So, who are you?

Wow, the pressure... to write something readable, to produce a post that will have people bothering to come back... None of this made any easier by the fact I'm thoroughly embedded in a cold right now and feeling particularly pathetic today.
Hopefully, that'll have granted me the sympathy vote at least. If you're an American reader, chances are that you'll be thinking, 'aww, poor chickadee, all gunged up with cold and yet battling bravely to produce a posting. Let's hope she finds her positive energy again soon.' The Brits amongst you, however, will be vaguely wondering why I'm bothering to produce a post at all if I'm really that ill, and if I'm not that ill then shut up and get on with it. A slightly stereotypical observation, but nevertheless grounded in reality. For some reason I was thinking about that TV show yesterday, 'Britain's Got Talent' - the one where a mobile phone salesman shook all the viewers up just a little with his perfect rendition of, 'Nessun dorma.' Likewise, a wee lass called Connie - a six year old half pint - silenced everyone with a pitch perfect performance of, 'Somewhere over the rainbow.' The mobile phone guy, Potts was his surname, simply announced he was There to Sing Opera.

Now switch over to the 'America's Got Talent' I just stumbled across. The acts I saw were, frankly, a ghastly concoction of all that is loathesome about America. Even children as young as eight were essentially saying that darn, they were pretty brilliant weren't they and check out how THEY could shake their booty. Dear God. If you ask me, the contestants I saw were - aside from those who were merely classifiable as lunatics - skilled, not talented. They had practised enough times to Get It Right On The Night. Our Potts guy, damn he was incredible. People who know nothing about opera even realised this.

I was definitely coming to a point here but it seems to be alluding me right now. Something to do with the brash and crass nature of most Americans, who seemed intent on rewarding 'beauty' (anorexic girls with enough make-up to create attractive gremlins), rather than talent. This is just the impression I get from multiple television shows and numerous encounters with our cousins acoss the pond: sit in a cafe anywhere in Oxford and you'll be able to hear the Americans conversing, and if you are unable to distinguish the accent then they're the ones who use phrases such as, 'and how did that make you feel?' every third sentence. Probably in an insincere voice while they eye up the cute waiter hovering in the background. (Hang on, I said Oxford. No cute waiters there - I'll save you the effort, ladies, I've already checked).

Have I annoyed anybody out there yet? Awesome. Stereotypes are frustrating as hell, aren't they? They are basically grounded in a little truth and a great deal of 'pop psychology', the kind of ludicrous information filed away in self-help books. You know the type of thing: How To Get the Man of your Dreams; How To Keep the Man of your Dreams; How to Get Over the fact the Man of your Dreams was actually the Man of your Nightmares. The point of this post, I think, is to try and get everyone to stop making judgements - yes, this is especially directed at you readers who claim to be 'open minded', i.e. the ones who say, 'I like to think of myself as fairly relaxed, but...' and proceed to annihilate the character of some poor soul across the room. Everyone has the potential to be more than the sum of their parts, more than the mere flesh and blood of which we consist - shown by the likes of one Mr Potts who was just there to sing a bit of opera. Maybe we liked him because he was sincere, and sincerity is so darn rare these days.

I'll end this dubiously down-beat post with a poem. And a thought for each of you to turn over in your minds before you fall asleep tonight: are you who you want to be?

Because your eyes were two flames
And your brooch wasn't pinned right,
I thought you had spent the night
In playing forbidden games.

Because you were vile and devious
Such deadly hatred I bore you:
To see you was to abhor you
So lovely and yet so villainous.

Because a note came to light,
I know now where you had been,
And what you had done unseen —
Cried for me all the long night.


POR TUS OJOS ENCENDIDOS... (Verso XIX)

Por tus ojos encendidos
Y lo mal puesto de un broche,
Pensé que estuviste anoche
Jugando a juegos prohibidos.

Te odié por vil y alevosa:
Te odié con odio de muerte:
Náusea me daba de verte
Tan villana y tan hermosa.

Y por la esquela que vi
Sin saber cómo ni cuándo,
Sé que estuviste llorando
Toda la noche por mí.