You know what this blog hasn't had in a good long while? A nice rant! So pull up your chair, break out a cupcake or three, and settle in, cuz I'm ready to rip with not one, not two, but THREE rants in one!
Rant #1
So my long-term readers and friends are aware that I do enjoy a nice reality TV program now and again. I like nothing more than spending my Thursday nights with the supposedly "real" housewives of Atlanta or watching Stacy and Clinton turn around a fashion disaster. One of my faves is Dancing With the Stars. It's the near-perfect reality TV premise. It has everything! Glittery costumes! Sexy dancers! Obscure semidemihemicelebrities of the kind who used to show up on "Hollywood Squares"! Tension! Drama! Action! Plus it's one of the few reality shows - okay, the only reality show - I can actually picture myself participating in, except for the minor impediment of my non-semidemihemicelebrity status. But really, how much of a celebrity does one have to be to get on that show? After all, when I go out to run errands of an evening, any number of young pubescent types recognize who I am - isn't that celebrity status of a sort? ANYWAY, that's not what's rantworthy about DWTS. What's rantworthy is what happens after the D-listers, former A-listers, retired football players and marginally well-known Olympic athletes finish dancing. Once they're done, the formidable Len Goodman offers his opinion of their efforts. And more often than not, the audience boos him loudly. Why? Because Len Goodman has the audacity to - gasp! - judge the dancers' efforts critically. Which means that sometimes he says things that - horrors! - aren't nice! Can you imagine??? Here's this internationally-known expert on ballroom dance, a man who's been involved in the dance world for longer than most people in the audience have been ALIVE, and he actually TAKES THE DANCERS' EFFORTS SERIOUSLY AND CRITIQUES THEM AS SUCH. And you know what happens? If you listen closely, you'll notice that as Len is calling the dancers out, most of the time they're agreeing with him. He'll say something like, "Your footwork is sloppy, you're off the beat and you faked your way through that turn," and the celebrity in question is nodding in acquiescence and saying, "yup, yup, you're right, I did," and so on. Meanwhile the audience is booing because, hey! They like whoever it is and they think Len's being an old meanie-pants.
You know what? This is what's wrong with America today! As a nation, we think that just showing up and going through the motions should be rewarded! Everyone's a winner, everyone gets a star on their chart and a blue ribbon and everyone gets to go home and feel proud of themselves! Well, codswollop! You know what? [Aside from the fact that I say, 'you know what' rather a lot in my rants, I mean.] Sometimes just appearing on time and doing your best ain't good enough. Sometimes you actually have to have this thing called TALENT, and this other thing called SKILL, and if you have them but don't use them, or if you don't actually have them and think you do, then SOMEONE NEEDS TO CALL YOU OUT ON THAT SH!T. And calling someone out for doing something incorrectly isn't being MEAN, it's being HONEST. It's not like Len tells these people they're losers who should never show their faces in public again, he's telling them to clean up their footwork and stop being 'innovative' with their choreography. So why is that such a horrible thing? Didn't we become a great nation because people weren't satisfied with the status quo and they kept trying to do better? This is why China and India and all the other Asian tigers are going to rise up and eat our collective lunch! Because they're constantly striving to be better! Meanwhile, I have parents who can't understand why I won't recommend their kid for the honors level when said kid doesn't do homework, doesn't write well, and has no intellectual curiosity. But if I dared to say, "Your kid won't do the work, won't put effort into the writing, and isn't willing to think all that hard," I would be put in the stocks in the town square and pelted with cow pies! Meanwhile there are literally thousands upon thousands Chinese and Indians and fill-in-the-blanks who are used to working hard and being criticized and then going out and working even harder who would luuuuuurve to have HALF the freedoms and opportunities we enjoy because they would take those opportunities and USE them, instead of sitting around sulking because someone told them they weren't A-number-one at everything just because they're a nice person. Bah!
