BLOG 219: HASSLE

"If you read too many things about yourself that are a little bit incorrect, you start just kind of like obsessing over what people think about you." 

Taylor Swift 

If this wasn't MY blog, I would be terribly humble and say "I have had the privilege to be related to, be friends with, or work with very famous people." But ah-ha! This IS my blog … so I don't have to be terribly humble. 

So here's the truth... no, it is NOT a privilege to be around people who for some reason or the other have become notable to the mass of humanity (who by and large have not become notable). People are just people, so it is not a privilege to be in someone's sphere who has become notable for some reason. They are not superhuman.... nothing fundamental changes about your DNA because you have achieved fame. You still eat, pee, poo and daydream of something better...regardless of how well known you have become. 

And that is great - it keeps people grounded.  Nothing other than your status in the eyes of people who do not know you has changed - for a start they have heard of you! But this isn't all good.  People do crazy things when in the presence of someone who has achieved fame... it is most peculiar. It becomes work to remember that you are just a human who has to eat, will definitely pee and poo, and will.. no matter how large the fame portion... dream of some day in the future when life WILL be better than this. That is why famous people hold on tight to their non famous friends... preferably people who knew them BEFORE it became possible to employ someone to pick out the coffee revels from the bag. (Side note... who the HELL eats those coffee ones...  orange creme,  toffee, or peanut centres, along with Galaxy Counters and Maltesers  are all we need!).  

When  I've been with friends, family or colleagues who are in the public sphere bubble that one calls fame... I am absolutely gob-smacked at how genuine the faith is in articles and gossip even in the face of those within the inner circle trying to give the true version. The other day, within my ear shot some acquaintances of mine mistakenly said two famous people were related to each other. I intervened in the dialogue and said that I could 100% confirm that those two persons were not related. Suddenly, computer screens (showing the welcome page of a notorious gossip website) were promptly swiveled towards me with a triumphant "SEE!!!!"… as if that was conclusive proof. So,  I calmly pointed out that I have an impeccable source  - that being that I am related to one of the individuals and not the other. There was a moment of consideration, then it was decided that the website was right and I was wrong - that the knowledge of to whom I am related MUST be lacking in some way because the internet says otherwise!  (After all... who am I!) 

It seems to me that once you achieve fame then everyone who has never met you seems to think that (courtesy of the often fabricated press stories) that they KNOW you, and that they KNOW the intimate details of your life and...given the opportunity to be in your sphere... will act out the intense emotions they feel for you.... which conversely are generated from NOT knowing anything REAL about you at all.  Yes, there are half naked fans who somehow get into your private areas and profess undying love but there are also people (who have done little more than read a gossip website or magazine) who will pronounce with some force and passion how much they HATE you! One only has to look at how reading what John Lennon was purported to BE like, sent one crazed individual who had never met him previously to shoot him dead. 

Recently a trio of us went shopping, two of us had nothing to do with the fame game and one of us used to be famous some time ago and is slotting very nicely back into the wonderful  world of moderate anonymity. One of the trio said to the one who used to  be famous... "You are getting a lot of looks from people - some are blatantly staring!". The friend that used to be famous, just took it all in their stride. "Oh people are  just looking to figure out if I am somebody they know or if I am somebody they SHOULD know". It was quite creepy though, very intrusive and... given that we really don't do eye-contact with people we haven't been formally introduced to in the UK... very rude.  It's simply not something anyone SHOULD have to get used to while picking up milk from Sainsbury's. 

On the other hand there is an old argument that fame does not happen by accident - it has to be courted. To maintain being the public eye, a certain amount of wooing takes place, one must be accessible, one must gain support, respond to applause and one must allow your likeness to be made available for the public to stare at.  Yup... you are so gonna need the press as they are your best shot of achieving this in front of the largest audience possible.  Of course sooner or later you will want them to step back a bit... but the deal done does have the clause...If you go out of your way to bring this kind of attention into your life...it's a bit crap to complain about it! But why do celebs get tired of the publicity? Well quite franky magazines and websites use press releases and interviews to build a character for the celebrity, no one bothers with the cold hard facts, there is a tacit  agreement between the celebs people and the press to build a character that the public want to know  - something that will support the image they have bought into. 

