Daring the Gods: The Chihuly Exhibit

Our friends Kitty and Sheldon were down for Columbus day weekend and since St. Petersburg is the more cultured city, we decided to take them down to the Chihuly and Dali for a museum day.  Of course we took Coach with us.  What?!!  A museum filled with glass and one filled with priceless art?  Are you nuts?

Well, you read the blog!  Don't you have the answer to that already?

Now, Coach has now developed into a 10 am pooper, so when we got down to St. Pete about 10:30 and there had been no poop, I was a bit concerned. I sent Fred, Sheldon and Kitty on to the Chihuly to get tickets while I walked the boy to see if he would give it up.

Now, sometimes I like to think of myself (egotistically, I know) as the poo whisperer, as there have been some moments when I feel that I can sense that Coach has to go (Tim's office poo notwithstanding).  I proved this on a dinner trip to Chili's one day.  Michele, Coach and I were on our way in when there was something about his walk that just bothered me.  

"Give me a couple of minutes.  I think he needs to poo." I took him over to a grassy spot and sure enough, he twirled and pooed. "Ha!" I thought.  "I AM the poo whisperer!"

But here we were in St. Pete far away from Chili's and after the infamous Tim's office poo.  My confidence was shaken.  Did I still have what it took?  Would he poo?  We walked over to the grass and I did my little lullaby of poo commands.  Holey guacamole, batman, we have poo!  Now we could go into the Chihuly museum and not fear leaving a deposit on the floor of any kind.

I could feel that little fear drifting out of my body.  Then we started our walk up to the museum.  And it hit me.

Did you know that the Chihuly museum is a museum of glass?  Well, actually, it is a museum that houses glass art.  Not an actual museum made of glass.  But, regardless, the museum is filled with glass.  Very, very expensive glass.  I saw the big glass sculpture outside the building.

"Crapola." Glass sculpture.  I looked down at Coach.  He was so docile.  He plodded along like a good boy.  I sighed.  Can't back out now.  I went up to the door and told Coach to sit.  Then we went inside.

I have to give props to the museum people.  They said not one word to us about bringing Coach to the museum.  They didn't even give us a strange look.  And if in their heads they were thinking, "OMG!!!" You couldn't tell from their faces.

The man took our tickets and this wizened older lady peeled off his side and started to follow us.  At first I thought she was just some stranger, but it was clear that we had been assigned a docent.  A docent who hated the idea of service animals.

"Is he unhappy?" She stood close and peered down at Coach as I sat on the bench and stared at the boat filled with glass floats.  (As you might imagine, I sat a lot and had Coach do the same!)

Startled, I looked up at her.  "No. He's a happy dog." Then I realized she was one of those people, the people who object to service dogs because they think their lives are so tragic and they never have any fun.  By this time, Fred had come up and was listening and he jumped in.

Fred took over and explained how Coach gets to play at home.  How he has lots of time to be off leash and have fun.  But he also gets to be with us all day.  What other dog gets to do that?  He's always with his person.  That's where he wants to be.  That's what makes him happy.

"Hmmmm."  She shook her head and pursed her lips and wandered over to Sheldon, who had become the only person in our group who would talk to her.

I looked at Kitty and Kitty shook her head.

In the Chihuly there is a glass hallway that you walk through to get to the other room and the ceiling is covered with glass.  You have to look up to see it, but it shouldn't be a big deal.  When I was coming into the boat room with Coach, I looked down the towards the glass hallway and there was a couple in it.  The woman had fallen and her husband was trying to pull her up.  I couldn't tell if she had just been overwhelmed by the glass and fainted or if she had looked up too much and lost her balance and fallen back or if perhaps she was just tired and resting on the floor.  I think perhaps she had lost her balance.

I was a bit nervous going towards the hallway as I had Coach and I wanted to look up, but I wasn't sure I should.  After all, a grown woman had just fallen down!  What if I fell too?  How many people fall in this place?  Is this something that happens all the time?  Should they put up a warning sign?  Don't look up too much?  Only tilt your head at a 30 degree angle or you will stop the blood flow and you will fall down?  Seriously! This could be a major health concern.

Where was that old lady docent? Was she looking up?  If she was looking up, surely I could look up.  No.  I was all alone.  They were all back looking at the chandeliers.  Fine.  I'll do it myself.

Coach  is lying down on the tiles while Kitty, Sheldon and I smile up and Fred.  You can see a piece of Chihuly in the background behind Kitty.

I didn't fall.  I also didn't really look up.  Turns out there is a glass angel up there somewhere.  The old lady docent told Sheldon about it.  He looked up and saw it.

We made it through without Coach knocking anything over or breaking anything.  Nor did I fall or trip or run into something.  Maybe next time I will look up.