About shallowness...

There are many conflicting opinions about what shallowness is. Some think beauty is shallow, or to acknowledge beauty. But it takes a lot of depth and character of spirit to notice the beauty of nature and animals, sometimes perhaps a lot more than to not notice. I have often wondered if it was shallow of me to get excited about people who were into the same music. As a kid, I didn't think I was cool enough to hang out with kids who were into They Might be Giants or The Fall like me. I was a poser. Even though I kept this stuff in the very depth of my soul. Music kept me alive. It was my breath and a reason to breathe. It often took me into a deep fantasy world where Madame Deja Vu peers into a blue crystal ball and steals my past.

I was once really sensitive to my music and to meet people who wouldn't say negative things about music that I loved was a profound relief. These chosen expressions of someone else's soul touched mine. Consider how much depth music had in my spirit, how it gave me the courage to live, how much it meant to me. Now consider how I never met anyone who liked the same music. Of course I was going to get excited over the like-interested, especially considering this was a random act of me finding someone with similar interests not a conformist one of scoping such people out or trying to make them. But contrarily, I soon learned that though he was of the same interest, he was quite different in attitude. It excited me to meet people with similar interests especially deep-rooted spiritual ones such as music. But to him, music was not a spiritual phenomenon but a strictly social one. I connected with him and his music on a deeply spiritual level and he later criticized this connection, calling it shallow. And of course, I was crushed. This musical connection was one of the deepest ones I felt in years and one of the only ones I ever had. But this was coming from someone who looked upon music as a grey social spree. And to him it had no spiritual colours whatsoever. He didn't listen to music to heal all that sad stuff going on inside and to make him happy. He listened to music to make all that contrary stuff on the outside happy.  He was more inclined than I was to hang out with kids who listened to the same music, who dressed the same. In fact, I always felt there was a weird conformity in everybody liking the same thing. And often times, many of my friends were as like to me as Mister Magoo is to Doctor Who. And besides, I was always too insecure to think I was cool enough to hang out with kids who were into anything cool. As an adult, the concept of cool seems puerile and shallow. And it is. But to a child, it's one of the most profound things. Clothes, music, friends; they all gave kids a a sense of identity - their sense of identity is often their sense of cool, and there's nothing shallow about forming a sense of identity. Some live life as a child and never lose this sense of cool, this sense of identity. One is inclined sometimes to call such people shallow when really many of them just have the souls of children.

To my grey social-spree friend, music was a scheme around which to make friends or to lose them, to like people or to not like people. I had many good good friends who would sooner run with the wild turkeys, pecking for yummy bugs and seed, than listen to Stiff Little Fingers; but I just made an effort to never ever talk to them about music. And I tried not to ridicule anyone else's music for I feared ridiculing a very important part of their beings, their creative beings, their souls. I try to be sensitive to people's music because it speaks to them and I try to be sensitive to them. Once the like-interested sat outside the club shaking his fist, shouting sarcastic abuses and ridicule over a band playing inside that he did not like. He insulted their characters because he didn't like their music. And he was the same person who criticized what he believed to be the shallow sides of music. This band didn't interest him therefore he didn't like them; he didn't like the guys in the band and ridiculed them because of their music. Some of those guys were my friends, good friends though our tastes in music were quite different. This is an example why I would put attitude above interest. I found myself inspired by people who had similar interests; it gave us something deeply meaningful to talk about. But am more inspired by those with more positive attitudes towards things that have deep spiritual meaning to me. And I would never ridicule those who had nothing in common. I have close friends of many different colours of skin, spirit, and mind. This also explains why I would sometimes feel inclined to connect with people into the same things: they will not ridicule the one thing I once loved the most: music.

So I was criticized for not getting more involved with the like-interested: this community of art, or that one; this community of music, or that one. If you like it so much than why aren't you more involved? They'd question even though I was just too insecure about my place. But I was also criticized for actually getting involved with the like-interested: this community of art, or that one; this community of music, or that one. It's shallow to connect with others based on their music or art even though that's often a natural part of forming art and music communities. As a good friend once said to me, "The hip kids follow the hip kids."  I never really thought it was very hip to follow but to connect is often inevitable and I know what he meant. Often times to follow or to connect are not so different.  And I won't get into great detail over what I think "hip" means. No doubt it means many different things to many different people. And though it sounds shallow - a new pair of posh brand name blue jeans or a trendy bubblegum cd - I believe rationalizing and intuition are pretty hip, too. So I guess it's not always that shallow.

Communities can be shallow because they alienate everybody on the outside. Vegetarian communities alienate tall guys with big noses and leather sneakers just because they're not vegetarians. Then they complain about how uncommunal communal living houses are. Fantasy communities alienate vegetarians because they're not cannibals with red eyes, soul-eating madames named Deja Vu peering into blue crystal balls and stealing futures. But what if both fantasy and future are important parts of your life and you want to be a friend to both? Community forbade this liberty. Between a community and a social club, there's a line as thin as the pages of a storybook with all the pages ripped out. Music communities alienate some of the people who love them the most simply because they don't play music. This is what happened to me. I wasn't allowed to love music because I did not play it. And all the big boys and little boys in the music community decided I was a just a girl and not a guitar hero. They posted a notice on the social club door that might as well have read "no girls allowed".

Communities can be shallow, yet at the same time it's pretty normal for people to instinctively connect with the like-minded because they get along better with the like-minded - those with similar spirits, values, and interests. Music itself has become increasingly shallow. And as an adult it is hard for me to have the same connection to it at all. My musical heart is broken. I must patch it up with the beauty of animals and nature no matter how shallow some feel beauty is.

This cannot get any more convoluted. The topic of shallowness is a complex one and is anything but shallow. It's too deep for me.

Elaine 07