  

But there always will come a day when the celeb wants to be left alone or at least just be the real them. On that day they will reject the media, calling the interest (so painfully courted) intrusion.  So what do the media do when the access is denied....  hack the celebs phone and print their private pictures. Of course... the media  won't know what the pictures mean...so they'll just make up a by-line.  Better still they'll purchase a snap taken by a 'fan' on their mobile as long as it fulfills the criteria "Every picture tells a story". Well yes they do but what story would that be? 

At least the celebrity has the right of rebuttal and has the forum to try to put the record straight. 

But have you ever wondered about the other people in those pictures?  

To an outside eye it must looks like a load of fun being the 'entourage'. Those pictures always show 'a mystery friend' hanging out in somewhere swanky with the celeb. How much non-fun can that be? Life behind the VIP rope! Great. 

Actually no. Things are not  always what they seem.   

Day or night you are at risk of finding yourself in a shot that has made to seem compromising just to sell the story they want to tell. Simple acts that we all do with our friends... lean in to talk during say... a sporting event, will be explained as some kind of sexually based relationship wantonly conducted under the full glare of daylight! (Damn the fact that your boyfriend- who is sitting to your left - has been cropped out of the photo to make it seem that you are having a liaison with the celebrity sitting to your right). 

The worst pictures though are ones taken at night. They always seem doubly as damning... like just by being there you are some how a 'creature of the night'… and therefore morally.... flexible? 

But lets face facts... being out after sunset is routine. You're out for the evening. There has been a few beers, something happens and you detect that your friend is not about to react well to it. So you take the friend aside, hold their lapel and say "Oi mate... look me in the eye.. listen it's not worth it...". We've all done it… you know, when you are telling them off or breaking bad news and need to have eye contact to ensure they are paying attention. [We girls do this a lot with our male friends who have crushes on unsuitable women, or want to have fights with big men that would (given the opportunity) use them as a butter churn!] This is one, maybe two seconds of a great night out - 8hrs with not a single memorable incident to mar the memory - you don't even recall doing it. So how do you feel when the surreptitiously taken photo of you holding your friends lapel appears in the paper or on a gossip website, with the by line "Celebrity getting intimate with mystery woman at drunken nightclub outing."   

This kind of misrepresentation has happened in my circle quite a few times: highlights include where a relative was tagged as getting intimate with an older woman (he was being told off by his aunty at a family wedding), where a friend's mystery new lover was seen sneaking in and out of her house in the early hours (chemist was dropping over some insulin) and my favourite, a series of photographs showing a rapturous reaction to a marriage proposal (over dinner, a box containing coloured contact lens was shown and the person shown them was very shocked then amused by the design) . 

But hey! Surely they could it all laugh off - okay the  by-lines were made up but they seem harmless enough?  After all the story is about the person the person who is ACTUALLY famous not you... shouldn't you be happy that proximity makes you almost famous for a moment?

Well no: Not when you have to explain to your boyfriend/partner/husband that you are not cheating on them (photo says it's an intimate moment and it sure looks like it), and you have a huge row... not when your credibility at work is damaged because people didn't know that was your nephew (why should they know your entire family tree?) and you are forever marked as a cougar.... not when it encourages 'other celebrity watchers' to start following you around with cameras at the ready (after all you proposed to a celeb!).  Suddenly people you don't know are staring at you in public places... or worse deciding what they think of you because of what they've read. 

The damage done to people simply because they happen to be in the orbit of someone who has achieved fame is seldom talked of.  And there is real damage....your life is intruded upon.

Famous people  get loads of adoration because they do something or have something that the majority of people don't. And this makes them interesting. Sometimes this means that they get a shed load of financial reward too. But.... mainly it means that they are well known.  So yay them! 

BUT just like ANYBODY ELSE they still eat, pee, poo and daydream of something better.... and... they also have friends and family. 

Who are NOT famous.  They just know someone who is.   

And when they get loads of hassle without any of the perks just because of that...  it really sucks! 

