Megan Stielstra's Blog

Christopher has taught Mojo the following: Sit, Down, Stay, Come, Heel, Off, Fetch, Leave it, Wait, Kisses! (as in Lick us, don’t chew on us!), Back! (as in Get away from that cookie, Dude!) Go! (as in Run really fast and burn off all that excessive energy!), Roll over, Tickle Megan! and Hold the Treat on Your Nose Until I Tell You Okay and Then Flip It in the Air and Catch It!

I have taught Mojo choreographed dance numbers. When Christopher is at work, what we do is turn the volume waaay up and get our dance on. He likes Michael Jackson (post Bad, pre-Thriller), Black Eyed Peas and the Beastie Boys. He hates—HATES—opera, and musicals he can tolerate for a little while and then he gets distracted. Just this morning, we were doing Seasons of Love from Rent (a little background: I am what my friend Ryan calls a “Rent-head,” which, as far as I can tell, means I saw the show a couple times (in New York and here) and I was very skeptical of the film version initially but ended up loving it and have seen it three times and I cried. Every time. Because it’s beautiful. Plus I really dig La Boheme and am in favor of modernization of the Classics in general ‘cause, d’uh, they’re Classics! Which means their stories should be universal enough to fit into any time period [and of course there are exceptions to this as far as I’m concerned, re: Ten Things I Hate About You and et all teen dramas, although maybe that’s just ‘cause I don’t so much like the teen dramas. When I was a teenager the teen dramas were really badass. Like Heathers. And Pump Up the Volume. And just before I was a teen there were all those John Hughes movies and my favorite teen drama on the planet, Satisfaction starring Ms. Justine Bateman and that girl who voiced Jem from Jem and the Holograms. I mean, seriously, they don’t MAKE ‘em like that anymore! Do they? Or do I just not appreciate what they’re making these days ‘cause I’m a [gulp] grown-up?] and stories about love and loss and friendship and enjoying life and fully living each moment are stories that I need to hear more of. I recently had a discussion with someone about Rent and they said that the reason why it “sucked” was because the lyrics were “nonsensical.” As proof, they offered the lyric: “Rent rent rent rent rent rent rent! I don’t want to pay rent!” Okay. I’ll give you that. Rent rent rent rent rent rent! is a little silly. BUT, if we take little jaunt through musical history, I think we’ll find that lyrical silliness is a necessity to the form. Case (s) in point:

Guys and Dolls: “Standing there, gazing at you, full of the bloom of youth/ Standing there, gazing at you, with the sheep's eye/And the licorice tooth

Hello Dolly: So, golly gee, fellas/find her a vacant knee, fellas

Mary Poppins: No where is there/A more 'appier crew/Than them wot sings/"Chim chim cher-ee/Chim cher-oo!"

Music Man: To the rhythm of Harch! Harch! Harch!/All the kids began to march/And they're marching still right today!

Sound of Muisc: Timid and shy and scared are you/Of things beyond your ken [?]) and Mojo was really good through the whole number, sitting in his spotlight next to mine with his tail wagging (we pretended there were five more spotlights next to ours and we were lined up at the front of a stage). But when we got to the part where the Joanne character sings that solo, I was really getting into it and Mojo left his imaginary spotlight and jumped on me. I told him, “This is great emotion that you’re exhibiting here, but you have to stay in your spotlight. Don’t ever leave your spotlight!” He looked at me very seriously for a second. Then he lay down and rolled over.