I had occasion, this evening, to intoduce a dear friend of mine to In the Heights. She's a fan of the Beastie Boys, and there's a line from Shake Your Rump that always reminds me of 96,000. I played it in her car, hoping it would thrill her as it had me. Her reaction was...disconcerting. She laughed at some lines that jumped out to her as funny, and she seemed to enjoy it overall, but she had nothing like the reaction that I had when I first heard it. The first time I listened to In the Heights, I liked it. The first time she listened to In the Heights, she judged it. And I find it disturbing.
I can't recall if I actually asked for her opinion, or the break in the music due to my phone being evil prompted her to fill the silence, but when it came, her comment was that, although she liked it, she didn't understand why it sounded so "big band" when it was supposed to be about this particular group of people. Mind you, a clearly urban group is rapping, underscored by drumbeats and base more than anything else for the majority of the song. I certainly don't recall anything fitting that description being played as part of the Big Band Era. Seeing my confusion, she tried to explain to me that the music in the song is more reminiscent of Glen Miller and Bing Crosby than the blues or jazz that she expected to hear in "that kind" of musical. In brief, she felt that the music lacked authenticity.
Now, the first problem with her impression of what she should be hearing was that she was running off of misinformation. Whoever talked to her about In the Heights apparently led her to believe that it centers around a predominantly black community, rather than a Hispanic one. Although she accepted my correction immediately, she came back with the insistance that the music still sounds more Big Band than Spanish. She maintained that it didn't seem to be an accurate portrayal of the community the show was supposed to represent because of this "big band" sound that she kept hearing, even after finding out that the lyricist is Hispanic. It wasn't until after she finally registered that the composer, who is also the lyricist, is Hispanic that she conceded. Long after her concession (to what, I'm not entirely sure), however, I'm still disturbed.
Our exchange had started while the song was paused, which happened to be right before a climax in the music where, according to my friend, the composer must have realized that he "needed" to include more of the Latin flavor that it had been lacking so far. The idea that the change in the music had come, not because of the progress in the action and atmosphere, but out of a need to appease some ambiguous notion of what music should sound like in the street of a Latin neighborhood, seemed to be incredibly shortsighted and ungenerous to the writers. I recalled complaints about Will Smith's rapping not being black enough in reaction to his less grammatically atrocious lyrics and clean content.
It was time for me to get out of the car and I didn't want to pick a fight after she had conceded, so I didn't ask any of the questions that had come to mind, but they persisted when I got out of the car. Principal among them was, What did you expect to hear? What do you say a Latin musical should sound like, and what gives you the authority to say so? These questions aren't meant to be digs. I genuinely don't understand where she was coming from. Her initial opinion that the music sounded too "big band" to be about the ghetto, meaning a black neighborhood, clashes pretty harshly with the history behind the big bands. If the style of the big bands is somehow incompatible with black culture, that's bad news for fans of Cab Calloway or Louis Armstrong. It's also rather sad for lovers of jazz, the root of the popular forties music. Surprise at a group of black people's association with swing is a lot like confusion over a black person's affinity for rock n' roll. We are talking about a major piece of American culture, and nothing says America like a major cultural staple taken from black people and made to look like something else.
Speaking of staples, it bears acknowledging that ITH is an American musical. Musical theatre happens to be one of the few cultural exports that can be called uniquely American. Like America itself, American musical theatre is constantly influenced by the variety of cultures that contribute to it. It doesn't completely become something else based on what kind of music is popular. Rather, it encorprates various aspects of music from different moments in America as they help to contribute to the story. Rent is a contemporary musical that features rock songs. Memphis is a musical about rock and roll that features the blues tune that rock music evolved from. The suggestion that In the Heights doesn't sound Latin enough implies that the American aspect of Hispanic American culture should be discarded for the sake of communicating that this is a musical about Latinos, not suburban middle America (because the Spanish, the rapping, the horns, and the title don't do that already). It's funny that this subject came up over a musical that has themes of how Americans cope with their immigrant heritage. Usnavi decides in the end that he new world he was brought to is his true home. I wonder how welvome a notion that is.
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
It's the little things
I've been in rehearsal for Hairspray for going on five weeks now and I find myself frustrated to the point of wanting to quit at some point every rehearsal. It's how I felt last night when we did yet another run-through without me being caught up at all on all I'd missed during my fabulous vacation cruise extravaganza. It stops being fun when I know I'm doing everything all wrong and my only focus when it's wrong is to get it right. During one of our many backstage singing moments last night, I was focused on getting it right. I had my script out to guide me through the music, but had to get close to the stage for my entrance, so I walked to the wings, still singing my part, still angry about all the things I wasn't getting right. While we were waiting for our cue, one of my castmates turned around and grinned at me. It was not a conciliatory "we're in the same place at the same time" smile, but a genuine grin for a specific reason which was completely unknown to me. Being focused, as I was, on not getting yet another thing wrong, I forgot about it as soon as I got onstage and didn't think about it until she brought it up as she was driving me home. It turns out she was just so happy that I was holding down my part among people who were singing something different from me. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that I was what had pleased her so much before she entered. It hadn't occurred to me that singing my part would be enough to make an impact on someone. It certainly hasn't been enough to make an impact on my music director. But it impacted her. It brought a smile to her face. And that smile eventually brought a smile to my face.
