Archive for August, 2009
Idol Mania
Aug 10th
For six hours I weathered the storm inside Newark’s Prudential Center aka ‘The Rock’. Six hours of mixed emotion, laughter, and fear. Before arriving at The Rock, I met my mom and 40 of her friends. Mostly old high school friends of hers and their assorted families. It was completely out of control. There was so much East Coast Jew floating through the air that I still smell like lox after two showers. They were fantastic women, every one of them. I was completely and utterly overwhelmed by the attention and affection heaped on me from all angles. I ate seafood paella and answered questions about my life between bites.
It’s hard to stay excited about meeting family friends when the common question is, “so what are you going to do out here?” and the only response is either “slowly fail?” or “good question.” We did have a great time, though. By the end of all the intense talking and picture taking (seriously, like probably 100 group pictures) other guests at the restaurant started to wonder aloud if I was a famous. Alas, buying a website rarely makes one famous.
We take our seats fairly close to the stage and get comfortable. It takes about 8 minutes for the first crazy person to spot my mom and get teary on her. The next family is kind of neat, though: two little Jewish girls and their father who had flown from Israel to see Adam. Damn. It is at this point that I notice Mom begins to generate her own gravity and dozens of fans embark on a sort of exuberant-but-slow zombie shuffle in our direction. Taking this as my cue to get the hell out of the area lest they consume me with toothy grins and misplaced praise, I duck under an arm and quickly scan the room for a familiar face. I see a family of 3 that we ate dinner with and desperately try to play it cool about 50 feet from ground zero. Mom has, by this point, become a small black hole.
I hatch a new plan 5 minutes later when someone manages to recognize me. I try to ask her to be subtle and just pretend that we’re old friends but it simply doesn’t work. I’ve been found out. I snap a few pictures, mostly with kids because they can excuse their behavior by virtue of their age. Luckily, the lights begin to dim (and not because they can not longer escape Mom’s gravitational pull) and I am able to escape back to my seat in the darkness.
“AMERICAN. IDOLS. LIVE.” Wow. They really take this thing seriously, hmm?
“NUMBER TEN. MICHAEL. SARVER.”
It’s at this point that I realize heavy drinking is a must. Apparently there’s a bar somewhere above us that is selling Coors Light in plastic bottles. I’m not surprised that they don’t trust us.
Sidling up to the bar, I ask the couple in front of me how the cocktails are. The largest man in the world shrugs his shoulders like I asked him how it feels to be beaten with phonebooks. His wife and I exchange platitudes and impotent rage at The Man until I kindly ask if she might shift to the side so I can summon a bartender.
“I will. But only if you’re an Adam fan.”
I’m torn. Either I tell her how I can’t stand him to watch the sparks fly, or I tell her I’ve been a fan of his for 20 years to watch the sparks fly. I choose the latter.
“I’m his brother. Of course I’m a fan.”
“Bullshit.”
“You know what? Thank you. You’re the first skeptic I’ve met. Now I don’t feel like as big of a tool for namedropping.
“This… no. WHAT? Bullshit. Prove it.”
“Well, that’s my ID on the bar.”
“This… This is the best night EVER! Honey, buy him his drink.”
The largest man in the world snaps his attention from the Yankee game to protest but she shoots him a sidelong glance to which he complies.
“You don’t have to do that. Now I do feel like a tool. I can buy my own fourteen dollar cocktail.”
“No. I insist. Let me buy you a drink. I’m a big fan too.”
Wow. Normal people! They just like him! No crying, gushing, or defecating. Just smiles. We exchange names and go through the whole twenty questions about what it’s like to to live in someone’s shadow. I reply that I’m happy he’s finally gotten out from under mine. It’s been too long. The large one offers me his business card.
“Look, you just moved here. If you ever want a true New Yorker to show you around Manhattan, I can take you to every cool bar in the city.”
His card reads “Stan Muller – Scientist”. I chortle and ask him what exactly it is that he works on for his company (a very well-known producer of health care products). He leans in real close and checks to make sure the coast is clear.
“You uhh…. familiar with KY?”
“Holy shit this is the best night EVER!”
“I’m the co-inventor.”
“On behalf of myself and I imagine Adam as well, thank you for your hard work and dedication.”
In the fervor of our exchange, I fail to notice an altogether too drunk girl and her weak-willed boyfriend getting too close. She starts loudly asking the obvious questions and ruins everything. Now people want pictures again. I wince an apology at my new friends and they silently nod forgiveness as I duck out of the bar and back into the darkness. All in all, I drank for free and managed to completely avoid NUMBER TEN. MICHAEL. SARVER. Pretty good deal if you ask me.
The rest of the evening proceeds as you would expect. I finally surrender to the small clang of emotion rattling around my gut when the crowd goes wild for Adam. It’s fun and I’m proud. I like Muse. Adam sings Muse. All is well. I momentarily forget I’m limited to a four song set and suddenly it’s over. The Top 5 were mostly pretty great. I’m impressed by Matt’s ability to rock the hell out of the piano. Allison is the real deal and I think Kris is pretty cool, too.
