Ten Miles Past Normal

Chapter Seven


In Which Life Imitates Robert Rauschenberg





I don’t have any friends in Art I, but as a place I have to be every day, it’s not so bad. Not as good as Great Girls and Women, because Sarah’s not in it, but better than just about anything else. For one thing, the teacher, Ms. Ashdown, is both humane and reasonable. She’s funny, she’s cool, but she actually expects you to work in class and turn in your projects on time. On the respect-o-meter, Ms. Ashdown gets high marks. Add to that, she’s praised my “color instinct” three times this semester.

I’m a fan.

I thought art was where I’d make friends, and some possibilities exist, but nothing has panned out yet. There’s a quiet, pale girl named Meg who sits off by herself, sketches constantly, and has a tendency toward interesting socks. When we have group critiques, she’s the one everyone listens to. She can be critical, but she’s never unkind, and she’s always right. The problem is, other than group critique, she doesn’t talk. I complimented her once on a drawing, and she smiled very nicely and sort of nodded. Then she went right back to sketching without a word. She’s refused to make eye contact with me ever since.

I take my seat at the table between Chester and Lynnette. They are a friendly, chatty, and outgoing duo. Unfortunately, they are, in fact, a duo, so I spend much of my time in art leaning way forward or way back so they can barrage each other with love taps and deep, meaningful looks. If they had reason to believe that anybody besides themselves existed in Art I, I’m sure we’d be the best of friends. Who knows, maybe they’ll break up, and not only will I have two new friends, I’ll be able to undo the damage to my spinal cord caused by being made to sit between the two of them.

As Ms. Ashdown goes over the roll, I sneak a peek at Sarah’s note. She’s moved past who I should sit with at lunch to her latest update on the Chocolate Wars. For a fund-raiser, the third graders in her neighborhood, students at Sewall Elementary, are selling chocolate made from Ivory Coast cocoa beans. Sarah has composed a letter to the school’s principal and PTA president explaining to them why they should sell fair trade chocolate instead. She will, she promises, e-mail me a copy for proofreading.

“Okay, my young friends, today we’re talking Rauschenberg!” Ms. Ashdown calls out. The classroom lights dim and the PowerPoint presentation begins. “Robert Rauschenberg was famous for saying he wanted to work in the gap between art and life,” Ms. Ashdown tells us. “He believed that everyday, ordinary things could be art.”

We spend a lot of the class period looking at Rauschenberg’s collages. We see stuffed birds and Coca-Cola bottles, bits of newspaper and fabric, photographs, tires, doors, and windows, all assembled on huge canvases. Somebody mutters, “I don’t get it,” and Ms. Ashdown replies, “Whose fault is that? Yours or the artist’s? I’m willing to entertain either answer, but I want you to actually think before you speak.”

That shuts the mutterer right up. And keeps me from raising my hand and saying that I don’t get it either. How is a tire stuck on a canvas art? What’s beautiful about a stick or a torn piece of newspaper? I’m not an art Neanderthal—we’ve spent the last four weeks on the abstract expressionists and I loved them, especially the ones who weren’t afraid to throw a little color out there—but I don’t know what to think about art that looks like it got pulled from a recycling bin.

So when Ms. Ashdown informs us that, yes, big surprise, we’re starting a unit on collage, I groan a little on the inside. Because I know she’s going to expect us to come up with junkyard projects, Rauschenberg-esque projects. I’m already nostalgic for the days spent in art class splashing paint on the canvas à la Jackson Pollock, fun, frolicsome days, days you could feel creative without going through the Dumpster to collect your materials.

To add insult to injury, two seconds later Chester accidently smacks me in the back of the head as he’s reaching his hand toward Lynnette.

“Wow, man, I’m so sorry,” he yelps, and begins rubbing my head where he’s smacked it. “Total accident.”

Lynnette glares at him. “Quit rubbing her head, moron! She doesn’t want you touching her!”

“It’s okay,” I assure both of them. “Just a little strange. I mean—”

But neither of them is paying attention to me anymore. They’ve already fallen back into Chester ’n’ Lynnette world, apologizing and making lovey-dovey cooing noises at each other.

I glance up at the clock. Three minutes left of class. Not enough time to start stapling shoelaces to a piece of poster board, but plenty of time to finish reading Sarah’s note so that I’ll be fully briefed by the time I see her.

The funny thing is, when I start to read I can’t help but imagining Robert Rauschenberg cutting out words from Sarah’s typewritten pages for a collage: chocolate, elementary, sweet, biodegradable, love.

I suppose I wouldn’t mind making a collage that had a few words in it. Sure, it’s not the same as mounting a stuffed Angora goat’s head on a piece of canvas (which, yes, Robert Rauschenberg did, thank you very much), but at least I won’t be getting any angry phone calls from PETA. I’ll take words over a goat’s head any day.

Which is why I carry the note over to the self-healing mat at the back of the room and use an X-Acto knife to cut each word out in a precise, tiny rectangle. I ask Ms. Ashdown for an envelope and deposit the words inside.

Then I take the picture I drew in algebra of Mr. and Mrs. Pritchard and put that in the envelope too, and I put the envelope in the front pocket of my backpack.

It’s not a collage exactly, but at least it’s something I can live with.