Rant #2
Just the other day I dragged my work-weary self home from the salt mines, only to meet up with my spousal unit in the garage. He unloaded the day's cultch from the car and unearthed a two-page missive from my daughters' private preschool/kindergarten. The letter elaborated in great detail upon how birthdays and Halloween are going to be celebrated. In lieu of costumes, the younger set has "Crazy Hat Day," where the kids all come to school wearing madcap chapeaus lovingly crafted at home.
Ahem.
Now, I realize that when we chose a private preschool/kindergarten, we were signing up to run with fast company. When we attended the end-of-school ceremony last year, I eavesdropped on the conversations around me and quickly realized that the place was lousy with stay-at-home moms, and I don't mean the kind that you run into at Costco wearing sloppy sweats and pushing a shopping cart full of Hi-C and cheese nips. No, these mommies are clearly of the Pilates-and-lattes ilk, two hobbies that are a lot easier to pursue during five child-free hours of private preschool. I'm sure they can spare a morning to run to Michael's for fake flowers and a glue gun, all the better to make a botanically-correct themed party hat using the same flowers found in the gardens at Hampton Court Palace between early June and mid-July. Meanwhile, you know what I'M doing during those same five hours, and the one and a half hour preceding that and the two hours after that? I'm WORKING. At my JOB. The one that enables us to afford PRIVATE PRESCHOOL TUITION. And then when I'm not at my job, I'm running to said preschool to pick up the monsters, and then perhaps dashing to the grocery store to procure some food for dinner, then going home and cooking said food, along with tidying up and doing dishes and finding clean clothes for the next day and, oh yes, let's not forget making sure that the next day's lunches don't contain any of the SEVENTY BILLION KNOWN ALLERGENS WE HAVE TO AVOID. So you know what? [There's that phrase again!] After I've done everything else I have to do, and if I don't have schoolwork to correct, I have approximately one hour per day to do what I want to do. ONE HOUR. And I'm supposed to spend it making a crazy hat?!? I'll tell you what's crazy, and it ain't no hat!!
Rant #3
Warren brought the girls home from dance class today and announced, "Next week they're enforcing the dress code." This means I have to go out and buy India a new pair of tap shoes... despite the fact that she has a perfectly good pair of tap shoes. Why? Because we switched dance schools, that's why! And where the previous dance school insisted that pre-tap and ballet students wear WHITE tap shoes, which necessitated about five trips to various local dance emporia prior to giving up and just ordering the damn things over the internet, the new dance school insists on BLACK tap shoes, the kind with ELASTIC fasteners, not buckles and certainly not ties. This is in addition to the ballet-pink tights, the ballet-pink ballet slippers, and the pink leotard WITH attached skirt.
For the love of Balanchine, dance schools, just what do you think this is? The American Ballet Theatre Junior? The Bolshoi West? What?
Eight million years ago, when I was in dance school, we were expected to wear leotards and tights to class. Period. Pink, green, red, white, black, fuschia, my mom got whatever was on sale or dug whatever my cousin had outgrown a couple years ago out of the box and off to class I went. And you know what? I don't think I was any better or worse a dancer because of what I wore. I know having everyone wear the same thing stops the kids from competing based on dress and makes everyone look more uniform, but, sheesh! They're five years old! Tell the parents to buy plain leotards and tights and give up on the Anna Pavlova pretensions! And as far as shoes go, how about I'll buy a new pair of tap shoes when India damn well grows out of the old ones that I spent perfectly good money on and which fit her perfectly damn fine, thank you very much! Tell you what, if my kids show any actual talent and skill (about which I've already written, if you care to scroll back to the top of this screed), and if they should find themselves in seriously advanced dance classes, I will be more than happy to buy the officially-sanctioned dancewear, right down to the last ribbon and hairbow. Meanwhile, I don't think the girls need any specialized gear to pretend they're bunnies hopping down the mountainside looking for carrots.
Whew. I feel so much better!
"To critique" is not a verb form. "To criticize" is a verb form. A "critique" is the result of criticism.
Posted by: Poppi | October 14, 2009 at 05:39 PM