No Day But Today...and Yesterday?

I went to see the new "Rent" movie not once, but two times since it came out 2 days ago. Should I be embarrassed? The first time, my friends and I went to the Ziegfeld Theatre (the BEST to see movie musicals!). The lines were crazy, the theatre was PACKED, and everyone there wanted to be there with their entire being! I have never seen a movie where people applauded from the opening credits, but this is how we started the night.

This show is very important to me, and to a lot of people I know. I cried for nearly every song from the beginning to the end. The entire show isn't ALL sad, but I couldn't help it! I was so happy it was made. I was so proud of it and all the people involved. It made me happy to think about all the people who never knew a thing about the show who will one day fall in love with it because of this movie. I was crying for the tragedy of such a brilliant creation existing on it's own without it's incredible creator being alive on the earth with it. I cried for the beautiful irony of his lyrics about 'writing one song...before he goes...a song about love...from the soul of a young man...'. I cried because he left this legacy of songs behind, not just one. Tears welled up in my eyes the way they always seem to since I moved here and witness people in front of my singing their hearts out on stage (usually live) on the stages of NYC. I cry because it shakes me. I cry because I know how it feels to do it, and I long to be a part of something half as good. I cry when I am afraid I won't get to. I feel chills up my spine because the show isn't only about love and dreams, he created a piece of art that speaks to people about issues we still want to ignore.

The songs of this show bring me back to my dorm room in college for musical theatre. If you weren't listening to the album in your room, and no one on your floor was, you would undoubtedly hear it coming through the pipes in the bathroom from another floor. We were far from alphabet city and not yet starving artists. We were starving college students who were starving to start living for our art. ..>

Tonight several of the same friends and I decided to go again, after eating a lot of food...with a few people who had yet to see it. We made our way to a less glamorous theatre. The theatre was nearly empty (probably due to the horridly cold temps!), and applause after every song just wasn't the tone of the evening. Of course I enjoyed seeing it again, but I was mortified when I heard the my friends on the other end of the row had to endure some ignorant people who never should have been watching the movie in the first place. Evidently these guys gaybashed through the entire movie, saying things starting with "fuckin' faggots..." and getting disgruntled every time a song started. What were these people doing in there?!?!?! Clearly they had just snuck in and should never have stayed. When they realized they were annoying my friends, I guess they decided they ought to stick around and ruin the entire night. I found out about this all upon leaving the theatre. I don't think I need to explain to you how bad this upset me. I just can't understand people intentionally setting out to ruin other people's happiness. I can't fathom how that could be an enjoyable time. It also slaps you in the face. We weren't sitting in a theatre in Oklahoma watching some Jackie Chan Movie, we were in NEW YORK CITY watching about movie MUSICAL about gay people, straight people, people with HIV. Of course NYC is one of the best places to be in our country if you happen to be gay or love those who are...but I think sometimes we forget just how far we haven't come in the scheme of things. We still are living in our very own city with people like that. I guess we need reminded of that, though I still don't quite know what to do about it.

As starving college students these songs inspired us to pursue what is real and genuine...in our careers and our friends and lovers. They showed us how important it is to live and love without regret. I am 8 years older. The NYC we live in is far different than the one these characters lived in 20 years ago. I am still inspired by these words and melodies. The most valuable message Jonathan Larson gave us, in my opinion, is to live in the present moment. As soon as we are thinking about this moment, it is already gone. Did we actually LIVE it? ..>

From the already powerful message that was harshly cemented with his untimely death:

"There is no future, there is no past, I live this moment as my last. There's only us. There's only this. Forget regret, or life is yours to miss. No other road. No other way. No day but today."

I am hispanic....

I have been doing several retarted things lately...most of which I am entirely too embarrassed to list. The only one I can bring myself to mention, for sheer comic value, is that I accidently checked off that I am hispanic while filling out paperwork for a job I applied for this week. I was being sort of rushed, and I totally thought I was checking off the box for caucasian...but no. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!

The Twilight Zone....

