Latest / Heavyweight / #54 Victor and Maite

Transcript

#54 Victor and Maite · Heavyweight

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Jackie. I can't. I can't hear you. Where are you.
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: I'm at the beach.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: You're at the beach. Are you wearing plenty of ointment?
• 0:15
  Speaker 3: How are you?
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: I'm good. I had a medical question for you. Our
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: audy belly buttons prefer to innis because they need less
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: upkeep okay, As I was talking to my dentist, and
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: when I pushed him on it, he says that, yes,
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: what I know.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: What shark?
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Oh my god, I'm gonna tell your picture. Baby shark.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Do do do do do do? Baby shark? Do do
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: do do do? Baby shark?
• 0:49
  Speaker 4: Do do do do? Do do do?
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: I'm Jonathan Goldstein and this is heavyweight. Today's episode Victor
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: and Mita right after the break. Depending on how you
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: look at it, the story of Victor in Mitay is
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: either a love story for the ages or not a
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: love story at all. Since first meeting Victor, I've been
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: trying to decide which it is.
• 1:31
  Speaker 5: When she gets into a room, it's like the sun enters,
• 1:35
  Speaker 5: you know, everything is nice and warm.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: Victor is a painter living in New York, and he's
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: describing Mighty, the woman who first stole his heart thirty
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: five years ago.
• 1:46
  Speaker 5: The truth is, every time I see her, it's the
• 1:50
  Speaker 5: most beautiful that I have seen her in my life.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: Victor paints huge, spectacular canvases. There are common motifs like
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: rotary phones, skulls, butterflies. But the thing that nearly every
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: painting has in common, the thing Victor can't stop painting,
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: is Mita. They first met at a party back home
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: in Mexico thirty five years ago. Mita was eighteen and
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: Victor was nineteen. All these years later and no detail
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: has been forgotten.
• 2:24
  Speaker 5: She was wearing a white lace suit which was from
• 2:30
  Speaker 5: her mother's, like a seventies thing from her mother.
• 2:33
  Speaker 4: How can you forget that?
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Victor, shy by nature, said nothing to Mite at the party,
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: But a couple months later he ran into her at
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: the university they both attended.
• 2:45
  Speaker 5: And I asked her if she could model, and she
• 2:49
  Speaker 5: said yes, And that's how everything started.
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: He almost did not even talk that day is my day.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: He just said, please sit here, and then he started painting.
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: The whole studio smelled of paint, of oil. I was
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: so nervous that I could barely think. My hands were shaking,
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: and I brought a book. I think it was crime
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: and punishment, and I was pretending that I was reading,
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: but I could not focus on the reading at all.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: Victor already knew he was going to be an artist,
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: and it even begun to show his work in galleries.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: His drive made him seem older than his nineteen years.
• 3:38
  Speaker 4: I was still.
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: I felt that I was in the head and the
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: body of a child. And here's this guy who was enormous,
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: enormous in what he wasn't believed and knew. I barely
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: knew anything.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: Sitting there, holding still pretending to Dosteyevski, mighty was falling
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: in love. After several hours, Victor stopped painting. He thanked Mite,
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: told her she could go, but before she left, he
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: showed her the canvas he'd been working on. As Mite recalls,
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: he was almost blank, and.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: I was surprised that there was not much on it,
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: except for traces or something, but not as I had imagined.
• 4:30
  Speaker 5: I was to overwhelmed that this completely out of my league,
• 4:34
  Speaker 5: beautiful popular girl came.
• 4:38
  Speaker 4: I couldn't do anything. Was just like.
• 4:43
  Speaker 5: But in the days after, I made from memory thirty
• 4:48
  Speaker 5: five paintings.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: After that first meeting, the two started. A couple years later,
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: they married and moved to New York, where they had
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: a daughter. Victor found success in New York. He was
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: discovered by a famous art dealer and began showing in Europe,
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: South America, and Asia. He sold enough paintings to support
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: his family, but as time went on, his relationship with
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: my Day began to deteriorate.
• 5:21
  Speaker 5: My nature is very depressive and more introspective and isolated,
• 5:27
  Speaker 5: so I never want to do anything, never want to
• 5:30
  Speaker 5: go to a picnic or hang with friends, or go
• 5:33
  Speaker 5: to roller skating Central Park, that kind of thing.
