In the summer of 1989, I spent three weeks in the USSR...

In the summer of 1989, I spent three weeks in the USSR as part of a student exchange program. On this trip, I spent a day with a family in Smolensk whose son happened to be my age. He was a self-taught artist and had some pretty cool pieces on display in his family's apartment. He was a perfect match-up for our "Family Day" as I also had a bit of an artistic bent and was preparing to study art in college.

I wouldn't call myself an artist, though. My problem was, I didn't get it. Like, I could make art and see art, but I couldn't dive into it, see through it, past it, appreciate it for much more than its pure aesthetic function of filling up space in a corner or matching a sofa.

Case in point: this kid gives me what I thought was, as he described, a "self portrait" to keep as a gift from him. I thought, oh ok, that's kind of weird and a little narcissistic, but alrighty then, maybe that's all these kids in this crazy Communist country know to do when they have nothing else to share -- maybe they just stare in a mirror and draw themselves on some notebook paper then give that to their visitors as gifts. I mean, I'm a country bumpkin from Alabama, what do I know. So, I never even looked at it long enough to determine how much the drawing may or may not look like him, or try to take away any other merits of the piece. I just said thank you, how nice, oh that's really sweet, I'll treasure it forever.

I placed it in a book when I got back to my hostel, it flew home with me from Moscow to Birmingham a few weeks later, and I stashed it away when I got home. Since then it's always been in the bottom of some folder or box.

Fast-forward 26 years to this past December when Carl and I are preparing to move out of our house, literally going through everything we own, and this falls out of a folder. I look at it for the first time in a couple of decades, now with a more mature set of eyes, and I realize... Holy. Crap. That's not a self-portrait of that kid... apparantly he didn't know what that English term meant. How could I not have seen at the time that this was a drawing he'd made from my passport photo which had been sent to his family in the weeks preceding our visit?

I sat on the floor of my bedroom in Grant Park looking at this in a stupor when it hit me, and I wished somehow I knew how to find this person and share my revelation with him.

Although I don't even remember his name or his family's name, maybe one day I'll find a way to track him down and let him know that I finally get it.