weird.

Last night I was at a friend's house for our weekly meditation group. The half-Canadian that leads the group is leaving next week, and the night proceeded as it often does: hellos, satsang, and meditation.

But this is beside the point.

The point is that after we finished, I walked into the kitchen to set down my empty glass in the sink. I turned around, and that's when I saw it:

the Obama family

On the refrigerator was a picture of the president, the first lady, and their children. I was immediately fascinated, drawn to it, staring at it, and searching the image for what it was that I found so enthralling. I heard myself say:

"It's so weird... It's so weird... It's so weird..."

"Why is it weird?" my friend asked.

I had no answer and kept repeating, savant-like:

"It's so weird... It's so weird... It's so weird..."

One of my favorite experiences in life is when something, wholly and mysteriously, grabs my attention. Most of the time I'm drawn to ideas and images and sounds that already hold some resonance. I think most people are like me in this regard; we gravitate towards the types of experiences that have been shown pleasurable or rewarding in the past.

(Sukha, I think it's called.)

Everyone once in a while, though, I find myself enthralled by something that 'shouldn't' be. Whenever this happens, besides the initial easy pleasure of fascination, there comes a second pleasure – the joy of discovering why I enjoy. This is what I spent the ride home doing with my yin. The rant went, approximately, as follows:

The picture caught my attention because it embodies this bizarre mixing of the public and private realms, the intimate and the impersonal, the authentic and the contrived. Apparently my friend received it in a campaign email, and had she not posted it on her refrigerator, I would have never realized the complex set of relationships being embodied by the image.

The kitchen – and especially the refrigerator – stands at the heart of the private sphere. It is both the source of the family's sustenance as well as the gallery where finger-painting and school pictures and crudely drawn "I love mommy and daddy" cards are displayed. These are the most intimate and personal creations of our lives, the artifacts and art objects we surround ourselves with.

The Presidency, of course, has long been this strange mingling of personal and private, best exemplified by the bizarre status of the First Lady, who is either appointed to her post by her husband or indirectly elected by citizens depending on one's point-of-view. (I'm sure one of my civic-minded friends will clear this confusion up for me.)

This picture seemed different, however, and it took nearly twenty minutes for me to articulate it to myself. The staging of the photograph has the feel of a Christmas card – performative and sincere, saccharin and sweet, banal and unique. My yin asked how it was any different than having a picture of a rock star:

Andy Warhol

or movie star:

understood

or spirit star:

the nature of the image.

This image is different because it deploys the family in disturbingly novel and impersonal way, calling upon the aesthetics and sensibilities of the familial familiar (the Christmas photo sent to friends and loved ones) as a means to achieving the most impersonal and public of ends (Obama's upcoming re-election campaign).

A picture of the Obama family is not like a picture of Obama, or even a picture of Obama and his wife. The President and First Lady are public figures, first and foremost, whereas the family is held sacrosanct by the same mythologies and mythologizers who spin deficient libidos and surplus economies into the web we call the American Dream.

All this in a single image, and I would have never even realized it if not for my friend and her beautiful refrigerator...

Does the photograph look any different now?