Strange and Beautiful

My friend's first child was born tonight. She is a perfect soft pink bundle of limbs and cries and is strange and beautiful in the way that only new life can be. I watched with her grandparents as she was measured and prodded and wiped and swaddled. Her first moments taking place under shocking bright lights while her father stood in hospital scrubs and held her tiny hand and tried to comfort her with the gentle touch of his soft, wrinkled fingers skimming her fuzzy little head.

He is a feminist filmmaker, former member of an otherwise all girl punk band, and has been married to this tiny person's mother for 14 years. He was made to be the father to a daughter. He will be amazing at it. She will feel empowered and supported and have a unique confidence in her interactions with men that will come from the perfect security she will always know in the love of her father.

I'm incredibly happy for him and for his wife. I am in awe. I am shaken. I am joyful.

_____________

It is strange to find in myself conscious thought about something I normally don't question. But I cannot help but think about this now. Today. In this moment.

I will never be a parent. No one will ever call me mama. My uterus will always go unused, never fulfilling its biological purpose. This strange organ that can make life, can create a dizzying miracle, will labor through only the motions of it's cycle until it gives even that up altogether.

I have chosen this, so I have no justification for this odd moment of inner conflict. After 20 years of being sexually active and having never so much as a scare, I may not be able to conceive - this potential for anything else may only be an illusion to me, a sorrow I will never truly have to confront. But I had a harrowing childhood. A childhood of hurt and hollow and scars that never completely go away. The kind of childhood that seems a bit like a gothic novel or a horror story when I forget to forget it. And I have struggled in my own relationships with the several parents that have been a part of my life, and watched their struggles with the children they have raised. So by the time I was ten years of age, I had decided. I could never be a parent.

My whole life people have told me how good I would be as a mother. But the truth is I'm scattered and fragile and always rushing to catch up and never financially stable enough, never grown up enough, have never become the person I would want to be in order to have a child. And if I want to be really honest with myself, brutally honest, the men in my life have always been scattered and fragile and rushing to catch up and never financially stable enough, never grown up enough... or if they were? They didn't want a child with me.

In some quiet part of myself I imagine a version of me who is like my grandmother. She was short like me and sharp like me and gregarious like I sometimes can be. I adored her. She had one girl and five strapping boys. Clever, varied, driven, interesting men. Men who, like me, adored her but also felt like she was their friend, their ally. Men who made something of themselves. She was a force of nature and I always felt as if she willed them into full lives. I imagine that if I'd taken a different path, maybe I'd have been like her. Surrounded by sons. I'd have been good at it, I think. Wise and loving and a little bit stern and a little bit crazy. Good at holding them and good at letting them go, which seems like the trick with raising boys. And I would have been. I think. Good at it. This other me I never turned into. Never found the right man or the right moment or enough healing or enough security to let myself find out.

I was engaged years ago to a man who had a son, a wonderful man who wasn't ultimately the right man for me (both of us too scattered), and his son started to call me "mom" (His "other mom"). We bonded. We were close. I kept up with his son for a long while after I had to leave that relationship behind, but I would mourn every time I had to say goodbye to him. I would babysit him or even just run into the boy in the street with his mother - also my friend - and whenever he left I would cry like the wound was new. It was like that for years. This hollow awful ache I never expected I could feel. Didn't let myself think I might have the capacity for. A kind of broken heart I'd never before experienced, never imagined.

So I have chosen this. I know that. I think it's the right decision. I'm remarkably strong for someone who has been through so much but I would never take the risk that I'm not strong enough or healed enough to hold it together for a child. My mother took that risk with me. It didn't turn out well. I won't make the same mistake. Most days life is hard enough as it is. Recovering from so much death in the past several years. Trying to make my life stable enough just to sustain the long term romantic relationship I am in. Finding ways to fulfill my need to create art and trying to do something with my life. Some days I find even pet ownership to be a challenge. And I have (yes, if you've been around long enough, you'll know this) bunnies. Not typically considered a high stress pet.

So I'm doing the right thing. I know this. But on a day like today it hits me deep in my gut and twists a little. In there under the happiness. That I am feeling. God I am. But I need a few minutes tonight to exorcise this. To acknowledge it. That this little kernel of regret lives somewhere deep in me.

Most days impossible to find at all.

_________________

My friend has wanted to be two things in life. His whole life. A husband and a father. And he has been a husband since his very early twenties, but in many ways he was her husband before that. He knew he would never let his wife go from the moment he first kissed her roughly 17 years ago. Being the best husband and partner he could be has been his great goal in life and he's wonderful at it. He worships her still. When he plays guitar he inevitably sings to her, even if she's in another room. Even when he doesn't realize it he turns toward her so she can hear his voice. He cannot help it. His love for her is a part of everything in him. It is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.

So I know how completely and perfectly this girl will be loved. And how fortunate she is to be born into the midst of this great love that is already there. She is so wanted. That is the best thing a child can have. She will have the devotion of two clever, creative, amazing people who are ready and prepared to give her everything. I'm excited to be around for it. To watch as it begins.

A few hours ago a new life came out of my friend's wife (who, I should say, is also my very dear friend). This is amazing to me.

I am feeling a lot of things tonight but more than anything, I am joyful. I am shaken. I am in awe.

Privacy

I know I haven't posted regularly in a long time. At first it was the grief. My world turned upside down and I couldn't do this, or much of anything, with any reliability.

But I've really just realized the other thing that happened and took this away from me. I started writing because I was unhappy with the blogs out there that aimed at being for women and feminist but were either bitchy or pedantic and insulting. I know a lot of amazing female bloggers, but they had their own things they were writing about. Feminism and the female voice wasn't their focus. So for a while, it was mine.

I wanted to anonymously share my experiences with rape, weight loss, self-image, relationships, medical emergencies, traumatic loss, and violent crime so that others - strangers - could hopefully get something out of what I was experiencing or had experienced. These were private things, intensely personal things, but things so many people cope with and that I felt talking about could be beneficial. At the very least, for me.

I shared my blog with some friends. A few people I knew. I chose them carefully. The ones I did not mind having access to this personal voice. These conversations I was having with myself.

I made friends with some amazing people online who were also, in essence, anonymous to me. People I had not met in person but whose writing I admired and who were supportive of me and seemed to understand what I was doing and why I was doing it.

I went through breakups. Significant others now seemed off the table as topics so I wouldn't offend or hurt men I had loved who might come here on a down day and, unhealthily, look to see what I was writing. I couldn't do that to them.

A few people I knew personally found the blog. It was an adjustment, but I came to terms with it and it wasn't anyone I couldn't handle knowing these things about me. But it stifled my voice more, made me more hesitant to share. Because I hadn't chosen them as an audience.

Then a stranger here in town who knows my full name and has vague connections to me through mutual friends (but who I had never met) found the blog. He now follows all my public online accounts. He seems like a nice guy. But we don't know each other. And he has read these deeply personal things about me and then shown up to see me and said hello to me in public places because, naturally, he feels he knows me. Like I said, he seems nice. He always has. He even explained how he found me and even offered tips for making my blog more anonymous and to help prevent being located the way he ran across me. But I don't know him.

And that was really it for me. Because these windows into my life weren't written for strangers here in my home town who have no connection to the issues I'm discussing and are just curious about me. And what I could talk about became so limited once I grew concerned about so many other people. I was never the point. Shared feeling and thought was. Being able to have other women who were about to have a biopsy on their uterus search and find my post and know what to expect and how it felt and that they were going to be okay. Sharing what I had learned, what I thought might help, with other people who experienced traumatic loss in a way that made the national news. And talking to other women and men about how feminists aren't one kind of person. Aren't even just women. And that hating men OR sharing tips on how to tell if your guy is cheating were not constructive ways to be a community.