The by-line is seldom real... but the person is. 

Do give that a thought the  next time you see the 'mystery person' in the next candid celebrity snap. 

The JaxWorld Blog can be followed on Twitter- @JaxWorldBlog    

 

Or you can join over 7000 fans of The JaxWorld Blog on Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/The.JaxWorld.Blog   

 

Thanks for continuing to vote for JaxWorld as the Best Blog about Stuff and for ALL your support that has made this blog such a huge success.

BLOG 218: Where's Grose-vhen-oor Skaware?

"Be friendly to everyone. Those who deserve it the least need it the most". Bo Bennett 

Shopping is a private affair in England.  Mainly we do it on our own - but you can bring a friend or two if you like. But shopping is kind of invitation only. You wouldn't expect the whole of the second floor of Selfridges to turn around and approve your purchase.  However THAT is exactly what happened to me.  I was rather rattled I must say. I had to stop and check to see if I was still in the same country. 

If you live in England it's a simple three question procedure: 

1. Is Bruce Forsyth still presenting Strictly? 

2. Is everyone still convinced that Marks and Spencers Percy Pigs are the best sweetie ever? 

3. Does the world still stop for X Factor? 

If the answer is yes, yes and yes, then yup you are in dear old Blighty and nothing fundamental has changed. 

However, post summer Olympics things do seem a little different. People seem to be … what's the polite way of putting this... INVOLVED. 

Now I'm not ranting about this. Lord knows some days the British reserve get's right up my hooter and I wanna scream "For the love of Monkeys! WHAT will it take for you people to get amongst it!!!" But lately everyone at least in my fair city seems to want to chat, help, advise and even HUG! What on earth is going on? 

Eye-contact - the great British no-no seems to be everywhere. Folks are wandering about their business head high , catching your eye and smiling.  People are happily offering seats to you on the bus or train without you having to pretend you are pregnant or injured! Random conversations with total strangers are entered into willy-nilly and you can't hesitate in the street without some helpful soul approaching you ready to offer directions. It's all terribly lovely... but so not the England I'm used to. Correction - the London I'm used to (they've always been a bit 'Midsomer'  in the provinces). 

Yep - for a fortnight, London hosted the greatest show on Earth, did it our way (no pale facsimiles of Hollyweird Razzmatazz or the military precision of our eastern  neighbours)  - just a show of great organisation, fantastic hospitality and Brit-centric displays of what WE do best. When it ended, we all felt a little smug, a lot proud and a bit more....munificent. Yep, our city (which face facts, this time last year was on fire and hurling rocks at store windows) rose to the challenge, rebuilt a deprived area of town, spruced up a lot of areas that didn't even realise they were in need of a bit of attention, and opened not only it's doors but it's heart to the globe. We did good  - the world called us" the hosts with the mosts" and claim Our Olympics was the best ever. 

Usually in London, (and we are used to hosting a lot of folk for this event or that), once the gig is up... it's business as usual. We just go back to how things were before. Even after August 2011's extreme events - how did we know it was over? We opened our front doors and the atmosphere was back to normal, we didn't need the tv or radio to tell us... we were back to bustling about in our private spheres, doing our business and having to make a grand gesture to attract the attention of even those we know. Business as usual is what we do, whether it be Royal Weddings or Summer Riots - we just go back to normal the moment the event ceases.    

However - as my experience in Selfridges shows,  there are lingering remnants of the liberal attitude my co-city dwellers  fostered for the games. The games dragged us all in, so after a fortnight of hosting an extra 2 million visitors, there aren't too many of London's 8,174,100 regular residents  who haven't been  an active host even in the smallest way. And unlike  August 2011, rather than return to normal, we've deliberately let some of what has passed linger on. (Suppose we better as part two; the Paralympics, kick off in 7 days!) However despite the fact all the sporting venues are a hive of activity as they get refreshed in look, function and signage - life should have returned to normal since the main event ended. 

But instead, I try on a pair of shoes in the mecca that is the 2nd floor of the best shop on the planet... and everyone on the floor want to talk to me about them. Eye contact. Smiling. Uninvited dialogue.  And on at least two occasions... actual TOUCHING took place. 

