"I'm a proud member of the rabble" - Benjamin Netanyahu
Last Thursday, I heard Elie Wiesel present Benjamin Netanyahu. The circumstance was politics. The topic was truth. And I listened. And I understood. I understood what it is that we are fighting for. It isn't a question of semantics. It's a question of gut and heart and veracity.
Last Friday, a woman revealed me. In one critically scanning glance, she knew who I was. With one sweep, I, the complacent, was rewired. I'm relearning how to walk.
And then, this past Monday, I repented. I read a list of faults and acknowledged them as my own. I think that as we grow older, we find that more faults truly are our own. And each year, we can assume more responsibility for righting them.
By October 1st, 2009, I'm supposed to sum up the past twenty years of my experience on a few 8.5 by 11 inch sheets of eggshell and submit them for judgment.
How much of your being can you fit in the palm of your hand? In the clench of your fist? How much trickles through the cracks?
It’s all really a story about life. It’s a story about journeying towards enlightened communication. I was born in New Jersey and upgraded to New York. I was born into a dysfunctional home of parental normality and upgraded to deeper understanding with a single mom. I was raised in a home of Russian immigrants and ended up learning not only two distinct languages, but also the languages of poetry, art, literature, and music. I grew up in a home of Jewish definition and learned the languages of Zionism and soul. However, as I grew and evolved, I didn’t understand that vocation could be as interdisciplinary as life, and upon my application to college, I forced myself to choose a language. I was going to be a singer. I was going to have one definition - one dimension - one tool with which to speak my mind. But tides roll in and tides roll out leaving the same shores behind, but eroded and reinterpreted. Music is not only performative. It is influential. It's the language of multifaceted possibility. I now choose music as the mother tongue of my universality.
I'm starting a list of things I don't know. Like why I like Rubinstein's Bach more than Gould's. Or why I can't do homework with Joni Mitchell anymore. Or where passion comes from.
I'm waiting for answers in a snapple cap.