So I miss writing. But I don't want to share my feelings with strangers who live where I live and know my name. And I don't want to edit myself for a growing number of people who actually do know me and could be effected by what I write. I'm trying to decide if I should make this password protected - which defeats my desire to share my feelings with other people outside my life who have similar experiences - or if I should start a new blog somewhere. I don't know. Those of you who have stayed in touch and have always been supportive - I will let you know what I end up doing.

I got tired of not saying this. And no longer being able to write what I really thought. That's all.

Creation

I always understood that Carrie Fisher quote, “I don’t want life to imitate art. I want life to BE art.” I did want that. I often do.

I draw. And paint. And act, write, sculpt, sing, direct, photograph, model, cook, cater, sew, design, perform and am an amateur makeup artist.

I do a lot of things. Or I CAN. I am able to do many things.

After my teenage years and up until about 5 years ago, I rarely created anything. I was afraid. Afraid the things I made would not be good enough. Uncertain what the value of anything that I created might be. If it was something funny or silly or frivolous, it didn't seem to have enough meaning. If I tried to write or paint something serious, it seemed too self-important.

I was made of doubt. So I created little. And kept even less.

I began acting again 5 years ago. By accident really. Anyone who has spent time with a community theater will understand that one day I was helping a friend out by stage managing her play and a few months later I was on stage, in costume for the next production, looking around and wondering how the heck I got there.

The acting community led to other things. And slowly I found myself surrounded by people who make art. Play music, paint pictures, film movies, put on comedy shows... Crazy people. Wonderful people. People brave enough to create. People who don't seem to be frozen by the doubt that haunts me.

A friend I made recently brought this into sharp focus for me. He creates constantly. He is a newspaper columnist, an independent filmmaker, a talented photographer, a natural comedian, and a very capable musician - and he does one or another of these things all of the time. No day goes past without him creating something. Being near this consistent creative force feels strange and wonderful and a little intimidating. But the biggest lesson to me has been the experience of watching someone who doesn't hesitate. Doesn't pull back from trying because he is uncertain if each thing he does will be perfect. He produces work and shares ideas and makes something every single day. It floors me. He is so talented. But also so brave.

I'm still afraid. But I'm slowly starting to draw and write again. Those were the things that came first. When I was too young to understand that directing a play or designing a burlesque costume were things a person COULD do, I was drawing pictures and writing things down. And I am trying new things. And I am learning to have faith.

It took me so long to figure out that part of the beauty is in the creating itself. So many things live inside me. If I start now and I try to get them out of me, making something each and every day, I will never finish. I will never run out. And not everything I make will be good. It won't be beautiful or have value to everyone who sees it. And that's okay. Even if I only make things for myself, these things are evidence of a life lived, of days spent not in fear or self-doubt but instead actively engaged in the act of creating.

I want the art of my life to be in the making of things and expression of ideas and the sharing of joy and experience. I want to actually do all the many things I am able to do.

I want to be brave, too.

In My Mind

The longer I live, the more I realize how little I know.

I look back at old entries on here and am struck by how much I have changed in five years. How wrong I was about some things, how far some of my ways of thinking have shifted. I wasn't a teenager when I started writing here. I was 30. And even still, my view of the world has altered. The self that I am now is far less convinced she has anything to teach anyone else. I'm a work in progress. There is so much I do not know.

A long time ago I wrote a list of qualities I wanted, a post about the Woman I Want To Be. It was a long list. It had somewhere in the neighborhood of 30 items on it. The woman I am now has accomplished some of these things (I have adventurous hair. I pay my bills on time. I am more patient. I travel a great deal more...)

But my priorities have shifted.

And my goals have become simpler.

I want to be kind.

I want to learn to be content.

I want to be good at sharing my life with someone.

I want creating to be a part of my daily life.

The rest will figure itself out. Or it won't. But the stress I have created within myself to meet some vague ideal had never been fulfilling or fruitful. The constraints I have put on myself because of my own fears or my need to fit into some image of perfect that I assumed other people had... they have taken me nowhere.

At the rate I am going I may just be completely self-aware and centered and actualized by the time I'm 70. I think I'm kind of okay. At 70? Clearly I will be freaking awesome.

Some part of me wants to remove old entries. Erase foolishness, broad proclamations, a tone that implies a high opinion of my own knowledge and understanding of the world... But it's all a part of the journey, right? I keep running headfirst into the world (or, to be fair, sometimes the world runs headfirst into me) and getting battered and bruised and coming back thinking, "That hurt like hell. But I learned something." Which is good.

Even when what I learn is that I know so little.

That's okay, too.

___________________________


When I'm struggling with it, listening to this gets me right on track.

It's the funniest thing, because I don't think the person I was 5 years ago would have appreciated this song in NEARLY the same way.

"It's funny how I imagined
That I could win this win-less fight
Maybe it isn't all that funny
That I've been fighting all my life
But maybe I have to think it's funny
If I want to live before I die
And maybe it's funniest of all
To think I'll die before I actually see
That I am exactly the person that I want to be."

– Amanda Palmer


Yes.

Crossing Paths

In the past few weeks I've made new friends. People who live all over the world - in four different countries - as well as a few new ones here in the states. It's been a long time since I've met new people I have a sudden and strong connection with. I had begun to think I'd outgrown the ability to make such quick, almost instinctual bonds with people - grown too cynical to allow myself to have faith in a stranger, to grow attached to someone new.

When you've lost many people who are close to you, caring can become a risky proposition. Allowing yourself to become very attached to anyone new seems unnecessarily reckless. Every person you let yourself love is another person you will lose. Funny how I remember the fears I had as a teenager - to grow attached was to risk that someone else would hurt me by rejecting me. Now I simply worry about those I love being safe, being well. For the past few years to add to that burden was unthinkable.

I attended a work conference last week. I had made a few connections via online networking in advance, so I was looking for a few faces that might register or be vaguely familiar after gazing at the icon that had represented them to me for the month preceding my trip. Perhaps there is a kinship to working in a similar field, but I also think sometimes you just know a kindred spirit right away (how very Anne Shirley of me, no?). The first night there I introduced myself to a few strangers, had drinks in the hotel bar, passed time as one does when far from home and surrounded by unfamiliar people. Then one of the people I'd had brief contact with online showed up. Our brief exchange online had left me expecting someone with a sense of humor not unlike my own, a sharp mind, someone I was likely to get along with. Perhaps it was seeing anything familiar after a lonely afternoon, but as I introduced him to the group I had gathered with in the bar there was this immediate feeling of comfort. My introduction read so clearly as, "This is my friend."

Some of my reaction to the people I met is, certainly, that I was fortunate enough to meet some genuinely special people. I am delighted to be keeping in touch with several people I met there and feel an increasing sense of community as we maintain contact. But it was also a striking and much needed reminder that I am not done. The world is still huge and full of interesting and wonderful people. I am not too old, too damaged, too cynical to make a new friend. To care about people who hadn't existed for me just days prior.

The week involved listening to a great many speakers, trying to soak up far more information than I feel I could ever manage in just a few days and being exposed to so many new ideas. The first morning I walked into a conference room filled primarily with strangers and sat down next to an old friend. Who I had met the night before.

Holding My Breath

My friend's husband is a Mexican citizen. They are truly in love. They were married in Mexico City almost a year ago. It was joyous. His family loves her. She is so happy with him, she glows. With him, it's like she has found the security and support she has always needed in order to fully be herself, trust herself, accept herself. He is kind and has a generous heart. He is playful with her and has such unwavering faith in her. I love watching them together. They give me hope.

I wrote a letter of support for her petition for him to come to the U.S. while they go through the process of applying for his citizenship.

I know there are people who marry just for a green card. My friends are not those people. I know that immigration is a complex issue with a fraught history and much animosity on both ends of the argument. My friends aren't making any kind of statement.

They are just in love. They want to build a life together. A life where they can live and work in the same country. A life where the people around them love and accept both of them. They want to have a family (maybe not as soon as his grandmother thinks they should have a family, but eventually - a family!) and a future.