She brought me back to another car ride I shared with her on the way to rehearsal for Oklahoma! when she expressed her hope that I would get to permanently say the line I'd said during the previous rehearsal because the person assigned to it wasn't there. She really hoped it would be my line because, in her words, I'd "said it so good." It was all of ten words, a setup for the principle character I'd auditioned to play, and I didn't even think the director had noticed someone else was saying the line. It was that insignificant. Then Kasea made it significant and, when I was eventually assigned that one line, I was determined to make it significant to someone in the audience. I made a moment. Life is made of moments. I'm grateful for that reminder.
She brought me back to another car ride I shared with her on the way to rehearsal for Oklahoma! when she expressed her hope that I would get to permanently say the line I'd said during the previous rehearsal because the person assigned to it wasn't there. She really hoped it would be my line because, in her words, I'd "said it so good." It was all of ten words, a setup for the principle character I'd auditioned to play, and I didn't even think the director had noticed someone else was saying the line. It was that insignificant. Then Kasea made it significant and, when I was eventually assigned that one line, I was determined to make it significant to someone in the audience. I made a moment. Life is made of moments. I'm grateful for that reminder.
Monday, October 1, 2012
On Being Misunderstood
I got to experience a rather irritating incident of irony today, and I'm not at all amused by it. Last week, I had two clients coem to the Writing Center for assistance with papers "on being misunderstood". They were instructed to write about an experience in which they had been misunderstood in narrative form. Pretty straightforward. The first client was a fellow theatre major, a sweetheart who, amusingly enough, wrote about the assumption people have that she is a mean person. Her writings had some shortcomings, of course, but I was able to understand what she was trying to do and happy to work with her to help make her idea come across. I gave some feedback, I made some suggestions, she jotted down some notes and went on her merry way.
The second client was in the same class, had gotten the same assignment, and was attempting to follow the example of the same writer. Instead of one experience, he wrote about three separate experience that didn't seem to have anything to do with one another. They did all exemplify some form of being misunderstood, but I didn't understand why he chose to put those three together. A series of inquiring led me to understand that they seemed so fragmented because they had nothing to do with each other. He had made them up. He couldn't come up with a time that he had been misunderstood, so he decided to write three separate lies and pretend that they were a part of a common theme in his life. I explained to him that the assignment was not to write a fictional account and that he couldn't actually do what was asked of him if he just made it up. He maintained that he couldn't come up with anything. Because we still had time in the session, I tried discussing diction and tone and attention to detail, but everything went back to the fact that he hadn't done what was asked of him. I was not about to advise him to turn in three unrelated lies about a relatively common occurance, so I finally told him that he needed to find something real to write about. I refused to believe that he had not been misunderstood once in his life. I even started throwing out examples to get him started, like having a text misread, or having someone not hear him correctly. Granted, these aren't as dramatic as having a strange woman beg him not to rob her, but they were at least things that could probably happen. He didn't want to talk about those things. He said he couldn't come up with enough to write on those things. After we went back and forth a few times, I asked him a question that he said he couldn't answer on the spot. I said that that was fine, since we still had time, and went to get some water while he thought about it. When I came back, I asked him if he was still thinking, and he basically told me he would not be able to come up with anything at all ever in life. I was glad when we ran out of time, but wished that I could have just sent him away early for refusing to cooperate.
Fast forward to today. I come in this afternoon and the schedule says that my 3:30 appointment is with my boss...to discuss a client complaint. I was nervous, as I always am at the prospect of having done something wrong. I make mistakes quite often, and, although I do my best to be friendly and patient with my clients, I do understand that I can sometimes be less delightful than many of my colleagues. I quickly review in my head the past few weeks. I can't remember leaving a client waiting or using my phone in a session. I haven't been on facebook or twitter or anything, and I never complain about clients when I have clients nearby. What could I have done?
When my boss comes to talk to me, she explains that a roommate of a client was crestfallen after having had an appointment with me, prompting said roommate to call and complain. Apparently I "belittled him," talked down to him," and insulted his intelligence by walking away. I am appropriately concerned that my actions may have been offensive and try to think back to the appointment in question and see what I should reevaluate. I completely forgot about Client 2, and instead the session that comes to me is the one from that same week where the client's paper similarly had unrelated elements and didn't seem to make sense. I recall the session as having been productive and don't understand why he would have been offended by anything I said. I even remember him coming in the next day and mentioning an advance he made with the same essay. In myreassessment of my immediate history with clients, I realize that I'm thinking of the wrong person. I am perfectly clear on who the client in question is now, and I let out a little laugh.
I laugh partly out of relief that I wasn't so wrong about how a session with a client had gone, partly out of amusement that he, of all, people, had seen fit to complain about me, and partly because the session was much funnier in hindsight when I'm not trying to drill something substantive out of this boy. I start to explain to my superior what actually happened, and she stops me.
