the heavens are falling down
by Stace on May 31st, 2010
filed under let me entertain you
what about flowering fields? is there a time? – Michael Jackson, “Earth Song”
I finally sat down with MJ’s This is It today, and amazing as it was, both in the feature itself and the special features, what struck me repeatedly was Michael’s passion for the world (the planet itself, I mean). It’s not like this is a new thing discovery for me: I’ve been a fan since I was a kid, so I know that he used this song (and “Heal the World,” too) to try to speak out for the planet.
His heart definitely bled for the earth. It’s interesting – in some ways, I’ve known this for a very long time. And yet it’s like a fresh discovery. Someone on the DVD said something about how MJ was worried about the destruction of Earth long before it became trendy. That’s very true! The public (or at least the media) was so busy speculating on his personal life, we missed one of the most amazing things about him: his passion for protecting the planet. I have to say, I’ve always defended him. Always. I’m not even going to comment on the allegations except to say that he never had a chance at a real childhood or even a normal life, and I hope he was getting/would have gotten some help. Aside from that, I think he was truly a brilliant musician, a beautiful soul, and a gifted, loving man. I haven’t exactly walked in his shoes, so I do my best not to judge but just to be grateful for the joy and entertainment he provided me with for the majority of my lifetime.
The performance of “Earth Song” at the O2 Arena would’ve been amazing. He had this gorgeous video featuring a little girl (a metaphor for humanity) wandering the beautiful rainforest. Like the child, we’ve fallen asleep and wake to discover that our home has been destroyed. When the girl wakes, the whole rainforest is aflame, dead or dying – except for one plant. She gets to it and uproots it to save it, and ends up onstage with MJ as a bulldozer is destroying everything around. As it stops, though, it’s definitely no happy ending – out climbs a human being. Michael’s point was that we have done this to our own world. He wanted people to stop deflecting blame. He had a point, too: a lot of people say “they’ll get around to cleaning up the environment eventually…” Wait, who’s the “they?” The government? Maybe eventually. But it’s not likely. Should we really wait around and hope that, celebrity-endorsed or not, someone else will spearhead a campaign to really save the planet? No.
We should do it ourselves. And I don’t mean that “we” collectively. I mean every single one of us. Not only should it not be a “they,” I challenge you to take “we” and make it “me“. Every day. Big changes? Great. Little changes make big differences, too. I’m not gonna preach about what I think those changes should be – it’s a personal choice, and we all make different ones. I challenge you, though, to find a few of your own and make them. Michael Jackson kept stressing that he felt that this was our last chance to fix the earth before we lose her. I’m not really sure I can find anything to disagree with. And interestingly, no matter how much I’ve loved the man as a performer, these were the moments of the documentary that brought tears to my eyes. What a fantastic man he was, flaws and all. We miss you, MJ.
what about all the dreams that you said were yours and mine? did you ever stop to notice this crying earth, its weeping shores?
i want your everything as long as it's free
by Stace on March 29th, 2010
filed under let me entertain you, pretty things
i want your drama, the touch of your hand… i want your love… love, love, love, i want your love… – Lady Gaga, “Bad Romance”
Does anyone else think Lady Gaga had watched one too many episodes of cheesy teen “dramas” a la One Tree Hill before writing this song? This is my favorite of all her songs, but I always have this thought when it’s on. If no one else gets it, I’m content with this just being my own little joke with myself.
The reason I criticize shows like One Tree Hill (which I’ve seen one time too many thanks to a few girlfriends and my mom) is because of the way they depict “romance.” If that’s what they think love is like, frankly, I’ll pass. It’s utter rubbish. It’s fighting, contrived breakups, manipulation, and over-the-top, sickly sweet declarations of love that are almost always profusely peppered with one’s full name. That tactic, specifically, grosses me out. Does anyone in the “real world” actually do this? (Please, God, tell me the answer is no!)