She would move there, but the two of them together in Mexico cannot earn a fraction of what either of them alone could earn here. And his family lives in Mexico City - where it is notoriously overcrowded and incredibly dangerous. If they were to raise their family there, they would share a three bedroom home with his parents, his two adult sisters and their two children. And, like his sister's children, my friend's children would play in a small concrete courtyard with a locked gate to ensure their safety in such a dangerous city. So she is here, away from him. Working in the States, to pay for lawyers, so that someday the two of them can have a life here together.

We all know this - but in the U.S. we take for granted the wealth we are born with. I grew up with very little, but the poverty I was born in is nothing like the poverty they endure in other nations. I thought I understood what an overcrowded city meant until I visited Mexico City and saw the people packed like sardines into bus taxis to get to their jobs, the number of people who share a home - and only one bathroom - in even a middle class environment. There are so many people, there is no escape from it - 24 hours a day you have people around you. Huge crowds in the streets, even at home every bed is a shared space. It's overwhelming. I had no idea.

I think that when we discuss immigration, it's easy for the argument to get focused on our resources and to forget the people involved. Families who are separated. People with no other reasonable choice than to seek shelter in a land that will not welcome them. So that they can make enough money to support their families. So that someday their children can play outside. If I was born in a country where the work I could get would not allow me to live in any comfort, where my children had to be locked in a courtyard in order to be safe, where I could not go out without an escort because I feared for my own safety - I wouldn't care whether it was legal that I travel to a neighboring country to live in safety.

I respect that my friends are doing this the right way, following all the proper legal channels. In spite of how painful it is for them to be apart. But my perspective on this issue is forever changed. I watch my friend working, living alone and missing her husband terribly and I am in awe of her patience. I watch her and catch my breath, knowing how she aches to have him home with her and how long they have been apart as they try to do the right thing.

Moments

My mother and I were addressing my little sister's commitment ceremony invites last week (sis isn't sure about marriage, especially when so many of her friends cannot yet legally marry in the states in which they live). We were missing an address, so I called my sister. My mother kept writing while she listened to me talking. I got the missing address from my sister and then read aloud the list of names to ensure that we hadn't missed anyone.

We get to a dear old friend of my sister's who I remember fondly. I last saw him a decade ago. Sis tells me he's met a great man and they're very happy. My mom hears me discuss this with her and I say, "His beau is a bear? That's SO perfect for him! I bet they are adorable together."

My mom asks me - very serious and in all innocence:
"Does that mean he's a plushie?"

She learned that word from my sister.

I hope mom makes some awkward incorrect reference to this during my sister's event. It would be suitable karmic retribution.

_________________________

My father (who is actually a pretty hip guy on the whole) recently read an article online about youth culture and modern slang. He thinks "I'm just saying." is hilarious. I told him some acronym based phrases that were not on the list he read ("OMG" and "bee-tee-dubs" - which is "BTW" pronounced out loud). But the phrase he CANNOT get over, the one that surprised and entertained him the most, was this:

"friends with benefits"

He keeps repeating it. And bringing it up in conversation. Because he thinks it is bizarre and is vastly entertained that people use that phrase.

It's like having a 7 year old hear a curse word. And they aren't used to it and only understand it to a certain degree but they KEEP SAYING IT.

It's horrifying. Makes me wish I could take his internet access away.

_________________________

I think this means we've come full circle in some odd way. Now I'm the one worried that they're learning words or phrases they shouldn't know and hoping they won't say them in front of the neighbors.

I bet they felt like this when my brother started belting out lines from Les Miserables' "Lovely Ladies" in the supermarket when he was 4. Or when I was 7 or 8 and they took all of us to a restaurant and I wanted to order my drink myself. I saucily demanded that the server put "a LOT of nicotine!" in my Shirley Temple.

(I thought I had the word "grenadine" figured out.)

This is like payback for those moments, isn't it?

Talking to People Who Aren't There

I tend to be a talkative person, but I have become less so as I have grown older. People don't really need to know so much about me. There are things we say to other people to make ourselves feel better, but that benefit them in no way. Some confessions, deep personal thoughts, difficult truths, messy personal histories... some are meant for few people to hear. Your closest friend, maybe a sister. But really, sometimes we just talk for ourselves and it serves no purpose. Sometimes our deepest feelings aren't meant to be shared. Getting to this has been a process. It took me a long time to learn to trust and to share information about myself or things that I felt with people. Then I had to turn around and learn when to stop. I'm still learning.

As I grow, sometimes I find myself "telling" someone something when they aren't there. The things I know I would be saying only for me, the things that are too hard to actually tell. I will picture the conversation I would have, that I might have about these things. I talk it through. I apologize. I tell the person who isn't there all the hard things they don't know, the complicated things I feel but can't say. Different people in my life, people who were once in my life, people I never got to say my piece to.

Sometimes I want to go stand outside somewhere and call things out. Like The Sound of Music meets Primal Scream therapy. Put me in a dress made out of curtains and set me on a mountaintop so I can give the universe hell for all the things I can never say aloud or realized too late. I can see myself - just screaming out sentences. Because the people who should hear them are gone. Or the time for it is past. Or because it would help me, not them.

It's like an exercise I do in my head...
finding the thing I wish I could say:

"I'm exhausted and sometimes this is too much."

"If I had it do over - I would press charges."

"I should never have left you and gotten on that plane."

"Grow up. See past yourself. Yes, I think you are selfish."

"Sometimes I want to protect you from the world. And yourself."

"You should have left her back then."

"No one believes anything you say anymore."

"Next to you is the safest I ever felt."

"I always loved you."

"Come back."

Things They Don't Write How-To Books For

I hope none of you are ever caught smack in the middle of a horrific tragedy that makes newspaper headlines. And if you are, then chances are it will only happen once.

I've had two happen in my life - roughly only a year apart (the second of the two was over a year ago now). I feel a bit like I have the lay of the land. I could write a book, but that's so time consuming. Instead I'm going to chronicle some of my thoughts here. You know, where it's messy and unorganized and will never get snag me an advance from a publisher. How's that for brains?

Actually, that's the first thing I learned:

1) Don't expect your brain to be fully present. Be prepared when it goes on hiatus for a bit. Don't feel dumb when you can't form complex sentences, but also - don't operate heavy machinery. Or try to balance your checkbook alone...

In fact, when you have survived a horrific tragedy, and everyone asks how they can help, here is the best advice I have for you: hand your checkbook or your debit card to your nearest, dearest and most trustworthy friend or relative. Give them your bills. Tell them to pay what is necessary and give you the remaining cash in increments. I'm not even kidding. You should not be trusted with money or expected to do math after a tragedy and NO ONE thinks about that. I still have no idea what I did with my May 2009 paycheck. I think I bought some food. And maybe clothing to wear to memorials. And... um... yeah. I got nothing. I have NO IDEA what I spent money on. I just didn't care. At all. I'm still trying to catch up on debts that were ignored and went unpaid during the first several months.

2) Buy a mild sedative (unless you are suffering from dangerous levels of depression). Take it at 9pm every night. I don't care how busy you are. You need rest and if you don't do this you are going to end up like me - awake at 1am on a weeknight making lists because you have forgotten how to sleep. It ain't pretty. I mean it. It's going to take years for the bags under my eyes to go away. Small birds could nest in the hollows beneath my eyes. The sleep deprivation does NOT help you regain brainpower. Take a pill. Get some sleep. Later, when you are ready to heal, you will stop taking them and start dreaming again and blah blah blah healing blah.

3) Even the nicest reporter is not your friend. Everything is on the record. I'm going to write a lengthy post about this at some point, but just remember - even a genuinely well-intentioned reporter (and they DO exist) may misquote you. If you speak to the media, do the following (even though you will sound like an idiot in person when you do this):

Think very carefully about exactly what you want to say.

Say very little.

Pause as long as you need to to come up with the shortest and least complex sentence possible.

