Post by Polina on Sept 23, 2008 17:11:58 GMT -1
So, I am looking forward to seeing the main man lose his rag all over the shop this evening? Of course I am.
More than that; I'm thoroughly interested in this. Any of you that know me IRL will know why; I have a lulu of a temper. In my defence I would say that it doesn't often happen, but from time to time it does. I have a huge capacity to Get Mad.
When I was small I was not very good at controlling this. I'm still not; I'm just better at it than I was. I still remember the moment when I had finally had it with a large boy at school (who tormented me for being small and a girl) and set about him, firstly with one of my more mature harangues to date (and secondly, I have to admit, with a swift punch to the testicles, one of the more useful bits of information to come down from having two older sisters having been duly taken on board).
But here is the problem; it felt good. I won. And, as a knock on effect, having been punched in the nuts by a six year old girl effectively ended his playground dominance, so I felt I'd achieved something useful for the populace. And this rather set up an association most unhealthy; that of finally having enough and letting fly with solving a problem rather than creating another one.
I have something of an issue of mistrust with people who won't fight, who withdraw from the fray and take a measured look to find other outcomes. I know, in what passes for my intellect, that this is the mature and sensible approach. I'm just no good at finding it, and a bit of me Not that I advocate physical violence as a solution - not at all. But when it comes to fight or flight, I'm a lot better at the former than the latter, and I do find it hard to accept that this is wrong.
I also have absolutely no sense of preservation, and absolutely no tolerance for People Talking crep. I have permanently bruised shins from my husband kicking me under dinner-party-tables when a fellow guest starts off with The Trouble With Oxbridge People or Opera Is Just So Elitist and he sees dismal visions of us still arguing it out at 10 o'clock the following morning. And let's not even start on the moment when I thought facing off a six foot something builder who had made adverse comment on my appearance was a good idea.
So, I could definitely learn a lot from anyone who has the magic secret of when it's a good idea to lose your temper. But control it altogether? Never face up to someone who is talking complete crep? Never stand up for what you believe in? Never let anyone know that what they do is not meeting with your entire approval? Hmm, not sure. But take that to its logical extreme and it becomes reasonable to punch someone out for Looking At You in a Funny Way or Winding You Up. Which it clearly isn't.
Consequently when I read that the man was about to do a series on Being Mr Angry I rather rejoiced. Quite apart from the seductive impression of like calling to like across the Great Grimpen Mire of fangirly self-delusion, I wanted to see how it worked for him. After all, anger and frustration have driven some of the best creative work I have ever done. Would I have ever had the balls to get up and do my stuff had some deep and fundamental part of me not been Deeply and Profoundly Cross? So I am very, very curious to see how a hugely talented person holds it together; because as sure as God made little apples you don't succeed in a crucifyingly unforgiving business unless you channel your passions rather than letting them bounce about like a hundredweight of frozen peas getting under everyone's feet and pissing them off.
Because there lies the issue. When is out of control really out of control? When I lose the plot and start screaming and kicking the walls, I have made a decision to let it run. And it's the point of decision that is critical. After all, it's one of Sir Humphrey's irregular verbs; I have passionate convictions, You are a temperamental bastard, and He has a disgraceful lack of self-control. I lose my rag when I think it's justified, but what do those around me think? That I'm striking a blow for common sense or that I'm behaving like an arse? Hmm. I'm not planning on asking any time soon.
It seems a slippery slope from there to say that I've never punched anyone, never caused anyone serious harm, so that's Ok. It isn't really. We're encouraged to let it all hang out now; everywhere you turn on tv there is some brainless chav letting it all hang out on the Jeremy Kyle show and being encouraged to do so by an audience of hyenas. Or two characters coming to verbal or (increasingly) physical blows in one of the septic soaps. Or some utterly ghastly wannabe on Big Brother, rejoicing in their witless tantrums becoming the stuff of national conversation. It's Good Television, they tell us, but a shocking ideology.
But I'm different. Of course I am. I would never actually punch Ben Fogle in the head, even though every instinct in my soul rises up to do so whenever I see his smug not-quite-handsome face leering out of my television. On such delusions are the worst fights begun; that my intense irritation is justified, and that of others is not.
So I will watch. And listen. And learn. And perhaps pray that Mr P and I are the only couple so dysfunctional that a really good life-enhancing belter of a row will more often than not end in the bedroom, or we may well all be doomed to lose the plot for ever more. (Or perhaps not - if that were the end of more fights I think the world might be a more interesting, if slightly more populated, place) And I shall hope to see a lesson for our time; a demonstration of what can be done to disarm the Semtex in the blood that the escalation of casual violence would imply is going off with ever increasing frequency, for we - at least I - do need lessons in how to button it and not feel compelled to right every trivial wrong.
And if his meditations, anger management classes and internal cogitations iron out the fire and the fury, make him a calm, sweet creature, easy to work and live with and at peace with the world and himself, then let me rejoice.
