An American Idol Odyssey Part 3
0 Comments Published by ginny on Monday, August 25, 2003 at 3:00 AM.
Day Three, Tuesday
I woke at eight, when they turned the lights back on, but I managed to stay in bed until about eleven, reading and resting. After that, I spent the day documenting what went on, reading, talking to my neighbors, listening to the groups of people singing, painting my nails, and being nervous. Mostly being nervous. Actually, the day went amazingly fast, considering that I spent virtually all of it sitting in a hard plastic stadium seat doing nothing.
There was certainly constant entertainment in the form of watching the other kids sing. There was one huge group who were singing from Monday night straight on through to Wednesday morning, pretty much – a loose and fluctuating circle of people harmonizing on gospel and slow R&B tunes. It was vastly impressive – even from across the stadium you could hear them, and the impression was, as it was for our whole group, of sheer mass. A mass of sound, of youth, of hopefulness, a mass in the religious sense too. There was so much church-singing going on, the sound of so many voices giving everything they had.
And there were a lot of huge voices there too. Voices you could hear almost across that arena. It was humbling – I feel like I have a big, powerful voice, but I don’t have the kind of voice a lot of those girls had, a voice that almost shouts to God. Mine calls, but does not so much call attention, maybe? I don’t know. Anyway, there were a lot of very impressive voices, and even more very impressive looks. That was the other entertainment for the day, checking out which kids really had the look.
Now, one reassuring thing about this group of people, which I’d appreciated immediately upon getting there, is that it was not, by any means, composed entirely of BeautifulPeople, as I’d been afraid it would be. I mean, I worried that I’d be the only normal-looking girl among a mass of Brittany Spearses and Jennifer Lopezes. But I wasn’t at all. By in large, in fact, this was a refreshingly and wonderfully normal group of people – a real, live group of American kids. As I told my mother, there were a lot of girls who were prettier than me, but there were also a lot of girls who were not prettier than me.
That said, though, there were also a lot of really good looking people there, and watching them was an entertainment in itself, at least for me. There was one girl, who'd been in front of me in line from the beginning, whom I took to calling Miss Brittany Spears, because, oh, man, was she.
She was this tiny little thing, complete with real live stage mom who I saw re-straightening Miss Brittany's hair, piece by piece, in the bathroom at three o'clock on Monday. I mean, there weren't any cameras there yet, aside from news cameras! And not even many of them! But this girl was already dressed to the nines: tiny little striped miniskirt and white halter top showing off her long, long, perfect eighteen-year-old legs and her flat, flat, perfect eighteen year-old stomach, complete with jaunty and fashionable newsboy cap over her perfect blonde hair. I mean, did she have the look.
There was another one, too, near me, whom I called Miss J-Lo, even though she didn't look much like Jennifer Lopez did at eighteen. She looked better. Perfect Hispanic skin and a wide, pouty mouth, expertly chunked and curled waist-length hair, and the coolest clothes – she wore this stripey arm-band thing on one arm that kind of looked like a leg-warmer, only for your arm. It sounds stupid, but really it looked cool. Way cool. Perfect cool.
And aside from them, there were a ton of other BeautifulPeople worth looking at: a tiny and out-of-this-world beautiful Cambodian-looking girl on the floor behind me; a diva-in-the-making with the best cheekbones I've ever seen and the coolest arrangement of braids in front of me (she dressed all in white on the day of the audition, which only made it better), an absolute Usher look-alike stationed somewhere to my right. So anyway, a game of Spot the BeautifulPeople took up a great deal of Tuesday too, I guess.
I also attempted to nap some, since I knew I'd be getting basically no sleep that night: because of all the "we might start auditions at any time, and we'll definitely be starting early on Wednesday" speeches the American Idol people kept giving us, I figured to be safe I'd have to be at the Dome from about three a.m. on (a popular rumor had it that's when they'd start lining us up) – so if I wanted to shower and get dressed in the hotel room I'd reserved expressly for that purpose (I was not auditioning without a shower), I'd have to do it around midnight.
And my voice, I noticed, was already rough. Noticeably rough. Worryingly rough. Mystery ailment had come back in some strength on Monday night, and I was worried that it, combined with the aftermath of losing my voice a week and a half ago, combined with getting very little sleep in a dust-filled environment, would take out my voice altogether. I tried not to panic, and I tried to rest, but it wasn't easy.
I got back up from napping around eight in the evening, when they showed us American Juniors on the jumbotron. I was definitely the most enthusiastic American Juniors-watcher on my row. In fact, I think I was the most enthusiastic everything on my row. When I wasn't resting or reading, I was chattering excitedly to anyone and everyone around me, whether I got a response or not – which probably helped me make friends, but probably kept me from making some too. No matter. It is part of my persona! As excited, enthusiastic girlish-person! (Honestly, I do think they appreciate that sort of thing. I love American Idol! It's a good reason to have me on the show!)
Anyway, after American Juniors, I called Jessica (as I'd promised to do), called home, and gathered up my things to go out to the car and to the hotel room to nap for an hour, I hoped, get ready, and be back by three a.m.
And here begins (technically, anyway, as it was by this point almost midnight) Day Four, Wednesday! Who will move on? You'll find out.....after the break!
