"Meet me under the whale at the Natural History Museum..."

 Or, maybe, "...what if we kissed under the whale at the Natural History Museum?"

The American Museum of Natural History was a place I had dreamed of going for years before I first went there. I became obsessed with the Windows of Nature book, and memorized every single diorama therein. I read an article from 2013 about the Los Angeles Natural History Museum that both LA and NY's dioramas use the real-life actual locations where the specimens were taken.

The AMNH has so many floors, and so many hidden wings therein. The last time I was there, I discovered sections I had never seen before, despite having gone two previous times. The main entrance to the museum is on the second floor, and the sections I was the most obsessed with (from the Windows of Nature book) are on the "first floor," which is downstairs (it's the entrance from the subway station). The Hall of Ocean life (which is my favourite of all the galleries and halls), an even lower and split level. It really just feels like the AMNH is endless, like doing an ever-evolving puzzle.

This actually scares the ever-living shit out of me:

My hands were shaking so hard, I couldn't even take the photo!!!

The AMNH is the largest in the world, and it certainly feels that way. In terms of size or both the collections and the physical museum itself, it seems almost intimidating in its size. It seems endless--but in the best way. You definitely feel as though you have gotten your money's worth of museum. It just feels so special and I wish that we had something more similar to it here. I really, sincerely miss when the California Academy of Sciences was more like this.

It's such a silly thing to be attached to, the giant blue whale on the ceiling. It's so strange to be in love with a place like this, and to want to share it as you would share any other part of your heart or thing of significance with someone else. I feel so blessed to have done this three times now by myself, the next time, I want to share it with someone else. 

*I am still immensely, unspeakably jealous of those who got their Covid vaccines under the whale.