I think when you turn 25, you are tossed into a new reality. This belief has been validated several times since then. Today was one such time.

I am in a room full of strangers, gathered to work for a small hourly rate promoting a brand on the streets of New York. I am surrounded by squeaky girls commenting on which clubs in NYC are good for picking up guys while contradicting eachother's agreements that you can't pick up good guys in NYC clubs.

They speak over each other and nod excitedly, all of their opinions magically coinciding to provide immediate bonds, for the moment. The topics range from "all the hot guys that were coming off the subway this morning!" to "guys, do any of you have fake IDs??".

They discuss circumsized/uncircumsized penises and their recent trips "studying abroad" in foreign countries. At some points I feel like I'm sitting in a bizarre episode of "Sex and the City" in which the stars' much younger and less experienced understudies have taken over. I am silent.

As I hear a few connect over the shared experience of just turning 19, another comments that 22 is such a 'cute age'. Just as one poo-poo's 25, another makes a pathetic attempt to redeem it by boasting that you will then be able to rent a car. They responded to that just as boisterously as I did on my 25th birthday. The original poo-poo'er defines 25 as an age that means "marriage" to her (she has just turned 19). I observe quietly along with the sweet brazilian girl whose english makes her a weak contender for their astute commentary.

I am trapped in some strange reality where everyone around me is at a COMPLETELY different point in their lives than I. Their realities are as real to them as mine is to me, yet they all seem like strange little giggling aliens! I find myself envious of their trips to Europe that I keep saying I'll take. That is all I am jealous of. I feel like I'm sitting in glass box at the end of the table witnessing an experiment to see what happens when you toss several '22 and unders' in a room with one 28 year old just to see what happens. All I could do was sit there, restrained within the reality I understood in my box, and appreciate everything on the outside as my excruciating amusement.

We continued the rest of our day and I made friends with the brazilian girl, partially because she too had felt a little left out of the ambiguously intimate lunch we had all just shared, and partially because Kate Winslet took one of her flyers!! Although I am now aware that I should have respected my initial reservations about taking this low-payed promotion, I accepted my having agreed to do it. I did this because, like these bizarre giggling aliens, I need the money.

It will only be a few short and quick years before at least half of these girls are in my position, far from marriage after 25 or having had their first baby already. I hope by then I will have experienced my travels abroad and we will ALL be very far from needing a job like this. Until then, I will still be baffled that one of them, born and raised on Long Island, now living in the city mentioned that she voted for Bush last year. She said she had faith in him. She thought John Kerry was evil. This is why I never voted in an election until last year, because when I was young and dumb like that, I knew I had no business being in a voting booth. In the world we are living in right now, though, I can't imagine still being THAT dumb.

"...seriously took naptime for granted!"

Pet Peeve # 3,989
Filling out job applications...

I have never enjoyed filling these out, because they are so damned time-consuming, repetitive, and they never leave enough room in the boxes to write everything they are asking for. My hand gets all cramped up from writing all tiny, yet maintaining legibility. Why doesn't someone think of a way you can include all of the relevant information of your work experience legibly typed on one pleasant sheet of paper? Oh wait, someone did, it's called a resume (something else I really enjoy creating). What a shame it is that there are still people out there that want you to fill out the regular application. Some will accept your resume in place of filling out the "work experience" section. Some are assholes and make you write everything out again in those tiny boxes that mock the amount of letters in every word you attempt to write. Do they really want to know what job I performed at that store? Well just read the friggin' resume I spent so much time on already! The power trips and busy-work have already begun.
What really has ALWAYS confused me is the section where they want to know about the schools you have attended, all the way back to elementary school! Are you kidding me? When was that relevant? I understand when you are 16 and getting your first job they would have very little to read if you didn't put that, but even then...what did it do for them? If you are in high school, doesn't that mean that you obviously completed elementary school? Then they ask what field of study you took part in at each stage of your school career. What does everyone else put in there? I mean, unless you are in the special classes (special-good, or special-"special"), what other fields of studies exist in grade school and high school? Someone told me to write "Academic". So I suppose my field of study in GRADE SCHOOL was highly academic, whatever the hell that means. Can I just write "Well, I learned to read, and seriously took naptime for granted!"?

