Navel-gazing in the extreme (but not mine, someone else's)

Happy Thanksgiving to my American friends. Happy Thursday to the rest of you. I usually have a bit of a rant about what a sham this holiday is, but this year I can't be bothered, so you get this instead. You're welcome.

 *****

Hoo, boy.

Last week I did a thing I haven't done in a looong time. I went to a college dance department show. I hadn't been to one since, well, college. One of the girls at my Pleasant Hill dance studio who was a high school senior last year is now a freshman at a private Catholic college a few towns over, and she was in the show and told my pal P.V. about it, so P.V. invited me and her mom to go see it with her.

Kids, the average college dance department show has not changed in the last thirteen years.

When I was in college and enrolled in a dance department class, I had to go to the shows and write "reviews" of them as part of my coursework. I pity the poor soul who had to read them. I inevitably panned them. I was merciless. Spite and vitriol flew from my fingers and filled the required page with disgust.

I was kind of an asshole.

I regret nothing.

Back to last week. The show had a theme which I can appreciate, even applaud. This one was billed as a "shared dance show that is energized by a long-awaited collective assembling and finding momentum beside each other again. Returning to campus this fall and reflecting on the shared experiences of the last few years, these emerging choreographers are exploring concepts of life cycles, family, returning to self, letting go, healing, and pathways forward together." Cue me signing resignedly and admitting that it's a good theme for the current state of the world, while at the same time rolling my eyes and making a rather rude hand gesture because dear God, could they be anymore vomit-inducingly sincere?

The pieces college dance students create can be wonderfully meaningful and cathartic and freeing for them. Dance therapy is a thing, you know. And that's fantastic! The trouble is that for the most part they get so bleeding artsy about it that what the audience ends up experiencing is the performative equivalent of being on the outside of an inside joke. It just doesn't translate. The audience sits there observing some very talented people doing something they enjoy, but the meaning is lost on them. Sometimes it sort-of comes through--if the program notes give enough insight into the choreographer's process--but for the most part...not so much. 

It's not always a complete strike-out. Most of the time there are one or two pieces that hit the mark and then some--there were two pieces that have actually stayed with me since this performance. One was delightfully creepy in a way that made me properly uncomfortable. The little quote in the program notes was something about strangeness, and your strangeness, and what if you looked at that strangeness, and what if that strangeness looked back at you. It gave me the wibblies in a wonderful way. It's difficult to try to relay a physical artwork in verbal form, so I won't. Just take the description of my reaction at face value. The second piece, well, I haven't the foggiest notion of how it fit into the overarching theme at all, but it was a refreshing change from the styles of tap I get to dance myself. It was a wonderfully gentle, simple-in-steps-but-complicated-in-rhythms piece that started a capella and transitioned to Pennies From Heaven. It was clean, it was bright, it was wonderful. It put me in mind of old Fred Astaire films. With a world that loves hard and fast and sharp and edgy, it was a lovely reminder of the value of slowing down every once in a while.

Other than those two pieces, though, the rest of the show was hidden behind the rehearsal room palisades insofar as meaning was concerned. I could take the time to pick the rest of it apart in terms of technique and execution and use of lighting and sound design, but that smacks of all those damnable papers I had to churn out during my undergrad years, and fuck that noise, thank you very much.

No, the average college dance department show hasn't changed at all since the last time I attended one. They're still chock-full of self-indulgent, deep-and-meaningful wankery. And they still make me want to scream.

Coming soon to a Critter Nation near you!

So here's the thing. A few times a year, the rescue from which I adopt my rats has a surgery day. They work with one of the local community colleges that has a veterinary technician program. The rescue supplies the animals--guinea pigs and rats--and the vet tech students get hands-on experience. It's a beautiful thing.

There was a surgery day the other week. This means that the rescue had a sudden influx of neutered male rats. Why fix the boys and not the girls? It's easier. It's as simple as that. There's significantly more danger and possibility of things going wrong with the females. Not that there isn't a level of danger to the males, of course there is, but it's less. In any case, neutered males can mix with in-tact females and not make a million ratty babies. This is ideal when you happen to have one lonely female rat left from your last mischief who needs a friend, and you were planning on boys at some point in the future anyway.

Yes. Maggie has three new friends. I was planning on three boys, but there was a pair of brothers who were sweet as anything, so I took them and a little girl from a group that was abandoned on the steps of the rescue (some people need to fuck off and DIE). The bonding period was nearly immediate, which is unusual. Every time I've bonded a mischief before it's been a week of bloodshed and mayhem. This time, I think I heard about three squeaks, and none of them were the 'fuck you' squeak. They were more the 'hey, maybe don't do that, okay?' squeak. Everybody was in a pile in the hammock by the second day. It was some kind of miracle, and I'm not questioning it.

