Jo Calderone taught us a lesson when he perfromed "You and I" at the VMA's: Don't be an asshole. Even if you ARE an asshole, just because you are a guy, or from Jersey, or whatever - don't be an asshole to your girl. Hell, even if you are from Boston and no one is expecting you not to be an asshole, still be better than that for Love and don't be one to the girl who puts up with you.
But there is another lesson in the song, and in the Love between Jo and Gaga, one which she really is the best at sharing, which made me realize how divine she is, which made me conclude that she is the human incarnation of the Goddess in the way I had always hoped and expected a girl would be, and the world would recognize. I'm not really putting Gaga above the rest of us by saying she is the Goddess, but she is in a special place if she is the first person in a long time that so much of the world can see the Goddess in, and once we learn from her we start to see the Goddess in everyone - well, you can see why I say we may all be divine, we are all the Goddess, but Gaga is just better at it right now. But we can all be better at it, we can all manifest more of our divine nature. And Gaga shows us how.
This special place in Time that Gaga appears is between our past dismissive view of people and our future wonderous view of each other, recognizing the divine in everyone. It's the heart, the special center of the universe within everything that the scientists can't find - that's the special place in "space" that Gaga occupies. She is in all of us. She let us know early, and reminds us, in the divine inspiration of the lyrics. I mentioned "Paparazzi" in gagablog 31 and I can't say enough about it. Yes, I will be exporing Gaga's intervention for Christianity/Catholicism soon, but I realized I need to be a real typing monster and say all I can to keep up with Gaga. Love is in all of us, unites us, and is amazing and overwhelming and indescribable, and yet the person who can reveal it the best to the most is more direct experience of and pathway to the Goddess - rebirth of the Goddess in us. Gaga's lyrics have revealed the mystical secret of love to me in a way no other art has, and I will try to explain in my best remembrence of the Goddess.
"Paparazzi" is one of the best, most mystical songs to me because Gaga does that thing where she takes both sides of identity and perception itself. It's beyond genius, it's divine inspiration. And this is the nature of Love - its "between us" but really we are all it. While we still need to wake up and see how we are all connected, even deeper than that we are all the same consciousness. Just as your clearest thought in a trainyard messy mind is the Goddess of you in the moment, the person amongst us who can best express the Love that confounds all of us is the Goddess of the World in the current era. The best love songs show how love is between us - remind us of Love we feel for someone with the story of two other lovers, or love itself. Some songs manage to present both sides - duets, obviously, but songs that get into the real mystery of how we are all one, yet two people realizing their oneness is the mystical trick of love, do this in a more magical way. And "Paparazzi" takes it to another level entirely: I had just started paying real attention to Gaga, expecting the mystical from her, when I heard/saw "Paparrazzi" and it blew me away. She was playing both sides of the love mystery, not just for the song but to show us how we are all doing this. On one level she is the "fan" and the "star", the fan in love with the star and vice versa. But on another level she is the paparazzi, chasing the star "in love with her", and the star, chasing the paparazzi "in love with the love of the world". This is the perspective of the Goddess, to me: within all of us, sad for being unrecognized/unappreciated and doing anything to get our attention in each other and get us back into love. Its a perfect song, which shows how the One thing becomes Two, the Lovers, and how it all becomes 3 and 4 to infinity, with the perception of "others", which again are all reflections of "ourself" - the Goddess. How, by being two mirrors, and facing each other, with the "center of space" of Love between them, Gaga reflects her image infinitely - one becomes two becomes a google, and infinity.
"Paparazzi" was one of the best presentations of this message to me, but the whole album "The Fame" brought out this side of love, the way the world can be in love with someone and someone can be in love with, and earn and deserve, the love of the world. Romantic love is there, too, and playing both sides of a relationship, and a lot of "girl" perspective on different relationships, too, that our culture has neglected or underepresented. But being in love with the whole world was a major message for me, and I saw Gaga as the Lover of the World, the mysterious Bride of Christ, and the Goddess for the whole world, of Love and Art and more.
By contrast, "You and I" is more of a traditional love song, between two people. While I had been a bit of a holy fool and thought it was all about sex (and weed, ahem, "champagne") "You and I" reminded me of the love between two people, monogamy even, in a way that at first made me uncomfortable, ashamed even. In the course of the last month I have realized that I had rejected monogamy in a sense by seeing it as patriarchal but I have come to appreciate it's good qualities due to recent personal events, but also from hearing "You and I", and that's a story I can share.
