Good Morning, Hank, it’s Tuesday.

So, right now I’m staying about half the time at an Airbnb in Cincinnati Ohio because that’s where they’re filming the Turtles All the Way Down movie and when I moved into this Airbnb I brought some art with me so that I wouldn’t feel so lonely looking at the walls. Like, I brought this print I like and this Candide poster And also this painting that Sarah made in college, which I really love. It always reminds me of this line in Watership Down where one of the rabbits says, I don’t like straight lines, men make them.

I wanted to have the painting with me partly because it just makes me happy to look at, but also partly because it reminds me that even the human hand actually can’t make a straight line, at least like, without the help of a ruler because our bodies are wondrously imprecise.

But anyway, we’re not here to talk about art I like. We’re here to talk about the art that came with my Airbnb. Like there’s put queso in your face-o, which you know, isn’t to my taste, but I can appreciate it. Then there’s this painting, which is fine, but it does kind of seem like it was made by a machine. A hypothesis that is confirmed when you look up at the loft and you see the exact same painting, just turned on its side.

But then Hank, then, when you go to the bathroom, behind the toilet, you will find a canvas printed with the word wanderlust and its definition. I have at least five questions. First, and I’m gonna try to say this delicately, this Airbnb is in Cincinnati, which is a lovely town, and I love being there, but when one thinks of wanderlust, does one think of Cincinnati.

Don’t get me wrong, I live in Indianapolis, a town famous for its lack of wanderlustyness. I just think maybe the wanderlust canvas plays in Southern France, but does it play in Southern Ohio?

Secondly, I know it’s hard to find artwork for a bathroom, they are messy places, the humidity changes, there are showers, et cetera, but why in God's name did you choose a canvas. It's already damaged and it doesn’t look particularly old. Someday Baumgartner Restoration is gonna have his hands full with this one.

Thirdly, when a work of art is nothing but a word and its definition printed on its canvas, you need to nail the execution, so here is my question: why is it not centered top to bottom or left to right. Now during the long and lonely times I’ve spent with this artwork, I’ve often wondered if perhaps someone intentionally uncentered it to give it a slight dissonance, an asymmetry, a feeling that something might be rotten in the state of wanderlust. But actually I think it's just off-center. That said, authorial intent doesn’t matter, and upon reflection in my favorite thing about this artwork by a pretty wide margin is that it’s off-centered.

Fourthly, I understand you have a limited art budget for your Airbnb. I get that. But after intensive googling, I know how much you paid for the wanderlust canvas, and what I’m wondering is why didn’t you buy this for three dollars less? Or just find an old picture of Cincinnati and print it out, and put it in a six-dollar frame. I mean this is so much better than wanderlust. I mean a free wiener wurst with each drink? What a bargain.

Lastly, did you know, that in Cincinnati, there is an art school. It’s true! And there are lots of artists making interesting, inexpensive work that you can buy at local art shows. Which is my actual advice, not just to the owner of this Airbnb, but also to anyone living with undecorated walls, put something on them, and not just anything. Something semi-particular to you.

Go to student art shows at local universities. Browse Etsy, support artists. And in the process, you'll get to find out that when you live with an artwork for years, looking at it with ever-changing eyes, you get to experience something even deeper and more lovely than wanderlust.

Hank, I’ll see you on Friday