Saturday morning rant/ramble Part I

Just after 11pm last night, I was fuming and planning to tell you why I wouldn't donate to Broadway Cares. You see, I had just missed a train, and I hate just missing a train at after 11pm (after 10pm, for that matter), because there wouldn't be another for almost twenty minutes, and I was really f*ing tired. I might have caught the train with minutes to spare, had one of the actors in Candide not taken "another minute" of the audience's time to tell us about Broadway Cares. But he did. And Candide was very good, but also a few songs too long. Actually, Candide shared some of the styles and quirks of the STC's production of Argonautica a few years ago, which was overwhelmingly excellent. But I digress. It was a few songs too long (and too loud), and my fellow theatergoers, while much more efficient, as well as polite, than our weekend matinee counterparts, still took their time getting out of the theater. So I missed my train, and other people probably missed their train and therefore also their bus. Who told this guy he could tell us about Broadway Cares?

It took all of five seconds for me to turn my frustration on myself. I mean, I was still annoyed, and not just because I missed the train, but because I kind of resent knee-jerk charitable solicitations. I believe wholeheartedly in charitable giving, but I believe it should be deliberate and researched. I also acknowledge that some people will only give when asked out loud, so it's not entirely fair to blame the fundraisers for trying.

I was also annoyed because I f*ing hate the holidays. I stopped into Giant the Saturday after Thanksgiving, and they were already playing Christmas music. I haven't returned since--they've driven me out entirely for another month, during which I will shop exclusively at Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and Asian markets. Anyway, when I walked into the theater, there were carolers. Gag me.

And it had been a long day on top of a long week. I know that I'm lucky to have a job, but the $hit I worked on much of yesterday was seriously tedious. I don't even mind, when I'm working on it, but it has a very cumulative exhausting effect.

So by 11pm, i.e. after a long day of work and three hours of Candide, I was really ready to go home. But at 11:25, I was just boarding a train when I might have been getting off the train, and at 11:05, I was seething as the train that might have been rolled away right in front of my eyes.

The reason I'm going on about this is that if the worst thing that happened to me all week is having missed a train, even at 11pm, after a mostly excellent performance for which I paid very little thanks to the generosity of area donors who subsidize under-35 subscriptions for the Shakespeare Theater Company, maybe I should get over myself and donate to Broadway Cares. Isn't that what donations are really about? An outsourcing of what you want to share? I can't share my health with people, and it's not feasible, in some cases, to share my time. So the least I can do is donate, because seething on a metro platform for twenty minutes is not like caring for an ailing family member year after year, or ailing oneself. I'm just saying. Or maybe I'm asking. What would you do?