I’m horrified to discover it’s not just crap like OTH that does this. This morning, while lounging around, enjoying the last sleeping-in morning of my dwindling spring break, I had Sex and the City on my TV (no surprise – it’s one of my faves). Much to my horror, I stopped in mid-type when I heard Trey say “Charlotte York MacDougal…” to which she, of course, cooed “yes, Trey MacDougal” in response. Can you hear me gagging?! Say it ain’t so!! Not on my beloved SATC! Then again, I guess the point might simply be that Trey and Charlotte’s relationship was cheesy and unrealistic, and perhaps the writers subtly use this ridiculous kind of dialogue to punctuate this idea? Maybe they were intentionally inducing an “ick” moment as a kind of foreshadow to the lack of actual substance the relationship would turn out to have? That it was all fluff and pretty words, and not much else? I hope so, anyway.
If anyone reading this finds this kind of over-the-top, ooey gooey romantic stuff attractive, you gotta tell me. I’m dying to find the perspective, because it must exist. (Otherwise it wouldn’t be able to continually resurface, even in jest.) I am certain there must be women somewhere who sigh every time they see a scene like this on a TV show (it doesn’t happen in our actual lives, does it? I pray not), but…I just don’t know any of them.
I just noticed that this post feels a lot like the sentiment I feel about Valentine’s day. See, I don’t have anything against this so-called “holiday” in particular. I don’t have anything against romance. It’s contrived “romance” I take issue with. As far as I’m concerned, romance by definition requires effort: thought and/or work of some kind. You have to actually take the time to get to know (at least a little personal something about) the person you’re trying to impress, and insincere one-size-fits-all crap like candy, teddy bears, and (dare I say it) long-stemmed red roses are just…predictable. Next!
My best friend once said that she’d be happy if a guy would pick her a handful of weeds over a pre-packaged bouquet. That was years ago, and I’ve never forgotten it. I couldn’t have said it better myself. The point is, I don’t think there’s much romance in any “romantic” store-bought item. These silly scenes that irked me up into a blogging lather are the television equivalent of prefabricated cheese. That said, as I was alluding to, there must be some women out there, somewhere, (maybe men too?) who enjoy this kind of thing. (Else, how could they continually make their way onto the air?) If this is true, I guess it’s romantic to make such big silly statements…since I already proclaim that in order to properly romance someone we have to know a little about what s/he likes. In that case…by all means. Just, if you don’t mind, make sure I’m out of earshot. There’s a chance I might retch if I ever hear this live and in person.
The last thing I’m gonna say about the subject (hopefully forever, as I’m starting to feel I need to leave the poor horse alone – it’s dead or dying) is this: I can only speak for me. But any time anyone uses my entire name (including middle name, since my “maiden” name is the only one I have, at least for the foreseeable future), I don’t swoon. I just think I’m in trouble…
i want your love and all your lover’s revenge, you and me could write a bad romance…
get straight… go forward… move ahead!
by Stace on March 22nd, 2010
filed under let me entertain you
it’s not too late…to whip it …into shape…shape it up… – “Whip It,” Devo
I wonder if they chose to call the movie Whip It because of the song? I mean, I know that there’s a “whip” move the roller girls use, but…the book was called Derby Girl, originally. The reason I wonder is because it wasn’t too late to whip it up into shape: the book? Meh. Sorry. The movie, however, I loved!
This isn’t a new occurrence to me – the idea that keeps creeping up on me, flying in the face of the notion we cling to that “the book is always better.” Sad but true, but these days it just ain’t so anymore. Anyway, Whip It was Drew Barrymore’s directorial debut, and I love Drew (true, more as an entity than as an actress), so I had to see it. I also really like Kristen Wiig, Ellen Page, Juliette Lewis, and Jimmy Fallon. In other words, stellar cast. Maybe I’m a sucker, but I loved the movie. I couldn’t wait to buy it when it came out on DVD. Yeah, there are some cliches, but it’s not over the top – I thought it was a really cool story about a girl finding her way. Naturally, as an avid reader, when I like a movie/TV show/play that started as a book, I want to read the book… (And no – disappointment in this area will never keep me from reading. Ever.)
