In honor of Martin Luther King Junior the Metropolitan Museum of Art was open today, on a Monday when it is usually closed. It was a rare treat. Despite the fact that some big swaths of the museum were closed, Asian Art, the American Wing, numerous individual galleries among them, the museum was well attended but not crowded. The museum is still pay what you wish, they will still gladly check your coat, and the cafeteria is actually one of the better places of its kind to eat on the Upper East Side. It is very close to being another one of the great public institutions that make our city great in turn. One could find a quarter on the street, a dime or a penny even and still be able to spend a warm, edifying afternoon among the world’s masterpieces. Ironically some of the galleries housing the greatest works in the museum are the emptiest. One can linger alone with a handful of Vermeers, or surround oneself with a roomful of Rembrandt. The Breughels are barely noticed, the Van Eycks, Titians, Tintorettos all unmolested. Of course for nothing at all you can loiter in the big noisy Great Hall entrance to the museum. It is a terrific location for people watching, and offers an international menu. On a warmer day you need not even enter the museum. Its great stone stairway is like New York’s front stoop. Eat some lunch, talk up a friend, bounce a ball or simply lose yourself in Fifth Avenue’s elegant shuffle downtown. Count yourself lucky to live here. I do.