I would like to start this blog post with a thank you to a very special friend of mine who has a true gift for listening. A couple of weeks ago I fell into one of my bouts of melancholy over the fact that I am a 28 year old single man who lives in a town with no apparent romantic options because the average age of the members of the opposite sex is dead. But seriously, those of you who know me can vouch for the fact that for the most part I am a person who enjoys life and is always there to give an encouraging word, laugh with a well told joke, or generally be a good friend. And though I am a confessed realist, I would say that I lean to the side of optimism instead of pessimism.
However, every now and then I look around me and see my friends with their spouses, or girlfriends and wonder to myself, why not me? It depresses me to think that I am a person with a lot of love to give and no one to give it to. Now I love my friends and I am very liberal with the love I have for them but that is a different kind of love. I want to know the kind of love that exists between two people who have become one. The kind that I see when my parents or grandparents look at each other.
The platitudes of it will happen when it happens sound more hollow to me the older that I get and it gets extremely frustrating because for all my bluster and realistic philosophy the truth of the matter is, I am a hopeless romantic at heart. I know that I am probably making more out of this than there actually is but this is how I feel sometimes, and I am not one who usually verbalizes feelings like this because of my masculine conditioning of internalizing such feelings.
Anyway I really just needed to vent. To my good friend again I say thank you for being able to listen to me when I do externalize these feelings and to all my other friends who read this blog, I am sorry I have not trusted you enough to tell you these things before. Hopefully you won't think less of me.
'Til we meet again.
Paul
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Monday, March 9, 2009
An evening with the King.
This past weekend I went to see Roger's and Hammerstein's classic musical "The King and I", which was playing at my local community theater. Now some of you may be asking yourselves why, because some of you know that I have an unbiased hatred for that show. The answer to that question is that I have a very good friend who was playing the King, who stepped in on short notice and needed the support of his friends. That being said I now know why I do not like this show.
I first developed a dislike for this show as a little (yes I was little at one time) boy when my sister would watch the movie starring Yul Brenner with some regularity. I really think it was the song "Getting to Know You" that did it for me, to this day I cannot hear that song and not cringe. But after a few years I began to reevaluate my dislike for the show and try to give it a fair shake. After all there have been many movies that I could not stand as a child that I have grown to love in my adult life, The Wizard of Oz is one that immediately springs to mind. However no matter how many times I watched it with an objective eye there was always something that grated on me about it and I never could figure it out.
This weekend however I think I know. The show is very uneven. You have arguably one of the most dynamic characters in theater in The King, surrounded by a group of under defined characters that no matter how good of actors you have to play them are always coming up short. Now before you get angry at me and misconstrue my words, I am not saying that the only person I saw that did a fantastic job on Friday was my friend the King. I have many friends in that show and I was astounded by how good some of them were. I never before realized just how good a singing voice Lady Thiang or Lun Tha had until I saw them this weekend.
What I am saying is that no matter how good they are, the characters they are playing are so underdeveloped it is painful. There is a whole story in and of itself for the Lun Tha/Tuptim relationship. Now I know that the show is about the relationship between Anna and the King, and all others are support, but it just seems to me that with a little bit of tweaking in other areas of the show it could be so much more than it is.
Anyway I have probably made no end of enemies by this post but I felt that these were things I needed to say.
'Til we meet again
Paul
P.S. A word of advice. Never play Clue with lawyers.
I first developed a dislike for this show as a little (yes I was little at one time) boy when my sister would watch the movie starring Yul Brenner with some regularity. I really think it was the song "Getting to Know You" that did it for me, to this day I cannot hear that song and not cringe. But after a few years I began to reevaluate my dislike for the show and try to give it a fair shake. After all there have been many movies that I could not stand as a child that I have grown to love in my adult life, The Wizard of Oz is one that immediately springs to mind. However no matter how many times I watched it with an objective eye there was always something that grated on me about it and I never could figure it out.
This weekend however I think I know. The show is very uneven. You have arguably one of the most dynamic characters in theater in The King, surrounded by a group of under defined characters that no matter how good of actors you have to play them are always coming up short. Now before you get angry at me and misconstrue my words, I am not saying that the only person I saw that did a fantastic job on Friday was my friend the King. I have many friends in that show and I was astounded by how good some of them were. I never before realized just how good a singing voice Lady Thiang or Lun Tha had until I saw them this weekend.
What I am saying is that no matter how good they are, the characters they are playing are so underdeveloped it is painful. There is a whole story in and of itself for the Lun Tha/Tuptim relationship. Now I know that the show is about the relationship between Anna and the King, and all others are support, but it just seems to me that with a little bit of tweaking in other areas of the show it could be so much more than it is.
Anyway I have probably made no end of enemies by this post but I felt that these were things I needed to say.
'Til we meet again
Paul
P.S. A word of advice. Never play Clue with lawyers.
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