My brother is a tenor. His girlfriend is a mezzo-soprano. Yesterday, I went to the latter’s performance. (Their links are here, if you’re interested: Duke Kim and Sun-Ly Pierce.)
LA Opera on a Saturday evening.
Los Angeles City Hall, on the other side of Grand Park. Amusingly, last night, there was some sort of rave going on in the park. 😂 The pre-party (?) started earlier than 6pm, and the whole event seems to have lasted for hours. When the opera audience had their intermission, the party was raging. The opera people: “Whaa… I paid for one opera ticket and I get to dance to EDM during the intermission? Nice.”
A pink chair and a pink table, just because.
On the left is the John Ferraro Building. This is where the Department of Water and Power is, can you believe it?! The building is absolutely magnificent when you see it in person. (Because of the trees and other obstacles, a photograph of the whole building doesn’t turn out that great.) The fountains and all that water makes sense, because under that, there’s that Californian-style garden. They’re saving water by focusing on native plants, and using the savings on lavish fountains!
A random airplane.
LA looks pretty when the sun is setting and things are pink. ❤️ However, please note: this short stretch of Grand Avenue is the only safe zone in this area. Performers who live 2 blocks away from the opera house will call an Uber rather than walk, especially at night. Even during the day—you can feel the vibe change instantly, once you walk a block or two away. One time, one of the performers was walking home and someone who was entirely naked except for a blanket casually walked by. That level of vibe change. Unhinged. Of course, there can be crazy people anywhere, but the thing with LA is that often, it’s just you and the crazy person on the street. There is no one else who can help you. So, if you can avoid it… just don’t walk in LA.
Sun-Ly got us THE BEST seats. If you ever come to the LA Opera, I recommend exactly these seats in the Founder’s Circle. (Unless you really dislike air conditioning noise. In that case, the first floor might be better. But mostly, during the performance, well, they’re performing… so the air conditioning noise isn’t that distracting.)
A view from the second floor of the opera building.
The obligatory shot of the program.
THE END.
Sun-Ly was amazing, and I enjoyed being in a crowd for the first time in a long while, away from my desk in my room where I sit alone and make stuff up.
That said, I’m not a fan of opera. I’m not anti-opera, but I’m not a fan either. Mostly, I attend opera performances to support someone I know. There are some opera pieces that I love (Lensky’s Aria is my favorite), but it’s not like I have extremely fine-grained preferences when it comes to opera. My likes and dislikes are generic. Often, they don’t have anything to do with opera specifically; they’re more related to storytelling, the grand theme of my life.
Which is actually why I learn so much by observing what happens in the opera world. A short summary of such learnings for the purposes of this letter would be: There is a good reason why opera is surviving and thriving: it knows it’s not for everyone.
Some people, somewhere, sometimes, will always consider opera too old-fashioned, too innovative, too expensive, too affordable, too stuck-up, too humble, too fast, too slow, etc, etc, etc.
Such opinions don’t matter. Opera knows this.
Sure, this thing called “opera” keeps changing. Also, sure, there are dozens of sub-entities within opera. (For example, the European opera is different from the American opera in terms of the frequency of performances, pay, rehearsal culture, so on and so forth.) Therefore, it may seem as if opera is shifting to cater to all kinds of opinions.
But opera does not abandon its core. If it had done that, it would’ve died a long time ago, the way an animal dies when it abandons its heart. Opera knows that a heart cannot be split into a million pieces and remain a heart. Its heart, it refuses to deviate from. It. will. not. budge. It accepts: opera isn’t for everyone.
Before this most recent visit to the LA Opera, I was in a place where I was ruminating obsessively about who I should be as Wynn Ray.
This idea of “Who should I be?” is amusing on so many levels, one of which is that it presumes the existence of some universal standard. But there is no universal standard, or any standard at all, for that matter. Thus, just as it doesn’t matter if someone thinks opera is too anything, it doesn’t matter if anybody thinks I’m too anything—including myself. I’m saying, it doesn’t matter if I think I’m too boring or too difficult or too whatever. I guarantee, one hundred percent, that there is someone out there who thinks I’m too dramatic or too shallow or too whatever else, and in fact, I was and will be one of them.
Meanwhile, also recently, I observed some discussions both public and private that (to me) revolved around the same theme. People were accusing other people of how this should’ve been that instead, how so-and-so should never have said/done this-and-that, blah blah blah. However:
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.
