Mood Swings

Mood Swings…it sounds like a ride you would find at an amusement park for hippies, right there between the Black Light Haunted Cave and the Grateful Dead-Drop – “freefall from 20 stories while never leaving the ground.” I am not sure what causes us to go from happy jubilance to locked-in-our-room-shut-ins burning candles and listening to easy listening 80’s music (Good ol’ Michael Bolton). Speaking of which, anyone notice the recent run of Office Space on TV? Classic. But not even a movie like Office Space can break us out of the doldrums of depression, yet, some days not even torrential downpours can knock us off cloud nine.

So how can we swing so far so fast? One moment you are cracking up at a David Cross joke about picking up women from a garbage truck, the next we are huddled in a corner of a dark room listening to Yacht Rock classics like “Rosanna” or “Sarah” (“no time is a good time for goodbye” - so powerful because its true) or some other song with a girl’s name as the title. Is it a chemical imbalance? Mental abuses during adolescence? An affinity for riding the emotional roller-coaster backwards at night with no lights, upside-down wearing a soaking wet bathing suit and t-shirt because you thought it would be a bright idea to ride the splash-down water slides so that you could freeze your butt off while on your 60mph trip into emotional oblivion because you want the additional pain?

Should we all become emotionally numb like all the extras in every 1950’s sci-fi flick that took place in a monotone uniform-wearing future? Well that’s not the answer. Should we avoid over-the-top drama that is portrayed in a Telemundo soap opera? Probably a good idea. But sometimes rational thought doesn’t help in emotional situations. The ‘snap’ analogy or ‘switch’ that some analysts use to describe emotional breakdowns aren’t just snazzy catch words.

Mood Swings…sounds like a dance club the Big Bad Voodoo Daddies would play at – “express your free spirit and defiance of the Great Depression through the art of dance.” As quickly as it takes to throw your partner over your head and pull them through your legs while spinning them 18 times, a person’s mood can shift with a single phone call, a bad burrito, or an alarm clock. It can be your partner wanting to sit this one out or preferring to do the hop, or can-can instead of the swing.

Mood Swings…sounds like a sports bar dedicated to baseball, tennis, and golf – the only sports that will put a swing back in your step, with the help of alcohol consumption, large TV screens, and surrounded by highly emotional and devout fans who are always on the verge of full out brawl. A mood is emotionally charged with events that include an individual’s invested interests. So a drop of a putt, a 9th inning game-winning home run, a well placed drop shot can make or break a person’s day or mood. Why do sports control our emotional strings like a tightly strung racket? Maybe this is what separates (generalizations forthcoming, be warned) men from women. A sports team winning is like buying new shoes, there, that should make it more understandable. Now guys, come with me to page 2…


Ever felt like punching a wall or giving high five to anyone within a 30 foot radius after a touchdown? Then you know what I am talking about, it isn’t just a game, it is status amongst your friends, its bragging rights for a whole year, its pride, and to proudly to exclaim THIS IS MY SCHOOL/TEAM AND WE ARE GOOD!

So there you go, mood swings…it sounds like…well, I think you get the point. So on those days that everything seems dreary and glum, as if the sun will never shine again, remember that the pendulum will swing back, continuing the cosmic balance of fate. The sun will remain unwavering, we just have to wait for the world to turn, and it will. News channels flash images of death, despair, accidents, and tragedies because they make better stories and keep viewers transfixed. But daily, society progresses and builds, people recover and even grow stronger, victims are remembered and future ones are saved by the formers’ sacrifices. When acts of violence seem senseless and unsettling, acts of kindness will prevail.

As the world turns...

Drama, drama, drama. This country seems to be obsessed with drama. Reality TV shows rely solely on scripts that revolve around drama. I call it the “Real World” generation. The first reality TV show I can recall was MTV’s “The Real World”. We all know the story of seven people picked to live in a house…blah, blah, blah. I was intrigued that first season, you remember, the one with that rock-a-robics dancer guy, the closet gay guy, the comic, the drama queen, the aspiring musicians, the model, the guy from the ‘backwoods’. Oh, wait, maybe I should be more specific since that’s pretty much every season. This was the one in New York, again, more specific, the New York loft. It had Eric Nies, that singer who looked like Shannon Hoon, the stand-up comic, and the singer-song writer girl. They had the racial tension and the sexual tension…more importantly, it had the drama, and the benefit of being the first, laying down the frame work for all future mediocre reality series from then on: The Real World seasons 2-68, The Road Rules, The Real World/Road Rules Challenge, American Idol, So You Think You Can Dance, Dancing With the Stars, Survivor, The Amazing Race, The Real World Challenge: The Amazing Survivor Race: Antartica, So You Think You Can Dance with the Stars of American Idol in -20 Degrees?

Of course these lead to the drama-filled, edge-of-your-seat excitement, game shows, like: Who Wants to be a Millionaire?, The Hot Seat with John McEnroe, 1 vs. 100, Deal or No Deal, and the Golf Channel’s…whatever that golf challenge show’s called that gets you a chance to play in a no-name tour tournament. (Don’t get me wrong, I would love a chance to be on that show because there would be no other way I would have an opportunity to play at Pebble Beach). And let me tell you, the drama is oozing all throughout these shows. Most of it produced using bad editing techniques and long, unnecessary pauses. Oh, and the commentary, that gut wrenching, heart-string pulling, Barbara Walters-would-be-envious, commentary. Imagine if the World Series of Poker was produced by “The Contenders” producers (coincidentally the same ones that created The Real World):

It’s Day 1 of the World Series of Poker and at the main event, everyone has hopes of making it to the coveted final table. Jim here comes from Annapolis, Maryland were he lives with his wife and new eleven month old baby girl. After this tournament Jim will be shipping out to China and must leave his family behind, wondering when he will be home again. They live in a 2 bedroom apartment above a Sushi shop and must feed the baby leftover pieces of rice and seaweed, an ironic twist on Jim’s naval career. Jim paid the entry fee by selling his car, childhood baseball card collection, tapping into his daughter’s college fund, and some money he borrowed from what he calls “acquaintances”……………..the tension’s mounting as he goes all in on the second hand of the day…………………………………………………………………………………the flop……………………………………….he picks up a pair but his opponent who made the gutsy call, Phil Ivey, has a flush draw…………………………..the turn, Jim picks up ANOTHER Queen to a make three of a kind, no clubs for Ivey’s flush draw…………………………………….the River………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………oh, there comes the 3 of clubs, Phil Ivey gets his flush and that’s it for Jim’s dreams of making it to the final table. He didn’t even make it into the money, too bad, he only had 7,326 more knock outs to go.…From Jim’s dismay to Julie’s triumph! Julie picks up two pair and nabs a modest pot as we get rolling on Day 1….we’ll be back after this commercial break.

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Welcome back to the World Series of Poker where your life can change with one turn of the card…[enter loud, blaring theme music]…

Yes, the drama. We love to see pictures of stars have cat fights outside of LA nightclubs or read about on set bickering or romances. What is that? Brady and Moynahan are having a baby and they are not even together?!? Britney Spears lost her mind and her hair?!? Papa Smurf got a hit put on him by Tony Soprano??? Now that’s some drama. We as Americans thrive on drama, in our relationships (why? I don’t know), on our television shows (so much better when it happens to other people), in our sports (gives something for the ladies to watch), and in our celebrities (we love to see the mighty fall…and its damn funny). If only we felt so inspired about seeing the real life drama that occurs everyday throughout the world…and instead of laughing, we actually helped. But where’s the fun in that, right?