Arriving home from a genuinely miserable month in frigid England, I was looking forward to the joyful, warm embrace of spring in Murphy. Not so fast.
Despite a flight half way around the globe – winter’s tentacles still wrapped my throat in their icy clutch – all because some wretched groundhog failed to throw a bit of shade. Cheers.
So, I confess to being somewhat out of sorts as I stepped out into the frost-latticed gloom of our North Carolina mountaintop, trussed up like an overdressed, frozen turkey. Thankfully, my mood was about to thaw as I entered the doors of the Murphy Art Center to find spring had actually sprung – in there at least.
In my absence, the dream team of Kelly Kennon and her miracle elves had been hard at work reorganizing the gorgeous art works to recreate a whole new gallery experience. By the way, no one really knows how or when they actually manage this seamless transition, with virtually no disruption to the day-to-day bustle of a busy gallery.
Gorgeous new spring exhibits flaunt glowing daffodil and tulip paintings, whimsical fairies and luminous butterfly photographs. Kelly has also curated an exciting crop of work from our newest artists, from furniture and miniature painters to spectacularly talented nature photographers.
I watched as customers, stumbling inside to escape the freezing temperatures, visibly melted into a warm puddle of smiling, awestruck admirers. They gawked lovingly and lingered in the fleeting premonition of warmer days yet to come.
The last time I wrote about this beautiful gallery, I had been visited from England by my 85-year-old dad who gamely helped with the gargantuan task of preparing for the grand opening at Halloween last year. This last, recent trip home was to say my last goodbye as this lovely man was suddenly overtaken by a swift and unforgiving fatal illness. When told the news, he said with a twinkle in his eye: “The party’s over. I’ve had the best life, the best family, the best friends, the best wife. No regrets.”
In October, he helped me paint a white picket fence at the MAC and – despite my protests for him to sit down and rest – I’d found him crouched beneath the urinal in the men’s bathroom studiously removing masking tape from the newly painted fixture.
Standing in the gallery now, I smiled as I recalled his ever present Liverpudlian humor: “What did you do on your holiday in the States, Harry? Ripped tape from a brick, bog house!” he quipped. He loved the gallery.
Having surveyed the lovely new exhibits, I visited the ladies room on the purportedly haunted upper floor. It was then that I heard a strange, scratching sound from the men’s room next door. (The scene of my dad’s lavatorial escapade.) The place seemed deserted, so with trepidation, I tapped on the door and hesitantly peeked inside. No one.
Feeling a tad shaky, I made for the stairs, passing by the ominous Halloween ghoul, still hunched by the upstairs window. As I scampered down, with some unseemly haste, I was relieved to see a workman in overalls on his way up.
It was a full two seconds too late before I registered the pair of laughing, Irish, blue eyes that had passed me by. By the time I’d spun around, he was gone. Vanished into thin air on the dark staircase.
“Spring will come and so will happiness. Hold on. Life will get warmer” –
Anita Krizzan.
Nite nite, dad, sleep tight.
The writer is a resident of Cherokee County.