"Do you see what you just did there?" she asks. I, of course know that I just laughed, but I don't see anything wrong with that. Something was funny, something was built up, and I let it out. I didn't even begin the story yet and she's already identifying what I did in this session that must have been so offensive. Never mind that I didn't laugh when he was actually there, that I wasn't at all amused by his refusal to follow directions and reluctance to cooperate with me. What matters now is that I let out a chuckle five days later, clearly evidence that I did something wrong five days ago. My boss goes on to say that the client may have taken this a different way and that that's the type of thing that can make a person feel belittled. She also "reminds" me that we don't leave the clients during a session, apparently seeing the one minute that I tried to give the guy some breathing room as further evidence of my shortcomings as a tutor. She smilingly maintains that I "keep these things in mind" before going on her merry way. Now I'm pissed off.
I don't ask her if she cares what actually happened in the session. It's clear from her response to my laughter that she doesn't. In this place where we pride ourselves on customer service, it doesn't occur to her that it may be the client who is in the wrong, or even that I have something to say about the session that might shed some actual light on why this person felt offended, rather than casting shadows of doubt on my qualification to work with people based on an involuntary expression of merriment. God forbid I show happiness on the job. I also no longer feel chastened by this exchange, or even the notion that this client came to the center for help and didn't have a good experience. The fact is, I didn't have a good experience either, and considering I haven't been paid for my work here since the beginning of August I'm not too concerned with the whole "we're here to serve you" mantra that he was looking to feel. My concern when he was here was in giving him things that would help him write the paper that he was supposed to write, and he showed no interest in taking that. I refuse to apologize or feel guilty for making a person feel bad about not following directions when I spent at least forty-five minutes trying to direct him according to what he needed to do. He didn't like that I asked him why he said what he said because he didn't have any answer and he didn't feel good about the comments I made because it was obvious that he was wrong. If his professor wanted him to turn in three pages of lies, she would have assigned them to write a work of fiction. As far as I'm concerned, my only mistake was in trying to help him when he didn't want to be helped.
And all of this comes out because I laughed. I freely admit that I laugh in my sessions from time to time. Sometimes a student writes something funny, or I remember something amusing, or I'm just enjoying the exchange so much that I allow that to come out. I never thought of that as a bad thing. In fact, the times that I laugh tend to be when I'm most engaged with my clients and we're able to make a good deal of progress. If I'm to take my boss at her word, I was wrong in all of those great sessions where the clients walked away with a new sense of direction. While I "keep in mind" that things that I say and do may be found offensive, I find myself in a position where I have to call into question all of the tactics I use to make my sessions productive. Don't ask the clients to justify themselves. That might make them uncomfortable. Don't point out obvious errors in judgement. That might offend their sensibilities. It's like someone just tripped me and the proposed solution is to cut off my legs. After all, if I hadn't tried to get somewhere in the first place, we wouldn't be in this situation. It's all quite disconcerting.
In the end, all this experience has done is make me reluctant to honestly engage with any of my clients. If some little snot who doesn't bother directions, isn't concerned enough about my performance to fill out a survey and has more credibility in a he-told-her-she-said than I do, who's to say I'll ever get any affirmation regarding my performance? I hope this client never comes back. If he does, I'm sure he won't misunderstand my contempt.
The second client was in the same class, had gotten the same assignment, and was attempting to follow the example of the same writer. Instead of one experience, he wrote about three separate experience that didn't seem to have anything to do with one another. They did all exemplify some form of being misunderstood, but I didn't understand why he chose to put those three together. A series of inquiring led me to understand that they seemed so fragmented because they had nothing to do with each other. He had made them up. He couldn't come up with a time that he had been misunderstood, so he decided to write three separate lies and pretend that they were a part of a common theme in his life. I explained to him that the assignment was not to write a fictional account and that he couldn't actually do what was asked of him if he just made it up. He maintained that he couldn't come up with anything. Because we still had time in the session, I tried discussing diction and tone and attention to detail, but everything went back to the fact that he hadn't done what was asked of him. I was not about to advise him to turn in three unrelated lies about a relatively common occurance, so I finally told him that he needed to find something real to write about. I refused to believe that he had not been misunderstood once in his life. I even started throwing out examples to get him started, like having a text misread, or having someone not hear him correctly. Granted, these aren't as dramatic as having a strange woman beg him not to rob her, but they were at least things that could probably happen. He didn't want to talk about those things. He said he couldn't come up with enough to write on those things. After we went back and forth a few times, I asked him a question that he said he couldn't answer on the spot. I said that that was fine, since we still had time, and went to get some water while he thought about it. When I came back, I asked him if he was still thinking, and he basically told me he would not be able to come up with anything at all ever in life. I was glad when we ran out of time, but wished that I could have just sent him away early for refusing to cooperate.