Speak at a reasonably slow pace and speak clearly - they cannot quote what they cannot understand or, in some cases, write down (but they can more easily misquote it).

End the conversation as soon as you have said what it is most important to say, no matter what. Even if it means being rude and saying, "Thank you for continuing to respect our privacy" and then just walking off.

You can stop ANY time you feel like it.

An interview isn't a conversation. It feels like it, but do NOT forget that you aren't just talking to someone - you're giving them material. And MOST important - Accept that they WILL get some of it wrong anyway. Even if they mean well. Even if they WRITE it accurately, their editor may cut out half a paragraph that changes EVERYTHING. Be prepared for that.

4) If you choose NOT to talk to the media, you are choosing not to have your voice heard. That's okay. They're going to get it wrong to some degree no matter what. But you need to accept that if you choose not to speak to the press, then you are choosing to keep your point of view to yourself. So, when your perspective and feelings are not represented (or accurately represented) in the media coverage, you need to be ready for that and know that you made that choice. Sometimes NOT talking to the media is as bad as talking to them. You aren't betraying a dead friend if you speak to a reporter. If you knew them better than anyone else, you're probably the person who wants to talk to the press the LEAST. You may, however, also be the best person to describe what your lost loved one was actually like. You may sit at home pissed off while people who did NOT know your friend that well are talking to the press. Neither choice is right. Neither choice is going to make things okay. Even the best news story is not very comforting. But recognize that whether or not you speak to the media - you are making a choice and you need to be ready for what that choice means.

5) There is no wrong reaction. The hardest thing to do sometimes is to figure what you need. What you actually want. If someone you love has died in the tragedy in question, then nothing is going to make that feel better. Except maybe time. Everyone has unique needs and one of the hardest things is seeing what you have to or need to do and accepting that. Conversely, if a lot of other people in your life who are effected by the tragedy - realize that they may have needs and reactions that you do not understand. Their reactions are valid, too. Even if they're weird or irritating. If they bother you, put some distance there, but don't punish other people who are also suffering for their reactions. Vent to a third party but it is important to get through difficult times without increasing someone else's suffering. This is the case with ALL tragedy, but it is magnified when there is media scrutiny. You start to feel like your emotions are supposed to fit some set course - because it's so public and others are SO aware of what is going on. It increases the pressure to "act normal" in a situation where there IS NO NORMAL. So just know that that is okay. You don't have to experience or cope with this in any particular way. Do what you need to do.

Honestly, if a large group of people are experiencing the same loss - the part about trying not to increase other people's suffering at all is dang near impossible. But try. When people are reacting to trauma they all have different needs. Be there for the people you love, but also locate some friends or family who are NOT sharing your loss. I don't care if you have to call someone you haven't talked to in ten years. I guess that would be #6...

6) Have at LEAST one person (preferably more) in your life who has not experienced the same trauma. Sounds easy, right? Well - depends on the scope of the trauma. But seriously - FIND someone. Like actually designate them. Let them KNOW. You are going to need to have someone around or someone you can call who has not ALSO just experienced this devastating loss. It took me forever to figure that out. You can't just lean on people who are also in the middle of healing and you need people you can trust - because acquaintances are not the best people to depend on when someone you love is in the news.

People can be surprisingly odd and unintentionally callous when, instead of just dealing with, "Oh your friend died, that's terrible." they are dealing with, "Your friend died and it's on the national news and the camera crews were right down the street from where I work and..." Yeah. Choose carefully, but find a non-trauma buddy. Someone who isn't excited about the fact that the newspaper reporter wants to interview you. If you stick with fellow survivors, then not everyone's needs will get met and some damage can be done. When massive, bizarre, life altering tragedy strikes - try to find at least one person to stand by you who isn't a fellow "victim." Even if that person is your awesome new therapist (**I HIGHLY recommend finding a good therapist!).

7) When you can, define your situation for the people outside your trauma. Basically, provide "Clif notes" to them. This is actually a good rule when dealing with a lot of types of tragedy - not just news-story horrific level stuff. But... remember that not everyone who matters to you is going to "get" it. And their ability to understand the level of impact the trauma has had on you does NOT mean they are a bad person or that they do not love you. Maybe they aren't imaginative. Maybe they've never experienced any sort of trauma. Maybe they are just human and have bad crap happening to them, too - smaller stuff than in your world, maybe - but still damn big in their world.

I learned to tell people in my life things along the lines of, "I am not okay. I may look okay and act okay sometimes, but I'm not really okay yet. I may not be okay for a long time. This _________ is what happened to me - in practical terms, that is what I experienced. That's a lot to process. I need you to try to remember that I'm always thinking about that, too. Don't give me a free pass to be a jerk or anything. But just be aware that that is part of what is happening inside me. All the time. So if I forget things or I don't reach out a lot - It's not that I don't care. It's that I'm still healing and I have a lot to work through."

It kind of feels like having to explain to the people you love that you were fully functional, but now part of your brain is gone. And you're sorry. And you don't actually know if it's going to come back.

But the things is, they DON'T KNOW unless you tell them. You may be really lucky and be surrounded by people who are incredibly empathetic and just pick up what's going on with you easy as can be. But this is the real world, so I'm thinking that's unlikely. If you talk to the people you love, even in the most rudimentary way, about where you are at and what you are still working through - that gives them some perspective and reminds them that you DO still love and need them. You just don't have complete access to your brain right now.

8. If you can, find ways to laugh. At least try. Again, good advice in all traumatic situations, but more so if it's something SO outside of normal experience (violent act, natural disaster, freak accident) that you have to process both the loss AND a horrific foreign experience. If someone has died, find someone else who knew them who will talk with you about the funny, stupid or weird things about your lost loved one - not just the simple, nice stuff. ESCAPE by watching a funny movie. DO something completely silly. One night shortly after the shooting, a bunch of my friends came over to my house and one of the guys - a big, butch guy's guy in the group - shows up with a hair highlighting kit. He let us highlight his hair. He was walking around with this silly cap on and strands of hair sticking out everywhere and, while my heart was so heavy, it made me see that there would be good again and there would be laughter again. It reminded me that the friend I had lost would want me to be able to smile - and would be laughing himself if he saw this big tough guy with a women's hair processing kit being used on his head (this man is one of my personal heroes).

Finding ANY joy and ANY normalcy kept me from losing my mind. When the world feels like it makes NO sense, the best thing you can do for yourself is find anything at all to laugh about. Or help someone else heal by giving them something to laugh about.

_________________________

These are the basics as I see them right now. I'm sure I will think of other things. Hindsight is 20/20. I think it was oddly helpful to me and the friends I went through the second tragedy with that I had had some previous experience with trauma in a public arena. I was better prepared for the media. I was more acclimated to the whole idea that terrible things actually happen to real people. On the whole, the big trick is to allow yourself to slow down. Take things one at a time. Don't rush any decisions that you don't have to. I know you don't have much choice about funeral arrangements. When you are involved in the memorial, those things have to be done. So you do them. But everything else can wait. And that's okay.

And last but not least - I hope no one I know ever needs any of this advice. If nothing else, though - rules 3 and 4 are really good to keep in mind during all media interaction.

Just in case, btw - to reiterate - I realize many of you put two and two together and will know which tragedies I am speaking of - which is fine. I just don't want this post or my blog linked to or mentioned in conjunction with anything that identifies my friends or the incidents in question. I hope my own awful experiences can be helpful to others, so I certainly want the advice or ideas passed on, but I don't want media-circus-gawker traffic. I appreciate your consideration.

Hand Dancing

I am almost done with my next post (trying to blog on the regular these days!) but for today I just want to share this:



BECAUSE IT'S SO AWESOME!

Jeremy Irons

Totally at random, I found this wonderful entry at "The Selvedge Yard" about the style of Jeremy Irons.

While I realize that he was styled for practically every shot used in this entry on him as a style icon, and I tend to be more fascinated with the style of people like - for example - Marlene Dietrich (who was fastidiously in control of every aspect of her own presentation at all times) because THEY are the person creating the style and selecting the clothing...

