Did. The. Thing
A week of bad parenting, subversive drag, and Dad jokes at the Dorch
As far as I’m concerned there are now two types of people in the world. Those who think the Ariana De Bose BAFTAs meme is the funniest thing in the universe and those who don’t understand the appeal, or WORSE don’t even realise that something so seismic has happened to the queer internet at all.
When “Angela Basset did the thing” is not living in my head rent free, I am trying to explain to someone why nothing will ever be the same again after it. Showing my wife the original performance, then the memes and then the responses to the memes really did nothing to convince her of the sheer brilliance of this moment in history and she looked at me a bit like how we look at our 4-year-old when she is deep into a passionate retelling of something that happened in the playground.
Also notable this week was my trip to the theatre to see the fantastic Travis Alabanza show Sounds of The Underground at the Royal Court. Have you seen it? It’s oh so worth getting a babysitter in for. No spoilers but it is about the nature of art and commerce, drag culture, performance as protest, the disappearance of LGBTQ night life and the dark reality of the queer experience for some. I laughed! I whooped! I cried! and I will never watch Ru Paul’s Drag Race in the same way again.
It has been quite a drag-filled few days actually, as last weekend I was performing, sadly not in drag, myself at the Royal Maritime Museum’s Out at Sea festival. I’m making it sound grander than it was - I basically read my picture book to a room of children but I had a microphone so forgive me a little Mariah moment.
Then we went to see a fantastic children’s drag show at the museum which had all the kids completely transfixed. Can we not give the Karens who protested a similar event at the Tate recently any airtime here.
It stared the fabulous Shay Shay and was pitched so perfectly for the audience. My daughter was right up the front, muscling her way on to the stage at any opportunity! We learnt about recycling, gender fluidity, individuality and there was singing and dancing and I don’t think I stopped smiling the whole way through.
What else? Oh! I finished a book - round of applause please - and no it wasn’t a Biff and Chip one. I read Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld who is one of my favourite writers. I was lucky enough to get my hands on a proof - it’s not out til April and even though there is a lesbian couple in it, the romance element was just all a bit straight for me. Nothing against straight people. Some of my best friends are that way inclined but it was a bit… boring?
The female protagonist (ooh I’m getting all A-Level English over here) was a writer for a late night TV comedy show which isn’t, but basically is, Saturday Night Live and I LOVED all the detail about working on the show which I imagine is very true to life. But, otherwise it was my least fave of her books. Maybe I read it at a bad time as I was concurrently watching Fleishman is in Trouble which is about rich unhappy divorcees in New York so I’d kind of had my fill of straight ennui.
I think I’ve put off talking about parenting for so many paragraphs this issue because, well, I’m worried I’ve not been a very good one this week. But this being, after all, a parenting newsletter I suppose I do need to go there. I’ll try and summarise the salient points
My kid has a very passionate personality. She falls in love with new toys each week and becomes completely obsessed with them. For some reason fluffy pom poms that you stick eyes and noses on to turn into weird creatures (see above) are the latest craze that we have unwittingly unleashed into our household with a tornado of glue guns, goggly eyes, teeny tiny pom pom paws that get everywhere and an associated helping of tears, tantrums and shouting.
It was my wife’s birthday yesterday and our daughter enjoyed this as another opportunity to express how unfair it is that it is not her birthday. She was so tired after not being able to sleep until 10.30pm the previous night, there was no way to rationalise or comfort her as she became more and more worked up about the fact it was not her birthday. Cut to me declaring LET’S PRETEND IT IS YOUR BIRTHDAY I’LL BUY YOU A PRESENT - ANYTHING - WHAT DO YOU WANT?! Said in a desperate attempt to stop the crying. Cut to me cycling back on a Lime Bike from Smyths with one of these (see above) ridiculous things in the basket
Every time I rode over a bump it let out one of its 150 noises and at one point started singing in this high pitched kitten meow. As instructed I was waiting for her at the school gates with the aforementioned fluff ball. So essentially she has learned that if she screams I buy her things which is obviously TERRIBLE. So there you go. Shame on me. How do I gentle parent my way out of this one?
And finally - I had a nice moment at The Dorchester Hotel* this week. My wife was reviewing it for her work and we were invited for dinner in the revamped lobby restaurant. There was a woman singing at the grand piano which was covered in mirrored squares to resemble a disco ball and once belonged to actual Liberace. As I walked past her on the way to the bath room she was singing the Estelle song American Boy and just so happened to make eye contact with me when she belted out the lyrics “are you gay?”. I smiled and said “yes I am actually” and she laughed so hard she had to stop singing.
There you go. I did the thing. Move over Suzi Ruffell!
Next week brings school strikes, World Book Day and the start of a new freelance job for me in-house at an office which always makes me itchy and nervous about how we’ll manage childcare and how I’ll deal with people eating lunch at their desks.
To be continued!
*If you have questions about the boycott of the Dorchester Collection hotels and why I personally am now going back happy to chat!
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Lotte x