It’s the highest calling for me, at least – don’t get me wrong, I have absolutely no illusions about that in the greater scheme of things. I don’t mean much, despite the effect I’ve had on a couple of people in the world… but from the inside, I’m all I’ve got, and my art is the only way I’ve got of keeping things even vaguely tidy.
So, yeah – being able to shut my brain down might be a great superpower, but if I’d been born with it, I’d never have known that I needed it, and I certainly would never have done anything worth reading about.
But in the end, since what I’m writing is about stuff that perhaps I’d just as soon not think about, I guess the only loser in THAT scenario would be you. And maybe that DOES make me an entertainer. Hrm.
People ask people what sort of superpower they wish they had. I don’t really know what the purpose of such a question is, but generally I think it’s just something to pass the time. I think Heather’s answer is generally “flying”. At the moment, my usual answer is “phasing”, since a gamer is always looking for a way to beat the system – and the ability to alter one’s molecular density at will so as to “phase” through matter has a number of clever implications that can be used in surprising ways.
However, right now, at 3.30am, I MIGHT just answer “to be able to shut my brain off”. Not much of a superpower, but I’d perhaps be able to not think about what I’d given up if that spectacular ability were mine. My productiveness would be doubled, untroubled by fatigue (being able to fall asleep when I want to) and untroubled by worry…
I think I’ve mentioned before how midnight is only populated by ghouls and goblins in stories for children. 3am is the frightening time for adults. A time for lying awake and thinking too much and sitting up alone, wishing you had friends in an opposing time zone.
Tonight it’s my place in the world that’s taking up my sleep time – in the studio I had another one of those moments where I stepped back and thought about what it was that I was spending all my time on… this weird compulsion I have to beat a piece of wood with steel strung across it… to bend notes out of vocal cords that were never really intended for such variable purposes.
I’m a performer, and I don’t know that I fully understand why. Compulsion’s the right word – I’m very fortunate that people are willing to pay me money for what I do, but I don’t know that I’d have a choice about it anyways. Somewhere along the line, being a performer has gotten semi-tangled with being an entertainer, which is fun – but it’s not foremost, which perhaps gives some people some miscontrued ideas of what I’m about or what I care about, or what my objectives are. I do like to entertain, and the performance is at the heart of everything that I do – but how much of any of this is about communicating what’s inside of me vs sending a message? Two very different things. And above all of that, how much of it is about exorcising what’s inside of me? That’s the highest calling of all. Getting it out of me before it drives me crazy.