When I first heard "You and I" I told my little monster friend Maesa that it was "the only song on the album that was not my very favorite - but I realize it's just because I am jealous of Luc Carl because I want Gaga to be in love with ME!" But I also could tell that this Gaga homage to monogamous love was a challenge for me to appreciate. But of course, Gaga ended up making the lesson easy. Yes, I had drastic personal events that taught me long-needed lessons, and I now more fully appreciate my lover. But even when I heard "You and I" and was not ready to think of myself as really monogamous I knew she was right in presenting this message and I knew I would have to learn it, though I still did not want to hear it yet. Even now I'm still flexible for a monogamist, but I actually appreciate the value of the monogamous side in a way I never did before. And Gaga made it easy to learn. It's a traditional love song, with some lines built in quoting her lover - but the choice to perform it as Jo Calderone just made it all come home for me: my belief that we really are all the Goddess becomes real, not just words, when she changes gender like that in this song about "the two of us". Love songs, the really good ones, can be for any love, between a man and a woman, two women, two men, or even two kings and a Queen ("Judas") or any combination. Gaga shows us how we are all the same, we are all in this love together and are just trying to be more together, better, and that's the real goal. For me, appreciating Gaga's love and longing for one person helped me realize that it IS "cool" to be in love with one person, and I truly am learning to care better for my lover, my "own...personal...gaga". And then she just drove the point home, well, he did, Jo Calderone. He is in love with Gaga just like I am, wanting to catch up with her, wanting to be the best I can be just to have shot. I do appreciate the idea that people can love the world more, even having more lovers than they generally expect, in more ways. But for me I have been insecure in love and not true enough to myself. I have been sure in my mind, but not in my actions. But now I have a better image of myself as a male, thanks to Jo Calderone, and I'm going with this lesson. It's true you have to love yourself, but one of the best ways to learn how to do this is by truly loving another.
I'm a kind of gnostic, I already felt like I knew a lot of these messages on "Born this Way" and was just like "Yeah, Gaga! Tell em about it!", but "You and I" was a big lesson for me, one that came with a real-life drama in my personal life that made other concerns, even revolutions!, seem petty to me, personally, in comparison. Having learned this lesson, or begun to, I feel I am a much more complete person. Ironically, it helps me get over a problem I have had with monogamy since being raised in a christian context that I had issues with. I realize that some of these issues were my own insecurity and there is value in that, so I appreciate an aspect of monogamy that I did not before, and can accept more variety in people, that it really is the best for some people, not a trap or ruse of christianity to oppress women. Just as I realized I had been duped in my impressions from christianity when I discovered that girls really like sex, too, I recently found out that girls really do like to have committed relationships, for healthy reasons, not just fear or expectation. Now, a lot of other problems I have with patriarchal christianity are actual problems that need to be addressed and reconciled, the church is just wrong about some things. And I really look forward to giving my play-by-play of Gaga's "cultural baptism", what I'm now calling an intervention for Christianity, because she is going to fix and heal it. But at the heart of it all is Love, and when we can love better, we can do everything better.
Jo Calderone gave us a clinic on this at the VMA's. Gaga is laying out the whole curriculum. Let's make the most of these days - we have full scholarships to Monster University, let's get the highest degrees in Love!
Oh, and I really like "You and I" now, it has joined all the other songs on "Born this Way" as my very favorite song. I haven't seent the video yet, but Jo Calderone completed the message for me, and it will always be the theme song for this transformational period in my life. And you know that's part of what she wanted to accomplish, tranfroming people so they can be their best. And I am happy for Gaga and Luc, for thier love, and for whoever else is lucky enough to be in love with her. And yeah, of course I would love for that to be me one day, I'm a fantasist of the highest order so I believe the impossible, but it really reminds me how lucky I am to be in love, to be with my lover, how awesome she is and how I will always cherish our moments together and seek the greatest love and togetherness as we chase each other around into the future years. Sometimes I fall behind and need to catch up to her - "I was an asshole" - but in the same way Gaga has taught me more about universal love, I'm learning from my lover, from myself, and from the divine inspiration of what Gaga is doing for all of us, the value of personal love and seeking it in its greatest truth and purity when you are lucky enough to be with someone. Sometimes its the longing from losing someone that reminds us of the true feelings - if we can learn this from a song without having to go completely through it, and save love, well, that is a blessing. Thanks Gaga, thanks Jo, I love ya'll, thanks for loving us.
And someone called him "King Jo" on facebook, reminding me how he is a great complimentary God to Goddess Gaga, or any lover to beloved - good for the passion and rage and action when necessary, knowing his place serving and catching up to his lover, and being a man who is real to her in pleasure, support, inspiration and grounding, without ever being an asshole again, being aware of that tendency and overcoming it, using that energy for good. I hope Gaga really does have that in another actual boy or girl, and I'm so happy I still have a chance to be with my lover again, I hope, but I am overcoming some of my deepest barriers to love and learning to be the best for her. Well, my neighbor invited me to plant a tree, so I will do the best I can for Mother now by wrapping this up going outside. Leaves Up!
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