Art Bucks

On our way to Black's Beach yesterday, Scott and I detoured up Mount Soledad through some of the most opulent neighborhoods in America.  The physical ascent itself, beginning at the Thrifty gas station at the bottom of the hill, played like a liminal space for Olympian wealth.  As we ground up the hill in our crummy Saturn, watching the temperature gauge to make sure we weren't overheating, it seemed difficult to imagine that people who lived on Mount Soledad didn't take their Bentleys into the sky by a more exclusive route, like a glass elevator or a spiral ramp fashioned from a solid slab of granite and inlaid with diamonds.

I have an unusual relationship with money, such that I don't want to have too much of it.  If I had a million dollars, I would buy all organic produce.  I would get a brand new Honda Hybrid, and a French Bulldog.  I would scale my work hours way back, and spend the extra time volunteering with FOCAS.  I'd pay back my student loans all at once.  And I guess I would buy a house somewhere, maybe in Boston, that would be big enough for me, Scott and the animals.  My clothes would still come from thrift shops.  

Scott joked that when the art bucks start rolling in, we could get a house like the creepy palaces up on Mount Soledad.  I have a check coming from Ninth Letter for $25.  That's my down payment right there.