God, Jeremy Irons just knows how to wear clothing, doesn't he? There is something fabulous about how he wears the clothes... about how he wears HIS BODY, at all times.



I actually held onto all the ads he did for Donna Karan.
Another thing to dig out from my vaults.

Vanity Fair's Proust Questionnaire Revisited

As I mentioned yesterday, I've wrote my original post regarding Vanity Fair’s Proust Questionnaire a while ago.

Then I answered it here.

But that was four years ago. A lot has happened in four years. So I've been working on doing it again. As a little exercise. Just to see how much I've changed.

As I said before, the trick is to answer honestly with yourself - not trying to impress your potential reader. I actually also keep a file of these from old issues of Vanity Fair, so I'm thinking I may pull some of them out and scan them in to share in the coming months. I love reading what Tom Waits and Edward Gorey and Shirley MacLaine had to say. It's fascinating to me.

The Questionnaire:

What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Freedom from material worry ...and living in an enormous house surrounded by the people I love.

What is your greatest fear?
To die without having done everything

What historical figure do you most identify with?
I'm not sure I identify with anyone

Which living person do you most admire?
Tom Waits

What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
my need to be liked

What trait do you most deplore in others?
Pretension... and being quick to judge

What is your greatest extravagance?
Time. When I let myself have any.

On what occasion do you lie?
To protect someone

What do you most dislike about your appearance?
My size... I'm not big, but I yearn to be tiny.

What is your favorite journey?
from knowing nothing about someone to knowing everything

What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
stoicism... and chastity

Which living person do you most despise?
Glenn Beck

Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
"Awesome." "I'm sorry."

What is your greatest regret?
the time I didn't spend with the loved ones who are now gone

What or who is the greatest love of your life?
Until now... the man who climbed Mount Desert Island with me and caught me when I fell coming back down...

But my life isn't over yet. And I have hope.

When and where were you happiest?
In a hotel room in Boston watching someone sleep roughly a decade ago

In Western Australia, driving to see my Aunt and Uncle in Perth with my fantastic, absurd, brilliant 18 year old Aussie cousin who is like my long-lost brother and realizing I was somewhere I belonged.

Which talent would you most like to have?
To be a tremendous athlete and dancer

What is your current state of mind?
ready

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
I would be more athletic and more motivated.

If you could change one thing about your family, what would it be?
Christmas

If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what would it be?
probably a worried little hen. Or a bear.

If you could choose what or who to come back as, what would it be?
A great dancer

What do your consider your greatest achievement?
The lives I have had a positive impact on

What is your most treasured possession?
My grandmother's engagement ring

What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?
Witnessing the death of a friend or loved one who is not yet old

What is your most marked characteristic?
my red hair, my (almost compulsive) need for everyone to be happy and safe and okay

What is the quality you most like in a man?
decisiveness, honor, kindness

What is the quality you most admire in a woman?
warmth, confidence, kindness

What do you most value in your friends?
loyalty, a lack of judgment, acceptance

Who are your favourite writers?
A.A. Milne, Tom Robbins, Terry Pratchett, Harlan Ellison, Jane Austen, Cormac McCarthy

Who is your favourite hero of fiction?
Jamie Fraser
(Go ahead, make fun. I don't care.)

Who are your heroes in real life?
One of my friends who died last year - she ran toward danger when every other person was running away. I hope to have that strength of character in my life in the moments when I have no time to think about my choices.

What are your favourite names?
Christopher, Grace, Gabriel, Michael, Dougal, Colin, Lorelei...

What is it that you most dislike?
getting out of bed on a rainy morning, yelling of any sort

How would you like to die?
Many decades from now, in the arms of someone who loves me

What is your motto?
Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting their own battle.

I didn't re-read the old one first and looking at them both - some things obviously have knee-jerk automatic answers... But I feel like so much has changed. I love this exercise. Sometimes so much happens that you come out the other end different. I think I am different. But in a good way. Or at least mostly in good ways.

It's kind of reassuring to look at the changes in yourself and walk away from it thinking that, on the whole, you're happy with them.

The Dame Questionnaire!

I'm working on answering the Vanity Fair Proust Questionnaire again. Now, I'm no Proust (then again, when it comes to questionnaires, neither was Proust. The Proust questionnaire is famously named for him because he ANSWERED two questionnaires rather notably when he was young - not because they were his idea). OBVIOUSLY. But working on that questionnaire got me thinking. I have questions. I have a lot of questions, actually. I narrowed them down to the ones I would most like to ask, the ones I would submit to someone, were it socially acceptable, upon first meeting them. Some of the ones that are most interesting to me.

I realize it's very presumptuous to put together a questionnaire, but these are just some of the the things I wonder about how and why people tick. I'd love it if someone chose to answer (post me a link, or if you don't have a blog - you're welcome to answer in my comments), but I'll probably just use it as an inventive new way to harass my sister. I can email her the questions to her one at a time when I'm having a slow day at work. I wonder how many I can send before she calls to ask why I'm torturing her with my incessant questioning.

Also: I am going to post links when people let me know they have answered the questionnaire - so you can view answering blog posts to the dame Questionnaire at:
The Chick Voice's At Altitude
cookiegeisha at The Death of Glitter
Lenore Kay at Pugs Can't Fly

Ideally - answer as simply, as quickly, and as honestly as possible. That's where the fun really lies in a questionnaire. In having an honest conversation with yourself.

Dame's Questionnaire

(imagine jazz hands here... and maybe a snappy drum intro)

What fictional person, place or thing would you make real, were it in your power?

What do you find comforting?

What makes you almost hold your breath in excitement?

What offends you?

What always makes you smile?

How are you in a crisis?

What is your most unusual or rare quality?

What woman has had the strongest impact on your life?

What fictional character did you love most or identify most closely with as a child?

What's the strangest job you ever had?

What's the hardest job you ever had?

If you could relive any moment in your life, which would it be?

Who was your first crush on?

What song makes your heart sing?

What book do you never tire of?

If you could live in a book, which book would it be?

What film have you watched the most times?

What film do you quote most often?
(Actually quote, not wish you were clever enough to quote regularly and INTEND to quote. What do you ACTUALLY quote?)

What film's dialog do you love most?

What poem or line of poetry resonates with you most strongly?

What famous quote do you repeat or refer to most frequently?

If you could (or had to) freeze your physical self at one age, what would it be?

What view would you choose if you could have any view from your bedroom window?

What one thing would you give to everyone you know if you could?

If you could be a tremendous success at any one thing, what would it be?

What, if anything, do you hesitate to do for fear of looking silly or being laughed at?

Who would you choose if you could talk to anyone who is no longer alive for an hour?

If you wrote your will, who would you leave your most prized possession to?

What sentence did you never say to someone, but wish you had?

What do you most like getting the opportunity to say?

When have you laughed the longest or the most?

Whose face is your favorite face?

Where do you feel safest?

When do you feel most yourself?

What makes you nostalgic?

What is the best lesson you have learned in life?

I pared this down by a few questions because I felt it was too long. And too repetitive. I'd ask you 50 questions about film and never tire. Also, I can only email my sister so many questions before she just goes insane... ;)

How to Write Again

Obviously I'm having trouble with this. Life got hectic. Then I lost someone. Then I lost a few more people and this got so much harder to do.

I guess it just feels trite sometimes. Useless. Self-important.

I'll be walking down the aisle in the grocery store and start thinking about some topic and I'll just ramble on and on about it in my head but as soon as I sit down to write... it seems hollow and silly.

A friend and I were talking today and she has had a hard year or so. And I have had a hard couple of years. And she was talking about a crush she had on someone and then she stopped and looked up at me and said, "But this is stupid. It's so unimportant. It feels stupid to even think about it." Because, in the grand scheme of things, a crush on a stranger or fleeting thoughts about life, the universe and everything that come to you in a grocery store aisle... well, it all starts to seem a little trivial by comparison.