Now these were not the usual parade of summer visitors to our city, no ...these were The 'just popping out' shopping office workers, The ladies who lunch, The up from the home counties to shop in town, basically -the parade of every day Brit that normally you would have to have under contract before you got even a peep from them!  

This NOT your routine London experience. Random people do not routinely pitch in to help me choose shoes for a forthcoming wedding! Most of the time you are hard pushed to get the attention of the Sales Assistant and she's being PAID to help! But … there I was, trying on shoes with complete strangers-whose accents declare them UK resident - offering unsolicited advice and assistance. Fabulous! (And I must say  -  the girl on her lunch break who was doing a pre-payday reckky, Thank you! I wouldn't not have even considered Nicholas Kirkwood, actually I had never heard of him!)  But hang on UNSOLICITED advice from complete strangers who are residents of the city? I thought I was in London,  I thought I was on Oxford Street... Okay, I started to panic!  - AM I STILL IN THE UK? 

To calm myself I did the three part character check: 

1. Yes- the new season of Strictly will be presented by Sir Bruce when it returns in Autumn 

2. Yes  - the nation is still obsessed with Marks and Spencers  Percy Pigs (Over £10million worth of sales per annum!) 

3. And okay not so many viewers tuned into X Factor on its return to TV last weekend, but it was STILL all people were talking about come Monday morning! 

Yep this is still Blighty!  

We are still a nation of contrary buggers! We still drink too much and smoke purely out of a misconceived solidarity to an oppressed minority! (We do NOT like to be TOLD, so banning things just makes us want to do it more) but we harangue the government to curb our excesses.  We still have a startling ignorance of other cultures and resort to Xenophobia at the first opportunity ("Oh American's are just too loud" , "I love France, it's just the French I can't stand", "Eastern Europeans work EVERY hour so we can't compete")  but we are so proud that over 300 languages and dialects are spoken in London as WE are the world most international city.  We love our open spaces but spend most of our time parked in front of our telly's in our  much loved living rooms (if an Englishman's home is his castle then his sofa is his throne!). And yes, we are friendly, humorous , hearty and a plain-speaking people while being physically repressed and very reserved (we know we're a difficult bunch of people to figure out.) 

However,  it is just a few days since we as a city of over 8 million souls got the opportunity to act like a small village for a while. 

Instead of bustling about, sighing deeply when a  visitor stands on the wrong side of the escalator and blocks traffic - we've learned to tap them gently on the shoulder, smile and show them pleasantly the error of their ways. We've learned (with some restraint) not to ask Americans to repeat the name of the Square their Embassy is in  - simply for our own amusement - but just give them directions  and send them happily on their way. We've learned to budge up on seating and nestle an unknown thigh beside ours so everyone gets to sit. We've stopped aiming our sights into the mid distance and actually met peoples glance and with a smile. We've even shared a Percy Pig or two with complete strangers when queuing feels more like just standing and letting time pass interminably.  

And in case you think that what happened in Selfridges was a one off... it so was not! 

Fact is Londoners have been chatting to strangers (wrapped in even stranger flags) and realised that even without a formal introduction, most folk are actually quite okay.  And we like what we've learned so it seems we just can't stop.  After the purchase,  I'm sitting on train chugging through the Sauff Lundin Suburbs on my way back to base with a lovely big yellow Selfridges bag next to me. I find myself smiling while stroking the bag  and bending the corner to look at the shoe box within. The lady seated across the aisle catches my eye. 

"Bin shopping love?" 

"Yeah - shoes for a wedding"  I hear myself say 

"Ooh! " She says "Can I see?"  

She moves over next  me and without thinking I produce the shoes. 

For the next 20 minutes we chat (never leaving the subject of the shoes but I received a fantastic tip about socks and hairdryers to make shoes comfy to wear at an all day wedding!). Then I disembark, wishing her a lovely day. No formal introductions, in fact we have no idea of each others names, I don't even know where she was travelling to (though her accent was similar to mine so I guess she's a local) and we never ONCE talked of the weather! Quite simply, she initiated a chat with a complete stranger who reciprocated  and a pleasant time was had by all.  I'm not complaining  - I got a great pair of hoofs and a great tip to ensure my trotters last the course! - but it is rather strange for London.  In the post Olympic rosy light, London has a  complete disregard for the perils of talking to strangers.