So…my problems with the book? Well, first of all, it felt a lot like I was reading Cosmopolitan. (Something I used to do, until I finally put my finger on what it was I didn’t like. I not only called to cancel my subscription, but asked for my money back and told them why: because I actually thought they were killing brain cells with their lack of substance and gratingly irritating word choices.) What I mean by that is, there was a ton of slang that, frankly, I don’t think anyone actually uses. It’s the kind of crap like “gams” and “‘rents” and stuff that magazines that try too hard to be on the “cutting edge” of our vernacular grasp on to. These are things that never really catch on in real life, and then they persist in strange places like magazines (and this book) a particularly annoying fashion like an older girl/mom who’s trying too hard to be cool & fit in. And, there it is: that’s exactly who I feel like Shauna Cross makes herself out to be. I think she probably is much cooler than that, though, which is the sad bit! She actually did/does play roller derby. She’s a screenwriter. I don’t know what made her choose to write a book from the first person POV of a sixteen year old girl. Her protagonist is anti-conformist, according to her teenage self, anyway (that part feels about right) – she loves the Ramones, and Chuck Taylors, and all sorts of other cliches. (Don’t get me wrong – nothing against the Ramones, and I’m an avid Chuck collector myself. It’s just that they feel so…easy that it doesn’t feel real. I bet kids like this “in real life” love bands we’ve never even heard of.)
Listen, it feels this simple to me: if you don’t remember very specifically what it’s like to be that girl, don’t write from her point of view. If you do and/or you intimately know a teenager now (I don’t mean “that kind” of ‘intimately’, obviously), then I think it’s okay to use him/her as the basis for your character, if you can pull it off. It’s also a good idea to have a modern teenage touchstone that will tell you if the character feels authentic or not. If you can’t do these things…then maybe it’s best to either 1) set your story in a time you are particularly familiar with, i.e. the one in which you were a teen, and remember the things you said & did, or 2) leave it alone.
I’m not saying no one should write books about teenagers that aren’t themselves teens. I’m saying I don’t want to read another book written by a grown woman about a teenager (especially from his/her POV) that lacks an authentic teenage voice, especially an accurate one. Call me crazy… In the name of research, the least they could be doing is spending time with a teenager or three until they get it down. A little “method” writing, if you will. I think Cross got so caught up in all these crazy words & expressions she was using (that, again, I promise young people don’t use often enough to be believable) that she lost the real heart of her own story. It just totally fell flat for me. It’s a great story about a cool chick who’s different, growing up and learning who she wants to be. She defies her parents, hurts her best friend, and gets her heart broken in the process, all of which are both typical in this kind of story and a bit cliche, but they can work if you do them well. It’s not that I think Cross didn’t, it’s just that I was so distracted by the incessant stream of silly things she kept trying to “slip in” to the dialect of the narrator/main character’s voice that I couldn’t take it seriously. It was just too too much.
One other (minor) thing that bugged me, is she somehow forgot which expressions she’d already used, and used the same ones back to back – twice. A very small, silly, nit-picky thing to be bothered by, but I was. (“Die-hard devotee” and “roller derby baptism,” to be specific.) The absolute best part of the whole book for me was one line I wish I wrote. I wholeheartedly agreed with it, stopped what I was doing, and put it in my phone. Here you go: “Even though I’m over most everything these days, I’m not over my dad calling me kiddo. I hope I never am.” This is one place where I couldn’t agree with Bliss more.
Interestingly enough, I just discovered she also wrote the screenplay for the movie. Maybe bad ass Drew helped her out? I don’t know…I need to watch it again, to see if I have the same problem now that I’ve identified it with the written version. I don’t think I will, though. There are so many cool people in this movie working hard to make it fun and everything the novel wasn’t, I can’t imagine seeing it again could possibly make me decide that I didn’t like it. (And I’ll let you know if it does!)