But I'm determined to get writing again. Even if it means subjecting Tracey (my most patient and faithful supporter) to terrible drivel.

I can't tell the drivel from the revelations any longer. I think all the time. And when you'd give anything to hear a person's voice again... suddenly small things can seem so large, can't they?

How do I separate the trivial and the tremendous?

The thing is - I can't. And for a little while, that may have to just be okay.

Just Like Starting Over

"You must do the thing you think you cannot do."
- Eleanor Roosevelt

I've always been fascinated by the idea of living a more spare life, finding a way to live without being surrounded by excess material possessions. I try to purge unnecessary belongings. I try to organize and simplify my life. It goes in cycles, every six months or so I am swept up in a fit of frenzy to clear the excess baggage from my life... in this last year that urge - and the sense that I am too tied down by things - has just grown and the need to pare away the unessential comes upon me with far greater frequency.

When I wrote this old post, I was just moving into my current home. It's been a good nest. A place to heal wounds after a painful and complicated breakup. A place to become myself again and get my bearings. But the last year has brought a lot of changes to how I see the world. I don't feel safe all alone in this house. Incongruously, I've gained a fearlessness in my approach to taking chances that I can only attribute to having lost so much - eventually you start trying things because little failures, embarrassments and inconveniences that you once found daunting are small and insignificant in the face of so much tragedy. I overcame my fear of traveling across the world to meet my family. Joined a local performance troupe that does edgy humor - something far outside my normal comfort zone. I'm working on overcoming my fear of public singing. And I think I'm ready to genuinely let go of the life I built in this house and start anew.

I have an opportunity to move to a much smaller space - an unused studio apartment in the back of an old friend's home. The offer was prompted by her desire to help me set aside savings so that I will be able to buy my own house - something I want dearly to do - but the result will be that I spend the next year in a very beautiful but very small space. Right now I live in a fully furnished two bedroom house. In my new home I will be surrounded by gorgeous views and have a private porch and sit in my bed and look out into vast forest, but I will also cook on a hotplate and have to pare away well over half of what I own.

I'm terrified. And exhilarated.

I once told a friend that, when making life decisions, I wait and listen to my gut reaction. I listen for that little thrill of fear and excitement. A singing of nervousness that ripples through me when I stand in front of a change and some part of my knows that this is what I must do. Because that's where the great fear comes from - from that knowledge. From seeing what must be undertaken.

Since I feel like I'm building myself again - from the ground up - I think going through a similar exercise with my life will be just the thing I need. So I am staring at my books. My furniture. My television. My dishes. My rows of shoes... Deciding what I can live without.

So far, I'm feeling like I can probably live without everything except the bunnies, the books and the shoes.

I feel that rush of adrenaline. I think I'm ready to leap.

"A little simplification would be the
first step toward rational living, I think."
- Eleanor Roosevelt

Unconditional

So the last year (the last two years, really..) have been difficult and insane and I kind of feel like I'm starting over from scratch. Like anything extraneous about the person I was has been seared away and I'm sitting down and trying to sort out what's left.

In the midst of this, the people in my life have changed. The people who find tragedy too overwhelming (or who don't have the patience for the fact that I average 4 months to return a phone call these days) have fallen away. But the friendships that HAVE survived have become stronger. And some support has come from places that seem surprising. People I barely knew when this happened. Family I had never met before this past year. And teh interwebs! Sometimes it's still funny to me how you can bond with people you never meet... but it makes sense in a way that this place where I put my thoughts and my lessons and my laughter has led me to some amazing people.

Tracey at Beyond the Pale always checks in with me and gives me someone safe to talk to (Thank you!)

And I don't think Greg, Sheila or Nina hane any idea how much it improves my day to hear from them and keep track of them via their blogs.

I drew into myself a great deal this year, and it was often misinterpreted as a desire to be left alone. As I explained it to one friend: I want to connect, but I don't know how anymore. I want to know that my friends are there and care about me, but I may not be able to talk. And sometimes the hardest thing in the world is picking up the telephone. Sometimes talking to the people I am closest to is far more difficult than talking to people who don't know what happened - because I can't hide things from the people who matter the most.

So she started sending cards to me every week. For MONTHS. How amazing is that? This weekly reminder that you matter enough to someone that they will just send you love. And know that you love them back without requiring anything in return? Those cards have been such a blessing.

One friend called me weekly for the first few months after the shooting and just left messages. Crazy messages. He told stories. He went on for as long as the voice mail system would let him. About silly things. Dreams. Monkeys. Anthropomorphic brooms.

My family in Australia had me come visit them and I fell in love with a big group of virtual strangers who took care of me and showed me their world and just let me in and loved me as if I'd been there all along. (I have to write about that trip. I'm not certain I even have the words to write about it. It was so important to me. I found a new home. Part of me feels like I belong on the other side of the planet.)

So I guess I'm saying: If, and when, you have friends experiencing profound loss - I know it's hard to know what to do. It's awkward. You don't know what they need and nothing makes it okay. We all know that. Just love them. The most amazing gift is to be shown love in ways that ask nothing in return. Love without conditions. Love that accepts that you are not yourself. Love that will be there when you put yourself back together again.

Sometimes the only light at the end of the tunnel was knowing that there were people who hadn't given up on me.

There have been people there to give me that and, in that, I am so blessed.

Therapy

So I'm seeing a therapist.

Four people in my life died violent deaths in the last two years. Three of them died in front of me. So... yeah. TOTALLY not feeling shy about the therapy thing. Feel a little funny when I hear people sigh in relief that I'm finally trying this out, mind you, but feel pretty certain that no one's gonna razz me for getting myself over to see a shrink.

My therapist is kind of great.

He's actually the second one I've tried. The first one specialized in trauma. Oddly enough, this made her pretty much useless to me. I think this is because I'm not your average trauma therapy patient. Since my first session has to start with what is essentially me listing the exhaustive number of bizarre traumatic things that have occurred in my life, I'm not the type for pussyfooting around. It's old hat enough that I'm pretty matter-of-fact about it. I don't need to be coddled. The first therapist was very worried about "re-traumatizing" me by letting me talk about the very thing I had come to see her to talk about.

Trauma is NOT my new therapist's specialty. And that's okay. I'm talking to SOMEONE. Which is good. And I'm sorting through things... which means having to feel them. I'll admit, I'm not 100% sold on this part of the process being a good idea. But in the end I'm moving forward in some way, shape or form. I think THAT part is very good. Instead of being in some sort of grief-shock stasis at all times. I guess it says a lot when crying at the drop of a hat and having lots of nightmares is progress. Buy hey! I'm doing something.

Doc referred to me as a "statistical anomaly" the other day - citing the fact that most people have some trauma and tragedy in life, but there are some oddities who either never experience any trauma or experience a disproportionate amount of it. You know which one I am. I found this oddly reassuring. Like being told you aren't crazy. I wanted to shake his hand. "So it's not just my imagination that this is a little excessive? Ok, good. I was hoping it wasn't just my imagination."

I kind of felt like looking up at the sky and saying, "See? He thinks I've had more than my share, too."

Lately I just find the whole world to be overwhelming. Which makes sense. All my resources are going to just, you know, getting out of bed in the morning. Holding my brain in place in spite of the fact that the last two years are actually real and sooner or later I'm going to have to allow that to sink in fully. All this admirable fortitude and getting out of bed and all takes up a great many resources. Which means that any teeny tiny little additional thing that happens is one more thing than I have the energy or strength to cope with.

You SO don't want to see what happens if I stub my toe or get snapped at by a stranger in the supermarket check out line.

So the other day I'm filling Doc in on my week and whatever I currently feel I am completely incapable of surmounting and he says, "Well, It's just life. There's no right way to do it."

I know it sounds silly, but it was a genuine relief to have someone say such a simple thing to me.

So this is me, checking in. Still breathing and all that fancy stuff. Defying statistics. Muddling through.

