A Day in the Life of an Art Museum Phone Operator, in Haiku -The Toast

Are you real? Well, yes.

Is it raining outside now?

…I’m in a basement.

The Dali show, from

seven years ago, I missed.

Can I still go now?

Who replaces your

American flags? May I

speak with them? URGENT.

We close at five. If

I arrive at five, when would

I need to leave? Five.

I found a Miro

in my attic. Can you buy

it? Not at all fake.

Picasso found in

gated community yard.

Definitely real.

Dental assistant

calls about tooth art that should

be in the museum.

I want to bring my

mini horse to the museum.

That should be fine, right?

Son in college has

assignment. Needs hand holding.

You should do his work.

A show, forty years

ago. Transfer me to the

curator please. Now.

Who were the very

first donors? The more recent

ones get their credit.

Why are there stairs? I

don’t like that you’re on a hill.

You should be lower.

The museum is not

free. This upsets you greatly.

And it’s my fault.

The prices are too

high. I’m not buying tickets,

just thought you should know.

There was a Rodin

at another museum.

So what was its name?

Can you tell me where

the skate park is? What do you

mean, you don’t know? Why?

Other museums have

a different parking system,

and this upsets me.

Our hours are ten to

five. Every day. No matter

how often you ask.

Do you guys have the

dinosaurs? You should, they’re much

better than paintings.

Maia Brown-Jackson is a recovering English major working at an arts organization. While drinking too much coffee and eating too much sugar, she’s writing like a madwoman and learning Twitter and Tumblr.

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+48 Vote up Vote down

yejmeister 113p · 503 weeks ago

That dentist's tooth art should be at least as good as these.
At least.

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10 replies · active 503 weeks ago

+13 Vote up Vote down

floridagal1 102p · 503 weeks ago

The tooth art is terrifying. On not liking that the museum is on a hill: During Fair St. Louis this summer I tried to go to the art museum (mistake #1, the roads were half blocked off) and ended up walking from Forsyth to the museum. Art Hill at the end almost did me in. So caller who hates hills, I feel you!

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+54 Vote up Vote down

literarysara 119p · 503 weeks ago

This delights me to no end. I was an art museum operator five years ago and these were all as perfectly and utterly true then as now!

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5 replies · active 503 weeks ago

+79 Vote up Vote down

SmrtCookie 122p · 503 weeks ago

Why wouldn't it be fine to take Lil' Sebastian to an art museum?? It's because he would upstage the art, isn't it?

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3 replies · active 503 weeks ago

+63 Vote up Vote down

irishbreakfasttime 128p · 503 weeks ago

oh these are perfect.

I am calling from
The line for tickets upstairs.
Make it go faster.

Parking costs too much
We are located downtown.
How inconvenient.

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6 replies · active 503 weeks ago

+20 Vote up Vote down

JPaper · 503 weeks ago

"What is there for kids?"
"What are they interested in?"
"Er... everything?" *shrug*

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+21 Vote up Vote down

JPaper · 503 weeks ago

"Oh, you're free? That's great!
No, I won't buy a guidebook
Or donate to you."

"I'd like tickets for
The Cheapside Hoard, please. WHAT D'YOU
MEAN, TWO YEARS AGO?!"

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1 reply · active 503 weeks ago

+25 Vote up Vote down

betsymore 124p · 503 weeks ago

These are glorious.

The department where I used to teach invited advisors to submit thesis-related haiku about a week before senior theses were due every year. I feel like they would have found an appreciative audience at the Toast.

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+27 Vote up Vote down

RuncibleSpoon 107p · 503 weeks ago

all of these are deeply and beautifully true. especially the willful disbelief about the firmness of set and stated closing times.

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+24 Vote up Vote down

jennycieplak 120p · 503 weeks ago

I would read, like, 1 million of these, so if there are any other museum operators who would like to post, please feel free.

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+40 Vote up Vote down

ebarrale 110p · 503 weeks ago

I live in Malvern,
can you give me directions
from my home address?

