Inspiration To Be........?

Last Friday, I was perusing Facebook, as I often do, and I noticed a little ad along the right side of my screen. Normally, I don't pay any attention to the ads on Facebook because, frankly, I find them annoying.

But this one was a bit different.

Okay, it really wasn't that different but it was something that I, apparently, wanted to notice.

Kevin Smith at Pabst Theater on Sunday, March 25th. 

If you don't know who Kevin Smith is, I suggest you start with his IMDb page...and then, perhaps, his page on Wikipedia. I know him best as Silent Bob in what is affectionately known as The Jersey Trilogy. It's not a "real" trilogy but there are three movies that encompass the same time frame and several of the same characters and overarching plots: Clerks, Mallrats, and Chasing Amy. If you really want to get into it, there are a couple other movies/cartoons that also include some of the same characters and plot lines, though not necessarily during the same time frame: Clerks II, Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back, Dogma, and Clerks: The Animated Series.

Anyway, I saw this little ad on Facebook about Kevin Smith having a show at the Pabst Theater on Sunday, March 25th and I thought to myself, "Pabst Theater? Pabst is in Milwaukee..." So, I turned to Husband and said, "What are our plans for Sunday night?" He, of course, wanted to know why...and I told him that Kevin Smith was going to be at Pabst Theater in Milwaukee on Sunday night. He pointed at Little Man and said, "It's great and all but what are we going to do with him?"

Good point.

We thought on it for a couple minutes and Husband called up a friend of his (she's one of his best friends, stood up in our wedding, etc.) and asked if she'd come down and babysit Little Man so we could go to the show.

She said yes!

I ordered tickets. When I was looking at Pabst Theater's website, I noticed that we would be getting Kevin Smith's new book...autographed.

Hell yes!

This whole thing keeps getting better and better.

Now, I've seen some of Kevin Smith's live shows (via Netflix) and they're almost always a Q&A style. Granted, he's on stage but there are microphones set up in the audience for people to come up and ask questions......but, he's like me and likes to not only listen to the stories of others, but he likes to talk. And he's hilarious.

Every show is different because of the Q&A. You never know what kinds of questions are going to come up.

Our seats were on the second floor, left of center, fifth row back. They actually weren't bad seats, even though we were on the second floor. He spent most of his time oscillating between the center of the stage (where there was a table set up) and to the podium on the left side of the stage.

I apologize for my blurry photos. We were pretty far back so I had to zoom in on the iPhone and, as a result, the photos turned out grainy and blurry...and the color isn't quite right (his hockey jersey is actually blue and orange, not yellow).

Anyway, the first question was about the Tim Burton quote on the back of the book which basically says that he (Tim Burton) would never read anything written by Kevin Smith. It's something Tim Burton said at least a decade ago and has to do with something Burton did in one of his films that was very similar to something Kevin Smith did in one of his comic books prior to that. Smith said that Burton must have stolen it from him and that he was going to sue him...it was all very tongue in cheek, totally not serious. Long story short, it got back to Tim Burton that Kevin Smith said he was going to sue him and Tim Burton said that he would never read anything written by Kevin Smith.

I know one of the other questions was about how Hell was worse than Wisconsin from Dogma. Basically, Bethany (Linda Fiorentino) is talking to Metatron (Alan Rickman) and asks if Bartleby and Loki (Ben Afleck and Matt Damon) were sent to Hell for their transgressions and the Metatron says, "Worse. Wisconsin. For the entire span of human history." So, why Wisconsin? Bethany is in McHenry, IL and needs to head to New Jersey...and Bartleby & Loki somehow needed to cross paths with her so they started out in Wisconsin. It isn't like Kevin Smith hates Wisconsin or anything.

There were questions about the characters and what he thought would have or could have happened if something had been done differently (like if he hadn't had Jeff Anderson and Brian O'Halloran for the parts of Randall and Dante in Clerks or if Jenny McCarthy had been cast as Gwen or Brandi in Mallrats).

He told us the story about what happened the night his father died...which, of course, made me get all teary-eyed. Stories like that make me get teary-eyed. Sue me. I'm emotional like that sometimes.

He talked about how he was just a comic book geek from Jersey that always said he wanted to be a filmmaker...and his sister looked at him and said, "Then be a filmmaker. Don't say you're going to be a filmmaker; be one." He talked about how he went from nothing but an idea in his head (Clerks) to making the film. He never expected Clerks to do anything other than give him peace of mind. It was one of those "If I don't do this, I'm going to die" type of things...that's how he put it. If he didn't make Clerks, he was going to die. It didn't matter to him if anyone ever saw it...he just had to make it.

Husband says that his shows, although hilarious, are also very uplifting. They give you this feeling that you can go out and do what you want to do and the hell with the critics and all the people bringing you down.

I definitely felt that.

Unfortunately, I'm at a point where I don't know what it is that I want to do..........

I spent five and a half years as a college student the first time around. I graduated with a BA in Psychology and Elementary Education from Luther College. I spent another year and a half working on another BA in Special Education at the University of Wisconsin - Madison (I'm almost finished with that, too). The question that I've had lately is: do I really want to be a teacher? I love teaching. I'm a damn good teacher, actually. Sadly, I feel like the profession is severely undervalued. The old saying of, "those who can, do; those who can't, teach"......it makes it sound like teachers are second-class college graduates who went into education because they weren't good at anything better. Most people seem to forget entirely that teachers have college degrees. I don't even want to get into the politics behind education. Let's just say that I'm completely disenfranchised with the entire educational system and I'm not sure I want to work in such a volatile, yet undervalued field.

But what do I want to do?

I love writing but I don't want to be a writer. I don't think I'm good enough and I don't think I have any ideas worth writing down. I mean, I have this...but this is my blog. It's not writing in the sense that I mean.

I love knitting...and I am a knitter...but that's my enjoyment; I don't want it to be a job (unless I'm fully in charge). Perhaps if I was as prolific as Elizabeth Zimmermann or able to design cute toys like Susan B. Anderson or socks like Carrie Sullivan or shawls like Wendy Johnson or...I could go on and on. The fact of the matter is that I am not any of them and although I can recreate what they do, I cannot make it up myself. I'm not a prolific fabulous lovely designer. Do I design? Yes. Am I a designer? Not really. Maybe. I don't know. We'll see.

So........what do I want to do?

No idea.

Someday, I'll figure it out......