{"id":127,"date":"2009-03-08T21:36:16","date_gmt":"2009-03-09T03:36:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/?p=127"},"modified":"2009-03-08T21:36:16","modified_gmt":"2009-03-09T03:36:16","slug":"making-connections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/2009\/03\/making-connections\/","title":{"rendered":"Making Connections"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday, I was playing some music for all the household to hear, and a Billie Holiday song came on. \u00a0My son looked up from his toy trucks and said: “Oh, this song is like Annie<\/em>,” which was his way of saying the music he was hearing was of a similar style to much of the music in that favorite motion picture. \u00a0Later, the song “Star Trek Rhapsody”, which is a parody based on “Bohemian Rhapsody,” came on. \u00a0My son said, “This sounds like WALL-E”. \u00a0Again, he was right: the sound effects in that song are very reminiscent of the sound effects in his favorite film.<\/p>\n

I think it’s great that someone so young is already able to spot similarities in unrelated bits of daily life. \u00a0Maybe it means he’s smart, or maybe it just means he’ll be a comedian one day. \u00a0Either way, I think such pattern recognition should be encouraged.<\/p>\n

His nonchalant comments reminded me of one day, about 25 years ago, when I was in second grade. \u00a0My elementary school used to have these things called “Picture Day”. \u00a0I don’t mean the day when all the kids try to look their best and pose for a lousy keepsake photo. \u00a0No, I mean the day that volunteers actually came into our class with a painting. \u00a0The paintings were on loan from the library, and the volunteers were usually librarians (though, for some reason, I have this hazy feeling that some of the volunteers were mothers’ of the children).<\/p>\n

I liked Picture Day. \u00a0The whole class would sit on the floor in a semi-circle and the volunteer would pull out a large reproduction of a famous painting and tell us the story of how this painting came to be and why it’s important. \u00a0I learned a lot about art and history thanks to Picture Day; one time a volunteer brought in Christina’s World<\/em>. \u00a0Another time, a volunteer came in with a painting of Dan Patch (of significance because my elementary school was named after Marion Savage).<\/p>\n

One day, a woman brought in two paintings. \u00a0When she pulled out the first painting, it was totally covered with tagboard. \u00a0She then opened up a flap that revealed a small portion of the painting. \u00a0In the flap, we could only darkness and some stars. \u00a0She asked if we had any guesses as to what time of day the painting was depicting. \u00a0Of course, we all shouted out “night time”. \u00a0Then she opened another flap, revealing what looked like a bright sun. \u00a0So then we were all confused. \u00a0Then she removed the whole piece of tagboard. \u00a0It was then that we saw Van Gogh’s Starry Night<\/em>. \u00a0I was immediately drawn to the picture; it was undoubtedly my favorite painting that anyone had ever brought in for picture day. \u00a0<\/p>\n

As she spoke to us about the painting, however, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had heard the words “starry night” somewhere before. \u00a0After much thinking, it finally occurred to me and, so, when she asked if we had any questions, my hand shot up into the air. \u00a0“Does this painting have anything to do with that song that goes ‘starry, starry night’?” I asked. \u00a0I was referring to the Don MacLean song, “Starry Starry Night”, of which my father owned the single. \u00a0She scrunched up her face and, looking really put out at the question, said: “Well, yes, but let’s focus on the painting, here.”<\/p>\n

After fielding a few more questions from the class, she pulled out her next picture: a painting depicting a scene from the Battle of Greasy Grass Creek. \u00a0I had never heard of Little Bighorn, or of George Custer, but, again, by sheer coincidence, as she told the story of the battle and the painting, I recalled another song my Dad owned. \u00a0So, at question time, I again raised my hand, and asked if this painting bore any connection to the funny song “Mr. Custer”. \u00a0This time, my teacher shot me a cold glance, as if I was acting out of line, and the volunteer, who assumed I was just trying to be funny, said, “Well, we’re not gonna talk about that song, it’s very disrespectful to Custer”.<\/p>\n

Here’s what I learned later in life: Custer was a supreme asshole who deserves no respect. \u00a0And even if he did, guess what? \u00a0I wasn’t talking about the actual historical event. \u00a0I was inquiring about the painting. \u00a0Maybe Larry Verne’s parody song was just a stupid parody song, but the painting was, well, just a painting. \u00a0And while I’m fully on board with the notion that Van Gogh’s contributions to the arts far exceeeds Don MacLean’s, guess what? \u00a0It’s still just <\/em>a painting. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Another thing I learned is that making connections like that helps the brain grow and stay alert. \u00a0Despite what I learned in school.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday, I was playing some music for all the household to hear, and a Billie Holiday song came on. \u00a0My son looked up from his toy trucks and said: “Oh, this song is like Annie,” which was his way of saying the music he was hearing was of a similar style to much of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books-film-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=127"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":130,"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127\/revisions\/130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}