Someone always talks. Usually, those who talk aren’t the ones who are in the arena. Extra-arena discussions as well as, frankly, the people who spend an inordinate amount of their resources on such discussions, do not matter. (Yes, I said it. Some people do not matter.) It’s a really shaky strategy to listen to anyone who wastes a significant amount of their existence trying to figure out what’s wrong.
This includes me, when I am spending a significant amount of my existence trying to figure out what’s wrong with me. That’s the conclusion I reached, after all the meandering ruminations.
Speaking of meandering. The blog is becoming a place for quick, frequent updates once again. Unedited, raw. I have never talked so much about a WIP before. You can follow the meandering path I take while telling a story. It’s funny in hindsight, but while I’m in the spiral, it’s scary!
Meanwhile, I want this newsletter to be a more intimate space. With the recent move to beehiiv, this newsletter now has its own website. Only subscribers can see the letters—either in their inbox or when they’re logged in to the site. The site also has commenting features!
AND I set up an automation.
WOW do you hear that word? Automation. In this case, the automation is for the sequence of emails that goes to new subscribers.
“Automation” might sound, well, automated. A bit soulless. But actually, human-to-human, it’s a very kind thing to do for another person. Imagine someone who knows nothing about me receiving this email right here. They might enjoy it, but they will most likely go, “Who are you and why are you telling me all this?”
And so I set up the automation sequence. And WOW it’s so much fun. 😭 The visual representation of the automation flow is beautiful. I feel quite geeky. Why did it take me 6 years to do this? Everyone, truly everyone who has ever attempted to create something and reach others has told me: THOU SHALT HAVE AN EMAIL LIST (an automated on-boarding sequence included). For whatever reason, I did not listen for SIX years. And now I’m finding that I really… I really genuinely like it. Hahahaha.
Anyway, so, the meandering ruminations resulted in practical outcomes. And now I have a simple test for future actions: Does this action reward those who recognize my core?
If yes, do it.
If not, don’t do it.
Building a newsletter is definitely something that rewards those who recognize my core. And if others unsubscribe, that’s wonderful. Because I’m like opera—not for everyone.
And I want to be even more like opera. Look at it. It has a spine. It has had one for centuries. I want to strengthen my spine too. I am in fact doing it these days:
I’m not saying that I’m any good at it. I’m just saying that I’m doing it. 😂
Also, I’m not bringing this up to be cute. “Oooh. Spine. Must strengthen spine, so look, calisthenics and spines, isn’t that funny? Haha." — Eh, no. You can see in all Wynn Ray stories how literally I mean it when I say, “You see who you are.” The universe speaks to Lyra in For Her Ears Only. Penelope accesses the blank page in Log Me Tender. Other people in the same situation wouldn’t have experienced the same thing, because the “same situation,” in fact, isn’t the same.
Everything filters through the lens that is you. (Generic you. All of us.) Hence when I’m thinking about spines, and I do exercises to strengthen my upper body, yes, it has an impact on my “internal” spine. That is non-frivolous. The feeling of having a spine is the same, whether it’s physical or metaphorical.
I’m curious: Where are you in the arena right now? Is there a part of your life where you’ve stopped explaining yourself, or would like to?
Hit reply. I’m genuinely asking.
Cheers,
Wynn
P.S.
Here are some more pictures, from the backstage:
These are very important!!! It’s all about juggling in “Akhnaten”!!!
The Founder’s Circle is the golden second floor area. Another reason to get tickets there. ✨Gold✨ Being on the second floor also allows you to see the deep end of the stage, which sometimes isn’t possible on the first floor. Ah, also, the rows are more steeply tiered in the Founder’s Circle. So, even if someone with a giant head sits in front of you, you’ll be able to see everything.
WoWOWOWw!
The history of people who wore this robe so far. So cool!
Creepy. 😭 When I was watching the opera from the audience, I did not know there were baby faces attached to these clothes! Sun-Ly said Akhnaten’s wardrobe has even more baby faces! And these clothes are heavy, with or without baby faces. I guess it’s the price you pay for being a royal. 👑
This is me. I am making a funny face, my eyes are closed, and I’m not sure what I’m doing with my arms. Most pictures anybody takes of me are like this. 😭 It’s not on them, it’s me consistently blinking too much or acting strangely. I don’t know. But at least here, my face is small compared to the rest of the picture, so in total, there isn’t too much weirdness going on.
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