Potential is a Dirty Word

I realized today the depth of my dislike for the word potential. It's destructive. Don't use it. I know people who apply it are well-meaning and attempting to be complimentary, but when I hear it in relationship to myself, I get one of two messages, or both of them alternating:

#1) In my opinion, you're not there yet. You could be doing so much more with your life. Why aren't you using all your gifts?

#2) You need to work a lot harder to become who you really are. The pressure is on. You are not acceptable "as is."

(OK, these two messages are so similar that they're actually the same message. Perhaps I have the potential for redundancy.)

These messages, people, are not encouragement. They are a mental death sentence. I've experienced the damaging effects of abundant potential for myself and I see it in others whom I care deeply about. And I'm pissed off about it today. Because I'm pretty sure that believing you have potential versus accepting and loving yourself right where you are can lead to a pretty serious bout of depression. Don't we have enough trouble seeing and admitting what is good in ourselves?

If you live in America you're also lucky enough to be daily bombarded both willingly and unwillingly, consciously, subconsciously and unconsciously by media monsters with a single message: YOU ARE DISSATISFIED WITH YOURSELF AND EVERY SINGLE THING IN YOUR LIFE. UNLESS YOU BUY THIS PRODUCT YOU WILL ALWAYS BE A LOSER. IF, HOWEVER YOU DO BUY THIS PRODUCT YOU WILL FULFILL YOUR TRUE POTENTIAL. Advertisers loooooooooove our potential.

The "P" word has been applied liberally to me throughout my life, and I have to say I've cringed at least a little bit every time I've heard it. It's not that I think I am or even want to be perfect already. It's not that I can't take feedback. I love feedback. I also genuinely enjoy the process of growing towards a summit and learning what doesn't work along the way. In theatre, I've always gotten at least as much (and very often more) juice out of the rehearsal process than performances. And blah blah blah, I know, but it is actually true that failures usually teach us more than successes.

So I say fuck potential. That is someone else's idea of who you are and who you can and/or should be. Be who you are right now...and place a lot more emphasis on what's good.

Weekends vs. Mondays

Everything about my weekend was awesome. So WTF with getting the blues on Monday?

Indications that Weekends are Yummy:

• Spent 19.5 hours in the delightful sphere of incredibly enlightened, soulful and sensitive girlmate. Solved every existential unknown. Feel sure my world, if not The World, is going to be okay now.
• Spent more than my fair share of time at the A&L Haven of Harmony and Peace.
• In spite of ambitious schedule, never felt rushed. Experienced only goodwill and smooth sailing everywhere I went.
• Started my hour and a half road trip home at the exact same time as my friend H started her hour and half road trip home in California. Caught up on the Buzz.
• Confirmed with Genius BlogMaster niece that I did not, in fact, plagiarize her in my Fartiste blog. Her comment: "It's natural that we would have the same fart narrative."
• Made it back in time to enjoy the last rays of sunlight and the remainder of Sunday evening In Austin With People From Austin. Highly entertaining and satisfying.
• Bonus: Met even more intelligent, quickwitted, loving people.
• Extra Bonus: Encore in my apartment in front of glorious fire with One Specific Person From Austin. Highly entertaining and satisfying.

Indications that Mondays Suck:

• I realized this morning I forgot to get most of the things I went to San Antonio to get.
• I lost my wallet last night, rendering me the Penniless, Identificationless Wonder.
• Since I promised to take my Freshman at UT niece to lunch today, went back home to retrieve backup money acquiring implements.
• Experienced rush hour twice (actually three times if you count both ways).
• Tempting Specific Person still in my bed. Had to resist. Had to focus. Had to go back to work.
• At post-time, Tempting Specific Person is still in my bed. I am still at work.

Indications that I Will Get Over It:

• I'm going to the opera tonight.
• I believe I will have another opportunity to sleep late with Tempting Specific Person.
• I believe another weekend will ultimately arrive.

Blogphobia

Dear Blog,

Now that I told some people about you, I'm too self conscious to write. Help.

Sincerely,

D2

Nothing is Constant But Change

(Even the subject of this blog is subject to change.)
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
As has become normal for me, I've recently gone through some blindingly fast and surgically precise life changes. A month ago I was working as a full time artist in a conservative church, 5 minutes away from home, where I lived with The Most Beautiful and Wonderful Dog in the World

and my almost elderly mother. (Whatever your opinion is about that, I have my reasons. They'll probably get divulged here sooner or later.)

In my mother's house there are three gargantuan TVs, probably the biggest TVs that ever were made or ever will be made, since they are the kind that guys who watch football bought right before flat panels hit the market. Inevitably, all three televisions are on, and there is a high probability that the Fox News Channel is on ALL of them. ALL DAY. And that's all I'm gonna say about that.

Last month I was single. SO single in fact that I don't really even want to talk about it. I lived in a conservative town where EVERYONE my age is already married and has 2.5 kids. I received some very interesting feedback during my stay in this town about the fact that I am still single. These helpful comments caused me to question my judgment, my sanity, every decision I have ever made regarding a man, my eligibility as a potential relationship partner, my viability as a woman, and even my worthiness of walking around on the planet with these other obviously more well adjusted and married humans. Once I wrote a comic monologue about that, which actually enabled me to move on somewhat. But I do seem to remember that the day before I performed it I pulled a Linda Blair-like freakout on my innocent and unsuspecting family members and promptly went to live in a hotel for a night.