• 5:37
  Speaker 4: I couldn't And she was the opposite, you know. She
• 5:41
  Speaker 4: was like, let's do everything, Let's go out.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: He was not very fond of me going out with friends,
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: but he didn't want to go out with friends either,
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: and that, you know, that was like a pain in
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: the ass. And I think maybe he was always possessive.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: It's just that as we were growing older it felt
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: more intense.
• 6:04
  Speaker 5: Everyone falls in love with her, men and women. Everyone.
• 6:10
  Speaker 5: It's impossible not to. She's that kind of person. And
• 6:14
  Speaker 5: I mean, I dealt with that for eleven years. Then
• 6:17
  Speaker 5: I had to had to divorce.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: In two thousand and three, Victor and miighty mutually decided
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: that it was in their best interests to go their
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: separate ways. But here's the thing, even now, twenty years
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: after their divorce, Mighty is still the face of his work.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: The hands, the neck, the lips. Scrolling through his portfolio.
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: It's image after image of Mighty might a reading, Mighty, drinking,
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: Mighty talking on the phone. How many paintings would you
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: say you have of her?
• 6:57
  Speaker 4: I'd made more than four thousand.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: Probably was there for a point after you guys had
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: broken up, for you made an effort to stop painting her.
• 7:13
  Speaker 4: Yes, of course.
• 7:15
  Speaker 5: When I've had girlfriends, the question always comes, are you
• 7:20
  Speaker 5: planning to paint her forever?
• 7:23
  Speaker 4: You know?
• 7:24
  Speaker 5: And my answer is if you have a better idea,
• 7:29
  Speaker 5: give me a better idea, and I might change it.
• 7:31
  Speaker 4: That's my answer.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: And that's the only answer Victor offers, which makes me
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: feel like a kid who won't stop asking. But why,
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: but why why his ex wife? Why might?
• 7:46
  Speaker 5: I don't really know, But I've done experiments. I've had
• 7:49
  Speaker 5: other models, professional models I hire, and the result is
• 7:55
  Speaker 5: not the same because when I am working on those,
• 8:00
  Speaker 5: I am working on everything that it's not her.
• 8:05
  Speaker 4: I am just describing what it's not.
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: Is Mie your first love.
• 8:12
  Speaker 4: I don't know.
• 8:14
  Speaker 5: I had a other girlfriends. You know that I thought
• 8:17
  Speaker 5: that I loved. It's a there, but not like this. No,
• 8:20
  Speaker 5: So the answer might be yes, is.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: She is she your only love? Or have you found
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: love since.
• 8:30
  Speaker 4: I fell in love since? But something dyed?
• 8:38
  Speaker 5: I don't want to be, you know, dramatic, but it's
• 8:42
  Speaker 5: the innocence. I don't think it can be replicated.
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: Victor broke up with Mighty as a husband, and yet
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: he can't break up with her as an artist. But
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: can the two things be separated? To me, it seems impossible.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: But on this point, Victory is clear. He is an
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: artist pursuing his inspiration, not a man pursuing a woman.
• 9:04
  Speaker 4: No, no, no, I'm.
• 9:06
  Speaker 5: Not trying to conquer her heart and to make her
• 9:09
  Speaker 5: think that I love for No, No, absolutely.
• 9:14
  Speaker 4: Nothing at all.
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: So for you, it's not pining.
• 9:18
  Speaker 4: No.
• 9:25
  Speaker 5: In my Latin American markets, this is like a full
• 9:28
  Speaker 5: on telenovela where I have old ladies come to me
• 9:32
  Speaker 5: crying telling me that I will get her in the end,
• 9:36
  Speaker 5: and everyone sees the art and uses her as a
• 9:40
  Speaker 5: mirror to tell themselves a story.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: I've been telling myself the very same story that boy
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: wins girl, boy loses girl, and boy wins girl back
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: by making thousands of paintings. Am I no different than
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: the old ladies of the Latin American markets? Or do
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: I see something about Victor that he himself does not.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: Eventually Mite got remarried, started a new family, and Victor
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: kept his distance. Respecting the fact that Mite had moved on.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: He continued to paint her, though using old photographs as
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: a reference. But then Mite got divorced.
• 10:25
  Speaker 4: And I ask her can I take some pictures?
