yale university art gallery does not have any frida kahlo, yet a visitor, manspreading in this long bench at the museum’s lounge, was studying in his laptop an image of one of her more gruesome paintings, the one where she actually stabbed the picture frame. she painted this that time she knew diego had an affair, again, albeit, this time with her younger sister. frida cribbed the painting’s central image from a newspaper report of an unfaithful woman fatally stabbed multiple times by her jealous husband. the murderer defended his action by telling the judge “it was just a few small nips.”
it was only a run—a poor excuse of a dash, really—from the historic waiting room of new haven union station to the decidedly pedestrian track 14 to catch the train back to grand central. that was all. but i almost passed out as soon as i slumped in my seat. oh, the drip, drip of the choices, unexplainable, unaccountable, in my life. i can’t remember now, but there was this english writer, of world war II vintage, who said that one, ultimately, is defeated by one’s own stupidity.