So I'm a big Cirque du Soleil fan. I was always a fan. My mother loved them, so I watched a lot of the recorded shows on public access.
But in high school I got to go to live shows twice. Those were, without exaggeration, life-changing experiences for me. And I really had to think about that today. I'm still thinking about it...hence writing this. See, I put up a post on my personal Facebook profile, basically saying "Hey, you probably can afford to see Cirque. It's only, like, fifty bucks a ticket." But I used the descriptor "massively inexpensive."
Oh boy, did that get some hackles up. Apparently fifty bucks isn't massively inexpensive. Which, if the people jumping on that had been poor like me, I could have understood. But they were people who were more well-off than I am, so it really threw me. They were people I knew went to movies (I don't) and concerts (I don't) and took trips (I literally cannot remember the last time I took a trip that wasn't business or necessity related.). So I knew right away there was a disconnect.
And I realized it had to be from me, because I'm a penny-pincher. I grew up poor, I'm still often on a shoestring budget...a frayed, frayed shoestring. Though not as much as we were when I was a kid. I have actual physical nausea if I spend money. So I knew there had to be something about Cirque that made it okay to me.
And that was when I realized how impactful it was on me. Cirque du Soleil pushed the boundaries of my mind. What live performers can do. What the human body can do. What artists can do. It fundamentally shaped a part of my soul, seeing those shows. And that's not something that can be communicated effectively, I don't think. See, to me that fifty dollar price tag isn't insane, because Cirque is something otherworldly.
And for the mere price of fifty dollars, I find out that I can take another piece of that otherworld with me into mundanity.
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