Fast forward to today. I come in this afternoon and the schedule says that my 3:30 appointment is with my boss...to discuss a client complaint. I was nervous, as I always am at the prospect of having done something wrong. I make mistakes quite often, and, although I do my best to be friendly and patient with my clients, I do understand that I can sometimes be less delightful than many of my colleagues. I quickly review in my head the past few weeks. I can't remember leaving a client waiting or using my phone in a session. I haven't been on facebook or twitter or anything, and I never complain about clients when I have clients nearby. What could I have done?
When my boss comes to talk to me, she explains that a roommate of a client was crestfallen after having had an appointment with me, prompting said roommate to call and complain. Apparently I "belittled him," talked down to him," and insulted his intelligence by walking away. I am appropriately concerned that my actions may have been offensive and try to think back to the appointment in question and see what I should reevaluate. I completely forgot about Client 2, and instead the session that comes to me is the one from that same week where the client's paper similarly had unrelated elements and didn't seem to make sense. I recall the session as having been productive and don't understand why he would have been offended by anything I said. I even remember him coming in the next day and mentioning an advance he made with the same essay. In myreassessment of my immediate history with clients, I realize that I'm thinking of the wrong person. I am perfectly clear on who the client in question is now, and I let out a little laugh.
I laugh partly out of relief that I wasn't so wrong about how a session with a client had gone, partly out of amusement that he, of all, people, had seen fit to complain about me, and partly because the session was much funnier in hindsight when I'm not trying to drill something substantive out of this boy. I start to explain to my superior what actually happened, and she stops me.
"Do you see what you just did there?" she asks. I, of course know that I just laughed, but I don't see anything wrong with that. Something was funny, something was built up, and I let it out. I didn't even begin the story yet and she's already identifying what I did in this session that must have been so offensive. Never mind that I didn't laugh when he was actually there, that I wasn't at all amused by his refusal to follow directions and reluctance to cooperate with me. What matters now is that I let out a chuckle five days later, clearly evidence that I did something wrong five days ago. My boss goes on to say that the client may have taken this a different way and that that's the type of thing that can make a person feel belittled. She also "reminds" me that we don't leave the clients during a session, apparently seeing the one minute that I tried to give the guy some breathing room as further evidence of my shortcomings as a tutor. She smilingly maintains that I "keep these things in mind" before going on her merry way. Now I'm pissed off.
I don't ask her if she cares what actually happened in the session. It's clear from her response to my laughter that she doesn't. In this place where we pride ourselves on customer service, it doesn't occur to her that it may be the client who is in the wrong, or even that I have something to say about the session that might shed some actual light on why this person felt offended, rather than casting shadows of doubt on my qualification to work with people based on an involuntary expression of merriment. God forbid I show happiness on the job. I also no longer feel chastened by this exchange, or even the notion that this client came to the center for help and didn't have a good experience. The fact is, I didn't have a good experience either, and considering I haven't been paid for my work here since the beginning of August I'm not too concerned with the whole "we're here to serve you" mantra that he was looking to feel. My concern when he was here was in giving him things that would help him write the paper that he was supposed to write, and he showed no interest in taking that. I refuse to apologize or feel guilty for making a person feel bad about not following directions when I spent at least forty-five minutes trying to direct him according to what he needed to do. He didn't like that I asked him why he said what he said because he didn't have any answer and he didn't feel good about the comments I made because it was obvious that he was wrong. If his professor wanted him to turn in three pages of lies, she would have assigned them to write a work of fiction. As far as I'm concerned, my only mistake was in trying to help him when he didn't want to be helped.
And all of this comes out because I laughed. I freely admit that I laugh in my sessions from time to time. Sometimes a student writes something funny, or I remember something amusing, or I'm just enjoying the exchange so much that I allow that to come out. I never thought of that as a bad thing. In fact, the times that I laugh tend to be when I'm most engaged with my clients and we're able to make a good deal of progress. If I'm to take my boss at her word, I was wrong in all of those great sessions where the clients walked away with a new sense of direction. While I "keep in mind" that things that I say and do may be found offensive, I find myself in a position where I have to call into question all of the tactics I use to make my sessions productive. Don't ask the clients to justify themselves. That might make them uncomfortable. Don't point out obvious errors in judgement. That might offend their sensibilities. It's like someone just tripped me and the proposed solution is to cut off my legs. After all, if I hadn't tried to get somewhere in the first place, we wouldn't be in this situation. It's all quite disconcerting.
In the end, all this experience has done is make me reluctant to honestly engage with any of my clients. If some little snot who doesn't bother directions, isn't concerned enough about my performance to fill out a survey and has more credibility in a he-told-her-she-said than I do, who's to say I'll ever get any affirmation regarding my performance? I hope this client never comes back. If he does, I'm sure he won't misunderstand my contempt.
Monday, August 20, 2012
Meet New Brian, MIOBI Style
I did actually start this right after the season premier. Then I got sidetracked and it ended up witting in my draft box for months. I know it doesn't really matter now, but hey. When does what I write ever matter?
