Ritual Boasting vs I Put Me Down You Pull Me Up?

Male/Female communication differences.  I read a lot about them.  I write a lot about them.  I train a lot of people about them.  A lot of money has been made by a lot of people on this very topic.  Mars and Venus, Deborah Tannen (she's the biz by the way and I'd just like to say that if you're really interested in this stuff, go straight to her books.  You'll find them on my "great books" page).  Male/Female Communication.  Lovely. And I'm well up on it, right?  I surf those communication waters without ever coming off my board, right?

Well, not so fast compadres!  This morning I had the classic male/female communication clash happen inside my own head.  

The communication differences are essentially about ritual, not about fact-talk.  Men and women by-and-large have different rituals, dating back to childhood, where they learned to interact differently.  Little boys competed with each other, and that made them feel connected.  Little girls connected and that's how they competed.  No right or wrong, just different, and so the sexes end up with different rituals.  Men do ritual boasting and ritual fighting to protect their place and to feel connected to other men.  Women do ritual complimenting and a mutually agreed version of what I call: "I put me down you pull me up".  For example:

Sheila: "Lovely, dress (report/job/house/husband) Mary"

Mary: "What this old thing?  You're the one with the nice dress (report/job/house/husband) - and a matching handbag too, I see!"

Sheila: "Do they match?  I just grabbed it (the chapter/computer/him) on the way out of the house.  I'm not such a good forward planner as you are."

You get the idea.  Women just aren't that comfortable with the thought that the world might think that they might think that they are blowing their own trumpet.  Little girls punish other little girls for it, and let me tell you, in the hell that is the school yard, you learn fast.  It isn't that women think that they aren't good at what they do, or that they lack confidence, or that they wouldn't be offended if someone belittled their accomplishments, it's just that the woman herself isn't supposed to point those accomplishments out.  It isn't done.  We do it for other women, and they do it for us.

But surely if you teach this stuff you're beyond being influenced by it, right?  WRONG.  Look 3 blogg entries down.  What do I do?  To try to entertain you and win your web-based affection?  Uh huh.  "My BBC script commission - who me?  Oooo I feel all doubtful.....Oooo maybe I'll hide under this hors d'oeuvre rather than put pen to paper."  Did I really feel incompetant?  Heck no.  I worked hard for that commission, and I know I'm a quick and clever writer.  Was I going to say so publicly?  Not on your Nelly!  THEN I found out this morning that my agent had directed the BBC contracts people to my website so that they might have a better understanding of my experience as they determine my fee. Immediately the old communication bind kicks in: will they be charmed by my womanly ritual of putting myself down so they can pull me back up, or will they not realise that I am a perfectly competant and experienced writter and OH HORROR OF HORRORS take me at my word?  That's got to be the worst. It transcends even the great sex divide.  Writers everywhere exclaim as one:  "But don't you realise its was all for... (insert at will) effect/character/to-make-you-laugh/the-annoyance-of-mother/the rent?????! "

Calling all Irish with Opinions, and Opinions About Ireland

I'm trying out a new idea.  Terra Nova Production's first show, a comedy about everything you every wanted to know about Irish Culture (we're still working on the title), is now on the blogosphere.

Cheerful Irish LandscapeThe idea is that all the ideas and discussion about the script are available for people to comment on, argue about etc WHILE we're writing the script not after.  If you want to see something make it onto the table for consideration in the script development process, this is where you post it up.

The address is:   www.terranovaproductions.net.

Why not go have a look? 

Embracing the Groupie Within

Ant & Ronnie GreerAsk anyone who knows me - no better yet, phone Cathy Broda, one-time yoga teacher to Madonna, currently living in bendy bliss in Hawaii, but really TRULY best known for her stint as my grade 11 classmate at Jakarata International School, and ask her - what single activity would be most likely to make my skin crawl, and the answer would be "assuming the role of a groupie".  Nothing else is so much at odds with directorial control-freakery.  After all, what is any director but yes yes, a control freak channelling their nature through what they hope is enough talent to make it sellable?  And I'm a director by nature, by inclination, by circumstance and by George! So the pink budgerigar of groupieness does not lightly settle upon my shoulder, but there I was this weekend, watching my sweetie on stage, a groupie par excellence.  I was taking photos (groan).  Chatting with fans (arrhggh). 
Ant & Whitey JohnsonCooking nibbles for the band (jaysus lord!)  And even at one point, was caught saying: "no I don't work here, I'm just with the band. I'm Anthony's girlfriend." (La la no responsibility! Oh God, I shouldn't be enjoying this so much - shoot me now!)

