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| Butterfly Area at the Natural History Museum |
A decade ago, we spent the better part of a full day at the Natural History Museum in Manhattan. If you have trouble placing it, the museum is the scene of the "Night at the Museum" movie from a few years back.
It is a place of wonder and imagination,beauty and curator skills; simply one fascinating thing after another. Mostly, however, it is a place of "please, thank you, let me get that door for you, pardon me, smiles, easy conversations with others, and a whole lot of common courtesy" that doesn't make its way much outside their walls.
One leaves the museum world of perfection and grace and re-enters a scene of name-calling, rudeness, talking over the other person, viciousness and snarly, non-existent manners.
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| Green butterflies 'blurring" around while others cooperated and stood still |
It struck us that museums are photos of imagination; snaps of a perfect world of detail and realism. It isn't a copy of our real life world at all. Sadly.
I want to go back if for no other reason than to enjoy "nice" frozen in time so it can wash over you like a warm wave. The butterflies have no fear as the signs say, don't hurt them. No one did. Kids held out their fingers as perches and some were rewarded. It was a gentle slice of life. Perhaps, sadly, one that lives on mostly in a world of dioramas and tableau vivants.
Miss it every day.