For our first Christmas together my boyfriend had a print by my then favorite artist framed. The print, Piano Man II, by Justin Bua depicts an elegant musician smoking a cigarette and playing the piano. With its cool urban vibe, long lean lines, and dark, seductive colors, something about the artwork spoke to me. I can remember hanging it in the bedroom of our apartment and thinking of how it would be the first of many…that one day, I would fill my home with other pieces by Bua, or artists like him. I’d set up a music room with instruments too expensive to touch and couches too pristine to sit on. For nearly 10 years that print hung on the walls of whatever place I called home, and for those years, the girl who had first fallen in love with it believed she’d always feel the same.
But much like relationships, not all artwork stands the test of time. When the day came for Piano Man to move on with me after my marriage ended, I couldn’t put him back up on the wall he had called home for years. I looked into his face, and touched the tips of his extended fingers, and I couldn’t quite remember what I had seen in him.
I couldn’t picture the future I had envisioned for nearly a decade. 31 year old me couldn’t look upon him with 21 year old eyes, no matter how desperately I tried. In the 10 years he had been proudly displayed, he hadn’t changed, but I certainly had. I was no longer that girl who believed happiness could be earned with a paycheque.
So, these days I choose to fill my home with photos I’ve taken…the places I’ve been and the faces I love most. A true reflection of what has made me who I am, rather than someone I’m striving to one day be.
The Zuf Truth 