it's been a while.
i can't help noticing both in myself and the world around me a sort of schizophrenia.
simultaneously terrified - not making enough money - not a whole lot of employment opportunities - watching arts funding decrease daily. terrifying
and at the same time wholly hopeful with the inauguration of Barack Obama on the way.
Is this the state of our generation - confusion? We grew up thinking anything was possible, and at the same time focusing so much of the possibility on how much money we could make. Perhaps it is the vision of possibility that will change with change. Perhaps it will be that the anything in anything is possible is not tangible in the I bought it for x dollars and cents, but it will be everything to see theater, go to a museum, listen to music for extended periods of time not doing anything else but listening. perhaps our priorities that grew up on us will shift because we choose for them to shift.

History

Last night I was watching CNN, MSNBC and yes, even FOX news as the delegates rained, and I waited to hear Barack Obama, the first ever African American to be the democratic party presidential nominee. I wanted to wake up jacob. To show him history happening. 2 things stopped me, well three actually - the most obvious being that if I woke him up he wouldn't go back to sleep. The other two are at opposite ends of the spectrum in emotional reaction. On a positive note, I realized that in the way that the word "assassination" didn't strike me in the way it struck my mom, that Jacob's generation will assume that an African American can be president of the USA. I cried during his speech. I cried watching the crowd. I cried from relief and happiness that there is an underbelly of this country that is shifting rapidly.

I also watched Hillary Clinton speak. And I watched the pundits talk about her as a possible Veep. And I was angry. Angry because a moment in history was being stolen, undercut, by something that could have waited until today or tomorrow. Angry because if I had woken Jacob, he would have heard as much about Hillary Clinton and what to do with her as he would have this historic moment. Angry at John McCain for not recognizing the significance of the moment in a speech that was delivered like a wax museum brainwashed version of a John McCain I have admired in the past.

Barack Obama has already made the world a better place for my son. For that, I say thank you. From the deepest part of my heart, thank you.

Thankless Honesty & Theater

Theater is a thankless art form. I’m not talking about money. (Although I could). Theater is honest. (And therefore thankless?) We’ll see. Let’s go back, but not all the way back to the middle of this introductory paragraph and start (for the second time) with Theater is Honest. And then will circle back around.
How? Is theater honest? Well, it isn’t a lot of the time. Infact, most of the time it’s a big lie. Actors pretending to be other people (albeit very effectively), on a set that is a made up place, with lights that act as the sun, moon and stars. Totally dishonest, actually if you think about it. A big lie. Maybe. Certainly. In some cases.
OK enough of the dillydallying questions. Let’s get to it. How? Does the Jessica think theater is honest? Thanks for asking. It starts with a question. Theater does. And hopefully ends with one. It starts with a question a playwright is asking perhaps to himself, perhaps of the world, perhaps it’s just a little moment in time. And then it becomes questions that the playwright’s collaborators ask of that playwright. The designers ask “What does this look like?” The actors ask “What’s my motivation?” The director shoots herself in the head. Just kidding. Sort of. The honesty starts with a series of questions. And ends with a series of planned questions, an unplanned ones too - unfortunately, and fortunately, there's no complete harnessing of human curiousity and where it can go.
The nature of questioning: ultimately it’s reactive. And if you have the right talent in the room with you, the combined reactions allow the play to float above each of the collaborators as its own entity. In an ideal world, and since it’s not an ideal world, we might as well talk about the ideal—In an ideal world the reactive nature of artists collaborating carries over into the performances of the actors. When questions are the heart of the process, ideally (again that word) the reactive nature of questioning and answering comes alive on stage.
The best part, though, is that the final questioners and the final answerers are the audience. They walk into a room. A large flower grows on stage and small person walk under it. What will happen? They ask themselves. They ask themselves what is this world? They react with laughter, or tears or outright boredom. The breath between the audience and the performance is a big question waiting to be answered by both parties in that moment. That is honest. And pentultimately real.

