Four more days. In four days, the first phase of journey that I have embarked upon will close and the next will open, leaving me as terrified as ever. And as exhilerated. I am working harder now than I ever worked at Fox or MTVN, and I'm fine with it. I want to do it. I have a job to do.
I have this paper to write about my personal perspective on disability and I am delaying writing it. I am delaying it because all the knowledge I've gained in the past 7 weeks is difficult to sum up, but also because...there's just so much more to know.
And I know this sounds like I'm making it about me when it's about the students. The students I've already met, and the ones that I will meet in September and the September after that. I have to square my shoulders for the burden of being a leader to these students, some of which might not know how to read and write.
We spoke about our hopes early in the program, and I can honestly say that one hope i Have for my students is that they learn to love reading and writing as much as I do, even if I have to read every book to them. I hope that they learn why the Constitution is important, how to add decimals and what a virus is. I hope that my efforts will not be in vain.
I was inspired when we went around the circle our first day in class, relating our previous lives and telling why we joined the program. We are all so different, but alike. I would not have crossed paths with these people had I not become a Fellow. I am thankful to be in a group of such passionate and incredibly smart individuals who have come together for a common purpose.
I haven't gotten to write much during training, about the experience or otherwise. But I feel as though the dam will break soon and i['m looking forward to it.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Awakening in Spring
When I saw Spring Awakening last month, I didn't immediately love it. I enjoyed it, but I thought the second act was ballad heavy and didn't rock hard enough and that the man story took too long to develop. I bought the CD soon after, and I can't stop listening to it. There is something in the music that keeps drawing me back - lyrics, voices, imagery - it's something different each time. And it's not even the same song that gets stuck in my head each time...it's usually different.
The show has since won several Tony's and thus increased in popularity and visibility, which it deserves. The cast is wonderful. And the story events, set in the repressed German society in the 1800s all goes back to the simple question "Where do babies come from?" The mother's point blank refusal to answer this simple question sets the plot in motion. How can a girl know if she's having sex if she doesn't know what sex is?
It's hard to fathom this in our culture. Children are learning about sex younger and younger and that's both good and bad. Wendla, the main female character in the play, did not know what she was doing. It's all there in the lyrics (which, by the way, are in present day vernacular). The imagery in the lyrics is beautiful, invoking the images of a blue angel seducing the boys.
The boys, Melchior - the one who is too smart for his own good and draws the wrath of his faceless elders by creating a sex manual, and Moritz, the suffering, school challenged one whose wild hairstyle is the manifestation of his inner termoil, are incredible characters. I felt most drawn to Moritz, especially in light of my recent studies, who expresses himself in electric-guitar highlighted songs and voices the confusion and frustration that many teens can identify with.
The most underdeveloped character that I found most interesting is Ilse, a girl who lives outside the society of the rest; a runaway who has more freedom than all of the rest put together. Ilse appears in the first act to sing a duet about being sexually abused but then offers Moritz an alternative to suffering at school, which he ultimately rejects.
The songs are sung as an interior monologue of the characters, with pulsing sexuality under their demure dresses and school uniforms. I would love to see the show again now that I know more about it and won't be looking for it to be something it's not. I have never seen a Broadway show more than once except for Rent (which is coming up again :oD)...but this one would be well worth the second look...as long as the original cast is still around.
The show has since won several Tony's and thus increased in popularity and visibility, which it deserves. The cast is wonderful. And the story events, set in the repressed German society in the 1800s all goes back to the simple question "Where do babies come from?" The mother's point blank refusal to answer this simple question sets the plot in motion. How can a girl know if she's having sex if she doesn't know what sex is?
It's hard to fathom this in our culture. Children are learning about sex younger and younger and that's both good and bad. Wendla, the main female character in the play, did not know what she was doing. It's all there in the lyrics (which, by the way, are in present day vernacular). The imagery in the lyrics is beautiful, invoking the images of a blue angel seducing the boys.
The boys, Melchior - the one who is too smart for his own good and draws the wrath of his faceless elders by creating a sex manual, and Moritz, the suffering, school challenged one whose wild hairstyle is the manifestation of his inner termoil, are incredible characters. I felt most drawn to Moritz, especially in light of my recent studies, who expresses himself in electric-guitar highlighted songs and voices the confusion and frustration that many teens can identify with.
The most underdeveloped character that I found most interesting is Ilse, a girl who lives outside the society of the rest; a runaway who has more freedom than all of the rest put together. Ilse appears in the first act to sing a duet about being sexually abused but then offers Moritz an alternative to suffering at school, which he ultimately rejects.
The songs are sung as an interior monologue of the characters, with pulsing sexuality under their demure dresses and school uniforms. I would love to see the show again now that I know more about it and won't be looking for it to be something it's not. I have never seen a Broadway show more than once except for Rent (which is coming up again :oD)...but this one would be well worth the second look...as long as the original cast is still around.
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