The Weekend in Foolish Attention
Bits and bytes of the week
ENERGIZER BUNNY. At one point during the two-day melee of music and bodies and whisking around through Millennium Park to the tune of fifteen miles per day, I thought about the Wichita Riverfest where I was tasked with putting up a quasi-busted tent and handing out branded swag. That was easy; this is hard. I’ll take hard over easy any day of the week, I decided and kept moving through waves of thousands of people.
Apparently, God was in a pranking mood in that it rained consistently from 10am through 7pm effectively smashing the idea of a capacity crowd and creating the odd circumstance that wet, bedraggled audience members stood for hours at the few seats out of the downpour that had been reserved for guests of the artists, various churches, the Mayor. We held those seats for a long time until these frustrated gospel fans simply took the seats for themselves.
As I explained to my ushers and various upper management types, the public audience is too large to control. Controlling a crowd of thousands of people is a Sisyphean boulder, the insane belief that a stanchion and a well meaning usher can contain a tidal wave. Audiences of that size in Chicago trained by the summer of 2020 to use the sheer force of their united presence to overwhelm authority and barrier can only be diverted into areas and behaviors but never controlled.
Taking that all in, the day was filled with incredible gospel choirs, enthusiastic listeners soaked to the bone but thrilled to be there, a testament to the very kind of citizens that inhabit the City of Big Shoulders—weather be damned, we’re having a good time.
As I drove home, smelling like a drenched sheep dog and completely exhausted, the lessons of the day were taken and cemented into a slightly different approach for the next day’s festival—the House Music Fest.
Beautiful weather and a capacity audience of folks looking to dance with abandon, drink and smoke weed, and even less behavioral barriers than the church-goers of the day before. I instructed my crew to focus on safety not rules. I knew this crowd was going to smoke in the park no matter what we did and would physically insist that they dance in the aisles. Our only option was to join the crowd, enjoy the music, dance with them, and gently but insistently keep things from getting completely out of control.
It worked. With something between 13,000 to 15,000 attendees, there were relatively few security incidents, no one was injured, and most of them had a ball. Including my crew who were so calm, so empathetic to the dancing idiots, that some reported they received tips (a first in my experience in the park). I randomly ran into dozens of people I had worked with years ago who all seemed thrilled I was back in town. My second n command dubbed me the Energizer Bunny (“You move through the crowd so fast, I’d see you halfway across the park one moment and then you’d just pop up right next to me like magic.”).
I had Tuesday off and I haven’t looked forward to doing my laundry and laying around more in a long time.
This weekend? The Chicago Blues Fest. Three days of these crowds with (hopefully) less rain and weed. 42 hours on shift in 72. I gotta pace myself which is a new lesson learned.
REPORT OR ARTISTIC EXPRESSION? I was asked to provide some feedback about the concerts in the park via a Front of House Report. Personally, I find reports as exciting as I do a Teams Meeting so I submitted a document that began like this:
“As the morning of June 2nd broke, the music from the North Promenade tent was pumping. At the get, the tent had approximately 500 attendees and the number just increased throughout the day. At 12:15pm we opened the bowl and the dancing commenced at 1:00pm. The lawn slowly filled up with day trippers and by 5:00pm, the place was packed and moving like something huge and alive.”
One senior staffer responded “Is this a report or a story?”
“Can’t it be both?” I asked.
“…”
WHO ARE YOU? WHO, WHO? WHO, WHO? Self reflection can be a Mobius Strip. The naval gaze is its own bizarre activity. This summer, I’m finding I’m an amalgamation of Denzel Washington in The Equalizer and Bill Murray in Meatballs. Not the ex-CIA thing, righting wrongs, but the living a bit like a monk at home and taking almost nothing seriously at work. All things being equal, I dig the combination.
“The most effective way to restrict democracy is to transfer decision-making from the public arena to unaccountable institutions: kings and princes, priestly castes, military juntas, party dictatorships, or modern corporations.”
~Noam Chomsky
FIGURING OUT THE FASCINATION. In 1931, Americans were completely in love with a couple who made their fame by knocking off banks, small mom & pop stores and rural gas stations. These two were revered as celebrities despite (or because of) murdering nine police officers and several civilians in their three year crime spree.
Another criminal of those days escaped from prison by carving a gun out of wood, had a legendary giant cock, was a notorious womanizer, and robbed 24 banks. People called him a folk hero.
In film, we idolize Michael Corleone, The Man with No Name, Travis Bickle, Mad Max, Dirty Harry Callahan, and almost any version of Robin Hood. On the boob tube, we love Tony Soprano, Dexter, Tyrion Lannister, Omar Little, and Vic Mackey.
Plainly, we Americans love nothing more than a law-breaking anti-hero.
Take the billionaire who pretends to be one thing through lies and subterfuge and then breaks a list of laws to combat what he sees as crime and corruption. We love that guy. He’s a hero, right?
Who doesn’t love Batman?
No one loves a meth dealer. These guys prey upon the weakest of our numbers, destroying lives, making money off of mental illness and addiction. Frequently violent out of necessity, meth dealers are the low-end version of the scumbags who target old people in insurance scams and Big Banks who con regular people out of their live savings. But we fucking love Walter White.
Why do we love these guys? It seems that Ayn Rand’s theme of selfishness as a positive trait is infecting the society at large. The focus on me and my empowerment and respect that I am owed and the end justifies the means Machiavellian ethos has taken over the extremes on both sides of the ideological fence.
Is it centrist to recognize that the Far Ends of the Spectrum are hellbent on using the exact same strategies of destroy their enemies?
Have a great weekend, gang! My mantra, as I listen to three full days of exceptional Chicago blues, is dial it down, pace myself, and enjoy the ride. Yours should be the same.
HEY!
Don't forget Saul Goodman...a role model if ever there was one.
Have a great weekend/week, Amigo!