Tasha Does Tulsa.

Last week, when my son and I found ourselves with some time to kill, we decided to stop by Philbrook Museum.

Little did I know that this visit to our hometown museum would change breakfast forever.

I wanted to visit because I knew time is running out on the To Live Forever: Egyptian Treasures exhibit, at Philbrook until Sept. 12.

I love Egyptian stuff. I’ve seen all the National Geographic movies about Egypt this and Egypt that. But it was time, I decided, to see some of that ancient action in real life.

So, we did. The first thing we saw upon stepping into the exhibit was a sarcophagus (which is larger than you think, by the way):

Me: Hey, son? What’s that? *I point to the sarcophagus*
Son: A guy.
Me: A guy?
Son: A guy! With a nose on his face.
Me: *blink blink*
Son: Look over there! A cat!

My son loves cats. Coincidentally, so did the ancient Egyptians. Cats are a recurring theme in the exhibit at Philbrook, which greatly pleased my two-year-old, cat-deprived little man.

Until he realized he couldn’t pet any of the cats in the exhibit. That he couldn’t touch anything at all, actually. Then he kinda flipped out.

Then I dropped my exhibit guide.

Then my phone rang.

Then a pair of Philbrook employees gave me the stink eye, which I deserved. I was supposed to have turned off my phone before entering the exhibit.

They started toward us.

Then I got sweaty. I suddenly felt like we were in the Matrix.

I managed to reach my back pocket to hit the ignore button, hold tightly to a seriously wriggly and pissed off child, dissuade the Philbrook agents and escape the exhibit, all while bent over backwards at the knees like a badass.

I am the Neo of that place now.

Then, we saw a cat outside. And despite my hypochondria and intense fear of ringworm, I let my son pet it.

Nice of me, huh?

Not all stray cats have ringworm, as was previously assumed.

Then we discovered this.

It’s a piece called Oklahoma Autumn. The artist is Eric Baker.

If I could design my dreams, this is how they would look.

Wow.

We wandered inside to eventually stumble upon this:

And by “this,” I mean this:

I wrote here about our family trip to Philbrook last winter. During that trip my son became very concerned about the well-being of this piece. The reason why is that, first of all, it doesn’t exactly have its smiley face on.

It cries. Or whines, rather. And mumbles to itself. It frets. And its eyes move independently, which is something I’ve always wanted to be able to do, actually.

Last time we visited Philbrook, this was called, in our little circle, The Piece Without a Name. We didn’t know what it was, and though we adults were intrigued by it, we knew it upset our son. Not in a been-on-the-phone-with-you-cable-TV-jerks-for-forty-five-minutes-only-to-be-disconnected sort of way.

More like in a why-is-fishy-swimming-upside-down-daddy sort of way.

So, we left the modern art gallery and never looked back. That was, until last week.

My son has aged nearly a year since that family trip to Philbrook. Here’s how his experience of this piece of art had changed:

-The piece now has a name. It is – wait for it – Donut. I mean, I guess I can kinda see it – can you?
-Kiddo is still very concerned about Donut’s psychological health.
-My son: “Donut, what’s wrong? Mommy, what’s wrong with Donut? Why is Donut crying? Donut is sad.”
-Intermittently throughout the rest of our visit, my son asks about Donut: “Is Donut okay? Go see Donut? Go see Donut now?”
-I was forced under threat of Meltdown in a Very Quiet, Echo-y Place to “go see Donut right naaaoooow” three – three – more times.
-The first thing out of my son’s mouth at the conclusion of our visit and as I put the key in the car ignition: “Go see Donut… naaaoooow?”
-The first thing out of my son’s mouth as his father came through the door of our humble abode: “What’s wrong with Donut? Go see Donut right now?”
-The first thing out of my husband’s mouth at hearing this: “Did you guys have donuts without me?”
-The first thing out of my son’s mouth upon waking the next morning: “Go see Donut now?”

Thank goodness I have photos of this piece that I can pull up on this here com-puter at any time of the night or day. Otherwise, I’d need to find another freelance job just to pay for the gas we’d use driving back and forth to Philbrook 27 times a day to check on a piece of art created by someone whom, in my imagination, couldn’t have possibly anticipated this particular response to this piece from a museum-goer.

One thing’s for sure: I’ll never be able to look at a donut straight faced again.

Modern Art at Philbrook photo by indrasarrow on Flickr.

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