In our “real” lives we are dishonest most of the time. The way we smile at the person who is driving us crazy. Or when we don’t tell the person we love that we love them. Or when we answer, no you don’t look fat in that. Or when we ignore our debts. Or when we don’t cry. We don’t have time to listen or question or experience the breath between people. And real life doesn’t give us the space that exists in theater between the audience and the performance to allow a real immersion in a story, even if that story is our own life.

So theater can be, (ideally), more honest than real life.
So why is it thankless? The nature of true honesty, a bird’s eye view of an experience, and the live performance means that once a moment has happened, it dies. Except in the memory of those who watch it. However, that memory will be filtered through the rememberer’s brain. The moment that stands on its own that has a collective breath of question between an audience and a performance dies the moment it happens. That’s honest. That’s thankless. It’s also beautiful. And it leaves me questioning, where did it go?

Hillary's generational schizophrenia

Hillary is all out of wack in terms of figuring out which generation she is speaking to, for, or wants to be a part of.
When I heard her comments on RFK, I thought, well, that's awkward. When my mom heard her comments, she said it sounds like she's putting a hit out on Obama. My mom lived through that terrible time - (the JFK, RFK, MLK untimely deaths) and she was sad to dip down into that memory, and fear of losing a voice so powerful and genuine (Obama's). I was 5 or 6 maybe when President Reagan was shot. That's the closest I have come to experiencing that fear. So Hillary alienates her own generation. That's dumb.

Especially dumb because at the same time she's alienating the younger feminists by claiming rampant sexism in this race. I think my generation of feminists (I'm 33) think less about the glass ceiling, and more about being a woman who can do It All, being a mother, having a job you love, being in a marriage or partnership that is respectful. We tend not to go to the I can do everything a man can do place, but rather to the place of look how powerful a woman is in her own womanhood. This change has everything to do with the men of my generation growing up and believing the same thing - a woman is powerful in her own right, and they don't think they can do everything we can. And partnerships have been born. My brother-in-law, by best friends' boyfriends and husbands, my friends who are men, and my husband all share the load of grocery shopping, laundry, dinner, etc. My husband, who is nearly perfect, says that he would love a woman to be president, but that Hillary seems more like a woman trying to be a man. This is the difference in the feminist generations. We don't want to be men, and we don't want to be victims of men. We want to do it all, and we do. And when people try to stop us, we find them silly, not bullies.

Another really big difference is that we demand respect and give respect in our personal lives. Bill Clinton should be THE LAST PERSON IN THE WORLD who should be out talking about respect for women. The man who referred to Monica Lewinsky as "THAT WOMAN" and ruined her life, should shut up when it comes to women, respect for women, and especially respect for his wife. If we all followed his model of respect for Hillary, she'd have been out long ago.

I feel very sorry for Hillary right now. Very Very sorry. She's for sure been part of a world that has paved the way for my generation, as a good example and as a bad example, but she's out of date.

Thank you, John Edwards

I had chills. chills.
Good for him.
I'm just a little glowy today. And smiling. There is hope.

Race-isms

I am annoyed.  At Hillary Clinton, yes, but more at the world.  I am so sad that there is latent racism that could stop Barack Obama in his tracks.  I read an article today that relayed information that saddened me, that a headquarters received bomb threats, that someone said "Hang the darky from a tree" and numerous other terrible remarks.

What upsets me the most is that it seems as though the media, the Clinton Campaign, are actually considering the idea that if Obama can't win people who won't vote for him because he's black, well then he shouldn't be the nominee.  Um, what?  There is a moral high ground that needs to be taken here.  Hillary should take it.  Rather than embracing her supporters who are racists, she needs to tell them they are wrong, and that there is no place for racism in the USA anymore.  I'm not so naive as to think that racism can be obliterated in one fell swoop - but I do think that more than anyone, the Democratic Party leadership needs to be the leaders in saying YES WE CAN get rid of this division.  It hurts so bad that Hillary is playing to racists undertones rather than out and out denouncing them.  She could help change the world. Right now, and she would be a more powerful woman for doing that.  But she's not.  And that is really really sad.  

i'm new to this

this is my first ever my own blog entry. i'm a mom. i'm a theater artist. i'm an obama supporter. i have so many things to laugh about.
i'll write a lot and often. but now i have to pick up my son.