(no subject)

[stonebender]

firecat

1. What was a favorite theater piece that you performed or worked in?

It's a tie. While attending junior college at Laney. I got a chance to direct Butterflies are Free. This isn't a great play, but for obvious reasons it is a play close to me. It was my first attempt at directing. My cast was several of my friends and I had a great time during rehearsal.

For my senior thesis I directed, a shortened version of Hughie by Eugene O'Neill. I really enjoyed putting it on, but my favorite memory is how the attitude of my teacher, changed towards me. The Dramatic Art Department UC Berkeley at the time was very small, maybe 100 people. Everyone knew everyone else. We all knew who were the stars of the department and who was probably going to graduate and never be heard of again. Everyone was nice to me but I felt "humored" in my attempts to work in the department. I never got cast in any of the plays. I tended to be assigned minor backstage jobs. It was clear I wasn't being taken seriously. After I directed Hughie, my professor said I had a fine theatrical sensibility. Many of my classmates seemed to notice me for the first time. It felt wonderful.

2. Describe an aspect of obtaining health care that bothers you a lot.

That hospitals are the most architecturally inaccessible buildings for people with disabilities who would presumably need them more often than the able-bodied. It is also amazing that the medical profession, including doctors and nurses, are remarkably untrained and prejudiced against people with disabilities.

3. What's your favorite Xxxenophile story?

It's difficult to say really. Some of them I like because they play on a particular fantasy of mine, others are funny etc. It's been awhile since I read them, but I remember the one about the cyborg leaving his penis home. Several in issue #2 were fun.

4. Describe an experience you had in your teens where you felt very happy.

Happy as a teenager!? Good Lord, Stef! I didn't have a lot happiness as a teenager. I suppose it would have to be my prom night. I hadn't dated at all until my senior year in high school. I went out a few times with Michelle Beatley. It was getting around prom time and everyone was asking everyone who they were taking and where they were going. Except they never asked me. There was no reason they should, I'd never gone to any other dances, but it bothered me that they didn't. So I asked Michelle to go to the prom with me and we went. Had a great time, I looked like a fool attempting to dance and got a kiss goodnight!

5. How come Lois McMaster Bujold isn't on your books list?

Because I don't like her? I read Falling Free by her. Which I have been told subsequently wasn't her best work. Anyway, it so personally offended me that I have been unable to read anything else by her.

Comments

[stonebender.livejournal.com]

Add to that, that much of the equipment and services I need to live independently are dependent on me dealing with doctors and hospitals etc..

That's the part that bothers me most, actually. I hate being in a position to have to beg for permission to have something I want, especially having to beg someone who knows a lot less than I do about what I want and why I want it, and who has a lot invested in pretending they know more than I do.

exACTly! I guess I lump that all in with the access and attitudinal issues.

It seems, to me, to propagate a paternalistic view which bothers me. Does that make sense?

Yes. I find a lot of Bujold's work fairly paternalistic and conservative.

I thought you were fan. I guess her conservative and paternalistic themes don't bother you?

[firecat]

Access issues: Yes, they're of a kind.

Bujold: Those tendencies in her works do give me pause, but I like her books anyway, because I think she's really a talented and skilled novelist.

I'm getting the impression my political sensibilities aren't all that reliably tied to my artistic tastes.

At Wiscon I was listening to several people talk about how they had thrown books across the room after reading certain passages. I was surprised because those passages by themselves would have made me roll my eyes but not put down the book.

On the other hand, I can't read Heinlein because of his attitudes toward women, so like I said, unreliable.