Jonathan C. Lewis
Author and Artist
Subversive Art in Davis
A fictional travelogue; four minutes to read.
Dear Travel Journal,
This afternoon I had the kind of conversation with a random stranger that defines the best of public transit. When traveling by train, I’m an old hand at random. As the scenery glides by, I like having chance conversations. Multi-tasking for a traveler.
The Amtrak Capitol Corridor train from Oakland to Davis, California, takes about 90 minutes. Enough time for a nap, a magazine read, a conversation, but not all three.
He boarded the train at Berkeley, shoved his backpack into the overhead rack, and plopped down next to me. From his dusty, well-worn boots, I guessed a college student on a budget headed back to the University of California, Davis, after a weekend partying with friends in Berkeley.
As if to explain why he chose to sit next to me, he mumbled his name. Sam, he said.
As the Suisun wetlands came into view, he wanted to talk. The steely clickety-clack of the train’s wheels created an aura of confidentiality, as if no one but me could hear him.
A sophomore, nineteen years old, Sam was agitated about the impending declaration of his undergraduate major. The pressure to make an adult decision, to lock in his future career, made his head feel as if a hatchet had cleaved it—his words.
First in his family to attend college, he feared disappointing everyone he loved. His parent’s wishes, repeatedly voiced at family gatherings, were for crime-fighting. Maybe an FBI agent chasing white supremacists. Or a CIA lawyer briefing Congress about protecting sources and methods. Something honorable, profitable, understandable to their blue-collar friends. Nothing weird or flaky.
Echoing words rehearsed for him by stoic male movie heroes, he added that he wasn’t feeling sorry for himself. Half-smiling, he said he was too numb for that.
He told me about the tree-shaded paths along the university’s 100-acre teaching arboretum. Exotic plants, blooming bushes, fragrant flowers, ducks, bunnies, squirrels, birds. A place where a city-born student could chill out. Or procrastinate a life-defining decision.
One day outside the campus library, funk artist Robert Arneson’s mirthful, mocking egghead sculptures seemed to ask Sam, Why are you here? Inside the library, artworks by Roy De Forest, David Hollowell, George Longfish, Tony Natsoulas and Peter VandenBerge, like spymasters recruiting a prospective double agent, dangled the artist’s life in front of him.
Before long—without telling his parents and without any real idea what to expect—he was enrolled in art history classes. Then came his first class about putting paint to canvas.
Like a blind man asked to choose between blondes or brunettes, he had no idea how to decide. His fingernails, chewed to the quick, played with the clasp on his faded jacket.
As Amtrak came to a halt at the Davis Spanish Revival train station, Sam busied himself with his backpack. His non-stop monologue interrupted, a cursory good-bye was all that was left in him.
With more time to talk, I would have mentioned that, like great art, the purpose of a great education is to create choices. To subvert us with new opportunities.
I would have invited myself to Sam’s first art exhibition.
