Blast From the Past

The many months of unemployment are starting to take their toll (for more about that, please refer my blog post dated 9/16/13, or for my European and former European colonies readers 16/9/13).  Even the Internet in all of its illegal downloading, race-baiting, relationship-destroying glory no longer beings me joy.  How desperate am I for entertainment, you ask?  I've started to visit museums!  For those of you that are not gasping in horror at that last sentence, I feel sad for you.  No one should live in the past.  Visiting a museum is like visiting your parent's house; drop in only when necessary, and stay just long enough to remind yourself how much better life is now.

The museums I've been going to have free admission.  However, as I wander through the exhibits I inevitably see a plastic bin with a slot on top and a sign asking for donations.  This has always struck me as both passive and aggressive; obviously the museum doesn't stay open on the power of rainbows and farts, so why are they being so cagey?  Do they think by not charging admission they're better than those snooty metropolitan museums because they're operating "on principle?"  I usually drop a few coins in the slot regardless, because my Irish Catholic upbringing won't let me enjoy anything for free that doesn't have any alcohol content.

These particular museums are local museums, meaning they show you what life was like in that area roughly between 100 and 150 years ago.  The exhibits consist mostly of old dinnerware, flatware, bits of clothing, bottles, jars, coins, and shoes....in other words, garbage.  Basically they dug up a bunch of garbage and put it on display.  And yeah, I get that it's supposed to be a window into the past, but all it shows us is that they had a lot of the stuff we still use today, minus the video games and speed dating.  But I guess you get what you pay for.

That's why last week I broke down and went to a museum that charged admission.  It was a 200-year-old building that was originally a barracks for convicts and later destitute (i.e. single) women.  If you have to pay to get in it must be of a higher quality than free, right?  Well, it turned out that it mostly contained the same junk as the free museums, only according to the plaque they were items found "underneath the floorboards of this very building."  Wow, I guess once they have your money there's no need for pretense is there?  They flat-out admit they're exhibiting 150-year-old garbage.  They even threw in a few mummified rats for good measure, as if there aren't dozens of them underneath the floorboards where you're sitting at this very moment.      

On the plus side, the experience has put me off museums for awhile.  But I can't help but wonder what museums will look like 100 years from now, especially since we generate about 1,000 times more crap these days.  Maybe someday my M&M wrappers and dried-out Bic pens will be on display in the same spot where I discarded them in my haste to get to traffic school or whatever.  Then I'll finally get the recognition I deserve.