Thursday 7 August 2014

Dark Humour

On Monday eve I learned of a new "batch" of accusations coming from BiL. When I looked at these accusations closely (without JADEing) I realised that -unwittingly- he had given away that when it comes to a particular feud we've been having over the last 4 years, it is Game Over, and he has lost. 

On Tuesday morning, I was telling a friend about the situation and after I put the phone down, a phrase "popped" in my head: "I will dance Flamenco upon your grave". This phrase came out of nowhere. I was puzzled by it, but I faintly remembered this "I will dance upon your grave" being a song. So I googled it, and sure enough, there it was: on good old faithful You Tube. When I saw it, it all came back to me. This was a song from a Spanish Ska Punk band from the 80s that some of my friends were into. When I listened to the lyrics, I thought: "What do you know, it turns out that my brain does dark humour and I didn't even know it". Because the words of the song are very dark indeed, even if the music is peppy. When this song came out I would have been around 15/16 years old and the meaning of it would have been way over my head. You listened to songs and sung them out loud without giving hardly any thought to whatever it meant, or why it was written. However it looks like the person who uploaded the song to You Tube got what it was about, because he put the following dedication with it:

"With love and from the heart to all those who try (UNSUCCESSFULLY) to make our everyday life misery... ;) " 

He obviously has dark humour too ;). Fascinating how the brain works, for to bring up a song that I had not listened to for more than twenty years and that was not even from one of the bands that I liked, it's amazing.

As I went to bed, something about this song kept bugging me, because though being written in a tongue-and-cheek way, it is pretty awful. The lyrics go something like (it doesn't make a lot sense in English, but bear in mind that in the original song all the endings rhyme) :

"I will kill you with my tap dance shoes,
I will choke you with my ballet dress,
I will hung you with my dinner jacket, 
and you will die while the DJ laughs, 
and I will dance upon your grave.

I will slaughter you with a sharp vinyl record,
A Rolling Stones one or maybe the Shadows',
You will choke with a collection of cassette tapes, 
the Shangril-las one or the Ronettes, 
and I will dance upon your grave".

It bothered me because I don't really feel that way about my BiL. As I was falling asleep, I had a lightbulb moment: my feelings about the song aren't about how I feel about BiL and my sister, it's about my "killing" their "power" to upset me. AH! That made so much more sense, and if you re-read the song, as if it was talking about killing the power/control/influence someone has or had over you, it sounds completely different.

So yes, their "power" to disturb my peace is dead, and I WILL dance upon its grave. :)

8 comments:

  1. What a great perspective!

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    1. Thanks Judy. I do feel like my poor brain is being squeezed like a lemon though, working out all this stuff. At this rate I'm going to have to sleep all winter to recover... ;)

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  2. Hahaha, this is so true: "You listened to songs and sung them out loud without giving hardly any thought to whatever it meant, or why it was written." I remember singing to them and not even understanding it.

    It is weird how something pops into your head like that. Nice realization from the song. Brava to not letting them influence you!

    xx
    PS As for the dark humor, I still have thoughts of duck taping certain FOO members. ;)

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    1. Ah, yes, I remember about the "duck taping" hahaha, what was the other thing that you wrote about too? Some code number they use in a series you follow...
      xx

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    2. The other was about a drill (in this case I don't want to torture them with it) rather it is a the loud sound of it that drowns out the noise. It kind of looks like a weapon so you can't hear their manipulation and whatever else they have to say to. xx

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    3. Ah, yes, I remember now, thanks. That is similar to the illustration of Ulysses having his sailors put wax in his ears so as to not hear the enticing sirens' song (which would destroy them) but in a modern version ;) xx

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  3. I love this! What a great song, and its spirit is so simultaneously "F-you," and uplifting--ballet, dinner jacket, tap dancing, records, The Ronettes, or Stones, it's like 'while I'm groovin my thang, i'll be groovin it on your grave.' And THAT'S funny! Yes it is about "killing their power to upset me." And if we get to dance that shit into the ground, so much the better. Your mind always seems to come up with creative interventions like this, always a memory of something that fits in. It's like you've got a creative archive always at the ready. How cool!

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    1. Thanks CS. I get surprised by the stuff my brain comes up with too ;) xx

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