I’m having this weird sensation lately, like I can’t figure out if I *actually* care what is going on, or if I’m just *acting* like I care what is going on. I don’t know how much it would change my work, between the two, and maybe it’s a combination of both at most times. Right now there is a political battle in my county, and I’m in the middle of it- both me as a figure as well as my organization- and this county is so back-assward when it comes to arts that I almost have to NOT care if I’m going to get through it. Every time I have to speak to politicos, or funders, or anyone else who has an axe to grind or a claim to stake, I have to sort of distance myself or I’ll feel as though I’m the grinder or the ground. <\/p>\n
I can’t believe, I honestly can’t believe, that there is no public funding for the arts in my county. I can’t believe, sometimes, that I eek out a living in a sector that is wholly unsupported by any governmental infrastructure. And I’m trying to do it in a state that is an embarrassment of riches and a stupefying posity of support for that which makes life richer, stronger, better. California, the fifth largest economy in the world, spends 3 cents per person on the arts. France, the sixth largest economy spends $56 per person. California is LAST IN THE NATION when it comes to arts spending. How can this not be, at the very least, terribly embarassing? <\/p>\n
And here’s the thing: I’m about ready to give up the fight. Not tomorrow, not next month, but of all the battles in the world that I want to fight, do I want to sweat bullets because I have to go alone to a governmental meeting next Tuesday where I’ll be surrounded by haters, to lobby for a measley portion of public funds for the arts? I certainly have plenty of conviction when it comes to this particular battle, and I’m ready to rally the troops and raise the defenses but if this one fails… well. I don’t really believe it will, but I’m staring up a long, slick mountain- hardly any crags to hold onto when I’m trying to climb- and I once again am questioning the worth of the trip.<\/p>\n
Enough metaphor. It’s just that I wonder how many people actually care if the arts sector is strong in this county. If only I knew that I was fighting for this because many, many people care deeply about it, I’d have more juice left. I just don’t know. In a way, I fight it for the kids who don’t know what they are missing when they don’t have arts in their schools. I’m fighting for the 47% of the population that have something like 1% representation at the governmental level and no real representation of their own cultural heritage in this town. And I’m fighting because if I didn’t put pencil to paper and bow to string and tap shoes to wood when I was a kid, I don’t know what the hell I’d be doing with my life.<\/p>\n
Still, though, christ, people, get with the program. This stuff MATTERS. It’s not fluff, it’s not excess, it is priority. <\/p>\n
*yeesh*<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I’m having this weird sensation lately, like I can’t figure out if I *actually* care what is going on, or if I’m just *acting* like I care what is going on. I don’t know how much it would change my work, between the two, and maybe it’s a combination of both at most times. Right […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-80","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlwms.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}