Just a musing: new year, same attitude
Starting the year off strong by telling people off!
Happy new year mixers!1
Before we start, places that I grew up in and around are on fire in the LA area. Please keep not only my family and friends there, but everyone who lives there including unhoused folks, pets and wildlife, in your thoughts. Please consider donating money to places such as the Pasadena Humane society and/or offering your time and services if you are able.
I haven’t used any brainpower in a month and half, but I am determined to get 2025’s first post out this week. Example of lack of brainpower: I could not decide on how to finish that previous sentence and stared at it for days before just adding a period. Yikes!
I want to get this post out this week for two main reasons. One, many of you lovely people pay for this! This is a service I provide in exchange for your subscription and money, and I must deliver. Two, this is the first real week back into real life and I must deliver on my promise to myself to keep this newsletter regular. Hitting the ground running keeps me accountable and will keep me from beating myself up for waiting too long. #Transparency!
In the spirit of transparency, remember my previous post? I wrote about how there are way too many newsletters these days that writers and readers alike can barely keep up. Turns out my writing was so good, so persuasive, that one of my own readers, an actual acquaintance at that, unsubscribed from my newsletter!!! Not the intended effect!!! To those of you who stayed — wanna do me a favor and share this with one (1) friend before you exit this email? (; Thanks!!!
The other day, as Derek and I sat waiting for an event to start at 92nd Street Y on the Upper East Side, he said he had an essay idea for me.
“How you hate when tourists walk slowly on the sidewalk. Things like that that make you mad.”
Unfortunately, I couldn’t expand that idea into a full essay (yet) beyond A List of My Personal Pet Peeves (others include loud chewing, being rude to waitstaff, putting coats in the overhead bin).
Fortunately, something along those lines happened later in the event that sparked something more.
The event was first a screening of Rose Matafeo’s latest comedy special On and on and On2, followed by a Q&A with Rose and John Oliver. In the second row, Derek and I got a solid view of the screen, and started chortling along with most of the rest of the audience once the special got going. Derek and I love to inspect an audience’s makeup, and this one was particularly curious with its mix of young people in their 20s and 30s, clearly there for Rose, and white people from 50 to 80 years old, who were either there for John or 92NY members who decided to show up.
This became clear about five to ten minutes into the special when two white women in the row in front of us, with their Eileen Fisher outfits and oversized glasses, began gesturing wildly and chit chatting at full volume about how the special wasn’t funny and “there are no jokes.” The only indication they knew there were other people around them, and therefore maybe shouldn’t be talking at that moment, was they ever so slightly leaned their heads together.
This being their first transgression, I granted them the benefit of the doubt thinking that this was a one-off comment. But they kept at it, complaining about Rose’s comedy, not caring that there was a theater full of people who had also paid 55 American dollars to see Rose’s comedy. They were loud enough that I couldn’t even hear the special, where Rose is yelling into a microphone, playing over auditorium speakers.
When it got to be clear that these two ladies didn’t give a damn about anyone but themselves and would continue without interference, I leaned over and said to the one closer to me, “You’re actually not very quiet when you chit chat.” She, mercifully, nodded at me and they both shut the hell up for the rest of the event. I say mercifully, because you never know with white women!! I had been preparing for the possibility they snapped back at whoever dared to interrupt the conversation they were entitled to.
I felt my adrenaline abate, and the rest of the event went on splendidly and hilariously. After, as the crowd was dispersing, I heard behind me, “I loved when you yelled at them.”
I turned and there was a woman who had been sitting in our row right behind the chatty offenders. “I loved when you yelled at them! I couldn’t hear anything, and I was gearing up to be brave enough to say something, so I’m so glad you did. You’re so brave!”
I thanked her and she walked away to the exit. I turned to Derek. “You hear that? I’m brave!”
“Yes, you are! Well done,” he said. He laughed at how the one area that I consistently show confidence is when telling people to knock it off when they’re behaving badly in public. And it’s true! If there’s anything I inherited from my dad (along with allergies, migraines and anxiety), it’s a low tolerance for bullshit! I’ve told countless offenders—often older white folks, interestingly—they’re being rude during a show, either for filming, talking, or texting. I just don’t understand and cannot abide the lack of awareness and/or respect these people have for others around them. So, thanks, dad! I promise to continue to use our shared power for good.
Many will say we’re now past the deadline for saying happy new year, but I wrote this greeting days ago, so it stays.
She is very funny and I recommend her comedy specials along with her TV show on Max, “Starstruck.”