It was the first tolerable day after nearly a month of temperatures in the high 90s and soggy humidity that sapped my energy and made even the short walk to the mailbox a misery. This day was mild by comparison, so my friend Paris and I decided to drive the 15 minutes from the condo where he lives with his partner in Bethesda to the Glenstone Museum in Potomac, Maryland.
The brother of my high school sweetheart, Paris has been a fixture in my life since we were in our early teens. When I left for college in August of 1996, his brother and I broke up, but Paris and I grew closer. We both lived in Baltimore in the early 2000s while he studied painting at MICA and I studied poetry at Hopkins, and when he moved back to Bethesda a few years after graduating, we continued to get together every few months.
We are both introverts who skew toward misanthropy, and we inspire a level of comfort in each other that can become inertia; we love watching terrible TV and lounging on the couch, jokingly reminiscing about days when we still had ambition and hope.
Together we are the quintessential Gen-Xers, cynical to the core and always ready with a cutting observation or dismissive roll of the eyes, the perfect balance of unease and ennui. As kids, we were alienated and angry, bonding over our shared sense of otherness, seeking solace in our art. As adults, we mostly try to figure out how we got so old, how we ended up so average, how we ever stayed up past 10pm. But Paris loves Glenstone, and his rare enthusiasm coupled with the good weather were enough to motivate us.
Paris drove us through winding Potomac streets lined with mansions that seemed to have sprouted like ostentatious mushrooms in the years since I’d been in that part of town. The road was edged with lush forest, and I almost didn’t notice the entrance which just seemed like another driveway. Soon after entering the property, though, the magnitude of the museum became apparent. At nearly 300 acres, Glenstone has quite a footprint. We could see the Jeff Koons sculpture, “Split-Rocker,” a 36-foot-tall hobby-horse head fashioned from flowers, looming from our parking space.
I could already tell that Paris had not exaggerated about how impressive the museum is—plus it is totally free for all guests, and even if you can’t get a reservation, there are several alternative ways to gain entry. As we walked to the arrival hall, Paris explained that the museum has an agreement with the bus system—anyone who takes the Ride-On into the property is guaranteed admittance. There are also several groups of people who are always admitted: educators (which is how Paris and I got in), students over age 12 (no one under 12 is permitted in the museum, something Paris told me with absolute glee), active military members, veterans, and museum workers.
The arrival hall itself is a work of art with high ceilings and pale wood walls. White parasols are available to all guests and the docents all wear gray smocks that reminded me of the canvas uniform I was given at a Korean spa. They also all wore pins—horizontal silver bars—on their chests. I felt like I was in some utopian fantasy where art and nature rule the day. The weight of my worries lifted as we took the path toward the exhibits.