Before she slashes her wrists open, before she withers beyond the point of salvation, there is a moment when Norma Desmond has the hope that everything will, finally and at long last, work out. That she will get the guy, and that the guy will love her in return. It’s a sad and deluded take on what is happening – the belief of a person too desperate to face the truth of the situation. Yet there is something noble and honest and raw about her happiness. It’s the stuff of childhood, the stuff of innocence. The sort of earnest belief that a lifetime of delusions will foster and encourage, but it carries with it a purity and grace that far less jaded individuals too often fail to exhibit, or even know.
In the name of that innocence, she dances a dance few of us have the guts to execute.
It is a dance of unabashed happiness, a dance of dreams.
Yet at the end, it is only a dance to the death of remaining hope.
RING OUT THE OLD, RING IN THE NEW, A MIDNIGHT WISH TO SHARE WITH YOU
YOUR LIPS ARE WARM, MY HEAD IS LIGHT, WERE WE ALIVE BEFORE TONIGHT?
I DON’T NEED A CROWDED BALLROOM, EVERYTHING I WANT IS HERE
IF YOU’RE WITH ME NEXT YEAR WILL BE THE PERFECT YEAR.
He tries to tell her, he tries to ease the news, but it’s easier not to, easier to leave before landing the final blow. As misguided and mistaken as she is, Norma is never dishonest. Her want is raw and open, her desire is stated, and boldly at that. She puts it out there, and leaves her heart vulnerable for the taking.
He does not take it. He tramples on it. Lightly at first, but it is unmistakable, and a declination, no matter how kind, stings however it is delivered. When you love someone and are told that you are not loved in return, there’s a sort of pain that’s different than dealing with anything else. It isn’t blameless, like death, and it isn’t random, like an accident. It’s a deliberate verdict on what you mean, or don’t mean, to another person. It is a dismissal.
ANOTHER CHANCE, ANOTHER START
SO MANY DREAMS TO TEASE THE HEART
WE DON’T NEED A CROWDED BALLROOM
EVERYTHYING WE WANT IS HERE
AND FACE TO FACE WE WILL EMBRACE THE PERFECT YEAR.
She wants so much to be wanted.
She wishes so badly to be loved.
She asks for so little… and so much. She asks for everything.
She gives her heart to this final dance, not knowing it will be their last. That’s just how she lives. A dance isn’t worth dancing if you’re not going to take the chance. She goes hard that way, burning brightly and at all expenses. The magnificent white-hot brilliance of pouring the whole of your being into the existence of another.
“What you’re trying to say is that you don’t want me to love you. Say it. Say it!”
She is dangerous.
She is devastated.
Above all else, she is delusional.
It carries her through to the very end.
It was the only way she could survive.
THE DELUSIONAL GRANDEUR TOUR: LAST STAND OF A ROCK STAR
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