It feels good to be blogging again. Midterms were a week from hell, and now they’re mostly behind me. I’m on spring break for the next week and plan to do my best to get back in the habit of blogging/writing daily, because I miss it and I meant to be in the practice in the first place. Oh, and…like the new theme? It’s easier to see where the comments are now, so those of you that weren’t leaving them in the first place can see where you can do so! I’m off to go watch Friends circa 1999…goodnight.
when a problem comes along, you must whip it…
poppin' champagne, livin' the life
by Stace on March 10th, 2010
filed under let me entertain you, ticket to write
wear them gold and diamonds rings, all them things don’t mean a thing… chaperones and limousines, shoppin’ for expensive things… – Fergie, “Glamorous”
The song & title of tonight’s blog are deliberately misleading…I did watch the Oscars last night. I even made notes about what I wanted to blog about. But you know what? I don’t care enough to. I enjoy awards shows. But nothing in this one (or my comments pertaining to it) are so important that I’m actually going to post a Tuesday-night blog about Sunday night’s Oscars. Let’s move on, shall we?
I have this short story I’ve been wanting to write for over a year. (It’s tough to find the kind of time necessary for fiction – even short fiction – when you’ve got a massive workload at school.) Thankfully, I’m in a Short Story class this term, and have to write one. It’s been fairly conceptualized for quite a while, and the dialogue was what was really holding me back. Today, I decided it was finally time to just dive in and write something even if I’m not thrilled with it and end up having to change most – or all – of it later. (Probably a decision that came none too soon, as it’s due tomorrow…the first draft of several, anyway.)
I just finished it, and I’m headed to bed with Dracula again. I’m not excited about what I’ve done with it yet. I’m not usually super-critical of my writing, but I’m kicking myself for not having started it sooner. Usually, though, I’ll be thinking “this isn’t my best work” or that it’s not very good, and I turn it in anyway, because I know it’ll do. Then I reread it at some point (usually several times between turning it in and getting it back from the professor) and decide it’s not so bad, or even that I like. (I just reread this and made minor adjustments…even now, I’m thinking, “I was a little harsh. This is a good starting point!”) Tomorrow, I’m just turning in this first draft to three members of a workshop group. We’ll be reading each others’ work all weekend and then meeting on Monday to discuss. The rewrite that comes from that workshop will be the “first draft” I’ll turn into my professor, and there will be a second round of this process before I turn in the final version. So…I guess it’s okay that I’m not excited about this dialogue? I just think it sounds so absolutely ridiculous and cheesy, because…well, I don’t want to give away the whole story (I want you to read it – it’s first on my list of ones I’ll submit for publication, once I’m happy with it)…
This much, though, I can ask you, because it’s relevant and I’m interested to know if anyone has insight. (It’s a lot harder of a question than it might seem at first!) Most of us have made significant changes in the people we were when we were younger – right? If so, and you had a chance to somehow speak to your younger self – to intervene somehow, you’d take it, right? More importantly, what would you say? Delores and I talked about this idea many, many months ago, and the idea for this story was born. It took a lot of working out details to conceptualize it as an actual written piece (I kept seeing how I could make it work as a scene in a movie or something – on film), but once I got those kinks worked out, I got hung up on the actual “what would you say?” dialogue.
And, if you can answer that question, here’s another: would what you have to say to your younger/former self sound absurdly cheesy and cliche? And if so, would that be okay, because you do know what you’re talking about? Because you’ve seen how it all turns out, and you are something of a sage in this particular person’s life, whether or not they know it? (And yeah, I realize this is all impossible, but it is fiction, after all…psychological realism is fun!)
One last thing to consider: Pink’s Conversations with My Thirteen-Year-Old Self is a great example of what I’m trying to get at. Once again, I’m grateful to this woman for making me feel like I’m not alone in the nightmares I’ve experienced, and the courage I had to find one day from somewhere to help that little girl heal and grow up and go out and face the world in solidarity with the woman I’d become. I don’t want to belittle her achievement in this awesome song, but…I think it’s easier to write something like this as a lyrical piece than an actual fictional piece that includes real dialogue. Maybe that’s a case of the grass being greener, though.