So, the new season of Make It or Break It is finally here and the writers made no mistake in establishing that the status quo breaker, Emily Kmetko is no longer a part of the road to London or any of the girls' lives. Lauren says, smugly, as the three get dropped off at the gym, that it's always been the three of them, repeating the sentiment first established in the pilot episode right before Emily came in and changed everything. Her not-so-subtle allusion to Emily, relating that "other girls come...go" can almost be seen as an assertion that the steady advancement of consistent drive the original top three had, as opposed to the sudden rise to notoriety that Emily was faced with and could never quite master, was meant to be the correct course all along. Alas, it just turned out to be a wagged tongue at any eager fans who might be holding out hope that Chelsea Hobbs would make a guest appearance. Instead of a resigned Emily appearing at the Olympic Training Center after a tragic abortion and a new hunger for Olympic glory, the loyal viewers of seasons past are treated to the appearance of some girl in a truck who apparently hasn't eaten in awhile and assumes that, despite not being on the national team or at all qualified to compete in a major competition, she'll be able to dazzle the judges and earn her spot.
Now, the writers of this show haven't been too picky about verisimilitude since the beginning, so it isn't so surprising that they don't expect this new character to follow the protocal of the gymnastics world, but it is a bit irritating that they don't even have her follow the rules that they've set forth themselves. She doesn't petition onto the team. She doesn't ask for a hearing or try to use some loophole to claim she qualifies. She literally shows up out of nowhere and expects to be accepted. The random appearance of Jordan (the new girl) directly reflects the sloth of the writing team. They really thought that, after all this time and all this waiting, they would throw in a new girl out of nowhere and we, the viewers, would just accept it. To their credit, they did at least throw in that Jordan was some has-been gymnast who hadn't been seen since she dramatically left the sport for unknown reasons. To their detriment, they didn't bother coming up with an explanation for how a girl with no money, no gym and, from my understanding, no home, who'd left gymnastics altogether for a significant period of time managed to get in shape enough to, not only reclaim her old skills, but to acquire a new one that no other (in shape professional full-time home having) gymnast in history has successfully landed, or what prompted her to do so. It was a far cry from the firm character sketch they'd set up for Emily.
The distinction between Jordan and Emily is as pronounced as it is irritating. It makes me wonder how the two would have interacted if that had ever come to pass. Alas, the two were never meant to exist in the same universe. This third season of Make It or Break It is, quite obviously, a half-assed bone thrown to shut up persistent fans everywhere. While the writers were able to pick up the story of the three not pregnant girls pretty easily, they would have to put actual effort into figuring out where to go with Emily's departure. They obviously weren't willing to do that, but neither were they willing to endure another barrage of angry mail from loyal tweens who loved watching the struggle of the underprivilaged underdog. So it was that Jordan Randall was concieved and, in hopes that none of the viewers would miss any of the genuine characteristics that made them want Emily, the writing team enhanced the superficial characteristics that make the fourth girl the underdog. While Emily was a struggling teen of a single mom whose father had left her, Jordan is a foster child who's been raised in the system. Whereas Emily lived in a crappy apartment and didn't have her own room, Jordan has to sleep in a tent. Where Emily's eastern European roots and humble income place her in the realm of white trash, Jordan is (gasp!) black. In every stupid way one could imagine, Jordan is the new and embellished token underdog character. I was disappointed that they could so easily throw away such a significant character. I see with this new girl just how significant they found her to be. It makes me wish they hadn't bothered coming back.
So, the new season of Make It or Break It is finally here and the writers made no mistake in establishing that the status quo breaker, Emily Kmetko is no longer a part of the road to London or any of the girls' lives. Lauren says, smugly, as the three get dropped off at the gym, that it's always been the three of them, repeating the sentiment first established in the pilot episode right before Emily came in and changed everything. Her not-so-subtle allusion to Emily, relating that "other girls come...go" can almost be seen as an assertion that the steady advancement of consistent drive the original top three had, as opposed to the sudden rise to notoriety that Emily was faced with and could never quite master, was meant to be the correct course all along. Alas, it just turned out to be a wagged tongue at any eager fans who might be holding out hope that Chelsea Hobbs would make a guest appearance. Instead of a resigned Emily appearing at the Olympic Training Center after a tragic abortion and a new hunger for Olympic glory, the loyal viewers of seasons past are treated to the appearance of some girl in a truck who apparently hasn't eaten in awhile and assumes that, despite not being on the national team or at all qualified to compete in a major competition, she'll be able to dazzle the judges and earn her spot.
Now, the writers of this show haven't been too picky about verisimilitude since the beginning, so it isn't so surprising that they don't expect this new character to follow the protocal of the gymnastics world, but it is a bit irritating that they don't even have her follow the rules that they've set forth themselves. She doesn't petition onto the team. She doesn't ask for a hearing or try to use some loophole to claim she qualifies. She literally shows up out of nowhere and expects to be accepted. The random appearance of Jordan (the new girl) directly reflects the sloth of the writing team. They really thought that, after all this time and all this waiting, they would throw in a new girl out of nowhere and we, the viewers, would just accept it. To their credit, they did at least throw in that Jordan was some has-been gymnast who hadn't been seen since she dramatically left the sport for unknown reasons. To their detriment, they didn't bother coming up with an explanation for how a girl with no money, no gym and, from my understanding, no home, who'd left gymnastics altogether for a significant period of time managed to get in shape enough to, not only reclaim her old skills, but to acquire a new one that no other (in shape professional full-time home having) gymnast in history has successfully landed, or what prompted her to do so. It was a far cry from the firm character sketch they'd set up for Emily.