And I can do this. I mean, hey - It's just life.

I Talk to Dead People

Maybe this isn't unusual. Maybe this is how a lot of people cope. I don't know. I've lost a lot of people over time, but this is new.

We're loading in tonight for the next show I'm working on at my theater. I'm not what you would call a handy person. I'm good with a paintbrush and so far I haven't permanently injured anyone with any of the power tools. I maintain that it is only a matter of time.

So tonight I've got a project to complete and I cannot complete this project with the use of the staple gun. I root around in the tool closet in the back of the theater. Find what I think is a staple gun. Locate staples. Try to load them into the gun. They fall out. I try again. Same result. I look at the fine print on the side of said gun. It says, "Load nails here." Ok. Wrong tool.

I go back. Find another thing that looks like a staple gun to me. Actually locate the word "staple" somewhere on it. Satisfied I have the right tool, attempt to find the place that the staples go in. After about five minutes of struggling and pulling at different bits of metal and trying to pop SOME PART of this thing open I am FED UP. I don't know a damn thing about any of this. I cannot remember this ever being so hard. I have never been so frustrated at the theater before and I OWN A STAPLE GUN AT HOME that I know how to use. I am beside myself.

Then it hits me. Standing in the tool closet, away from the 20 other cast and crew members who are noisily painting and drilling and sawing out on the stage I have a sudden moment of clarity. At set calls, I would come to Allan. I would hold the offending power tool or doohickey out to him and say, "Make it do." He would stop whatever he was doing and come and set up the tool, walk me through how to use it, pat me on the head and go back to what he had been doing. Eventually we got to where there were no words. I would hold it out and frown, he would smile because he liked being needed. He would walk through the steps and hand it back. I'd lean against him for a moment in a no-armed sort of hug. And work would begin again. A cooperative ballet as we built. He who knew everything, I who knew nothing. We had a rhythm when we worked together.

And tonight I stood in that tool shed and felt so lost. My partner is gone. I stared at the tools, tears rolling down my face, and just started talking to him... something I do a lot these days.

What will I do without you?

How will this ever feel right again?

Do you know how hard this is?

Are you here? Are you gone?

Do you know how much I love you?

I need you here. I need you with me.

I can't make this fucking staple thing work.

I'm useless without you.

God I miss you.

----------------------

There's another set going up. Another set he wasn't here to help build. Another set none of them were here to help build. And it isn't the same. And sometimes it's so damn hard. The theater is my home. It's where my heart lives. It's where my friends died. It's where I talk to them. It's where I'm trying to heal.

I found someone to help me. I finished my project. I'm going back tomorrow to touch it up and then we begin dress rehearsal.

The shows will open. The work will get done. I will heal.

It would be faster if he were here, though.
He knew how to fix anything.

One More Time, My Homage to John Hughes

I originally wrote What I Learned From John Hughes in March of 2007. My complaint, while in jest, was made to express primarily one thing: John Hughes had an impact on my formative years and my personal development through an art form that is dear to my heart. His films may not have been high art but they accomplished something that great art aspires to: they touched us, they let us know we weren't alone at a time when we most needed that message, and in some strange way they even changed us and impacted the people we became. What a strange, significant and lasting mark to have made on the world he left behind.

So here it is, one more time:

What I Learned From John Hughes

I have a friend who has a pet theory about John Hughes films. He says that John Hughes is responsible for 75% of all the relationship problems our generation has experienced because he destroyed our ability to realistically assess romantic situations and relationships. My friend may be on to something.

I started thinking about the John Hughes films of my teenage years and the impact they had on my impressionable, puberty muddled brain. For the purposes of this review, I consider THE John Hughes films to be:

Sixteen Candles (1984) JH wrote and directed
The Breakfast Club (1985) JH wrote, directed and produced
Weird Science (1985) JH wrote and directed
Pretty In Pink (1986) JH wrote and produced
Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986) JH wrote, directed and produced
Some Kind of Wonderful (1987) JH wrote and produced


And, for better or worse, this is what I learned:

Just be yourself.

"Not that I condone fascism, or any -ism for that matter. -Ism's in my opinion are not good. A person should not believe in an -ism, he should believe in himself."
- Matthew Broderick, Ferris Bueller, Ferris Bueller's Day Off

Every Hughes film touches on this. Andie is the quirky, weird girl in Pretty in Pink and WE LOVE HER FOR IT. Garry and Wyatt in Wierd Science meet girls who like them as they are. Ferris Bueller dances to his own drummer. He isn't the star quarterback or president of the student counsel. He has his own unique sense of style... and he's the most popular guy in school. Maybe in the city. He's a freaking legend. In Some Kind of Wonderful, Watts never changes. She stays a tomboy who plays drums and works on cars - and eventually Keith realizes how amazing she is JUST AS HERSELF. John Hughes let us in on the secret that being yourself was really where it was at.

"You had to be big shots didn't you. You had to show off. When are you gonna learn that people will like you for who you are, not for what you can give them."
- Kelly LeBrock, Lisa, Wierd Science

Stick to your principles.

"If somebody doesn't believe in me, I can't believe in them."
- Molly Ringwald, Andie, Pretty in Pink

I swear I learned half of my stubborn willingness to sacrifice anything to stick to my principles from my father and half from John Hughes films. From early on, I knew I should never accept anything less than what I deserved. I never let anyone tell me I wasn't good enough. I have always been honest and direct to a fault. A lot of that is my dad. But a lot of that is Andie and Duckie. And Watts and Keith.

"You remember how I said I'd rather be with someone for the wrong reason than alone for the right one? Well, I'd rather be right."
- Lea Thompson, Amanda Jones, Some Kind of Wonderful

Everyone finds love.

Sam and Jake Ryan. The Athlete and the Basket Case. Andie and Blaine. Keith and Watts. Farmer Ted and Caroline. Duckie and Kristy Swanson. Long Duck Dong and that really tall girl. These films taught us that, no matter who you are, there is someone out there for you. I'm not sure that's really a universal truth, but it's a nice message. It's reassuring. No matter how insecure I was in high school, I never doubted for a moment that someday a boy would love me. Someday an incredibly cute boy was going to come along and realize that I was the most amazing girl he had ever met. John Hughes told me so.

... And everyone just wants to be loved.

"I want a serious girlfriend. Somebody I can love, that's gonna love me back. Is that psycho?"
- Michael Schoeffling, Jake Ryan, Sixteen Candles

To me, this was brilliant new insight into the world. Beautiful, popular Jake Ryan wanted to find someone to love him just as much as Sam wanted to find that. Claire kisses John Bender in the closet and suddenly he isn't so tough, after all. Blaine may be rich and popular, but what he really needs is for Andie to love him and forgive him. This was a tremendous equalizer. People made a lot more sense once I understood this.

"I believed in you. I just didn't believe in me. I love you. always."
- Andrew McCarthy, Blaine, Pretty In Pink

We're not really all that different.

"We're all pretty bizarre. Some of us are just better at hiding it, that's all."
- Emilio Estevez, Andrew / The Athlete, Breakfast Club

Another popular message from Hughes, and probably the most consistent. All of his films lead you back to the idea that the geek and the jock and the rich girl and the tomboy - they all have insecurities. They all screw up. They all worry. They all want someone to love them. They all have imperfect families. They all had problems in high school. It's nice to know.

"Screws fall out all the time, the world is an imperfect place."
- Judd Nelson, John Bender / The Criminal, The Breakfast Club

The best guys are geeks and/or hard-core individualists.