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: Then she said yes, which is how Victor and Mite
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: came up with an unusual arrangement, one that I've been
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: trying to understand. One day each year, Mite goes to
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: Victor's studio, just like she did when they were teenagers,
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: and for this one day, she gives herself over to
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: his art. She dons the costumes he chooses and holds
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: the props he hands her. She sits still as he
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: paints her face with makeup, and allows herself to be
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: posed in the exact ways Victor wishes. After a couple
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: of hours, he pays her as he would any model.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: Then Mite leaves and Victor spends the rest of the
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: year painting her image. In the Greek myth of Persephone,
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: Persephone marries Hades but is unhappy living in the underworld,
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: so Hades agrees to release her to the world above
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: if she promises to return to him once a year.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: Over time, however, Persephonie falls in love with Hades. I
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: can't help wondering if Victor carries a shred of Hades's
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: hope in his heart too. I'll read to you something
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: that he said here in talking about you. I think
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: the physical is not even her most attractive quality. I mean,
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: of course she's super beautiful, but her personality is incredible,
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: like a nuclear bomb of charisma. When she gets into
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: a room, it's like the sun enters. Everything is nice
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: and warm.
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's I mean, that's very nice. I I.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: Don't really know what to say.
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: I mean, I I worry about him. I worry about
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: how you know his state of mind or heart, and
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: I want him to be fine and happy and find joy.
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: What do you think? How do you see this?
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure how I see this. My day doesn't
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: think Victor is in love with her, but enough people
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: have asked her to raise some doubts. It is not
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: easy to differentiate. We're enjoying ends Curator Gonzala or take
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: a writes of Victor's work and where an obsessive fixation begins.
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: It's this kind of thing. It's people like me that
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: make Mighty question herself.
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: Do you do you think that I'm if you said,
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: I mean, if someone says to me, this looks like
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: you're hurting him, then I would do things differently.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: Having talked to Victor about it at length, I don't
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: think my ya is hurting him, but seen from the outside,
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: the arrangement is unconventional.
• 13:38
  Speaker 4: If I try to.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: Give it too much thought, I could go crazy a
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: little bit.
• 13:44
  Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah, So.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: When I have doubts, it's important to know what Mikhaila thinks,
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: and I feel that she can be my compass.
• 13:54
  Speaker 6: I think it really was for me normal that my
• 13:57
  Speaker 6: dad painted my mom.
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: This is Victor in my Tay's daughter, Mikayla. She's twenty five,
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: but was just five years old when her parents divorced.
• 14:07
  Speaker 6: I do remember one moment in high school friend of
• 14:11
  Speaker 6: mine asked me, oh, your dad still paints your mom,
• 14:14
  Speaker 6: and I said yeah, he does, yeah, and my friend said, well,
• 14:18
  Speaker 6: he's still in love with her. Then right, he must
• 14:20
  Speaker 6: still be in love with her, and I guess I
• 14:23
  Speaker 6: did pause. I didn't really know what to say, and
• 14:26
  Speaker 6: I think there was a moment of is he.
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: Could he be?
• 14:31
  Speaker 6: Maybe I should ask him?
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: And so I did. I asked him.
• 14:34
  Speaker 4: What did he say?
• 14:36
  Speaker 6: He said no.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: Like any kid, Mikayla likes to see her parents getting along,
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: so when her mom asks her if she's okay with
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: her modeling, she's always said yes. But like me, Mikayla
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: still has questions.
• 14:50
  Speaker 6: I'd be curious to learn more about my mom, what's
• 14:54
  Speaker 6: going on through her mind, what she feels when she's
• 14:55
  Speaker 6: doing it.
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: Talking to my Day, I got the impression that she
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: might read to help Victor out of a sense of
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: responsibility or even worry. But is that enough to keep
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: someone returning to their ex husband over and over year
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: after year. Now, along with my question about why Victor
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: continues to paint my ta and only my ta, I
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: have a new one, why does myte model? Have you
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: ever stopped to imagine what it would be like to
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: be on the receiving end of such attention, like what
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: it's like for her?
• 15:30
  Speaker 5: Yes, I have thought how it must feel for her,
• 15:34
  Speaker 5: and I have told her the date that you don't
• 15:37
  Speaker 5: want me to do these things, I'll stop, and she hasn't.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: She hasn't so far.
• 15:42
  Speaker 5: No, why do you think she comes to your studio? I, Jonathan,
• 15:48
  Speaker 5: I truly have no idea.
