Saturday odds and ends...

I still can't believe that a book as violent and uncomfortably racy as Suzie and The Monsters lead me to this wonderful 18th century book. New Yorker magazine mentions it in this article about fictional music and its composers:

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/08/24/imaginary-concerts

Our personal history (especially the cruel parts) can help keep things in perspective. I'm pretty sure (though I wasn't so appreciative at the time) that being teased in middle school actually might have been a good thing for me. It made me far more realistic than I might have been otherwise, gave me more years than most people have, to brace for the future.

From my early teens on, I just knew that I was destined to never pair off in like or love. This wasn't just something I learned from always being foisted on some poor soul's team by the gym teacher or seeing everyone's eyes avert when it was time to choose a partner for science lab. It was something I saw in other people's eyes during after-school dances and other social events, even in the ones of the kindest souls.

I'm not saying people who are different deserve to be picked on (they most certainly don't!) but I do think I was so far gone from normal there was no way I'd ever have been the kind of girl who had friends. I always brought a book with me wherever I went and would read in homeroom, between classes, after our tests were turned in. I had horribly out-of-control hair and wore unusual clothes.

I didn't try as hard as I should have to fit in, probably because I was more interested in books than in other kids. I think I might have even been prissy, in the sense that I behaved like a schoolmarm instead of a student. I was an Adam Ant song, minus the fashion sense and style. I developed such indifference (on top of my already almost pathological shyness) to all that was around in middle school the guidance counselor told my parents there might be something wrong with me.

Back then I was terrified, much more than I am today. I tried not to let the spitballs (my hair was huge!) throw me off or the nasty comments ("Did you know your picture is under 'ugly' in the dictionary?") get to me. High school improved some and college turned out to be pretty wonderful and most people agree that middle school is Hell anyway.

But there are some times now when I wish I could get that detachment back. Then again, I don't have to run away or hide anymore so maybe it's for the best. I'd like to think I relate better to others nowadays even if I still secretly want to retreat when I meet people outside of my job or an already familiar social situation.



 

So the title character from the book I mentioned the other day (Suzie and The Monsters) has almost no scruples. But her iTunes play list is rather unbelievably good.

I do not particularly like the book itself (though the writing's decent enough) but I can't stop reading because I've already added five of the songs Suzie Kew (yes, that's her full fake name) listens to as she either moonlights at a strip club, jogs with her iPod on or uses her stealthy vampire skills to hypnotize men to get past check points at various places she's trying to break in along the way.
 

If not for Suzy Kew, I'd have no idea there's a samba version of "The Pink Panther," (also check out Mancini's Meglio Stasera) that there was a ridiculously (and shamefully) likable song in the early 90s called "People Are Still Having Sex" or that vampires (at least in this case) have amazing taste in classical music (see below.)

Also interesting is this book Suzie thinks about at one point; I have never heard of The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr before:

I find it both funny and sad that one tweet tonight on Twitter states: "This is as close to a lesbian couple as we'll ever get on NBC PrimeTime. #PeterPanLive." Of course, Peter Pan is not meant to be a lesbian and has always been played by a woman on the stage, but there's some truth to the tweet, for anyone starved for lesbian subtext in mainstream media.

Lesbian subtext (for me, at least) does not cheapen something or make it about sex. It just means that for those of us from a certain generation, growing up scared and isolated because of how we felt and who we couldn't talk to about those feelings, we had to make do with a very limited representation (in books, music, movies and tv) of who we were. As recently as the early 90s lesbians were still featured as villains, if they were featured at all on a tv show (see "Good Night, Dear Heart," Quantum Leap.)

Despite what the far right likes to think (and say) Hollywood is not really that gay friendly. Gays and lesbians are rarely the center of any show, unless it's a comedy or they are a recurring character on a drama. To say that featuring GLBTQ people on tv is somehow an "agenda" is to cry foul...representing reality is not making a political statement.

Though I often think no lesbian representation at all on tv is better than the train wreck/dreck that was The L Word, I still long for at least one or two solid storylines (on any show, really) moving beyond dated stereotypes.

I also think if a much younger me were watching "Peter Pan Live" tonight she would find some subtext in it, because of the innocence between the two leads not in spite of it...


That's just one reason this article drew my attention:


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dana-rudolph/peter-pan-my-first-lesbian-role-model_b_6259296.html?ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000054

via findyourfeet.com

More than one website has a pie chart showing that personal communication is broken down this way: 7 percent speaking, 38 tone and 55 body language. This makes perfect sense to me and sometimes not in a good way. Some charts are labelled "effective communication;" others (interestingly enough) are titled "believability."

For better or worse, I tend to be talkative (more than I'd like to be) but when I'm around this one person, let's call her X, I pretty much shut down. I am not proud of this nor do I think it's the proper way to react, but there it is. 

She is genuinely a nice person, but still...I get the sense that she'd rather talk to anyone else but me. Her words are always pleasant, but her tone can verge on icy and her body language even more so (can body language be icy?)


That "please stay away from me" vibe has gotten stronger in time, not less and it's so bad sometimes I either feel like fleeing or I shut up completely. It's very hard having to be around someone you are convinced doesn't like you, more so when they don't know you feel this way. Sometimes (emotional self-defense, fear you'll start babbling away in the midst of all that silence, whatever) you can retreat into yourself feeling frustrated, wishing you could change how they feel about you, but knowing it's absolutely pointless to even go there.


This article has some good advice on how to be okay with being disliked:


http://tinybuddha.com/blog/10-reasons-to-be-okay-with-being-disliked/