Underneath the Fedora

I read an NPR editorial recently that made me think of Emma during her teen years. It was about Johnny Weir’s desire to have people talk about more than his flamboyant costumes. It was about his struggle to be respected as an artist, a skater, but most of all as a man, a human being. I think any person in our society who colors outside the lines can relate to that struggle. I know Emma could. So today I’m sharing an excerpt from that editorial.

From: Behind The Spangles, Weir Is A Man In Full
by Trey Graham
NPR Editorial 2/26/10

“There's a reason this guy idolizes Lady Gaga, and it's to do, I think, with the transgressive ambition of his aesthetic impulse. Weir wants to express himself, sure, but he also wants to be noticed — to be singular, to thrill, to provoke. He talks about just wanting to be himself, but I wonder if he really understands that what makes him so special is how very startling that self is.

There may never be a time when people whose aesthetics are so far outside the mainstream — whose notions of beauty are so idiosyncratic, whose expressive instincts are so innately challenging to those content to go through life in jeans and a fleece — won't be the target of cheap jokes.

But as Sting put it, writing about Quentin Crisp in the song "Englishman in New York,"

    ‘It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile,
    Be yourself no matter what they say.’”