Off to bed…looking forward to reading some interesting responses tomorrow! Goodnight!
it’s been a long road, and the industry is cold… i’m glad my daddy told me so, he let his daughter know… g-l-a-m-o-r-o-u-s…
only the two of us
by Stace on March 2nd, 2010
filed under let me entertain you
on the wings of love, up and above the clouds… the only way to fly is on the wings of love… – Jeffrey Osborne, “On the Wings of Love”
Man, those are some deep lyrics. Oh wait…no – they’re just lame. (And also? So ridiculous for a show where one man/woman dates 25 hopefuls….”only the two of us”?? Really? Which two?) I’m just gonna come right out and say it: of all the trashy reality TV I watch (and often even defend), The Bachelor is the absolute lamest. I can’t even call it a guilty pleasure. Guilty yes. Pleasure? Not so much. It’s just that I keep watching because, season after season, they keep picking the wrong guy/girl. Seriously: every time! Poor Melissa had to watch the national TV airing of her accepting Jason’s proposal just to have him turn around and dump her (also on national TV) to reconcile with the other girl, Molly. (Who will be the only Bachelor couple ever to have gotten married…if they even count. So far, only one couple has ever gotten married from The Bachelorette, too, and it was the first – Trista & Ryan.)
I knew from the beginning Jake would end up with Vienna. Ick. I’m sorry, but if you don’t want to read my catty/mean comments about an insecure, immature 23-year-old girl playing house with a man she met filming a “reality” TV show, tune out now. What’s the draw, though, Jake? Is it those pretty brown cross-eyes? The bleached blond hair, or the extensions? The tanning bed glow? She even tries to say she’s “just herself” – that may be true, in the context of her personality, but whichever family member of Jake’s it was that said that people who claim to be “brutally honest” are often choosing to do so from a place of immaturity is dead on: with maturity comes the discernment to bite one’s tongue, and to hold back. Vienna doesn’t have this. (And this is a smidgen off-topic, but while I’m complaining about her, I need to add that “Jake and I’s” is not correct grammar for describing your and Jake’s anything. And let his mom know, too, so you’ll both be right from here on out, that the expression “sister-in-laws” is also grammatically incorrect and annoying. Thanks.) I hope this ends well for them. And I agree with Stephanie Klein when she says that Jake will probably (at least) wish he’d taken Ali back when he had the chance.
Which brings me to Ali, next season’s Bachelorette, which any of us who’ve been watching for a while saw coming. Tonight, I thought maybe they’d ask Tenley, but I’m glad I was right the first time. Ali is definitely one of the contestants I like most out of all the seasons I’ve ever watched (I have only been watching the last 2-3 years). I’m excited to see which loser that’s all wrong for her she’ll pick.
And seriously – they’re getting worse and worse. They always start with the same “the most dramatic rose ceremony ever in Bachelorette history” and there’s a scandal: someone’s sleeping with a crew member, someone has a girlfriend and is trying to get record publicity for his band, etc. The Bachelor/Bachelorette has a “banister” scene, is shown sobbing, can’t decide, “is in love with two/three men/women at the same time,” and then miraculously, somehow, knows they’ve “made the right decision” and professes his/her love “with all of my being” or some equal rubbish. It’s embarrassing. Are we surprised it’s not working?
Why do I watch this? Even I can’t answer that one…except to say that it’s…fun? I don’t know. And one more thing – even though it’s a show I don’t watch, I still have to know what’s with this new trend of putting Bachelor/Bachelorette contestants/castoffs (I was gonna say rejects, but I’m trying not to be harsh) on Dancing with the Stars? Shouldn’t they just go ahead and create a whole new Dancing with the Reality Stars and leave the original to the semi-famous of other genres? I mean, really, Jake and Kate Gosselin? Ick.
The other day, Emma asked me why I haven’t been updating any info about my own search. Quite simply, because there’s nothing to update. No nibbles, no nothing. Frankly, I’m quite bored with the whole thing at this moment. Last week, I was just too busy with my own (real life) friends, not to mention midterms, to even keep up with “winks” and emails. Yawn. Maybe Paula Cole was right – where have all the cowboys gone? (Nope…don’t want a cowboy. Can’t even say it in jest.)
on the wings of love, only the two of us… together flying high, flying high upon the wings of love…
