Coloring outside the lines...

There was a great deal of identifiable rhetoric operating in my childhood environment--especially that surrounding the idea of being of the working-class. Working-class rhetoric revolves around the idea that working-class people work harder than everyone else in America. I believe part of it must have evolved as a reaction to the difficulty of accessing higher education. The main facet of the rhetoric is the attitude that no one works harder, longer, or is more loyal than a working-class citizen of America. My family practiced and repeated this rhetoric along with a curious anti-intellectualism that denigrated education and the professions. Their attitudes have changed over time and as they've watched me progress through my academic and professional lives, but these early attitudes were difficult for me to surmount.

Rather than experience a one-time epiphany when I realized I could construct my own identity, I more so had a series of epiphanys as my life has evolved.. Another area of my life where I've experienced an epiphany of sorts is that surrounding the idea of mood. Now that I sort of know, and am confident of the direction, to which I'm heading, it's been helpful to reach back to Mr. Ed and recall his commandment to not take life so seriously!     "The identity of an individual, a nation, an empire, a civilization, may be altered by altering the story it tells about itself." W.J.T. Mitchell

Watching Mr. Ed when I was a child opened my eyes to the possibilities of living my life differently from those around me. Mr Ed's creators constantly came up with new ways to demonstrate that no one--not even a horse--is constrained by the societal role, class, or status assigned to them at birth. I took Mr Ed's lessons to heart and, way before I knew who Ulmer was, invented new ways of living for myself that would meet my needs. As a result, I am the first in my immediate family to: ride a bicycle learn to swim get divorced graduate from college earn a graduate degree among other things, particularly those having to do with Ulmer's concept of 'funk.'

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