Please please someone save me.  Give me a sign to hang around my neck that says: "YES OK, I share bed and board with one of the men on that stage who chooses to showcase his (undeniable if I do say so) talent playing a stringed instrument, but I'd like you to know that I am an artist in my own right with an excellent - excellent - thingy of my own - excellent. Yes!"  But when you arrive with the guy who plays the guitar NO ONE ever asks you what YOU do. Pah! Quoi?  Nul points! You're. With. The. Band. End of Story. ARRGJGHDHfk!!!!! No! No! I like it too much - I can't take it!!!!!

Well.  Ahem.  That's better now. I feel better for having - vented.  Yes.  Thank you for listening.  Very helpful.

(Pause) 

Before you go, there's one more little picture you might like. He's the handsome one on the left - the appears to be looking down though - did I tell you he's gigging next week at -

 

BBC Comedy Commission

Nuala McKeever and I have received our first comedy commission as a duo from BBC Radio Ulster.  Small. Friendly. A great little start.  What's it going to be about? Well I had script, character and episode ideas, but just now it's a bit of a blur really.  I knew that the imaginary man in the bottom right hand corner of the imaginary image in the white knickerbockers was doing something extremely funny in my own little imagination, but once someone has said :"Yes, it could quite possibly BE funny" I find it increasingly difficult to see him.

 

Let me check.  He appears to be STRANGLING the man in the  blue knickerbockers.  Maybe it is all a hideous dream.  Maybe this is my wiser self strangling me, while shouting: "your ...mother ...always ...thought ...you ...should ...be ...a ...teacher!" As he bangs my head against the floor to knock some sense into me. "The...B....B...C?!?  What were you thinking of??!!"  I immediately become convinced that everyone who hasn't been commissioned is funny than I am, and everyone who has is more successful.  Secretly I hope that someone has brought distracting crunchy snacks to this imaginary world, and that shortly there will be a break for tea and buns.  I will hide under the napkins when no one else is looking.

Paying With Your Wristwatch and Other Life Changing Opportunities

I'm just sitting here, quietly, grabbing a few moments at the close of what I think may have been a life changing week, but it's been too much of a whirlwind for me to really be able to tell.  I've just finished an 8 day stint in Hong Kong.  Just pause and think about that for a moment.  Courtesy of international air travel (yes I feel guilty, and cancelled a planned holiday to Bangkok to make up for it).... anyway, in less than 18 hours I found myself transported from a quiet beach in County Antrim to downtown Wan Chai.  And that was only the start.  Eight days in Hong Kong is... Hong Kong is... Eight... Blflezzchmbbub...

Yes.  It does.  Reduce one to. Incoherence.

What struck me?  What reduced moi, la belle dame sans silence, to this??  Its a cacophony, a smorgasbord, a...well...it's:

• being able to buy groceries anywhere in the country with your watch.  Your watch, for heaven's sake!
• More handbags than I knew existed in the entire world, let alone on one island
• Little old ladies sitting playing mahjong by a fish pond in the shade of a container storage port towering above them like a high rise building
  
• Enough escalators to take you to the moon and back 3 times
• The New Territories phenomenon of 7001s, 70 year old men with young Chinese wives and 1 year old children.  All of whom are likely to be widowed in the next 10 years.
• An entire town composed solely of high rise blocks, perhaps 70, 80 or 100 of them, built on what was a paddy field until 5 years ago
• Market stalls piled high with fish so fresh the prawns jump out at you as you walk by
• Mangrove swamps and perfect limpid water
  
• A city so clean you could eat off the streets
• A city with air pollution from mainland industries so heavy that they only saw the sun once in the 8 days I was there
• Dogs whose toenails are painted the same colour as their owners' fingernails
• Lift doors that close three seconds faster than anywhere else in the world
• Vending machines that sell books instead of chocolate in the subway
  
• Eating chicken elbows as a delicacy - delicious yes, but oh so crunchy
  
• Trendy girls who wear boots in the 26 degree centigrade spring weather
• The largest collection of urban butterflies I've ever seen
• Mobile phones that allow you to watch DVDs
• Poets composing verse on park benches...using their laptops
• Smart cards for parking meters so you don't have to fumble for the change
• Rules that oblige everyone with a cold to wear a mask and gloves so they don't infect anyone else - how sensible is that!
  
• Thousands of unique bloom-covered  trees that are completely sterile, and were all propagated from a single mutation discovered by a missionary in the 17th century
• Pork buns decorated with chocolate sprinkles on sale in the bakeries
• Paper ghettoblasters to burn for dead relatives so that they may listen to music in the next world
  

And that's just the start.  Colleagues and new friends in Hong Kong were amongst the kindest, most generous, most hospitable I have ever met.  Anywere.  For coherent thoughts, tune in later....