And then it’s over. We’re swiftly escorted to safety by security while throngs of people shout at us about how much he means to the world. They’re cover songs, people. Hang in there. I leave the concert with Mom and her best friend from childhood. We stay up until 3am drinking wine and laughing with her two daughters and have a grand old time. All in all it was a pretty fantastic experience. It was great meeting a bunch of wonderful people and hearing stories of Mom’s sordid past. I’m pretty sure I can eat a month’s worth of dinner for free based on all the hospitality the New Jersey women have offered.
I slept on a cot and dreamt of nothing. It was the best sleep in weeks. 3 hours later, Nancy is urging me into waking so that I can go meet the new group of kids I’ll be teaching. The girl who hangs on me is back. She hasn’t learned to respect my bubble over the weekend. The rest of them seem alright. Two more weeks until unemployment!
Journal of a Working Boy, or, Up From Sloth: Volume 1
Aug 9th
Hello again, dear readers. I apologize for my prolonged absence. I arrived in New York wide-eyed and hungry for life experience, but as soon as I started work at my school I was constantly exhausted. I did not originally plan to work at a school that had kids stay overnight for the week which required me to stay on the clock 18 hours a day. Alas, that job is over and now I’m working in Manhattan instead of the Bronx. I’m very pleased with the change: for starters, I’m not running this whole shindig anymore. Instead I’m just teaching a class which is what I wanted to do all along. It’s also a 9 to 5 schedule which allows me to sip some scotch and write from time to time.
My first day was a painful reminder that eight-year-olds are a tiring breed of child. Furthermore, 8 eight-year-olds are downright exhausting…
I arrive in the morning after tracking down a cup of coffee. 6am alarm clocks have never been my thing. The director of the campus seems like a nice guy: my age, a distinct “camp” personality. After sitting in the lounge area greeting kids as they arrive nervous and unsure what to expect, I meet the first of my eight students. Kevin defines ‘jew’ like I never knew a child could. He’s hilarious, very theatrical, speaks like an adult and makes bad jokes he knows are bad and then laughs at them with a fake elongated chuckle. It takes me 5 minutes of conversation before concluding that he will be my favorite. It took another 5 minutes to completely reverse that position.
I’m summoned to the check-in table because another of my group has arrived. This one’s mother asks to speak with me and explains that her son, Brandon, is very shy. It will take him a while to adjust, and feel comfortable around other kids. “Not a problem!” I proclaim with that cheesy confidence I exude around parents. It’s quite possible that it will be a problem, but why make them worry? On the walk back to the lounge I ask the same customary questions I asked of Kevin: how old are you? What grade are you in? Where are you from? Do you like videogames? All of these were answered in mumbles. Brandon is a very shy boy. Brandon is African-American.
“Kevin, meet Brandon. He’s also in our class this week. He’s eight years old, going into fourth grade, and really likes Pokemon. If I’m not mistaken, you two have a lot in common. You’re practically doubles!”
“Well, yes except for the skin color of course. Did you know that white people used to think that black people were slaves?”
Flabbergasted. What the fuck, Kevin? This is how you make a first impression now? What happened to your comedic charm? Kevin is staring intently at Brandon awaiting a reply. Brandon, I think, is about as shocked as I am so I quickly fill in.
“Yes, well, luckily we have advanced as a society so that all of us are equal!”
“Eh… to an extent….”
Shut the fuck up, Kevin. While you’re right that my reply has no nuance, this is hardly an 8-year-old’s normal cup of tea. Can’t we talk about Pokemon and World of Warcraft some more? I change the topics and hope that we haven’t done irreparable harm to Brandon’s ability to acclimate. Andrew then arrives. He’s a bigger kid, asian, and all the other instructors exchange a knowing glance when his name is mentioned. Apparently he’s a trouble maker. I return to the group to see Brandon holed up in a chair while Andrew is leaning in too close for comfort.
“…aren’t you going to say anything? You have to speak up or else people won’t like you and think you’re weird!”
“Brandon would you like to come over here and meet one of our other instructors?!”
Jesus christ. I forgot how unfiltered little kids are. The rest of them arrived mostly without a hitch. The one girl in my class being the one exception: she is a compulsive toucher. She’s has to be touching something at all times. Most of the time this was my hand, arm, finger, belt loop, pocket, or shoulder. This is hard for me because I am unaccustomed to that level of affection from, well, anyone. And especially from some little girl I don’t know. The rest of my week was spent finding creative new ways to distract her into hanging onto Kevin, which was always funny.
And that was that. Friday came and went, all the kids had a great time, and at 6pm I drank a glass of whiskey and breathed my first sigh of relief. Tonight I’m seeing Adam in concert in New Jersey with my mom and a gaggle of her old friends she grew up with. Tomorrow I have a brand new set of kids that will undoubtedly horrify and amaze me.