Now, y'all know how committed I am to my naming themes. The last group were all named for characters from The Powerpuff Girls. I still have Maggie, but I couldn't come up with another show or film with a Maggie in it that had other names that I liked. The Simpsons was right out. No way, thanks. I did toy with the idea of characters from The Ranch from Netflix because Debra Winger's character is called Maggie, but that ended up not really doing it for me either. It did remind me of a good film to pull from, though. Howard Hawks' 1959 cowboy classic Rio Bravo. The main trio in the film are all male, so I had to swap out one of the heroes for the love interest.

 

Ricky Nelson's character, Colorado Ryan, got the shaft. Sorry, Ricky.

 

(Pretty sure someone doctored that poster, but I could be wrong.)

One more of the human gang:

 

And now, without further ado, I would like to present to you, taking over for Messrs. Wayne and Martin, and Ms. Dickinson, my new, all-rodent cast!

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here, in case you have any interest, is the original film trailer.
 

I shouldn't be allowed to think.

So we're off from Irish dance for two weeks after our class this week. Next week is the last push of prep for the dancers going to the Western Region Oireachtas in Phoenix 11/19-11/21 so the class before ours is going to run later than usual and eat up our time slot. The week after is the Thanksgiving holiday and the school takes the whole week off for that--partly because of the holiday, and partly because the Oireachtas is always the weekend before and everyone will be very tired indeed.

Next year, though...next year the Oireachtas is going to be in San Francisco. That's effectively our 'home turf'. There's already talk of entering a group dance or two. They do four-hand or eight-hand on those, and we could probably drum up enough for either. Or both. And I am oh-so-very down for all of that.

Here's the thing, though. I'm starting to get capital-I Ideas. Capital-I Ideas like, "I wonder if I could get myself up to snuff to go in for the solo competitions by next year..." And, "How many feiseanna would I have to get in beforehand?"

You see what I mean about how I shouldn't be allowed to think?

I could list all the reasons it would be a terrible idea--things like the cost, the extra work, the fact that this is meant to be a recreational activity and I wasn't going into it for anything even resembling glory. I could list all the reasons it would be a fabulous idea--I could have a really groovy outfit going because even though I'd go the blackout route there's such a thing as black rhinestones and I am there for them. I'm still building cases for and against the whole endeavor.

I'm pretty sure 'for' is going to win.

What can I say? Buried deep down inside this fuck-you-and-the-horse-you-rode-in-on facade lives a girl who loves sparkly things and twirling. Organized twirling, obviously. And carefully curated sparkly things.

And while we're on the subject of organized twirling and carefully curated sparkly things, it's T-minus three months until my Pleasant Hill studio's first competition weekend. This year, I've got the schedule. This year, I've got a company jacket. This year, I am making the whole thing social--and also volunteering to be useful in whatever capacity is necessary in the moment, of course.

Mostly, this is all falling under the category of 'things to look forward to after two years of universal nonsense'. Y'all know I'm not the most social human being on God's green earth, but even I have reached a point where going out for more than the necessaries is appealing. 

And if I get to be sparkly while I do it? Added bonus!

You see, the thing is...

 ...I've got one particularly merciless rabid brain weasel being a real menace this week, and when you combine that with not-so-great sleep, a bit of general apathy, and a distinct lack of interesting things to talk about, it doesn't make for a very interesting post. Sorry, kids.

I was going to tell you about the big ol' family party, though, so we'll do a brief overview.

It was full of people I only sort of recognized, and certainly couldn't tell you how they were related to me. These were all relations from my father's father's side. He had a bunch of brothers...and maybe a sister or two? I don't know. Hard to keep track. Legit Italian Roman Catholics, amirite? So there were my dad's first cousins, and partners of same, and maybe some of their offspring...? I was the standard bearer for the under-forties, anyway. No actual children-children, thank goodness. I don't think I could have coped with keeping my dad from a major cardiovascular event and keeping my mother sane and small humans running around, even if I wouldn't have had to be in charge of said small humans.

I was having enough of a time being 50% in charge of setting up and taking down and feeding people and moving things around. We had loads of food, and only half the people who RSVP'd yes showed up, and there was a wild turkey who wanted to come in and join the party. I was tempted to let him. Would have livened things up a bit. We booked where we did because they had bocce courts, but no one played, which was some bullshit. At least that would have given me something to do besides hiding in the kitchen with my mother, or sitting at a table with my mother, or fussing over food tables with my mother...are you sensing a trend, here?

Still, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, and they were profuse in their praise and gratitude, and my dad's speech didn't go on for hours. It took a whole lot of persuading to get people to take party favors and leftovers home with them, though, which means that I now have a pile of small Italian flags...anybody want one? You pay the postage and I'll send 'em out.