"I feel compelled to mention to you, Jake, that if all you want of the girl is a piece of ass, I mean, I'll either do it myself, or get someone bigger than me to kick your ass. I mean, not many girls in contemporary American society today would give their underwear to help a geek like me."
- Anthony Michael Hall, Farmer Ted, Sixteen Candles

I have JH to thank for a lifetime of falling for the most interesting guy in the room. John Bender. Duckie. Cameron. Keith (I still have SUCH a crush on Eric Stoltz). Pretty boys have their work cut out when it comes to me. Instead, I fall for the rebel, the artist, the geek, the guy who has the guts to wear crazy vintage shoes and knows all the words to "Try A Little Tenderness." Super shy men or men who make me laugh or guys who look like trouble from a mile away. It's never the all-american average joe for me. If something isn't wildly different about him, I'll probably never notice him at all. In a John Hughes film, that character is the most appealing. He taught us to love the oddball.

Oddballs and rebels everywhere owe John Hughes big time.

"I know I'm old enough to be his mother, but when the Duck laid that kiss on me last night, I swear my thighs just went up in flames! He must practice on melons or something."
- Annie Potts, Iona, Pretty in Pink

If you want someone badly enough,
they will love you back.

This is where John Hughes caused a LOT of trouble. Sam pining for Jake Ryan. Garry and Wyatt pining for... well, for ANY actual girl. Andie pining for Blake. Watts pining for Keith. John Hughes taught us that the most unlikely romances can work out, and that WANTING IT seems to be the magic ingredient. As my friend is fond of ranting, this has caused no end of trouble. If wishes were horses then beggars would ride. But they aren't. Crushes don't always work out. Frequently they end in tears instead of candle-lit birthday cakes on top of dining room tables with hunky boys. But Mr. Hughes left that part out.

"That's why they call them crushes. If they were easy, they'd call them something else."
- Paul Dooley, Jim Baker / Sam's Dad, Sixteen Candles

Date and make friends outside your social circle / peer group.

There's just a lot of class line crossover in John Hughes films. The geek boy doesn't fall in love with a geek girl. The criminal doesn't meet a great chick who has a pierced nose and a wicked tattoo. They all find love in the unlikely places. So that's where you're apparently supposed to look. I'm not sure it makes sense to teach teens that Mr. Right is almost never going to be the guy you have everything in common with... but I met a lot of interesting people thanks to it. In the midst of exploring outside my comfort zone for nifty boys, I made many great friends I might never have met otherwise. At least insofar as it applies to making friends (remember Molly Ringwald doing Ally Sheedy's make-up in Breakfast Club? I loved that.), it's sound advice. I just don't think EVERY romance needed to be across class lines. The closest he ever came to bringing two people together who were on the same side of the tracks was Watts and Keith. And I liked them together. But they were the exception to the rule. Which leads me to...

The person you're meant to be with
may be right under your nose.

"Don't go mistaking paradise for a pair of long legs."
- Mary Stuart Masterson, Watts, Some Kind of Wonderful

Sometimes the best relationship is the one you end up having with a friend. Maybe instead of looking for the perfect face, you should be looking for an incredible person. Someone who already likes you for who you are. This is the case for Watts and Keith and it was supposed to be the case for Duckie and Andie (and WAS the case in the original ending, but was booed by audiences and didn't serve the rich man / poor man agenda of the film). Honestly, I always figured that Andie was going to regret that one day. It's nice that she got what she wanted and all, but even on his best day, Blaine was no Duck-man. Duckie was the greatest guy EVER. So Pretty In Pink taught me not to make the mistake Andie did, or that Keith ALMOST did. Pay attention, or you might miss out on someone like Duckie. And men like that come along once in a lifetime. If you're lucky.

A certain lack of respect for authority is healthy.

"Dear Mr. Vernon, we accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was we did wrong. But we think you're crazy to make an essay telling you who we think we are. You see us as you want to see us... In the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions."
- Anthony Michael Hall, Brian Johnson / The Brain, The Breakfast Club

Teachers and parents everywhere had John Hughes to thank for low-level rebellion becoming more socially acceptable. Really wild kids were going to act out anyway, but John Hughes taught the tamer kids that questioning authority (and the wisdom of being stuck inside on a perfectly nice sunny day) wasn't really bad. It was just logical. But honestly, John Hughes films are probably the healthiest and safest place for a teen to learn that some rules just need to be broken.

Of course, JH never covered the consequences of rebellion in any detail. He left out the part about how you end up grounded for most of your senior year because your DAD doesn't agree that it's reasonable to skip school to spend the day running around with your beautiful, trouble-maker boyfriend just because it was SUCH a gorgeous day outside...
But I'm not bitter (and, admittedly, don't regret it at all).

"I am not going to sit on my ass as the events that affect me unfold to determine the course of my life. I'm going to take a stand. I'm going to defend it. Right or wrong, I'm going to defend it."
- Alan Ruck, Cameron, Ferris Bueller's

Relax. Have fun. Spontaneity is it's own reward.

"Wyatt, you're going to have a heart attack by the time you're forty if you don't learn to relax."
- Kelly LeBrock, Lisa, Weird Science

"It's called a sense of humor - you should get one - they're nice."
- John Cryer, Duckie, Pretty In Pink

Value the moment. Enjoy your youth. Do the thing you are afraid to do. The rewards can be great, and if nothing else at least you lived fully. After all, look at Claire and Bender. He kissed her back. There is a lesson the be learned there.

"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it."
- Matthew Broderick, Ferris Bueller, Ferris Bueller's Day Off

Oh, and almost everything happens in Shermer, Illinois.

John Hughes grew up in Northbrook, Illinois. Which was once known as Shermerville. His high school was located on Shermer Road. Thus the fictitious suburban town of Shermer, Illinois is born. An homage to his own home town, Shermer, Illinois is featured as an imaginary suburb of Chicago in several John Hughes movies, including Weird Science, The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Sixteen Candles, Pretty in Pink and National Lampoon's Vacation. Also, the high schools in The Breakfast Club, Weird Science and Ferris Bueller's Day Off are all named Shermer High School. There's more on Shermer at The John Hughes Files.

This isn't actually something I learned per se.
I just remember being 14 and wanting to know where Shermer, Illinois was.

John Hughes
February 18, 1950 – August 6, 2009

I want to say thank you.

For a redheaded character who WAS the pretty girl. For the hope that someone like Jake Ryan might exist. For an awkward tomboy who got her man. For John Cryer lip syncing to Otis Redding, a moment in film so glorious to me that I never really recovered from it. For so very many characters I loved and performances that stayed with me. For the sense that the awkwardness, the angst and the insecurity I struggled with in my teenage years was such a universal experience that some guy was actually making films about it. Thank you for the laughter. Thank you for some of the most quotable dialog ever written. Thank you for the bubble gum of it all. Thank you for pop culture icons. Thank you for the glorious geeks and unforgettable rebels. Thank you for giving us Shermer, Illinois.

My Life Through One Artist's Work

Totally snagged this off of Alex. How brilliant! I'm usually iffy about these things, but this one has me tickled.

The instructions are:
Using only song names from ONE ARTIST, answer these questions.

Pick Your Artist:

Tom Waits


Are you male or female:
Rosie

Describe yourself:
Trampled Rose

How do you feel about yourself:
Fumblin' With The Blues

Describe your current boy/girl situation:
I Hope That I Don't Fall In Love With You

Describe where you currently live:
Way Down In The Hole

If you could go anywhere you wanted to go:
Good Old World

Your favorite form of transportation:
Downtown Train

Your best friend is:
Old Shoes (And Picture Postcards)

Your favorite color is:
The Black Rider

Favorite time of day:
Midnight Lullaby

If your life were a TV show, what would it be called:
The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me)
or maybe
Frank's Wild Years

What is life to you:
Shore Leave

What is the best advice you have to give:
I Don't Wanna Grow Up

"Well, God bless your crooked little heart,
St. Louis got the best of me
I miss your broken-china voice
How I wish you were still here with me
Well, you build it up, you wreck it down
You burn your mansion to the ground
When there's nothing left to keep you here,
When you're falling behind in this big blue world
Oh you got to Hold on, hold on, You got to hold on
Take my hand, I'm standing right here
You got to hold on"
- Tom Waits, Hold On