Feel free to scroll... I'm apparently restless and wandering around in the moon garden...
Sorry to relate Adam and teaching again, but teaching is the world I often come from and is probably my most personally creative "art," so discussions of creativity often lead me there.
Every year, the English students in my classes participate in a Shakespeare festival. Part of that day includes a big competition in which classes put together a ten minute reduced Shakespeare performance of the play they have been reading that year.
No parents can help, so crews of students design and make costumes, sets, learn lines and blocking, create music for the background etc....It is an "important," lol, competition that earns the class who wins big bragging rights each year. As a teacher, each year I have to oversee and put on this production with my 100 excitable 8th graders.
In the process of accomplishing this, I meet with groups of students to try to teach them how to lead and follow and dream big and make things happen. The first year I was in charge, we lost the competition, but since then, rather unfortunately, haha, we have been winning for ten years straight. The students love Shakespeare because of these performances, and every year my incoming students can't wait for that time of the year, already anticipating the "great Shakespeare" year they will have that they have heard
about from siblings, friends etc...
On my small scale, it is a lot of pressure because I want to give my students the quality experience they are so excited about, and I think it is one of the most valuable learning
experiences they have in my class, but it is a lot of work, and every year at the end of the
competition, I wonder how any new play will ever be as good as the one we just did!
Because students write it, act in it, produce it, and do all the sets and costumes for it, I
never know if that magical coming together will happen; I also know that whether it happens, or fails to happen, is largely due to whether I orchestrate all the parts to the best of my ability-whether I get the kids excited and motivated to get on board, whether I teach them how to manage work crews, how to brainstorm for ideas and then give up on
their own for the collective good of the project, whether I can get many non-actors to let loose and have fun on stage, whether or not I can bring out the best talents in the group
and use them all effectively, whether I can get them to give of their free time before and
after school and at lunch. Whew!
When the competition is over, and the students are invariably joyously bonding together and celebrating their victory, and I am receiving positive feedback, my main feeling is pure relief that the whole wonderful experience is just over for another year, lol.
Somehow, Adam's recent "I won't let you down" tweet reminded me of this sometimes
overwhelming experience. It made me think of how tiring it is when being good and
winning some things sets up hopes from others, even when they are very sincere and come from the best possible place, of being good and winning more things.
I know Adam concentrates, as I do in my small way when directing my class plays, on
enjoying and living inside the moment of doing and creating, and I think, like me, he accomplishes that in the middle of performing; he clearly loves it and the joy takes over. We can see and feel that.
But outside the moment, feeling the hopes and excitement when he is not performing from the people he so wants to do and be his best for, must be a bit overwhelming and pressure filled now and then. Underneath and all. Amercan Idol hopes, Queen hopes, tv
and movie hopes, radio and cd sales hopes, mega stardom hopes... After all, he doesn't want to "let us down." And he is determined that he won't. In fact, he promises us that he won't. And I believe him. I feel his energy; I love his hope, his drive.
But I'm glad I don't have to do it, lol. Because it feels a little exhausting, too.
I'm glad Adam has good primary people in his life to remind him that while "winning" public acclaim for his work and/or winning "star status" might certainly be personally gratifying, that the reason he is loved and respected by them is completely apart from that. As Eber says, he has always been proud to be Adam's father. And in Fault, Sauli
affirms that his relationship with Adam is not about what is happening for Adam publically;
it is instead about what happens between them privately.
I like these words from the core people in his life, the ones that matter.
In my own personal life, I try to to mirror their examples. I often tell my "artists" that my love/gratitude for them is about who they are before they even begin to create. It is about how they are with me, the gift they are to me.
I'm glad Adam has solid people in his life who can help him keep things real, the kind who
give as well as demand, who likely ask him what
he wants from
them from time to time, the kind of people who let him know that
they won't let
him down.
Im feeling glad that Adam has so many fans that are on team #whateverhewantstodo, fans that wont let him down. I'm glad they help him feel little more safe in his crazy world.
