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Jun. 11th, 2003 08:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rmThis may be really incoherent.
I just had a voice lesson, that went really really really badly. My voice sucked. I was an asshole and I was afraid and probably not in that order either. She tried to get me to do this exercise that involved improvising with the words to deal with different feeling in songs -- and I wouldn't do it -- I wouldn't just change one word in the line every time because I was afraid I'd say the wrong thing. What the fuck is that? I'm a consummate bullshit artist among other things, what the fuck is wrong with me? And you know the worst part, there's this part of my personality (that we'll refrain from discussing in detail right now) that's going to march back in there next time and demand we do the damn exercise, not even because it's the right thing to do.
Most of my early childhood memories involve being told to be careful when I wasn't even doing things that were risky. Or being praised for being quiet. Or being yelled at for being dramatic.
If you ask me to describe a memory related to shame and fear, nearly everyone one is someone saying "What?" in a nasty and shocked tone of voice, either because I said something they didn't approve of, or because I said something they misheard -- age eight to adulthood -- do you know how crazy it makes me that my father won't get a hearing aid?
And all of this just came to the forefront of my brain during tonight's lesson.
Now, admittedly I've been under a lot of stress, and am being thrown into some pretty high pressure situations related to my aspirations starting in the next couple of days and this was inevitable. I mean, I'm glad it happened in a voice lesson and no somewhere else, but Christ.
No Fear is not the mantra around here, although I make the frequent mistake of shortening it to that. Without fear you lose a lot of energy. It's just, not being beholden to it, not being held hostage by it -- and I can't say I did well on that count today.
So, I managed not to cry in my lesson. I managed not to cry on the 1/9 train. But then I get to that big crossing area in the Times Square station where all the Broadway posters are, and my lip quivers a little, but I'm okay, until someone starts playing Amazing Grace on the fucking trumpet. And the thing was, I couldn't even find the guy, it was just echoing through the whole station. But because I couldn't find the guy -- I'm distracted -- still not crying....
As I walked home from the F train, I thought about how righteously pissed off I am right now. And not in that very analytical let me tell you why you suck way, but in a really raw physical way that makes me want to put a fist through someone's face -- and really, anyones. That's a pretty rare mood for me, and probably necessary right now, but not a bundle of fun.
I was a dancer, I understand self improvement as being taken apart and reconstructed, by people you admire and love and also despise. The worst mistakes I have made in my life have involved choosing the wrong people for that task, and now that I've more or less chosen myself for it (as I am far crueller agent of change than anyone in my life right now), it brings up all sorts of really weird permutations on the self-hatred thing.
And then I got home to the perfectly expected and not particularly relevant to me news that Boheme is closing. And then I cried.
One day, all of this will matter. But right now, it's just somewhere between stupid and embarassing. And perhaps the most amazing part of all, is that somewhere in the distance, because New York City is always about feeding everyone's narrative all the time, I can hear fireworks going off, right now. Really.
I just had a voice lesson, that went really really really badly. My voice sucked. I was an asshole and I was afraid and probably not in that order either. She tried to get me to do this exercise that involved improvising with the words to deal with different feeling in songs -- and I wouldn't do it -- I wouldn't just change one word in the line every time because I was afraid I'd say the wrong thing. What the fuck is that? I'm a consummate bullshit artist among other things, what the fuck is wrong with me? And you know the worst part, there's this part of my personality (that we'll refrain from discussing in detail right now) that's going to march back in there next time and demand we do the damn exercise, not even because it's the right thing to do.
Most of my early childhood memories involve being told to be careful when I wasn't even doing things that were risky. Or being praised for being quiet. Or being yelled at for being dramatic.
If you ask me to describe a memory related to shame and fear, nearly everyone one is someone saying "What?" in a nasty and shocked tone of voice, either because I said something they didn't approve of, or because I said something they misheard -- age eight to adulthood -- do you know how crazy it makes me that my father won't get a hearing aid?
And all of this just came to the forefront of my brain during tonight's lesson.
Now, admittedly I've been under a lot of stress, and am being thrown into some pretty high pressure situations related to my aspirations starting in the next couple of days and this was inevitable. I mean, I'm glad it happened in a voice lesson and no somewhere else, but Christ.
No Fear is not the mantra around here, although I make the frequent mistake of shortening it to that. Without fear you lose a lot of energy. It's just, not being beholden to it, not being held hostage by it -- and I can't say I did well on that count today.
So, I managed not to cry in my lesson. I managed not to cry on the 1/9 train. But then I get to that big crossing area in the Times Square station where all the Broadway posters are, and my lip quivers a little, but I'm okay, until someone starts playing Amazing Grace on the fucking trumpet. And the thing was, I couldn't even find the guy, it was just echoing through the whole station. But because I couldn't find the guy -- I'm distracted -- still not crying....
As I walked home from the F train, I thought about how righteously pissed off I am right now. And not in that very analytical let me tell you why you suck way, but in a really raw physical way that makes me want to put a fist through someone's face -- and really, anyones. That's a pretty rare mood for me, and probably necessary right now, but not a bundle of fun.
I was a dancer, I understand self improvement as being taken apart and reconstructed, by people you admire and love and also despise. The worst mistakes I have made in my life have involved choosing the wrong people for that task, and now that I've more or less chosen myself for it (as I am far crueller agent of change than anyone in my life right now), it brings up all sorts of really weird permutations on the self-hatred thing.
And then I got home to the perfectly expected and not particularly relevant to me news that Boheme is closing. And then I cried.
One day, all of this will matter. But right now, it's just somewhere between stupid and embarassing. And perhaps the most amazing part of all, is that somewhere in the distance, because New York City is always about feeding everyone's narrative all the time, I can hear fireworks going off, right now. Really.
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no subject
Date: 2003-06-11 06:32 pm (UTC)I have no idea what's going on.
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Date: 2003-06-12 12:19 am (UTC)(no subject)
From:Re:
From:no subject
Date: 2003-06-12 09:38 am (UTC)That was really raw, and beautiful. And I know that we both know that "yeah, it's all part of the process" that doesn't make days like this better, but it's a really IMPORTANT part of the process, cause you're not going to heal those specific fault lines until you find them that specifically. I remember the first time I did Song and Dance, and I couldn't move for 10 minutes straight because I was afraid of saying something wrong, looking the wrong way, of it looking any less that brilliant. But we're never brilliant in the exercises, and we do look like idiots, and it's only after years of looking like a complete and total asshole do we get to pretend that's what we're doing.
I should also say, most people do this when they're my age or younger, and the amount of courage you have to take this on now, and the PROGRESS you're making considering 30 years of old habits is fucking staggering, and you should be in awe of yourself. I am. I don't say this often cause we're not like this, but I'm really proud of you, and impressed by you. Just try and get some sleep over the next few days. :)
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