I love the American spirit.
If a hurricane hits, or a flood happens…
“We’ll rebuild!”
is the American cry…
And by God,
they/we do.
Since living
here in Mexico…
I’ve noticed
another propensity to cry…
Real tears that
is.
Please know…
I’m not
criticizing, merely observing.
(I love the culture here)
As I’m trying
to learn Spanish…
I watch a lot
of local TV…
And while I don’t understand all that I
hear…
You don’t need an interpreter for tears…
Tears are a
universal language all their own.
So there I’ll be, channel surfing, come
to the news…
And there’s a story or situation…
Where someone is crying.
And then it dawned on me…
While every tragedy deserves tears…
U.S.
news reporters do not go after the tears…
They find the
bravado in survivors and victims.
And I love that!
Crying is also the main dialog…
On Spanish
speaking soap operas.
Once again,
I’ll be channel surfing, come upon a soap…
And sure
enough, an actress is crying…
I’ll change the
channel, come back a half-hour
later…
The actress is still crying!
Though I shed
my own share of tears...
I hate to cry, and more than that—I hate depression…
It’s why I
don’t like the blues…
I don’t want to be entertained by
depressing songs...
I can’t dance to the blues…
And I definitely don’t want to write or edit to the blues.
I think Steve Martin said in rIght in The Jerk…
“There’s something about those songs.
They depress me.”
So?
What about you?
Do you love the American spirit?
Got bravado?
Do you like the blues?
And if you do, please tell me why?
Always, Em-Musing
3 comments:
There's a difference between depression and sadness. And I think some cultures are more comfortable with expression of the more vulnerable negative emotions, and among Anglos in the US (because I don't think this is necessarily true among all cultural groups within the US), this is less true. We're often socialized to believe those emotions are weak, undesirable, unhelpful, even dangerous. I think you've just run up against one of those cultural differences--neither is better or worse, but our preferences are heavily influenced by our own early socialization.
I can only handle so much crying...
I don't care for crying much, but I find it emotionally cathartic to wallow in a good, dark funk every so often. And I LOVE the blues. As far as why... that's about as easy to answer as why I like brussels sprouts but not cucumbers. I just do. Great post.
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