Museum life is real.

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+18 Vote up Vote down

sausagedog 127p · 503 weeks ago

This is amazing. Just a handful of syllables for a remarkably thorough picture of what the job was like.

I'm so curious about the college student's assignment. What entitlement... and what help were they thinking they could get over the phone? That you would dictate a flawless essay for them?

My heart goes out to the people calling for a piece of art barely remembered, though--it's like when you'd hear a song on the radio in the days before Shazam & try desperately to place it later on, only harder because it's visual and often unreproducible. Not that they should put a poor phone operator on the spot, but I understand the emotion there.

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1 reply · active 503 weeks ago

+26 Vote up Vote down

acerulean · 503 weeks ago

This is incredible. And so much more accurate than anyone who has not answered the phone at an art museum will ever, ever know.

One woman called me at an NYC museum job asking what I could tell her about "those trees in Central Park," because they are, "SO big! They're big, right?"

No, ma'am- we, an arts institution, do not have much to say about those very big trees.

Also, NO you cannot leave your 6 suitcases here and then go to the museum next door.

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+79 Vote up Vote down

irishbreakfasttime 128p · 503 weeks ago

What age for child price?
What if my husband ACTS twelve?
An original joke.

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6 replies · active 503 weeks ago

+14 Vote up Vote down

bookwormV 119p · 503 weeks ago

Library questions aren't quite this bad, but I do get an awful lot of people (in academic/law libraries, where people can be reasonably expected to have used a library before) who apparently don't know how to look things up on an online catalogue.

(Also, hi, picture of Buffy from Becoming! My favourite.)

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+94 Vote up Vote down

leider_hosen 105p · 503 weeks ago

I cannot sell you
alcohol. It's a state park.
Here's a candy bar.

The platform is three
hundred yards away. You may
not drive. No road. Walk.

Cash only. We do
not take credit cards. We do
not take credit cards.

Elevator? No.
This is a trail for hiking.
Your car will not fit.

You don't want to see
a bear. I promise. You will
lose your shit. It's big.

(I worked at a state park.)

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+22 Vote up Vote down

louisagiffard 108p · 503 weeks ago

Horrifyingly accurate, although as I was front desk staff, I got many of these in person.

"Can I use my member
ship from unrelated
museum here? No."

(It was always like "I should get a member's price for this membership to the Detroit Space Museum!" (I live in Australia, and I worked at an art gallery.)

"This is the last week
You will have to queue up here
Yes, it's crowded"

These are terrible haikus.
I also got plenty of people very upset that they didn't get to go on a free guided tour, because they didn't turn up in time to obtain a place and there were limited numbers.

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2 replies · active 503 weeks ago

+14 Vote up Vote down

tabwootwo 91p · 503 weeks ago

What problem is it
this call, I wonder, is it
a personal one?

But I have renewed
But you sent a reminder
But I have renewed

Thank you for this, Maia! I am thoroughly and completely in the employ of a Museum and this is all so real. I interviewed today for a promotion for a position where I won't just be "the live human"- ::shudder::

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3 replies · active 503 weeks ago

+38 Vote up Vote down

jmstevenson76 111p · 503 weeks ago

I work in a museum basement. This year, they added a camera with a semi-live feed of the outdoors. It's nice.

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+10 Vote up Vote down

cleoreads 105p · 503 weeks ago

Oh man, I'm afraid I've been one of those callers. (I'm so sorry).

What do you mean the policy has changed?
Teachers used to get in free.
No, I don't want to buy a membership.

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+42 Vote up Vote down

tabwootwo 91p · 503 weeks ago

UPDATE: I GOT THE PROMOTION AND THIS ARTICLE WAS ACTUAL MAGIC!

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6 replies · active 503 weeks ago

+19 Vote up Vote down

Penguinetta 72p · 503 weeks ago

The one about dinosaurs is correct, though, c'mon now.

