it's all cinderella

imagine, if you will, what these blended titles may be.
pick one from each list....

PROTAGONIST

• a stressed-out lawyer

• a busy fashion executive

• a determined bride-to-be

• a workaholic hollywood publicist

• a driven marketing executive

• a successful but overworked business woman

ACTION

• warily welcomes a stranger into her home

• ends up hitchhiking to her wedding

• meets a life coach and is granted 12 wishes

• is knocked unconscious in a car accident

• is visited by the ghost of her former client

• wishes to see what her life would be like if....

HAPPY ENDING

notice i didn't say 'happy endings.' they all, of course, end the same way. a good man will always be more satisfying than a life lived in the business world. nowadays, some women do hold on to their careers, but only once they have reinstated the man where he was meant to be.

her work will then be denigrated, the guy rescues her from some dastardly foe, she thanks (her lucky star, elf, santa, whatever), and they ride off into the future, with bells ringing.

these are all, as you've probably guessed, taken from plots of christmas movies (frequently on lifetime or the hallmark channel). but i ask you: how often must women be sacrificed upon the logs of christmas?

and so as to not come across as an miscreant fool, i will admit that sometimes the protagonist is a man (like nicholas cage or ebeneezer scrooge -- except for that time susan lucci played scrooge). but, i believe, my point is still well-taken. the warmth of christmas mainly serves to remind us that jesus has preferred roles for all of us, and if you choose to rebel against these values, they just may come and make a movie about you.

all we are saying

Ev'rybody's talking about
Bagism, Shagism, Dragism, Madism, Ragism, Tagism
This-ism, that-ism
Isn't it the most
All we are saying is give peace a chance
All we are saying is give peace a chance

Ev'rybody's talking about
Ministers, Sinisters, Banisters and canisters,
Bishops and Fishops and Rabbis and Pop eyes,
And bye bye, bye byes.
All we are saying
is give peace a chance
All we are saying
is give peace a chance




Let me tell you now
Ev'ry- body's talk- ing about
Revolution, Evolution, Masturbation, Flagellation, Regulations.
Integrations, Meditations, United Nations, Congratulations
All we are saying is give peace a chance
All we are saying is give peace a chance

Oh Let's stick to it
Ev'rybody's talking about
John and Yoko,
Timmy Leary, Rosemary,
Tommy Smothers, Bob Dylan,
Tommy Cooper, Derek Tayor, Norman Mailer, Alan Ginsberg, Hare Krishna,
Hare Krishna
All we are saying is give peace a chance
All we are saying is give peace a chance

La plus ca change, la plus c'est la meme choses.

so while western women continued their affair with the kimono,

some women from japan adopted western-style dress.

it has been sug- gested, however, that this change was not so much an embrace of western ways as the west was embracing some of theirs, but a sign to the west that they were up to date, and must be negotiated with as equals.

[it is said of the dress, using google's translator: "The large formal outfit was worn the occasion where from Meiji era it is New Year worshiping celebration and the like with the court clothes of the Showa game previous term. The collar opening is large, only the sleeve the train (pulls in the dress of the short sleeve and the hem) the fact that you attach is the feature."]

vuillard's mother, with whom he lived until she died at the age of 60, was a corsetmaker and seamstress. many of his paintings feature women dressmaking, or simply sewing, often to create a mood of serenity.

as it turns out, really only a small minority of japanese women dressed in western clothes, and even they, not counting the empress, returned to the kimono in short shrift, to the gratitude of the japanese men.

in the west, the tradition never ended.

(inspiration)

till there was you

from The Music Man, by Meredith Wilson

There were bells....on the hill,
but I never heard them ringing
No, I never heard them at all,
Till there was you.

There were birds....in the sky,
but I never saw them winging,
no, I never saw them at all
Till there was you.

And there was music,
and there were wonderful roses,
they tell me, in sweet fragrant
meadows of dawn and dew.



There was love, all around
but I never heard it singing,
no, I never heard it at all
Till there was you.

Then there was music and wonderful roses
they tell me, in sweet fragrant meadows
of dawn and dew

There was love all around
But I never heard it singing
No, I never heard it at all
Till there was you
Till there was you

isn't it strange, isn't it interesting, that "we," well, the west anyway, didn't seem to see plum blossoms, or cherry, until they saw japan see plum blossoms and cherry. also interesting, though, is that i rarely see ornamental design being used the same way in both cultures; if it's on pottery in the west, it generally isn't in the east.


(top is by toshi yoshida, for dom; ohara koson; eiho hirezaki; royal doulton.)