 

I have no idea if this after-glow will last much longer - we're not our cousins over the pond, we're not a gushy chatty people - especially to random strangers! But while it's on, it is rather lovely but I am relieved that some things have remained the same. 

Brucey WILL be  back in the autumn. M & S Percy Pigs are STILL the nations favourite... and WHAT the hell was that orange thing on the X Factor that can't talk properly?!    

The JaxWorld Blog can be followed on Twitter- @JaxWorldBlog   

Or you can join over 7000 fans of The JaxWorld Blog on Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/The.JaxWorld.Blog  

Thanks for continuing to vote for JaxWorld as the Best Blog about Stuff and for ALL your support that has made this blog such a huge success.

BLOG 217: Lies all Lies!!!

 "There can be no keener revelation of a society's soul than the way in which it treats its children." Nelson Mandela

I have just got off the phone with an old friend who told me that last night she had an interesting conversation with her young son.  With secondary school looming she wished to ensure that he was up to speed on how human beings reproduced. This wasn't the mechanical side of things she was approaching - she'd left that to his schooling (in the UK kids from 5-7 years of age learn this in the classroom), it was more the physical and emotional side of things that she had rather ducked out of talking through with him and time had more than certainly run out!  Faced with zero choice, she called her son into the living room for the big chat.   

On viewing the information books that my friend had laid out on the coffee table, the little boy froze.  

"Are you alright?" she enquired 

"NO!" screamed the boy and he ran upstairs and slammed his bedroom door 

Confused my friend followed and tapped on the child's door. Finally after much coaxing the little boy, tear stained and blotchy faced opened the door to his room. 

"What's up honey?" she asked 

"I don't want you to tell me it isn't so" hiccupped the distressed child 

My friend was totally befuddled, and sat and consoled the boy until he was able to speak rationally about his fears.  She knew she'd stalled on having this chat due her own embarrassment and realised that by having it late, the child may have heard versions of how humans reproduce from other sources. She started to feel bad about letting her own feelings get in the way of giving her son the information he needed when he needed it  and prepared herself to sort out myth from fact. 

But she was not prepared for what the child said  next 

"Mummie, I don't want you to tell me it isn't so" 

"What isn't so baby?" she asked 

"When I was 6 we were shopping in Sainsbury's and you bought chocolate eggs and when I asked why you did and not the Easter Bunny you told  me that there isn't an Easter Bunny, then when I was 8 and you didn't have change that time I lost my big tooth you said there was no Tooth Fairy, then last year you called me in and told me Santa wasn't real, so now I DON'T want you to tell me that The Sexy isn't real either...please Mummie, please!" 

Yep! The child had found out about human reproductive intercourse  through  another avenue  and quite liked the idea of "The Sexy"! Based on his other one to one chats with his mum he has assumed that like the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy  and Santa, "The Sexy" was  just yet another myth waiting to be quashed as a right of passage! 

Oh how we laughed!!! (Well I did... I thought it hilarious!)  Poor kid, chocolate eggs, money for teeth, presents from a jolly beardy man in the artic, all proven to be big fat hairy lies and now he thought the only interesting thing he'd ever do with his nether regions was  heading the same way! 

On a more sober note though... parents everywhere... DO NOT assume it will always be YOUR choice when and how your kids will learn how to put what they learn into social perspective, if you won't step up there are more than a zillion ways for some other source to take your place. 

But more than this... PLEASE... try to have chats with your kids that don't always involve killing their fantasies!  

 

The JaxWorld Blog can be followed on Twitter- @JaxWorldBlog  

 

 

 

Or you can join over 7000 fans of The JaxWorld Blog on Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/The.JaxWorld.Blog 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for continuing to vote for JaxWorld as the Best Blog about Stuff and for ALL your support that has made this blog such a huge success.