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: Hmmm, I wonder. In a few weeks, Victor and Mite
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: are planning their annual will photoshoot in Victor's studio. Perhaps
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: the only way to truly understand why Persephone returns to
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: Hades is to follow her down to the underworld and
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: see firsthand after the break Victor Studio Victor, Oh, Hello, hi.
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: On a warm Friday in May, I arrived at Victor's studio,
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: a loft space with high ceilings and a concrete floor.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: Victor is dressed in black, black leather leggings, black boots,
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: and thick black glasses. There are paintings and photos of
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: my day everywhere. On one shelf, I noticed a photo
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: of two feet raised on tiptoes. That is that my
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: taste feet?
• 17:06
  Speaker 4: Yeah, m coming.
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: You can hear her voice, You can hear the footsteps, okay?
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: Can you can you distinguish her footsteps from other footstep?
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: As my taste steps grow louder, Victor turns to me suddenly,
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: but yes, yes, I can.
• 17:34
  Speaker 4: Go with us.
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: My Tay arrives in a T shirt, knee length black
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: skirts and cowboy boots. She's objectively striking. She and Victor
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: both are. It's the first time I've ever been with
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: them together, and it's like they go together, like Jack
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: and Meg White or ant Man in the Wasp. I
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: watch them as they watch each other, but of course
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: I cannot see what Victor is seeing, and I cannot
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: feel what either of them is feeling. During the photo shoot,
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: Victor poses Mite beside a greco bust. He poses her
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: against the stack of books. He poses her talking into
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: an old fashioned rotary telephone, and with a handful of
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: rubber superballs. He poses her lying atop a keyboard that
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: he bought especially for the shoot. He poses her looking
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: soulfully into the eyes of a cookie monster hand puppet.
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: I should have bought some coises.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: In spite of the surreal edge to the props, the
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: shoot is surprisingly casual and relaxed. It has the mood
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: of two old friends out for coffee. Sometimes Victor gives
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: Mite direction.
• 18:50
  Speaker 4: Now that must sight I except.
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: But mostly he doesn't say anything.
• 18:58
  Speaker 4: She said natural it's incredible.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: I don't do anything up until now. Myte has been
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: reserved from the moment we met her body language betrayed
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: someone who doesn't like attention. Yet as soon as the
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: camera starts clicking, something happens. She comes alive. At one point,
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: Victor compares Mite to Audrey Hepburn, who he says, is
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: quote not as pretty.
• 19:24
  Speaker 4: Not not even close, but in the same style. Well
• 19:28
  Speaker 4: that's so excessive.
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: Observing the day, one thing seems clear. In answer to
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: Michayla's question about why her mother does it, maybe it's
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: for the simple reason she enjoys it.
• 19:53
  Speaker 4: I think we're gone. Okay, I think we're gone.
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: After about an hour, the photo shoot is over. Victor
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: thanks my Tay and insists on calling her a car.
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: She's teaching a Spanish class this afternoon. She has a
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: life to get back to.
• 20:08
  Speaker 4: Thank you very much.
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: I'll be back.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: My Tay walks out, leaving me and Victor alone. Victor
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: seems tired, and that way introverts get after expending a
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: lot of social energy. After watching the shoot, I'm still
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: not sure what to think. I was hoping that seeing
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: Victor and my Tay together would answer all my questions,
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: but it hasn't. I ask Victor how the shoot went,
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: and he says he's pleased, But he says, I always
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: want more. You know, I can't tell if he means
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: more material or more time with my Tay. Is he
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: already counting the months until he can see her again?
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: This time? When my Ta walked through the door, did
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: you feel again that feeling of like she's more beautiful
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: than the last time.
• 20:55
  Speaker 4: Multiplied by one hundred? You know?
• 20:58
  Speaker 5: I find with her that her beauty or her type
• 21:03
  Speaker 5: of uh, I don't know what to call it can be.
• 21:10
  Speaker 4: I'm sure.
• 21:12
  Speaker 5: Once she had a tooth extracted when we were married,
• 21:16
  Speaker 5: and the dentist were it to me, and it had
• 21:18
  Speaker 5: a certain shape, and that shape was exactly the same
• 21:21
  Speaker 5: type of beauty.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: It's like the park contains the whole in micro and
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: in macro. Okay, let's take it a step further. I mean,
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: do you think you would be if you replaced ten
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: teeth for some different people, you would be able to
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: identify her tooth.
