In college...very little actually gave me pause.
It was your standard A,B,C...1,2,3 case scenario.
Until one elective, one lecture hall...one professor.
Sadly..I don't remember his name. I will call him Mr. G with
the missing Jaw. He had cancer and it left him visibly disfigured.
The class was Theater.
My idea of theater class was Broadway tunes and trips to TKTS in NY.
I never thought much about it aside from another vehicle to get me the hell outta there.
It alone is the most important class of my life thus far. (Aside from "How to Strip to the Oldies"..but that was just so I could earn some extra money during my one again off again unsuccessful career paths...it was short lived as well due to the age of my clients)...Anyhoot...
In short...the professor gave the students the opportunity to choose their grade. What? Someone actually allowed a college student to have an option. To ask themselves a question as to what it was that they wanted.
It was the first time I was challenged. It was also the first time someone let me
decide what I wanted.
I wanted an A+. I really for the first time ever wanted it...and I didn't even know why? It was a gift I thought. Something easy.
Ha.
Not easy at all.
What Mr. G with the missing Jaw presented to me was a valuable life lesson. Through theater.
In the curriculum you had to go see a few Broadway plays, off Broadway, local, and college...and then write about it and hand it in. E.A.S.Y.
Ha.
After attending said theater shows you would go back into the 100+ filled lecture hall and you would be called to stand and give your feedback. If it was not what he wanted to here he would tell you in a aggressive, horrid manner that you were fucking wrong...and you would flush red hot and hide your head for the rest of the class not understanding how you could have gotten this question wrong: IE;
Q: What exactly was Sweeney Todd angry about?
A: I believe it was the fact that he was wrongly imprisoned because the mayor was
secretly in love with his beautiful wife.
Response: That's wrong. Sit the fuck down, better luck next time fool.
And..I would be like "Wtf?..I'm not standing up ever again - this class is horrible"
Ha.
But then I would get my paper back with an A grade but a note on the top next to the grade saying that if I didn't stand up in class more then I wouldn't make it to my goal.
Ha.
The correct answer to the question I later learned would be...
A:
I felt that if in my life I was wrongly accused of something that
there would be no rest until order was returned. That the pain of losing
my freedom and my family would cause me an anger so great revenge would never be
enough.
Mr. G with the missing Jaw forced me to feel.
He taught me to feel and to be ok with feeling.
That what I was watching unfold at these performances ultimately was
about my life. About me.
And because of it...I have been able to see the world from this perspective however
painful it has been for me at times. I am lucky to have learned that so early on because it is one of the ruling factors behind Talula Love Bottoms.
I got an A+. Only three of us in the entire lecture hall which, after the number of students that chose the C grade and didn't have to go to class anymore, was about 30. It is still to this day noted as one of my greatest successes.
Ha.
Cash/Money
by the Beautiful Girls
(not the whole song..just the part I think applies)
Going, my boats leaving today.
Gonna get down to the water,
gonna wash these blues away.
Man this city's taken too much from me,
gonna head out to the country,
find a place where I can breathe.
I've been working 9 to 5,
trying to lead a gracious life,
but my hard work only ever went to keeping me in strife.
Gonna take another road.
Gonna find myself some soul.
Gonna do my best in ever way,
to pay attention as I go.
Cash Money aint got no use for you
unless you can buy me true love
And it's funny
how many times they've proved
that the only true fortune you can save,
is the truth.
Bottoms up. xoxo.
