The Big Bad Wolf

     In fifth grade I played the Big Bad Wolf in my elementary school's production - you might remember such famous lines as, "I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your house down." I tormented the pigs and I roared at the crowd - much like Snug in a Midsummer Night's Dream. And also much like Snug and the gang, I believed myself to be terrific: I was the greatest Wolf to ever saunter the stage.
     I distinctly remember running up to my mom at the end of the show and begging for assurance, "Was I good? I thought I messed up my speech." And she, and my grandma, and my grandpa, and my dad all tore down my doubt; they claimed I was fantastic. The family sitting beside them even chimed in, and if I thought I was great and my family thought I was great then, by God, I was great! Who's to say I wasn't?
     Now really, I was awful. I'll be the one to say I wasn't great; I was in fifth grade and I'm no prodigy, but in my ignorance I competed with all my idols. Shove off, Mickey Rooney, Sabrina Hayes has just stepped on the scene.
     Ignorance breeds confidence. In some adults, this may be dangerous, sure, but in children and in fools it becomes art. In A Midsummer Night's Dream Philostrate says of the coming play (put on by Bottom and friends), "[It] made mine eyes water; but more merry tears / The passion of loud laughter never shed" (5.1.147). He's warning Theseus against watching the play, and yet the rehearsal still brought him enjoyment, so where is the fault? Theseus demands to see the play; he says, "Never anything can be amiss / When simpleness and duty tender it" (5.1.149). This is the crux: we work with what we have available to us, like Quentin Tarantino and our friend, Shakespeare. When the skills and the language are lacking, but we still try to function in our simpleness, to form something beautiful, it is poetic; it is art. That's the beauty of the chaotic, and Shakespeare saw it too; he encouraged it.
     We all celebrate our greatness even when we are so clearly not, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

Be mindful, Mickey Rooney,
Sabrina Hayes, The Big Bad Wolf