On Patti Smith, Gender & Cohorts

I went to the Patti Smith concert. It wasn’t until today that I really was able to become coherent with my thoughts about some of the odd things she said between songs.

The first thing that struck me was when, after she sang “Kimberly”, she mentioned that it was the birthday of her sister for whom it was written. She then dedicated it to her and said “happy birthday Kimberly, wherever you are”. I thought “how strange, does she not have a relationship with her? Is she dead?” Because I only say that about people who are missing and presumed, deceased or long gone from me.

Later she was telling little stories about her relationship with Fred Smith. Let me state baldly that I am not a “worshipper” like many locals. Having done my time doin’ dirty deeds with M.D. I am so fully cognizant that those guys are just very, very, human. But I do respect them in a general way.
She told a story that when she was in disheveled Mom mode and the kids were dirty, Fred would walk on the other side of the street from them. Don’t get me wrong, she said it in a humorous and loving way. People laughed, cheered, whatever. Because it was an Ann Arbor crowd they got all excited that they could act excited about a local hero. She also intro’ed “Because The Night” by telling another story about how either they wrote it together or she wrote it for him (I get confused) calling him “a very good friend”. Which she then explained by relating how he once had said he wanted to introduce her for some award, she asked if he would say she was his wife, and he said he would say she was a very good friend. Meanwhile everyone is just gaga because she’s sharing stories of their idol “His Royal Majesty” Fred “Sonic” Smith. While I’m wondering if they are even stopping for one damn minute to consider the implications of what she is relating?

Because here is what it sounds like to me;
An internationally acclaimed poet/performer moves away from her career and life to marry and have kids with a somewhat famous, himself, guy. They/he seem to have some issues about gender roles and her success relative to his. Likely because they are from a particular (what I learned this year in Soc. is called) cohort, they don’t seem to be able to fully deal with a total equality based relationship thing. It’s not that I don’t think there was likely plenty of love, respect and creativity etc. I just got an urgent sense that she, in fact, subsumed some (perhaps largish) portion of herself to his personality. That it probably was a gender influenced decision, and that like many of my female friends who are getting older and more reflective she now has had an opportunity to gain a different take on it since he’s now been dead over a decade and her own career has resumed.

I looked around to confirm that they were both born in the 40’s. I think that this is a really tough place in time to have come from. Many of the people I know from that era have intense conflicts that no amount of decades of new and alternative thinking can resolve. I mean imagine that you have had a minimum of 20, and potentially up to 30 years of indoctrination in traditional gender roles when The Women’s Liberation Movement begins. It’s just likely to be too much to ever completely undo. Hell, I was born in the 60’s and those first 7 to 15 years of stereotyping still have a tremendous effect on me.

I guess what really bugged me was some creepy, unquestioning, adoration/celebrity factor. Whether it’s about her or him, the idea that some people don’t even question “stuff”, just blindly supporting a “cult of personality” mentality, not grasping that these people are ordinary, complex, heroic, flawed, poopin’, humans just like you and me. These issues are not really meant to be the stuff of titillating, celebrity gossip. Rather should probably be looked at and utilized to help liberate ourselves from restrictive role playing. I felt like her intention was to humorously and sweetly divulge and expose some quirky, uncomfortable, flaws and a lot of the people were just making it into a completely different thing. “Oh man, Fred Smith made Patti walk ten paces behind him haw, haw, he’s so cool”. It’s painful.
But other than that, I, Mrs. Lincoln, really enjoyed the play.