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Don't Tread On My Dream Dreams run the gamut from having freshly shaved legs the night
you meet Mr. Right, to acheiving fame and fortune. You can set your
expectations low or you can set them high. All to often, when your chosen
path is a creative conquest, you are met with naysayers who tell you your
dream, whether it is to be a singer or a writer or an actor or a circus star,
is unattainable. The odds are against you. It takes a fair amount of chutzpah
to tell them they are wrong, until of course you are standing there with the
Oscar, Grammy or Big Top before you. If you pay attention to the source, you will find that the most
negative people are those who do not create anything themselves and never go
out on a limb. Overnight success is a myth, an many of us have to live with
our dreams while making a living without them. You work for the day you can
drop the hyphenate waiter-actor, secretary-novelist, or CPA-Clown, and even
then people will still ask you when your going to get a "real" job.
For us IRA is a great guy who wrote Porgy and Bess and health insurance is
high doses of Vitamin C. One of my favorite dreamers, Nancy Atlas, has just released her
third CD- MATADOR, and played to a sell out crowd at the Stephen Talkhouse
which included Corporate raiders, Bikers, and the Mothers of Montauk. My
first encounter with Nancy was when she was waitressing at the Corner Bar and
I was paying for Budweiser with dimes. Ever since I first saw her play with
her rockin band, I wanted to be her back up singer. Of course I cannot sing
and efforts to teach me the tambourine (is it on the one and the three or the
two and the four) proved unsuccessful so I must admire her from afar. Nancy was always destined for success in my mind because she
worked wonders with duct tape on her cowboy boots, looked damn good in a
flag, and wrote lyrics that were so true they stung. Taking a break from a
busy summer to hear her acoustic set at sunset at Hampton Point was a little
bit of heaven. I feel the same satisfaction when someone emails me that they
enjoyed something I wrote and it made them laugh or cry or snort milk out of
their nose. Even those of us who are living our dream are still working out
the business portion, as getting paid what you're worth is difficult. People
don't think that someone who fixes their plumbing or prepares their taxes is
"just lucky to be doing it." Perhaps art is non-essential, but a
world without it would be bleak indeed. Even if your last name isn't Medici,
make the effort to support someone who has a dream and those establishments
that sponser them. The time spent at the concert, gallery opening, reading or
extra five minutess in the shower to guarantee smooth legs will be well worth
it. You can send comments to kissandtell@hotmail.com |