The distinction between Jordan and Emily is as pronounced as it is irritating. It makes me wonder how the two would have interacted if that had ever come to pass. Alas, the two were never meant to exist in the same universe. This third season of Make It or Break It is, quite obviously, a half-assed bone thrown to shut up persistent fans everywhere. While the writers were able to pick up the story of the three not pregnant girls pretty easily, they would have to put actual effort into figuring out where to go with Emily's departure. They obviously weren't willing to do that, but neither were they willing to endure another barrage of angry mail from loyal tweens who loved watching the struggle of the underprivilaged underdog. So it was that Jordan Randall was concieved and, in hopes that none of the viewers would miss any of the genuine characteristics that made them want Emily, the writing team enhanced the superficial characteristics that make the fourth girl the underdog. While Emily was a struggling teen of a single mom whose father had left her, Jordan is a foster child who's been raised in the system. Whereas Emily lived in a crappy apartment and didn't have her own room, Jordan has to sleep in a tent. Where Emily's eastern European roots and humble income place her in the realm of white trash, Jordan is (gasp!) black. In every stupid way one could imagine, Jordan is the new and embellished token underdog character. I was disappointed that they could so easily throw away such a significant character. I see with this new girl just how significant they found her to be. It makes me wish they hadn't bothered coming back.
But...some of my best friends...
I, like the rest of the liberal world, tend to roll my eyes when a person reputed to be an antisemite claims that some of his best friends are Jewish or a supposed racist pulls his black friend to the forefront to quash those accusations. It's perfectly possible, we agree, to have bigoted ideas and still be able to spend time with the people with whom one would associate those ideas. Cognitive dissonance plays a huge role in a culture full of people who scream about how this country was founded on religious freedom one minute and protest the building of a mosque the next, who abhor sloth and find it difficult to get out of bed, and I'm inclined be among those people who thinks they can have their cake and eat it too, hold onto old values and still consider myself to be liberally inclined. Sometimes I get angry that so much of the world, or at least the country, disagrees with me.
I keep hearing from everywhere I turn about how this is the most divided America has been in so many years. I wonder if it was this divided right after the ratification of the Constitution or right before the first state seceded, but I have to admit, things seem pretty nasty. In social politics, certainly, it's become a time to pick sides on many issues. One such issue is same-sex marriage, which the left likes to call "equality" and the right likes to call "an abomination that will send our country spiralling straight into hell. Like many other hot-button issues, one's position on this one is taken as an implication of greater matters. Thus, the assumption arises that because I'm not in favor of same-sex marriage, I am in favor of bigotry, discrimination and abuse, while I'm against tolerance, equality and love. The fact that I am disagree with a position that would be advantageous to a particular group somehow dictates how I feel toward that particular group, namely, that I hate them. I find this particularly problematic on the issue of same-sex marriage because, as the title suggests, my very best friend is gay. In fact, a lot of dear friends of mine happen to be gay (It's kind of hard to avoid them in musical theatre) and, not surprisingly, on the other side of this issue. I know that they want to get married to the spouses of their choosing, have that marriage validated from state to state, and not have to worry about ambiguity in matters of custody or inheritance just because their relationships don't fit under the convenient legal umbrella of marriage. I know that not having marriage as an option for their convenience is a disadvantage to them and I still put myself on the other side of the line. Do I not understand what's at stake? Have I been too much brainwashed by conservative upbringing? Or have I just decieved myself in assuming that I feel genuine regard for them?
I have a friend who's obviously a conservative republican, which I only know based on her facebook posts. I haven't discussed her political leanings with her largely because I'm not sure if our friendship would survive it unscathed. How, I wonder, can the person who went out of her way to take me home for months before she even knew me and never asked for anything in return be the same person who thinks that programs geared at helping the poor enslave them? How can I find myself having so much fun with a person who spews venom at the democratic party and champions measures that effectively disenfranchise people like me? Maybe we have no business being friends. On the other hand, maybe our ability to be friends despite our differences offers hope that society doesn't have to mark its history based on division. I came close to fighting with my sister over who deserved favor on a tv show. I considered my pick (the one most like me) to be the obvious victor and the other girl to be a shameless appeal to a lesser audience. My sister considered my pick to be overrated and the other girl to be more generally appealing. Does it follow that my sister is lesser than I, or that she's somehow unable to appreciate me based on the fact that I have qualities in common with the character she doesn't like? Perhaps. Perhaps it demonstrates that our relationship transcends the qualities that she finds so irritating that are to be found in both my character and me. When Kirk Cameron appeared on Piers Morgan Tonight, every gay and gay sympathizer I knew was up in arms over what they took to be malicious remarks and commented on the bigotry of statements to which I could largely relate? Do these friends see me as a bigot? I doubt it.