But that is all in the past now. That was a month ago.

In July I started asking for awareness. (FYI, beware of asking for crystal clear truth unless you want to enter WARP.) A series of undeniable events to be extrapolated upon later led me to resign my arts job in November. Before Christmas I somehow schmoozed my way through an interview that landed me The Perfect Job in The Best Town in the Universe. Now I live in Austin. Magically, I'm not weird anymore for being over 25 (oh ok over 35) and single. That is apparently perfectly normal in Austin. Magically, I can be satisfied at work and still leave my job at the door when 5:30 rolls around. Magically, I am finally making decisions based on what I want instead of what I should do. I even kind of have someone who is kind of, sort of, although not really, like a boyfriend. Which is...well, perfect.

I've always been a bit like a cat about change...my instinct is to hide behind the warm refrigerator for at least 3 months. I live in a new city, have a new job, new friends and new connections with old friends. Some of the people I was closest to in my one month ago life have seemingly dropped off the face of the earth. So I definitely have moments of...uh...strangeness.

Without a doubt the hardest change is that I had to leave my beloved pooch behind with my mom. To take care of her. And of course to continue his reign over his kingdom, The Backyard. And it's only fair. After all, my mom's the one who found him and brought him home. Even though I trained him and molded him with great patience into The Greatest Dog in All the Land. Even though I lost more shoes in the process than she did.

I'm visiting him today. He's looking a me right now with those eyes that say "I love you more than any other human being in the entire history or future of the world."

I guess some things don't change.

Fartiste

Growing up with 6 older brothers, I learned L'art du Fart at an early age. When I was about six or seven years old, my brother Scott tickled me (tickle≠love; tickle=warfare) until I hyperventilated. He then proceeded to throw me on the floor and suffocate me with the pillow he had at the ready. Right before I died, he removed the pillow, and as I sucked in what I assumed would be sweet, life-giving air, he farted, the kind of fart that only he could fart, right in my face. Then he stood over me and laughed his ass off before he walked away in triumph.

You'd think I would have developed some kind of fart phobia after an incident like this. But even in the moment I had some kind of deep, sick appreciation for his development of such an intricately calculated plan, and the flawless timing of his execution. He was damn funny.

Perhaps I am actually stuck in the 7th grade, but farts are funny. Period. A few years ago my coworkers, knowing that farts, especially the fake kind you make with your mouth, always take me to the verge of peeing in my pants, purchased a remote controlled fart machine and surreptitiously taped it underneath my chair. Anytime someone would walk by my desk, they would set it off. That made for good times.

Since Christmas was just around the corner, I purchased one to entertain my family with during our annual gift-giving extravaganza, and strangely enough, my brother Scott's 7 year old daughter took to the joke like a duck to water. She stole the remote from me, and every time someone would bend over to pick up a gift, she'd set it off. With 5 separate and hilarious sounds, the fart machine, especially in this child prodigy's hands, made our Christmas one of the jolliest in recent memory.

Sidebars:

Le Pétomane, the original Fartiste, is worth studying. Here's a clip from a really bad mini-movie made about him.

And my friend Emily sent me this video yesterday.

So Was She Dreaming or Not?

I cannot remember NOT being completely awestruck and fascinated by Judy Garland. Though in my recent, mature years I have not willingly owned up to this fact, the influence she has had over my entire life is undeniable.

I'm writing about this because for some strange reason I woke up this morning thinking about the Wizard of Oz. Especially Frank Morgan. And I had this horrifying thought. Maybe it was all just a dream. I've never fully considered this possibility, probably because I believe in faeries and most other unseen and unbelievable things. Which leads to the Oz Catch-22: have I always believed in faeries and most other unseen and unbelievable things, or did the Wizard of Oz's influence over my young mind give me a high propensity for crack smoking?

I think it's just that I wanted to be Judy Garland and skip down the yellow brick road, looking beautiful and sad, singing gloriously longing and soulful songs on the seat of an old tractor, holding my beloved terrier's rapt attention, and meeting new, helpful friends who are as unusual, unique, and over-the-top as possible. I now know I identified mostly with Judy's deep, hidden pain and her desire in her personal life to escape to a more acceptable non-reality. I still want to travel to Oz and hang out with a good witch who gives me magic shoes and travels in a bubble. I even want to sleep in the poppies for a while...though probably much, much longer than Judy and her crew did.

Ultimately, I simply cannot subscribe to the dream theory because that would mean the Cowardly Lion, Tin Man and Scarecrow are really just farm hands. And that is just unacceptable.

Parenthetical:
Of course nothing I'm discussing has anything to do with some of the more sophisticated layering of symbolism in this story, which is quite interesting and could be titled, "Sex, Drugs, and the Issues and Figures in American Politics at the End of the 19th Century." (My relationship with this movie is probably more aligned with the crowd who watch it while listening to the Dark Side of the Moon and smoking copious amounts of weed.)

Virgin Blogger

It's intimidating to start a blog because you wonder things like, "Am I the only one who thinks I might have something to say?" Fortunately the next thought is, "Fuck it."

Oh my God. I already used the "F" Word. And it only took two sentences.

I'm starting this public journal so I can better understand myself and how I fit into the world in its current state. So read at your own risk.

This is a work in progress, like me.