My Ice Cream Looks Abstract And Yours Surreal

I have learned a lot of things today, one of them is, if you eat durian ice cream in the afternoon you would end up burping until late at night with a durian after taste. And the other is, a life in the arts presents huge opportunities for success and even more titanic trip holes for failure.

I was awoken early in the morning by a commotion in our neighbors house. My neighbor was recently discharged from the hospital because of a mild stroke. Apparently sometime between his bath and breakfast he had an accident of some sort or probably just a minor fall. I am the closest thing to a nurse that they could think of so I was summoned to supervise fist aid.

It was a reality check for me, because once there I was completely clueless to what a nurse would actually do. I ended up taking his blood pressure and I slowly made my way out and faded out from the scene.

I went back to my bed and slept on until I was awoken up again by a honk from a sedan. The driver was calling out my name and I was bewildered because I had no idea who would look for me, since I have made myself a vitual recluse these past few weeks.

It was my client who was looking for me and she asked me why I didn't meet up with her at eight in the morning at the designated meeting place. I told her I don't have an idea what she's talking about. She assumed that I probably haven't received her message and told me that she needed my "expetise" on some matter. She then told me that since I am still in my underpants with no shirt on that I should dress up immediately and meet her at some odd place in the city.

"Meet me in Javellana residence in Jaro in one hour, you should know where that is. It's near the Angelicum school", she said.

Oh Angelicum, yes, I know that place.

She was my client to whom I sold some of my paintings recently, a nutritionist from Manhattan who has a taste for expensive abstract expressionist paintings. She's a fifty something and single. It was from her that I learned the term "rogue art peddling".

We had a conversation way back and she related to me a story when she was approached by a struggling Filipino artist who made his way to her New York apartment. She didn't know the guy but he introduced himself as John Santos and he made a painting just for her. She was surprised and though it was a "rogue art peddling" she bought the 4 x 6 ft. sucker out of delicadeza. It cost her some whopping five figures.

After hearing that story, I immersed myself in abstract expressionism and positioned my self as a struggling, starving artist. After a week I had paintings and was ready for some "rogue art peddling". And that's how she became my client.

~~~

In less than an hour, I was already there in Javellana residence drinking juice from fancy glasses with my client, her sister and Doña Maria. The Javellana's are old rich people and the house is full of paintings by the owners children, the floor hardwood and everything spells socialite. I wondered if Doña Maria likes abstract expressionism too.

The whole afternoon was spent hunting for really expensive furniture in the downtown area and there I was strutting beside them offering my "expert" advise on minimal design, what ice cream flavor is best on a hot sunny afternoon, how to make more money from fine art, how not to lose money from fine art and mentioning every now and then how abstract expressionism is the hottest art in these contemporary times and giving a reference to abstract expressionism in almost any topic that they talk about.

They would talk about Junjie Lopez's blue poodle and I would butt in, " oh how abstract expressionist that is". While eating durian ice cream in Crave Misono, I exclaimed with a burp, " this is Abstract Expressionist Josef Alber's favorite ice cream flavor you know?". They would test a sofa and I would say, "this would look good with an abstract expessionist painting, and I have just the right painting for that". I knew by mid afternoon that Abstract Expressionism is finally seeping into their psyche when even the driver would exclaim how cool Jackson Pollock is.

The day went great, though I haven't sold another Abstract Expressionist work. I had an interesting day on what would have been a dismal Monday on an ordinary week, splaterring brutal layers of red paint on an otherwise serene looking canvas and wondering if I could get anywhere painting distorted figures of naked women.