When I was 18 I took a ballet class at college and every morning our beginner adult class started just as the Ballet Majors in the studio next door took a mid-class break.
Many mornings they would gather in the doorway of my classroom and watch us struggle through our bar warmups or jumble up a new technique while they smiled and whispered to each other.
And every morning I dreaded seeing them there because I knew they were making fun of me.
I had other classes with some of them, and I was always embarrassed when ballet came up, and it always did, them being ballet majors, because I loved to talk about it but knew they’d seen me dance, and I was sure they thought I didn’t belong in the conversation.
At the end of the semester, our instructor announced that she’d like to invite the dancers from the next door studio to sit in on our final performance as an audience, and everyone in my class hesitated. We’d worked so hard, we wanted to celebrate our progress during our final without being judged. Most of us left class that day suddenly more anxious about the final than we’d ever been.
The next morning, in one of my other classes I had with the ballet majors, one of them approached me, and as if she’d been reading our minds the entire semester, she said
“Hey. I just wanted to say that I know we watch you guys dance a lot, and I wanted to make sure you know we’re never laughing at you. When we watch you guys learn the basics…..it reminds us of when we first started when we were younger. It’s like…looking at ourselves when we first fell in love with dancing. That’s why we love watching you guys.”
It shocked me. I felt awash with relief and utterly stupid all at once.
Here I had spent an entire semester assuming the worst of people who had otherwise been nothing but nice to me in every other setting, and I had no one to blame for that but my own insecurities that I’d allowed to rule me for months.
I’d been so unfair to these girls, because I was self conscious. I was so worried about being judged that I’d judged all of them.
Here I was worried they were laughing at me, and all along they were looking at me with nothing but absolute delight, even envy for what I was getting to experience.
This encounter changed my entire attitude, permanently.
It made me realize that, yeah sometimes people are jerks for no reason, but more often than not, people really are just….Good.
Since that day, I’ve started giving everyone the benefit of the doubt until they prove me wrong, for their sake and for my own.
And I’ve learned that the world becomes a lot better and life becomes a lot easier when you accept that maybe not everyone is judging you. Maybe you’re the one who’s hardest on yourself.
Let yourself be. Let yourself exist and breathe and be happy.
RENO MY RENO! Canadians fix people’s home improvement mistakes and are super nice about it but FIRM with man who don’t finish projects!
so far some shows that have worked for me:
Lord & Ladles – scottish chefs cook historical feasts in historical mansions! you meet wacky old money people and learn about strange things their ancestors got up to! you get to watch as world-renowned chefs fail at catching a fish! someone makes a hedgehog out of marzipan! people in the olden times ate some crazy shit! every episode ends with the chefs cheersing each other while lying on vintage furniture!
Big Dreams, Small Spaces – cute british people have cute yards that cute gardening man helps to make into much cuter yards. one lady wants to grow vegetables to share with her neighborhood. one lady wants to sculpt a huge mud head covered in moss coming out of the ground. one dad wants a garden for his down’s syndrome kid so he makes a sensory garden with a thousand different smells and textures. one couple wants to grow flowers for their wedding. it’s all wonderful.
Nailed It! – a bunch of people probably got high and decided to throw money at this show idea. everybody tries their best and everybody comes away either having learned something helpful, having had a rollicking good time, or having won a bunch of money. all the judges are good sports and nobody is made to feel bad for doing bad. also there’s some fucking crazy shit they get up to with modeling chocolate i tell you what.
Skin Wars – actually a lot about artists and their craft??? not really at all about sexy ladies being naked??? very cool stuff done by people with atrocious fashion sense and a complete willingness to buy into the moment. a few bad apples but mostly the reality-show-ness is pretty toned down and people are there to make cool art.
A Cook Abroad – chefs go to different parts of the world and learn about food there. A dumb white guy makes bread with adorable egyptian ladies! A british man gets exhausted by the length of roads in argentina and is only recharged by steak! An awesome woman makes cheese in france!
Love Your Garden – british man does garden makeovers for wholesome deserving families with special needs. Maybe a little bit on the weepy side of things but his assistants are all great and have fantastic hairstyles and people in wheelchairs deserve flowers!
Puffin Rock – this show is supposedly for babies but it is SO PRETTY and SO CHARMING and it’s about animals and nature and stuff and doesn’t really completely shy away from that?? like, one of the characters is a little rodent and the seagulls are the bad guys and he’s actually afraid of getting eaten?? anyway baby birds sing songs with baby bunnies and play splishsplash with baby seals and snuggle with baby animals of all sorts in a beautiful hand painted island.
Animal Airport – hey did you know some crazy shit goes down in Heathrow?? Did you know that there isn’t rabies in the UK? Everyone’s doggies and kitties have a long trip but they all get home in the end and also there are turtles and cheetahs and bugs and fish and everything!!!
this list is so relevant to my interests it hurts.
i’d also suggest the bbc historical farms series–it’s not on netflix, but it *is* mostly on youtube. the metafilter guide that originally introduced me to it is here. there are a bunch of different series of it, now, and each one is a group of archaeologists and historians living on a period location–victorian farm, they live in a farmhouse from the era, and they farm and raise animals and etc wearing period clothing, using period tools and sources as guides. and it sounds like it could be cringey, but they’re all experts in their fields and actually really invested in trying to do things well, so instead it’s a bunch of shows about teamwork and being friends (most of the core team stays the same) and learning things, and it’s delightful.
similarly, the sweet makers and victorian bakers have modern confectioners and bakers recreating period foods wearing appropriate clothing and using cookbooks from the era to guide them. (warning that one of the sweet makers episodes deals heavily with the history of sugar, and the slavery and horrific abuses associated with the same.)
If you want something positive, somewhat peaceful, and food craft related to watch on YouTube, look up loftypursuits (they make candy if you’re unfamiliar) and manaboutcakes (I might have a bit of a crush on the host)
I need my Netflix to have this category.
While I’m at it, I need Netflix to have the ability to make, curate and share playlists. Why isn’t that a thing?
“This has been a hard year … a hard few years, a hard century. For some of us, things have always been hard, and I wrote the Broken
Earth trilogy to speak to that struggle, and what it takes to live, let
alone thrive, in a world that seems determined to break you. A world of people who constantly question your competence, your relevance, your very existence. […]
As this genre finally, however grudgingly, acknowledges that the dreams
of the marginalized matter, and that all of us have a future, so will
the world.”
Organized Chaos 