The Heart of Things

Recently, 80’s rock band Journey decided to find a new lead singer in a truly modern way:  YouTube.  It makes sense, I guess, because 80’s rock bands that still play today are, more often than not, beloved novelty acts with a catalogue of signature, beloved songs.  Replacing your lead singer is a dangerous thing because it runs the risk of changing your sound – which might not be bad, if you were a band that was loved for its creativity and new output, but is probably horrible if you have a fan base that loves you – almost exclusively – for your past work.  So I guess YouTube makes sense:  cycle through a world’s worth of karaoke singers, cover bands, and parodies to find that one voice out there who perfectly matches yours.  And Journey did just that, which is how they found Arnel Pineda, a 41-year-old Filipino vocalist who previously fronted an 80’s rock cover band.  Sounds like a dream job…

A recent issue of Rolling Stone has a story in it, called “Sad ‘Journey’ for New Singer,” that describes the difficulty Pineda has had adjusting to life on the road with a real, big-time, beloved 80’s rock band.  Here’s what he says:  “It’s very, very sad.  There are days I just break down and cry.  This is a job I’m doing for my family.  That’s all the consolation I’m getting…  It’s a fantastic job, but at the same time it’s a curse.”

It’s hard, it seems, to be someone else.

Now, its apparent from his quotes in the story that Pineda’s struggles have a lot more to do with the unexpected rigors of life on the road than with the pressure of having to sing like Steve Perry, the former lead singer.  But life on the road is a part of being Perry.  And that’s exactly what I think is strange and interesting about this whole saga:  Pineda was hired to be Steve Perry.  He was chosen because he sounded remarkably like him, he’s being asked to tour with his band, and, the story explains, Journey even re-cut old classics with Pineda singing, and released these re-vamped classics with their latest album.  What Journey did, essentially, was pick a guy up off the street who possessed the most defining quality of their former band mate, and then ask him to do everything else that their old band mate did, too.  When Arnel Pineda accepted their offer, for all intents and purposes, he stopped being Arnel Pineda and started being Steve Perry.  The problem was that everything else in Arnel Pineda’s life didn’t stop with this transformation – he still had a girlfriend, a kid, a home, etc… and it sounds like there hasn’t been time in Steve Perry’s life for Arnel Pineda’s obligations.

I’ll just say that this all makes sense to me.  Don’t try to be someone else; just be yourself; be happy with who you are; etc., etc., etc.  Sounds like a fairly straightforward morality tale – and maybe it is.  I think there is a lot to be learned.  But I’ve learned something else, too:  people try to be someone else for lots of reasons.  Let me tell you another story…

At church a few weeks ago, a friend of mine who is Asian spoke about growing up Asian in an affluent, white community in the Southeast.  His friends were white, and, he explained, he quickly convinced himself that he was white, too… and that was that.  His image of himself was a white kid like any of friends, and he lived his life like a typical, Southeastern white kid – except that he wasn’t. 

One day, he told us, he was walking along and saw his own reflection on a glassy surface.  He didn’t know who he was looking at.  When he realized it was him, he was shocked, and confused, and he had to come to terms with the reality of his own identity.

I’ll come right out and say what, 99% of the time, I would think when I heard a story like that:  that it is one of the most melodramatic, sensationalist things I’ve ever heard.  But this time, I didn’t think that.

 I’d heard the story before from someone else.

 Another close friend is married to a woman who is half white, half Japanese (military parent).  She told me over dinner a while back that she had a similar experience.  She lived in a homogenous community with white friends, and she herself was white.  She just was – until one day, when she looked in the mirror, and saw herself.  And she rejected that identity, rejected the idea that that could be her.  She rejected it for awhile, at least.  In fact, I think that was the biggest common thread between the two stories – the shock, confusion, and rejection that both experienced when their identities were “revealed” to them.

 To hear two stories like this, so similar, from people that I knew and trusted was a bit jarring.  I didn’t really know what to make of it.  I’d never lived someplace particularly homogenous, and, realistically, I’m a WASP – so I’ve never really been in a situation where I needed to force myself to fit in.  But more than anything, it really challenged my idea of what identity is.  If you truly believe you are someone else, does it make you them?  And what, psychologically, are the effects of having to realize you are someone completely different than who you think you are?  I don’t know… and I don’t even know if my two friends would have an answer to that.  But it’s a question that really interests me.

 Questions of identity make me think – almost immediately – of James Gatz.  Here is a man who made himself into something “great” in pursuit of a goal.  I think that the fact that his goal was the love of a woman is important, but I also think that the point of the transformation renders the goal immaterial.  What is tragic about Gatz, in some way, is that he makes himself into something else, and finds life to be an empty place as he struggles to succeed in his pursuit.  It begs a question about the validity of the notion of “self-made,” a notion heavy with American underpinnings, and perhaps an idol for the entire country.  But that’s not why I think about James Gatz.

 When my mind drifts immediately to James Gatz it’s about me.  It’s about my own desire to make myself into something great.  Actually, it’s not about the desire – it’s about the practice.  I decide what I think a great person should be, and then I attempt to attain those qualities or characteristics; to remake myself in their image.  I try to be tough, but in touch with my emotions; interested in art but enjoying full-contact sports; to be a blue-collar intellectual.

 But there is another layer to this, too:  I don’t just try to remake myself into one image; I try to be different things for different people.  More often then not, these versions of myself are truly unselfish… it’s about me trying to be the friend or lover that I need to be for the person that I’m with.  In fact, I even find satisfaction from what (I think) is a talent for being able to do that really well. 

 I just don’t want to end up staring at a green light for the rest of my life.

 But then, there are times when I just want to know who is at the middle of everything.  Someone once said that Bob Dylan went so far into “Bob Dylan” that he didn’t really have an authentic self left.  Now, I know that the “me” I make for myself is probably more true than the me that I consciously choose to show others – and at times that true me is the me that I consciously choose to show others.  So maybe the question about who is at the center of it all is just something I ask myself to keep it all in check…

 …but there is a different question at play here, too.  It is suggested by Arnel Pineda, and by the stories of my two friends:  is any attempt to change one’s identity fundamentally an act of destruction?  Is it fundamentally an act of denial?  Of rejection?  I think Pineda probably just thought he was getting a new, better job.  And I don’t feel that I’m losing any part of myself in trying to make manifest my ideas of the ideal man.  But it seems clear that Pineda, my two friends, and myself all recognize that something is at stake.  I guess that thing would have to be identity, but identity is a slippery character – because how can our identity be anything other than what we ourselves say it is?

 And so I guess I come back to my friends’ stories.  I think what they amount to is that you do have an identity, but you can project an identity over that, as well.  When the non-reality of their projections were laid bare, my friends were forced to face their true identity, and it was a singular moment, because the rejection had, in fact, been an attempt to destroy their true identity, or at least to brick it up like Fortunato from The Cask of Amontillado.  I guess, sometimes, Fortunato sobers up too quickly and you realize you’re going down an unhappy path.  That’s like what happened with Arnel Pineda.  And sometimes you hear him shaking the chains, and instead of stopping to enjoy it, you stop and realize what you are doing, knock the bricks down, and set him free.  That’s like what happened with my friends.  But sometimes you get to the top, and he pleads with you, laughs at your “joke” – and then you seal him in anyways.  50 years later, maybe you narrate the story, and maybe you don’t.  But at that point, you’ll probably never get caught.  And I guess that’s what I’m afraid of for myself sometimes.

 Because it’s hard, it seems, to be someone else.