Today was the first time in a long time that I had an activity planned purely for the experience, for fun for recreation. I have been eager to see the new Hobart landmark MONA that has everybody buzzing in town. I purposely deferred the visit until after the initial frenzy and waited for my sister (and friend) to join me.
I admit, I did not do much research and thought I had enough insight to be prepared for the "shock factor" that MONA promised to deliver. I had a sense that I was walking through a private estate as we approached the entrance. I appreciated the entrepreneurial private gallery owner's contribution to our city. His provision of employment, attraction of tourists to stimulate our local economy, the funky building and engineering spectacle.
I felt such heaviness as I wandered the corridors and hallways and showrooms for the prized possessions of this man. I saw nothing that was unfamiliar. I saw nothing that shocked or rattled me. I was not horrified and repulsed by the perverse and depraved representations of the inner thoughts of the human mind.
What may have been considered horror in the media or illegal on the screen has been glamorised into a den of intrigue and culture. It has been read that sex and death are the main themes and that these are the main drives of the human, the pursuit of one and avoidance of the other.
I have seen this world, touched it's fringes, explored it's promise of answers to my deepest questions and promise to fill my soul's largest chasms of emptiness.
I felt nothing but having walked through the familiar realms of human brokenness. After all there is nothing new under the sun, a wise man once said. My heart aches for the lost and confused who are fooled into believing that there are no other prizes worth pursuing. Death has no need of avoidance, sex no threat of domination when the truth of the real goal is realised.
Maybe I am considered a fool by the intellectual and cultured and savvy of this world. I am not trying to be popular in my thinking or narrow minded. I just know another way, the wrestle is over and I am humbly grateful.