In the recent times, people have found the freedom to be honest, and therefore reveal the vast difference of opinion from one person to the other. Traditions vary, sentiments, perspective. Like the ever-expanding universe, the variety of positions has multiplied to the point that it's impossible to agree with them all. I find it equally impossible to hate all those that oppose me. There are deal breakers and there are trifles and there are the matters in between that don't have to be one or the other. I often find myself attatched to those whose charts don't entirely match up with mine. Betimes I'm annoyed by, angry with, or disappointed in my bestie or my sister or my conservative republican friend, but that doesn't diminish my affection or my appreciation for them. Isn't that what friendship is? Understanding that the qualities I find problematic aren't as big as the qualities that I find endearing? Isn't tolerance embracing the truth that how often another person is at odds with you has no bearing on the humanity of that person?
This is, I admit, partially a personal appeal to escape the labels I find so abhorrant. However, I seek to escape them because they don't fit me. There is so much more to this life than "us" and "them","allies" and "enemies". The world is characterized as much by its in-betweens as it is by its absolutes. I like to consider myself the former.
I keep hearing from everywhere I turn about how this is the most divided America has been in so many years. I wonder if it was this divided right after the ratification of the Constitution or right before the first state seceded, but I have to admit, things seem pretty nasty. In social politics, certainly, it's become a time to pick sides on many issues. One such issue is same-sex marriage, which the left likes to call "equality" and the right likes to call "an abomination that will send our country spiralling straight into hell. Like many other hot-button issues, one's position on this one is taken as an implication of greater matters. Thus, the assumption arises that because I'm not in favor of same-sex marriage, I am in favor of bigotry, discrimination and abuse, while I'm against tolerance, equality and love. The fact that I am disagree with a position that would be advantageous to a particular group somehow dictates how I feel toward that particular group, namely, that I hate them. I find this particularly problematic on the issue of same-sex marriage because, as the title suggests, my very best friend is gay. In fact, a lot of dear friends of mine happen to be gay (It's kind of hard to avoid them in musical theatre) and, not surprisingly, on the other side of this issue. I know that they want to get married to the spouses of their choosing, have that marriage validated from state to state, and not have to worry about ambiguity in matters of custody or inheritance just because their relationships don't fit under the convenient legal umbrella of marriage. I know that not having marriage as an option for their convenience is a disadvantage to them and I still put myself on the other side of the line. Do I not understand what's at stake? Have I been too much brainwashed by conservative upbringing? Or have I just decieved myself in assuming that I feel genuine regard for them?
I have a friend who's obviously a conservative republican, which I only know based on her facebook posts. I haven't discussed her political leanings with her largely because I'm not sure if our friendship would survive it unscathed. How, I wonder, can the person who went out of her way to take me home for months before she even knew me and never asked for anything in return be the same person who thinks that programs geared at helping the poor enslave them? How can I find myself having so much fun with a person who spews venom at the democratic party and champions measures that effectively disenfranchise people like me? Maybe we have no business being friends. On the other hand, maybe our ability to be friends despite our differences offers hope that society doesn't have to mark its history based on division. I came close to fighting with my sister over who deserved favor on a tv show. I considered my pick (the one most like me) to be the obvious victor and the other girl to be a shameless appeal to a lesser audience. My sister considered my pick to be overrated and the other girl to be more generally appealing. Does it follow that my sister is lesser than I, or that she's somehow unable to appreciate me based on the fact that I have qualities in common with the character she doesn't like? Perhaps. Perhaps it demonstrates that our relationship transcends the qualities that she finds so irritating that are to be found in both my character and me. When Kirk Cameron appeared on Piers Morgan Tonight, every gay and gay sympathizer I knew was up in arms over what they took to be malicious remarks and commented on the bigotry of statements to which I could largely relate? Do these friends see me as a bigot? I doubt it.
In the recent times, people have found the freedom to be honest, and therefore reveal the vast difference of opinion from one person to the other. Traditions vary, sentiments, perspective. Like the ever-expanding universe, the variety of positions has multiplied to the point that it's impossible to agree with them all. I find it equally impossible to hate all those that oppose me. There are deal breakers and there are trifles and there are the matters in between that don't have to be one or the other. I often find myself attatched to those whose charts don't entirely match up with mine. Betimes I'm annoyed by, angry with, or disappointed in my bestie or my sister or my conservative republican friend, but that doesn't diminish my affection or my appreciation for them. Isn't that what friendship is? Understanding that the qualities I find problematic aren't as big as the qualities that I find endearing? Isn't tolerance embracing the truth that how often another person is at odds with you has no bearing on the humanity of that person?
This is, I admit, partially a personal appeal to escape the labels I find so abhorrant. However, I seek to escape them because they don't fit me. There is so much more to this life than "us" and "them","allies" and "enemies". The world is characterized as much by its in-betweens as it is by its absolutes. I like to consider myself the former.