• 21:41
  Speaker 5: I'll go further. If you put ten thyroid glands. I
• 21:46
  Speaker 5: think I have a good chance of guessing. Why listen,
• 21:52
  Speaker 5: I don't know, And that's why I that's.
• 21:55
  Speaker 4: I know. This sounds like this is mad, This is crazy.
• 21:59
  Speaker 4: I understand.
• 21:59
  Speaker 5: I know if I present my portfolio in an institution,
• 22:03
  Speaker 5: mental institution, they will welcome me.
• 22:05
  Speaker 4: It's like, hey, do you belong here? Man?
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: Victor has insisted since the moment we met that he
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: is not in love with my Day, and I want
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: to believe him. But when he starts talking about how
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: he can pick her thyroid gland out of a lineup,
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: I find it hard to If that's not love, albeit
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: a love bordering on obsession, then what is it. The
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: force of your admiration doesn't seem like it's the right
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: word of your I don't know what do you think
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: is the right word? Is adoration?
• 22:40
  Speaker 4: Not?
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: The right word is no?
• 22:42
  Speaker 5: Uh, it's because you're trying to avoid the L word,
• 22:49
  Speaker 5: which is love. Right, Victor pauses, I do feel love for.
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: Her, but as quickly as he admits it, he returns
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: to the same old saw.
• 23:03
  Speaker 5: But to me, the only thing that matters is the
• 23:05
  Speaker 5: final art product and painting.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: This time, though, after having spent the day with them,
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: after seeing the way he looks at my tay, the
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: way that he hangs on her every move, I push
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: back but you ever feel like it flows backwards. Also,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean that the that the art
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: work is also a means of, you know, having a
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: having a relationship where your love is permissible. Victor needs
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Miighty to make art. But might Victor's art in some
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: ways be in service to spending time with Mighty?
• 23:39
  Speaker 4: Also?
• 23:40
  Speaker 5: Uh huh, Yeah, the answer is yes. Real love, real
• 23:53
  Speaker 5: love is doesn't stop right, you know, it doesn't. It
• 23:59
  Speaker 5: continues existing, It transforms itself, it moves in different ways.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: So you're saying that this is real love.
• 24:13
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: For Victor, real love doesn't require wooing and rings and
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: shared health insurance. Real love is simply delighting in the
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: object of his affection. But Mite has a different idea
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: of what real love is and what it isn't. I'm
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: reminded of something she said the first time we spoke.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: She told me that even though Victor was always looking
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: at her, she didn't feel seen.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: It's easier to see someone from afar and idealize the
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: person than to be in the every day and just
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: dealing with the juggling of life.
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: But he was with the every day, you know, for
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: many years. I mean, so it's it's not like he.
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: Yes, But I think I think that even then I
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: was kind of an hologram.
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: It was like the ideal mite has a point. Real
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: love isn't about the ideal. It's hard work and requires
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: seeing a person in their entirety, imperfections and all. But
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: then Victor tells me a story from after the divorce
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: that makes me think he sees more than perhaps my
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: day knows. If he cannot exactly see her imperfections, he
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: can at least see his own.
• 25:32
  Speaker 5: One day, I was going back home in Manouver in
• 25:36
  Speaker 5: a taxi and I saw her with her boyfriend and
• 25:39
  Speaker 5: friends in a sitting outside the table in a restaurant
• 25:43
  Speaker 5: or bar, and they were all super happy, you know,
• 25:47
  Speaker 5: having a great time.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: Victor had spent the whole day in his studio doing.
• 25:52
  Speaker 5: Like a very realistic depiction of her all day long.
• 25:58
  Speaker 5: But there she is sitting down with those guys having
• 26:02
  Speaker 5: a beer and talking about whatever and enjoying the day.
• 26:09
  Speaker 5: And I thought I couldn't provide her with that happiness
• 26:15
  Speaker 5: or like that regular normal, just enjoyment of life.
• 26:21
  Speaker 4: That was my feeling as a husband. You know what
• 26:30
  Speaker 4: I'm thinking about?
• 26:31
  Speaker 5: In cave paintings like from fifty thousand years ago. They
• 26:37
  Speaker 5: were the people there in the cave went to hunt
• 26:41
  Speaker 5: for a bison or something, and there was always a
• 26:44
  Speaker 5: dude who stayed behind.