I woke at eight, when they turned the lights back on, but I managed to stay in bed until about eleven, reading and resting. After that, I spent the day documenting what went on, reading, talking to my neighbors, listening to the groups of people singing, painting my nails, and being nervous. Mostly being nervous. Actually, the day went amazingly fast, considering that I spent virtually all of it sitting in a hard plastic stadium seat doing nothing.
There was certainly constant entertainment in the form of watching the other kids sing. There was one huge group who were singing from Monday night straight on through to Wednesday morning, pretty much – a loose and fluctuating circle of people harmonizing on gospel and slow R&B tunes. It was vastly impressive – even from across the stadium you could hear them, and the impression was, as it was for our whole group, of sheer mass. A mass of sound, of youth, of hopefulness, a mass in the religious sense too. There was so much church-singing going on, the sound of so many voices giving everything they had.
And there were a lot of huge voices there too. Voices you could hear almost across that arena. It was humbling – I feel like I have a big, powerful voice, but I don’t have the kind of voice a lot of those girls had, a voice that almost shouts to God. Mine calls, but does not so much call attention, maybe? I don’t know. Anyway, there were a lot of very impressive voices, and even more very impressive looks. That was the other entertainment for the day, checking out which kids really had the look.
Now, one reassuring thing about this group of people, which I’d appreciated immediately upon getting there, is that it was not, by any means, composed entirely of BeautifulPeople, as I’d been afraid it would be. I mean, I worried that I’d be the only normal-looking girl among a mass of Brittany Spearses and Jennifer Lopezes. But I wasn’t at all. By in large, in fact, this was a refreshingly and wonderfully normal group of people – a real, live group of American kids. As I told my mother, there were a lot of girls who were prettier than me, but there were also a lot of girls who were not prettier than me.
That said, though, there were also a lot of really good looking people there, and watching them was an entertainment in itself, at least for me. There was one girl, who'd been in front of me in line from the beginning, whom I took to calling Miss Brittany Spears, because, oh, man, was she.
She was this tiny little thing, complete with real live stage mom who I saw re-straightening Miss Brittany's hair, piece by piece, in the bathroom at three o'clock on Monday. I mean, there weren't any cameras there yet, aside from news cameras! And not even many of them! But this girl was already dressed to the nines: tiny little striped miniskirt and white halter top showing off her long, long, perfect eighteen-year-old legs and her flat, flat, perfect eighteen year-old stomach, complete with jaunty and fashionable newsboy cap over her perfect blonde hair. I mean, did she have the look.
There was another one, too, near me, whom I called Miss J-Lo, even though she didn't look much like Jennifer Lopez did at eighteen. She looked better. Perfect Hispanic skin and a wide, pouty mouth, expertly chunked and curled waist-length hair, and the coolest clothes – she wore this stripey arm-band thing on one arm that kind of looked like a leg-warmer, only for your arm. It sounds stupid, but really it looked cool. Way cool. Perfect cool.
And aside from them, there were a ton of other BeautifulPeople worth looking at: a tiny and out-of-this-world beautiful Cambodian-looking girl on the floor behind me; a diva-in-the-making with the best cheekbones I've ever seen and the coolest arrangement of braids in front of me (she dressed all in white on the day of the audition, which only made it better), an absolute Usher look-alike stationed somewhere to my right. So anyway, a game of Spot the BeautifulPeople took up a great deal of Tuesday too, I guess.
I also attempted to nap some, since I knew I'd be getting basically no sleep that night: because of all the "we might start auditions at any time, and we'll definitely be starting early on Wednesday" speeches the American Idol people kept giving us, I figured to be safe I'd have to be at the Dome from about three a.m. on (a popular rumor had it that's when they'd start lining us up) – so if I wanted to shower and get dressed in the hotel room I'd reserved expressly for that purpose (I was not auditioning without a shower), I'd have to do it around midnight.
And my voice, I noticed, was already rough. Noticeably rough. Worryingly rough. Mystery ailment had come back in some strength on Monday night, and I was worried that it, combined with the aftermath of losing my voice a week and a half ago, combined with getting very little sleep in a dust-filled environment, would take out my voice altogether. I tried not to panic, and I tried to rest, but it wasn't easy.
I got back up from napping around eight in the evening, when they showed us American Juniors on the jumbotron. I was definitely the most enthusiastic American Juniors-watcher on my row. In fact, I think I was the most enthusiastic everything on my row. When I wasn't resting or reading, I was chattering excitedly to anyone and everyone around me, whether I got a response or not – which probably helped me make friends, but probably kept me from making some too. No matter. It is part of my persona! As excited, enthusiastic girlish-person! (Honestly, I do think they appreciate that sort of thing. I love American Idol! It's a good reason to have me on the show!)
Anyway, after American Juniors, I called Jessica (as I'd promised to do), called home, and gathered up my things to go out to the car and to the hotel room to nap for an hour, I hoped, get ready, and be back by three a.m.
And here begins (technically, anyway, as it was by this point almost midnight) Day Four, Wednesday! Who will move on? You'll find out.....after the break!
Labels: american idol, celebrity, trips, tv
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