Pop Finds Pop Nutritious? Orly? Yarly.

Okay, I have to admit, there's a little part of me that is probably just wondering where youth went and how long I can cling. Of course, as I've always said, I turned 30 at age 12, and will probably remain 30 for the next 20 years at least (I'm 31). My personal perception of time has always been a little wonky, and I suspect that things are only going to get worse in transition.

But, so help me, I'm weirdly enraptured by the dance clubbing scene. The DJs (Tiesto, Oakenfield), the new performer-starlets (Katy Perry, Lady GaGa, and the like), and the veteran acts who against the odds keep hurtling themselves forward while being hungrily devoured by the others (Madonna, Tori Amos, and Peter Gabriel all come to mind), there's so much performance and production art -- some of it absurdly rich and noteworthy, some of it gallingly puerile -- being generated. I can't help but want in. It's peculiar, really, as it's so completely not the sort of thing I've ever participated in; my personal practice of "performance art" has pretty much always been extremely cerebral and traditional.

Actually, that does provoke a few suppositions. I have always been self-effacing in performance. I think authenticity has been exceptionally difficult for me, as Rachel has been crushed-away and silent for the last two decades. To perform authentically, to be present and genuine, has been crazy hard. I'd compare it to trying to walk on a half-thawed river: the first couple of steps seem steady, but then the "ground" wobbles and shivers, and as arms windmill everything shatters and I'm gone -- swept away downstream. And even if I manage to dance across through some sudden, superhuman dexterity, I'm shaken and unnerved, chilled, and the space I've crossed is a broken, slushy mess. That's what comes of pretending so hard to be what we aren't that we forget we aren't; burned bridges and scorched earth.