• 26:47
  Speaker 4: To depict what happened. And sometimes I think that's my job.
• 26:54
  Speaker 5: I don't go out and have a experience, but I'm
• 26:59
  Speaker 5: okay with it.
• 27:01
  Speaker 4: I'm a different thing, yeah, yeah, a different thing.
• 27:07
  Speaker 6: In college, I didn't really know how to be alone
• 27:09
  Speaker 6: without feeling lonely.
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: This is Victor and my Day's daughter, Mikayla again.
• 27:14
  Speaker 6: Every time I was alone, I felt like I was
• 27:16
  Speaker 6: doing something wrong or that, you know, I felt a
• 27:19
  Speaker 6: little ashamed.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: As it happens. Mikayla is a social psychology doctoral student,
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: and her work focuses on, of all things, the study
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: of loneliness. A little bit, it feels like she's dedicated
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: her life to trying to understand her dad.
• 27:35
  Speaker 6: There was a moment my sophomore year of college when
• 27:39
  Speaker 6: I was feeling really alone and very lonely, and I
• 27:43
  Speaker 6: called my dad and we talked for a while, and
• 27:46
  Speaker 6: he told me something that has stuck with me to
• 27:48
  Speaker 6: this day. He said, being alone does not mean being lonely.
• 27:55
  Speaker 6: It really struck me.
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: And do you think your dad was talking about himself.
• 28:01
  Speaker 6: Yeah, I think of him as someone who really enjoys
• 28:04
  Speaker 6: his solitude. Yeah, if he wanted to have a significant other,
• 28:09
  Speaker 6: if he wanted to have a big group of friends,
• 28:12
  Speaker 6: he totally could. But he doesn't want to, and he
• 28:15
  Speaker 6: knows that's a choice. So he's making a choice, which
• 28:19
  Speaker 6: I think is hard for some people to understand.
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: Victor's alone, but not lonely. He's not with somebody, and
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: yet he is sort of Finally, I think I understand
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: Victor couldn't handle being with Mita in her three dimensions,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: but with this arrangement, he only has to be with
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: her in two. Victor can worship Mite as he did
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: that first time he laid eyes on her as a teenager,
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: and then he lets her leave. For Mite's part, she
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: loves Victor two, but she needed something more. So if
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: Victor expresses his love by letting Mitey go, Mite expresses
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: her love by allowing him for one day at least
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: to keep her. It's Friday, and so before parting, I
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: ask Victor what I always ask people on Fridays. Do
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: you have weekend plans?
• 29:17
  Speaker 5: You know what I don't. I don't have anything to do.
• 29:23
  Speaker 5: All I do is computer and work.
• 29:26
  Speaker 4: You'll be here working. Yeah.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: Victor then tells me he's looking forward to the weekend,
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: and I believe him.
• 30:10
  Speaker 3: Now that the furnitures returning to its goodwill home, now
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: that the last month's rent is scheming with the damage
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: to take this moment to deserve.
• 30:31
  Speaker 4: If we meant it, if we.
• 30:32
  Speaker 3: Trust but felt around for far too from things that accidentally.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: This episode of Heavyweight was produced by supervising producer Stevie
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: Lane and me Jonathan Goldstein, along with Phoebe Flanagan. Our
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: senior producer is Khalila Holt. Production assistance by Moheey mcgauker,
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: the editorial guidance from Emily con Special thanks to Lauren Silverman,
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: Neil Drumming, mime O'Donnell, Anya Schultz, Jackie Cohen, and Jessica Basheer,
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: who directed a short documentary about Victor's art called Heroin
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: which is where I first learned about Victor and Mitay.
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: Bobby Lord mixed the episode with original music by Christine Fellows,
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: John K. Sampson, Blue Dot Sessions, Michael Hurst, and Bobby Lord.
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: Additional music credits can be found on our website, Gimbletmedia
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: dot com slash Heavyweight. Our theme song is by The
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: Weaker Thans, courtesy of Epitaph Records. Heavyweight is a Spotify
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: original podcast. Follow us on Twitter at Heavyweight, on Instagram
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: at Heavyweight podcast, or email us at Heavyweight at gimletmedia
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: dot com. You can also follow our show on Spotify
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: and tap the bell to receive notifications when new episodes drop.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: We'll be back in two weeks time with a new episode.