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Idle Pains
I've had the tendency for several years now to get headaches in the beginnings of the summer. A few weeks after school lets out, I'll have occasions when the light hurts my eyes, I feel a subtle, but distinct pounding, and I don't feel like moving for fear I'll disrupt the equilibrium in my head and shake my brain too much. Drinking water doesn't help, sleeping just makes me less conscious of the pain ofr awhile, and medicine makes me queasy, so I end up doing a little of each for a day or so until it passes. This summer was different. I had a show to finish when I got out of school and some backstage work and some box office work and, by the middle of June, it occurred to me that I hadn't spent any days lounging around to wait for the pain to pass, even when I could. I had somehow missed my seasonal headache.
I got home today (well, yesterday) around half past six after having just barely gotten out of the house before noon for the first time this week and having only a slightly more productive day than the previous two. I realized that I was tired just from being up and about and, by seven, decided it would make more sense to lie down and recoup some energy than try to keep going. I woke up a good three hours later with a whopping headache. Instead of calling it a day, I decided to get a bottle of water and go for a midnight stroll. When I came home an hour and a half later, both my head and the rest of me were feeling demonstrably better. Cautious though I am about getting to used to late nights, I went ahead and stayed up. I'm comfortably sleepy and a little hungry, but nothing hurts. It may be that not doing anything was the reason behind my pain all along. When a leg falls asleep, it's from lack of circulation. The mind needs to keep going. It feels so much better to do something and have done something than it does to wait for things to pass. Exercise gives you endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Progress makes me happier.
I got home today (well, yesterday) around half past six after having just barely gotten out of the house before noon for the first time this week and having only a slightly more productive day than the previous two. I realized that I was tired just from being up and about and, by seven, decided it would make more sense to lie down and recoup some energy than try to keep going. I woke up a good three hours later with a whopping headache. Instead of calling it a day, I decided to get a bottle of water and go for a midnight stroll. When I came home an hour and a half later, both my head and the rest of me were feeling demonstrably better. Cautious though I am about getting to used to late nights, I went ahead and stayed up. I'm comfortably sleepy and a little hungry, but nothing hurts. It may be that not doing anything was the reason behind my pain all along. When a leg falls asleep, it's from lack of circulation. The mind needs to keep going. It feels so much better to do something and have done something than it does to wait for things to pass. Exercise gives you endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Progress makes me happier.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
I has a tummy ache.
Today is ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, and I have been inspired by my inability to control myself heretofore to give up sweet tea for forty days. In honor of my resolution, I began celebrating Mardi Gras last weekend gorging myself to the conception of several food babies by consuming gallons of sweet tea and other gras things. I indulged in brownies and ice cream, cookies and burgers, and one kickass salad with losts of bacon with the knowledge that, beginning today, I would have to restrain myself. My first concrete recognition of Mardi Gras in many years has opened my eyes to two realities: first, that few people who choose to play on Mardi Gras follow through with Ash Wednesday and 2) Eating crap for four days does not feel good.
The logic of Mardi Gras was first supported by the notion that observers of Lent would have to do without certain pleasures for forty days and should get them in while they still could. Eat all of the meat before it spoils. Drink all the beer before it separates. Have all the sex before the chastity belts get fastened. The gorging was motivated by an imperative to indulge. Eventually, however, one is motivated to take part in the holy time by an imperative to stop. I realized by the time the actual day of fat came that I was a bit over it. I didn't want any more sweet tea, any more sweet anything, really, and only continued out of a sense of obligation and a resolve that I would discipline myself on the morrow. By the time I got home to partake of my last indulgence, I had to force myself to consume my yummy brownie and cup of ice cream. Now that time is over and, although my bladder full of sweet tea was the only real motivation I had for getting up this morning, I'm glad of it. The Mardi Gras tactic is much like the parent's decision to make a child smpke a pack of cigarettes after trying one. At some point, you realize that gorging is disgusting and you don't want to do it anymore. After that last piece of cake, you prefer restraint to immoderation. That's where I am right now. I hope it lasts.
The logic of Mardi Gras was first supported by the notion that observers of Lent would have to do without certain pleasures for forty days and should get them in while they still could. Eat all of the meat before it spoils. Drink all the beer before it separates. Have all the sex before the chastity belts get fastened. The gorging was motivated by an imperative to indulge. Eventually, however, one is motivated to take part in the holy time by an imperative to stop. I realized by the time the actual day of fat came that I was a bit over it. I didn't want any more sweet tea, any more sweet anything, really, and only continued out of a sense of obligation and a resolve that I would discipline myself on the morrow. By the time I got home to partake of my last indulgence, I had to force myself to consume my yummy brownie and cup of ice cream. Now that time is over and, although my bladder full of sweet tea was the only real motivation I had for getting up this morning, I'm glad of it. The Mardi Gras tactic is much like the parent's decision to make a child smpke a pack of cigarettes after trying one. At some point, you realize that gorging is disgusting and you don't want to do it anymore. After that last piece of cake, you prefer restraint to immoderation. That's where I am right now. I hope it lasts.
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