When I stopped by Mom’s house to drop off the check for my cell phone and car insurance, I enlisted my brother to help me search for my old college posters. Buried deep within the bowels of his closet was giant pile of rolled up posters. We unearthed them together and chose a few to bring back to New York.
Last night was spent determining where these new pictures should be hung and today I finally put all but one of them up. On one wall, which is actually half a wall and half a permanently shut door to the living room I hung my old poster of former New York Jets Wide Receiver Wayne Chrebet.
Chrebet, at 5’10 and white went undrafted out of Hofstra and when he showed up at Jets open tryouts he had to plead with the security guard that he really was a football player. He made the team as the seventh wide receiver, but worked hard throughout the season and due to some injuries became the lone bright spot on a dismal 1-15 team. For most of his ten year career, he functioned as the third wide receiver, often brought in only on third down situations in which a 6 to 12 yard gain was needed. Although not as fast as most of the players he lined up against, he consistently found ways to get open and move the chains for the Jets.
Unfortunantly, he was repeatedly hit hard during his career and suffered upwards of eight to ten concussions. These forced his reluctant retirement from the NFL at the end of last season. He’ll be missed on Sunday afternoons, but he has a place on my wall as a reminder of a younger, simpler time.
In between my two giant windows, right above my desk and computer, I’ve placed two mementoes of Prague. Both are fairly cheesy. One is a picture of two cold war Russian soldiers holding binoculars and rifles. The caption reads, “Pray We Don’t Catch You At Another Museum.” I bought it at the Museum of Communism in Prague, which is very worthwhile, go see if you have the chance. The old TV footage of the student riots before the Velvet Revolution is really startling. The other picture is a drawing of the Charles Bridge I bought a few meters from the Charles Bridge during one of my last days in Prague.
Next to my bed, I placed a long poster of a Mucha painting entitled, “Repos de la Nuit.” Which, I’m fairly confidant translates to Repose at Night. It’s the fourth in a series of four painting depicting a young woman in various states. It is very pleasing to the eye.
On the wall closer to my bed I have hung up from left to right: A poster of the “Wanderer- by Caspar David Friedrich, a poster for Kenyon College my alma mater, and two tapestries I bought during my recent visit to Peru.
The Wanderer, or rather, the Wanderer Above a Sea of Fog is one my favorite paintings. I discovered Friedrich freshman year in Introduction to Modern European and American Art. The class was as long and sleep inducing as the name suggests, but it did expand my cultural horizons so to speak. Friedrich was a German Romantic painter who paintings often showed solitary figures against the backdrop of vast nature. “Monk By the Sea,” is another of my favorites. But, the poster store didn’t have it.
The Kenyon poster is another bit of cheese. It shows a few of Kenyon’s more majestic buildings rising out from beneath a field of corn. This is very accurate. The caption reads, “A jewel encased in corn fields.” That is hyperbole.
The tapestries which I bought from an old woman for a pittance look really neat. Both show condors in flight and I’ve arranged them so they are facing each other. I’m a bit proud of myself, if you hadn’t noticed.
The last poster, a picture of giant wave enveloping a lighthouse was actually given to me by a college girlfriend upon her graduation. I was a year younger, so she was kind enough to leave it for me, along with her fridge and possibly a microwave. If you are out there Kerry, thanks.
That’s a fair description of my room. I’ll try to take pictures soon to give you a better idea, but maybe if you’re lucky, perhaps you’ll figure out a way to see it in person.