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1 reply · active 503 weeks ago

+10 Vote up Vote down

keristars 105p · 503 weeks ago

This is 5000% accurate and it's the worst and the number of times a week I get people wanting to show me their amateur pencil drawings to hang on the walls or verify that some giclee print is a masterpiece original uggggghhhh

(also the people who try to google us and get really confused when they visit and we're not one of a dozen museums with a similar acronym, or are not showing the same exhibition as one of those. what do you mean all the Museums of Modern Art and Museums of Fine Art and so on aren't the same thing??? they have the same name!!! just like McDonald's and Barnes & Noble etc.)

THAT SAID I love my job at the front desk and wouldn't give it up for the world. (okay, maybe it's just THIS PARTICULAR museum that i love so much, but i actually had an opportunity recently to move to a different position with better pay, etc. but ultimately declined to pursue it because most of the things I love about my job are tied to being the primary guest relations person.)

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+26 Vote up Vote down

canoekanoe · 503 weeks ago

I answer phones at a book publisher. I want to play!

Do you have the book
I saw yesterday at school?
The blue one? It's blue.

Where are you? Can I
come visit? Because I want
to buy books. Why not?

Who operates your
press machine thing? What
do you mean, no one?

I sent a book back
to you twenty years ago.
Give it back now, please.

I am important.
I wrote a book. No, not a
published one! Free stuff?

Free stuff? Free stuff? Free
stuff? Free stuff? Free stuff? Free stuff?
Free stuff? Free stuff? Free

I don't understand
why you sell books on the web.
Why don't you hate cash?

I am a student.
Help me write my essay, please.
No, I got it used.

It's blue. I think it's
about birds? Maybe? Oh, you're
not Oxford? Who's this?

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+15 Vote up Vote down

bethcorriveau 130p · 503 weeks ago

I saw this art here
thirty years ago; it is
not where it was. Where is it?

Where are your bathrooms?
They are hard to find, and there
Are no signs pointing the way.

Impressionism is
The only art anyone
Ever asks to see.

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+6 Vote up Vote down

Karen · 503 weeks ago

I missed the tour of
impressionism. Will they
hang them back up soon?

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+7 Vote up Vote down

keristars 105p · 503 weeks ago

Sign: Free After 6
It is 11 a.m.
Do I HAVE to pay?

Please direct me to
local art studios. What?
No Drop-in visits?!
(implied: "They should be grateful that I want to see their work" and "the artists should be available at ALL times")

It's your lucky day!
I have some art to donate
if you pay for it

I keep stumbling across more and more things today that mostly just make me roll my eyes and patiently explain, again, that no, things don't quite work that way... (pretty glad I the good interactions outweigh the repetitious or annoying ones!)

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+8 Vote up Vote down

theowlofderision 103p · 503 weeks ago

Ahhh, curator here, and I FEEL you. Our switchboard regularly routes things through to the wrong extension - and the volunteers working the entrance desk often get pressured by visitors into calling a curator to pose a question or insist on having their artwork (which they just happen to have on their person) appraised.

Sample call from earlier this week:

"Can I make an appointment to see the Bayeux Tapestry?"

"No, sir, the Bayeux Tapestry is not in this museum." (IT IS IN FRANCE).

"A label in gallery X says that you have the Bayeux Tapestry."

*I think for a bit and suddenly realise what he's talking about*

"Sir, the label refers to a 19th century photographic copy of the tapestry."

"Well why isn't it on display?"

"Because it doesn't fit with our current gallery plans or the stories we are trying to tell in them."

"You should have it on display. It's really important. It's HISTORY."

"It is also too fragile to display and would disintegrate under light."

"Oh. Thank you for your time."

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+2 Vote up Vote down

ranaseo23 72p · 495 weeks ago

all of these are deeply and beautifully true. especially the willful disbelief about the firmness of set and stated closing times..To Know More Visit Us Joy Card BD

A Day in the Life of an Art Museum Phone Operator, in Haiku

ByMaia Brown-Jackson

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