Thursday, Jan. 16, 2003
Everything I need is right here in my hands, posted at 11:47 p.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com She was intense, unguarded, and stunning. I left feeling affirmed, connected, and envious of her passion.Yes, I just returned from Melissa Ferrick's concert. As usual, it was superb.
This woman is just a phenomenal performer. She's a walking case study of a singer who lives through her art. Her problems and passions are flooding her insides, and she uses music as a way to release them. And she admits it, as a lyric in one of her songs screams, "Isn't it obvious what I'm doing out here every night / I'm desperately, desperately trying to learn / how to be loved." That isn't the actual lyric on the CD version of the song, but Ferrick reinvents and reimagines many of her songs for the live show. "Til You're Dead" gets a sped-up version with plenty of scatting. "Welcome to My Life" gets a credo in the middle where she screams, "Whether you are queer or straight or transgendered or gypsy or African-American or hippy or Native American or woman or man or any other nationality or sexual orientation or ethnic group, I declare all Ferrick shows to be safe places!" She then added on a new verse in which she described what feminism is: "I am not defined by my sexual orientation / my brain and my heart and my guts do not have a sexual orientation / Feminism is transending your gender / This means that if you are a man, you are not judged here by your cock (aw shucks) / If you are a woman, you are not judged here by your cunt / Feminism is transending gender." She went off on this for a while, and this was interesting. I felt at that moment like I was at a radical political rally, and it felt good.
This was my 9th time seeing Melissa Ferrick. I couldn't find anybody to go with, and almost backed out, but was so glad I went. There is something so empowering about seeing her in concert. She is truly an artist that seems to use her art to heal herself, and her intensity rocks. It's tough to listen to her music and not be concerned about her psychological state, but then she'll sing a song like "Drive" or "Win 'Em Over" that is just so utterly happy that you're left feeling like she takes specific emotional issues and fleshes them out for a whole song. Her lyrics are very personal, yet her passion is able to bring her audience along with her.
She played "I Like It That Way," one of my all-time favorites of hers. I have always wanted to request "The Juliana Hatfield Song," which is the song that first made me a fan yet I've never heard it live. I chickened out, though.
The opener, this guy named Stephen Kellogg, was really good. I'd never heard of him before, but he had a laid-back, goofy Todd Snider kind of vibe that I liked a lot. His songs were good, too, with great vocals and stage presence. When he ended with a folk cover of Madonna's "Like a Prayer," I was hooked indeed. I checked out his tour schedule on the way out, and was surprised to learn he is actually opening up for Todd Snider at a show that Andi, Rob, Kristen, and I had planned on attending in Annapolis. Cool. He's also playing a gig with Rose Polenzani in a month or so at a venue I've been wanting to check out for a while, so I might go to that show.
Trying to go to more shows this year, in keeping with my New Year's Resolutions...
***
Otherwise, life seems extremely busy and without downtime. School is darn stressful right now, with no paper because of budget cuts, the whole furlough issue, the end of the semester approaching, and the knee-deep stack of papers on my desk.
I haven't done that great of a job in letting parents know if their kid is failing this semester, except for progress reports. Usually I'm big on calling home often with frequent updates for the borderline kids, but with my computer broke down for much of the marking period, I haven't been able to give good estimates of grades so I haven't called home much. Instead, I've been concentrating on making sure these borderline kids pass my class. With 70 as the pass/fail cutoff (which I hate, hate, hate), I've really to push some of them. I sat down with the ten or so borderline kids in the last week or so and told them that I wanted them to pass, and that I needed 110% from them on the work from now until the end of the semester.
It's worked for most of them. But today we took a fairly easy "Have you read it?" type of quiz/test for Their Eyes Were Watching God. Two of the angels that I had spoken to just four days before failed miserably, both getting 50%.
I was pissed off. I probably showed it. As soon as I recorded the scores, I called both of them out into the hallway and sort of laid into them. I do not think I was mean, but I was very clear that I was disappointed and expected more effort than they demonstrated. I told them that a 50% on an easy check quiz is simply unacceptable, that I was concerned about both of them passing.
One of the girls started crying.
"I don't want you to cry, Natasha. I want you to pass."
More crying. Not sobbing, but tears rolling down from the eyes like water condensing on a window.
"Natasha, you don't need to cry. I need more effort from you, though. You do not want to be taking this course again in the summer."
She wouldn't look at me. I sent her to the bathroom to clean up. I felt bad. Ugh.
***
After leaving the concert, I was pleasantly pleased to see the ground covered in snow. There is a winter snow advisory. Could be a snow day!