Oddly enough, I created this Hy-Art (Fantin-Latour/Ernst) before reading this article, about the attraction the Internet has revealed between people who share the same name, or "Googlegangers". (The mirroring effect is mine.)
As usual with my big ideas, I was not the only one to come up with it. For years, I've wanted to start the Marc Olmsted Club, and do a documentary about the 22 of us meeting. I thought it would be very funny for all of us to offer to pay a bill with the same credit card, among other discussions of the impact of one's name on one's life. I can think of a few of you with interesting appellations. Ever meet your googlegangers? Care to share?
At the risk of seeming to lay it on a bit thick about my feet, I neglected to mention that I stubbed my left fourth toe, (the one next to the pinky toe) about two weeks ago. Unfortunately, it has remained extremely tender, and exacerbated my limp. Yesterday, when I went to get a nerve induction test and physical therapy on my tarpal tunnel, it was decided that I should get an X-ray today on the toe, which I will do at 11..
What is it with me and my feet? (I wonder if other Marc Olmsteds have similar plaints?) I've had three surgeries on my big toe in over the years. Once it got so infected I had to go on IV antibiotics and have the nail removed. (This is what I get for being a klutz, someone prone to jerky, impatient movements. Riding with me when I drove a stick shift was legendary. It wasn't pretty.)
I watched American Idol Gives Back last night, and spent the second day in a row feeling completely inadequate in the face of AIDS and poverty around the world.
And yet, I am ambivalent about the amount of money given by a Pitt or a Bono, not because I don't admire their generosity, but because I think part of the problem is a world economic system that rewards the few with far too much in the first place.
In a fair world, the rickshaw driver would earn as much as a doctor, the maid as much as a lawyer. The teacher would make more than the CEO, and the artist, the actor, the writer--we wouldn't make much at all, because we get to do what we love.
It's an odd concoction, to be an economic communist and yet a cultural individualist. I guess I'm a Scandinavian Social Democrat at heart, not too surprising with a last name that comes from Danish. ("Almstede" means "Place of the Elms.")
MCO 2008
