Creative Excess

As most of us know, I have very little difficulty being in front of a crowd of people. Some might even say that it's closer to my natural state of being than any form of solitude. However, effusing the soul-ramblings of my heart is very different than presenting a topic to a classroom in a foreign language. Today, I had to discuss the differences between my home country and France for class, a project that all of my classmates must endure, but of course I was the first person to get the ball rolling. Admittedly, I volunteered for this position because I would rather do it first and be done with it. However, after a weekend of non-stop running around and language meetings in which I was speaking the worst broken French I've spoken in quite some time, I was not overly optimistic about my results. Yesterday added insult to injury because I spent the morning in bed with a sore back and proceeded to have zero internet access until post-8pm in the evening. Happily, this time allowed the creative juices in my plump little brain to saturate... (iew)... And so, my mind journeyed back to the days of my youth, when a simple little project would turn into a full-scale production. 

For example, when I was in 6th grade, my teacher instructed the class to use a list of spelling words in a short story. One of the groups decided to make a little skit out of their words and present it to the class. This of course spurred my competitive streak and prompted me to step up and go even further. I would therefore make a film! A live-action film that ultimately had absolutely nothing to do with any of the spelling words on any level, but I still somehow convinced my teacher to schedule a viewing during normal class time hours. I rallied my little group of spelling teammates, brought them to our local park and staged an epic thriller in which the cast of 6 was slowly wheedled down to 2 in a tale of torment, tragedy, and triumph. Basically, as we made our way around the pond, one of my friends was "eaten by a bear", creatively displayed via another friend sitting in a sewage pipe and crying over his leftover shoe. Two friends met their demise by drowning in the pond, aptly signified by large rocks creating a dramatic splash in the water. And the final victim was brought to her end by a killer bee... Yes, it was drawn on poster board, yes it was 2-dimensional and only colored on one side, and yes there was a velcro stinger. In the end, my best friend and I sat weeping over our losses until the rather too jolly curtain call. I believe the entire film was less than 15 minutes in length. 

Now, I share this anecdote mainly because it's spectacularly amusing and if I can post that video at some point I certainly shall. But also to demonstrate the lengths I will go for completely unnecessary and unwarranted ridiculousness. My French project did not remotely come close to this scale (though now my mind is definitely concocting new plans involving the pirate costume sitting in my closet), but I did stay up until 2am last night when I had to awake at 6am to create the following short story, comparing a day in the life of little blonde me living in NYC versus living in Paris... Tra la...