Silliness, I say.

What's sillier at 28 years old?
-writing in detailed information about where you went to grade school, middle school, and high school?
or -still applying for the jobs that require that I fill out these dumbass applications?

Sigh.

Mother Nature fights back...

I just wanted to mention, in light of my silly news report about the umbrella corpses in NYC, that I fully understand how we definitely haven't had the worst of the weather plaguing the world recently. Last week was miserable yes, but even as the rain started leaking into my apartment from faulty gutters around the door to my balcony, and I had several random buckets/bowls/towels to catch it...thoughts of people's entire homes submerged in water as they clung to their rooftop waiting for help were never far from my mind. It seems like mother nature is suddenly retaliating for all the shit we put her through on a daily basis. She is showing us in every nook and cranny of the world that she is still more powerful no matter how much we continue to take advantage of her. Floods are happening all over...earthquakes...tsunamis...dangerous rains and winds....it's insane! I can't help but wonder if these things aren't always happening, and we just don't know about it because when it isn't happening to us we barely pay attention. Certainly the media is very selective with its coverage, but when nothing has happened in the U.S. for a while, how much attention do we pay to these natural disasters in other countries? Sigh.

Umbrella Corpses

10,000 FOUND DEAD, WITH NUMBERS EXPECTED TO DOUBLE BY END OF STORM

Pummelled with incessent, monsoon-like rain this week, NYC's sidewalks are covered with the corpses of umbrellas that were unable to endure the heavy winds. Walking outside with a raincoat and large umbrella just isn't enough for this storm. Even if your umbrella remains in tact and sees you home, chances are you will arrive very moist none-the-less. Unfortunately, however, most umbrellas won't see their owners to their destinations.

Even more upsetting in these dismal days is that so many umbrella corpses have simply been tossed aside for everyone to walk over and step on. Umbrellas lie in peices on the ground exactly as they were when last their owners cursed them, verbally abusing them for mocking them so. "...I saw one that barely looked like an umbrella anymore.." said a dampened passerby, "...it had been run over by more than one car. Bits of metal and fabric covered the entire street corner! It made me want to vomit, until I got distracted when my fucking peice of shit umbrella blew inside fucking out too!" Bernie Bilko, a resident of a street corner near Tower Records in the east village told us, "I can't even find me any eats 'cause 8 or 9 dead umbrellas always be up in my trash cans!" It is hard to miss these tragic reminders that this storm has yet to be over.

Your umbrella too, may fall victim to the abominable winds. A tell-tale sign this is about to happen is when your umbrella begins to show signs of weakness by suddenly flipping inside out without warning, rendering it useless and slightly humiliating. While there is nothing you can do to prevent this misfortune, if it should happen to the umbrella you love, please take it easy. Take a moment to enjoy a few deep breaths, bid it a fond farewell, and gently tuck it into the nearest trash can (with some crackers for Bernie). Memorial services for the deceased have been cancelled due to rain.

Sleepin' the day away....

Why did I sleep until 3pm today? I did it because it's cold outside, and moist (and not in a good way). I did it because my cat wouldn't stop cuddlin' with me. I did it because every time I tried to get up he'd gently put his paw on my shoulder and say "don't leave me like this". I did it because the covers were warm, and I was not. I did it because my pillows were making love to my head. I did it, even though I knew it would make it impossible for me to get a good night's rest tonight. All I know is at noon, when I was up to go to the bathroom, it felt like 6am somehow, and my body was hurting for more slumber. It felt unnatural to be alive and conscious.

There are some days it just feels right to live like a monster in a cave, not even pulling back the curtains to see the ugly weather outside. It comforts me to just hear the wind and the rain hit the windows as I stay warm and dry.

Today was one of those days.

I am not ashamed.