And try not to be too disappointed.
More than that; I'm thoroughly interested in this. Any of you that know me IRL will know why; I have a lulu of a temper. In my defence I would say that it doesn't often happen, but from time to time it does. I have a huge capacity to Get Mad.
When I was small I was not very good at controlling this. I'm still not; I'm just better at it than I was. I still remember the moment when I had finally had it with a large boy at school (who tormented me for being small and a girl) and set about him, firstly with one of my more mature harangues to date (and secondly, I have to admit, with a swift punch to the testicles, one of the more useful bits of information to come down from having two older sisters having been duly taken on board).
But here is the problem; it felt good. I won. And, as a knock on effect, having been punched in the nuts by a six year old girl effectively ended his playground dominance, so I felt I'd achieved something useful for the populace. And this rather set up an association most unhealthy; that of finally having enough and letting fly with solving a problem rather than creating another one.
I have something of an issue of mistrust with people who won't fight, who withdraw from the fray and take a measured look to find other outcomes. I know, in what passes for my intellect, that this is the mature and sensible approach. I'm just no good at finding it, and a bit of me Not that I advocate physical violence as a solution - not at all. But when it comes to fight or flight, I'm a lot better at the former than the latter, and I do find it hard to accept that this is wrong.
I also have absolutely no sense of preservation, and absolutely no tolerance for People Talking crep. I have permanently bruised shins from my husband kicking me under dinner-party-tables when a fellow guest starts off with The Trouble With Oxbridge People or Opera Is Just So Elitist and he sees dismal visions of us still arguing it out at 10 o'clock the following morning. And let's not even start on the moment when I thought facing off a six foot something builder who had made adverse comment on my appearance was a good idea.
So, I could definitely learn a lot from anyone who has the magic secret of when it's a good idea to lose your temper. But control it altogether? Never face up to someone who is talking complete crep? Never stand up for what you believe in? Never let anyone know that what they do is not meeting with your entire approval? Hmm, not sure. But take that to its logical extreme and it becomes reasonable to punch someone out for Looking At You in a Funny Way or Winding You Up. Which it clearly isn't.
Consequently when I read that the man was about to do a series on Being Mr Angry I rather rejoiced. Quite apart from the seductive impression of like calling to like across the Great Grimpen Mire of fangirly self-delusion, I wanted to see how it worked for him. After all, anger and frustration have driven some of the best creative work I have ever done. Would I have ever had the balls to get up and do my stuff had some deep and fundamental part of me not been Deeply and Profoundly Cross? So I am very, very curious to see how a hugely talented person holds it together; because as sure as God made little apples you don't succeed in a crucifyingly unforgiving business unless you channel your passions rather than letting them bounce about like a hundredweight of frozen peas getting under everyone's feet and pissing them off.
Because there lies the issue. When is out of control really out of control? When I lose the plot and start screaming and kicking the walls, I have made a decision to let it run. And it's the point of decision that is critical. After all, it's one of Sir Humphrey's irregular verbs; I have passionate convictions, You are a temperamental bastard, and He has a disgraceful lack of self-control. I lose my rag when I think it's justified, but what do those around me think? That I'm striking a blow for common sense or that I'm behaving like an arse? Hmm. I'm not planning on asking any time soon.
It seems a slippery slope from there to say that I've never punched anyone, never caused anyone serious harm, so that's Ok. It isn't really. We're encouraged to let it all hang out now; everywhere you turn on tv there is some brainless chav letting it all hang out on the Jeremy Kyle show and being encouraged to do so by an audience of hyenas. Or two characters coming to verbal or (increasingly) physical blows in one of the septic soaps. Or some utterly ghastly wannabe on Big Brother, rejoicing in their witless tantrums becoming the stuff of national conversation. It's Good Television, they tell us, but a shocking ideology.
But I'm different. Of course I am. I would never actually punch Ben Fogle in the head, even though every instinct in my soul rises up to do so whenever I see his smug not-quite-handsome face leering out of my television. On such delusions are the worst fights begun; that my intense irritation is justified, and that of others is not.
So I will watch. And listen. And learn. And perhaps pray that Mr P and I are the only couple so dysfunctional that a really good life-enhancing belter of a row will more often than not end in the bedroom, or we may well all be doomed to lose the plot for ever more. (Or perhaps not - if that were the end of more fights I think the world might be a more interesting, if slightly more populated, place) And I shall hope to see a lesson for our time; a demonstration of what can be done to disarm the Semtex in the blood that the escalation of casual violence would imply is going off with ever increasing frequency, for we - at least I - do need lessons in how to button it and not feel compelled to right every trivial wrong.
And if his meditations, anger management classes and internal cogitations iron out the fire and the fury, make him a calm, sweet creature, easy to work and live with and at peace with the world and himself, then let me rejoice.
And try not to be too disappointed.
