mtl3p

in love with joanna newsom’s voice. go check out “peach plum pear”.

it’s this aesthetic that i’ve been into so strongly over the last couple of years. that of trying so hard even though there’s no hope of hitting that note. of not retreating into the safety of irony.
I spent so much time when I was young having to learn about irony and sarcasm, how to slide into them instinctively as a protection mechanism. and it’s so hard to unlearn, to regain the ability to deal earnestly with a situation even when you aware of the possibilty of looking at it through the lense of irony.

a good example is dancing. how nerve-wracking is it to get excited about dancing - to not constantly keep that eye on one-self. to lose oneself in the joy of having fun moving to music. the only way I can do it is by becoming a good enough dancer that i know 99% of the time i can have fun and not look stupid. but I still keep that eye on myself most of the time.

It makes me think of my friend from high school in NH - Neal. He got made fun of all the time because he refused to deal with a situation or someone with anything less than full earnestness. Sometimes when people first met him they weren’t sure if he was being simple or putting on a show. He could take your hand, and make some outrageous statement that you had spent the last 7 years learning how to make fun of - like telling you that he would pray for you to do well in you english exam - and miraculously you would find yourself saying “thanks neal. i would really appreciate that.”

We ended up being really good friends - and I’ll never lose my appreciation for my time with him.
jen, too. she was a wonderful dancer. she was the first person to show me how fun is was to dance *with* someone. that I don’t have to be in some kind of solitary headspace with the music. she taught me how to play. for her, dancing was playing - with the other person, or just playing around other people.
I still have difficulty with playing. But I’m practicing. I take the opportunity especially when I’m around babies or kids, to be stupid with them and follow whatever dumb story or actions come into my head without worrying about how i’ll look.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 17th, 2006 at 11:48 pm and is filed under Whatever. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.