and my January trip to Omaha! And then throw in a few pictures of my most recent MFA visits.

In December, I got a surprise trip to Washington, DC for my birthday and we did so much. We did a tour of DC, I got to see one of my oldest college friends, Malory, we did Zoo Lights in the evening, saw a concert at the Library of Congress and just wandered around the city, not to mention all of the museums below! When I found out where we were going (after we were through security, I was convinced we were just driving up to Maine) we started to plan and the one thing I really wanted to do was see the Library of Congress AND they had an awesome concert showing. Unfortunately, I didn’t read the program book correctly so we went to the wrong concert (still amazing), and we ran out of time to actually tour the Library, so it just means we’ll have to go back!

In addition to the Library, we toured the U.S. Capitol and visited a bunch of museums and monuments: National Archives, Washington Monument (to the top!), Jefferson Memorial, Roosevelt Memorial, MLK Memorial, Air and Space Museum, Natural History Museum, Portrait Gallery and the American Art Museum. We were so tired by the end of the trip that I think we both passed out on the plane back. Of all the museums, I think I enjoyed the National Archives the most, shocker right? They were incredibly fascinating and we had an early morning tour (they only do two a day!) and it was well worth it. I’m even considering doing digital volunteering throughout this year, I just have to make myself do it.

Then, less than two weeks later, I was in a car for an 18 hour drive to visit my best friend Alie in Virginia (where I got my tattoo)and see family members spread across North Carolina. And the fun part in North Carolina, aside from seeing everyone, is the past two years I’ve stuck around longer than usual and spent a few days with my young cousins AND got to spend New Years with good friends. Nick, to the right, will be marrying my good friend Caroline this coming June and it’ very exciting! The only downside was that I had to fly out too early on New Year’s Day for another friend from college’s wedding in Omaha!

My friend Tara from UNC and Leeds was getting married and this was exciting for numerous reasons. I love love love Tara and knew any man she married would be amazing AND I knew there would be people from Leeds and Carolina who flew in for the wedding. The only hesitation I had was that it was in Omaha, NE and boy was I wrong.

After nearly missing my plane in Chicago —thanks for nothing United, who schedules a connection in that big ass airport with the bare-minimum 45 minutes between flights, oh they do—and having been sick for two weeks already at this point, I arrived in Omaha. I was pleasantly surprised at how big it was and the longer I stayed the more I discovered. I stayed in the Old Market area, right by where the wedding was and found so many little stores and dozens of restaurants, including some amazing sushi! I didn’t even need to leave a 10 block radius! But one day, friends from the UK (Hi Clair, Dom and Fiona if you’re reading!) to check out the Joslyn Art Museum (JAM’s site) and was even more impressed. Although their displayed collection wasn’t that big it was still impressive and that says nothing for the stunning building! The American Indian collection was wonderful and I can’t wait to get back to DC to visit the newly opened American Indian Museum.

After the museum I went back to the hotel and slept for quote a few hours until another friend, Emily/Spuzz (HEY!) flew in and we had dinner. The next day I took it easy as the wedding was that night and I wanted to be ready for the festivities. The wedding itself was stunning. Tara was beautiful and her husband Seth was so incredibly wonderful (I got to eat lunch with them the day I arrived) and seeing friends and people I knew was the perfect end to a long vacation.

As much fun as it was to meet Seth and see Tara and her sisters and all of our mutual friends from around the globe, I was ready to come home to Boston. I’d been gone for more than two weeks at that point and wanted to sleep in a familiar bed and to be able to relax and I did. I ended up taking a sick day that Monday because I’d spent two weeks sick and hadn’t seen any improvement and then worked from home that Wednesday because of Boston’s -27° windchill, so I finally started to feel better by that Friday.

The last (and most recent) cultural thing I’ve done was to visit the MFA twice in the same week. Tim and I went to see the Goya exhibit its last weekend  here and I’m sad I waited until the end because I could have spent many more hours there. I was, however, thankful there was a members only hour before the museum opened because the line was CRAZY when we finally left the museum. And then I had a friend from undergrad in town for work (Hey Meg!) and she’d never been to the MFA so we went and grabbed a coffee there and while we were there I checked out the Klimt’s visiting Adam and Eve. I didn’t take a picture of it as I’m sure I’ll go back later, but I came across a museum label with a word I’ve been fascinated with recently: fin de siècle. I’d never seen it before, but I’ve seen it everywhere recently and I strangely love it.Needless to say it’s been a busy few months and I can’t wait to see where the next few take me!

Have you done anything cultural recently?