I don’t believe I have ever watched “Inside the Actors Studio,” although I suppose there is a chance I came across excerpts from it on YouTube.
At any rate, every episode of the show ended with a 10-question quiz that was designed to provide insight into the person being interviewed.
I took the quiz in 2015 and recently came across my answers. I took it again this morning to seehow much I have — or haven’t — change in eight years.
Here goes:
1. What is your favorite word?
In 2015: It would have to be “love,” which can mean so much (“I love you”) or so little (“I love pancakes”) taken in exactly the same context. One might be willing to die for the person they love, yet not walk a block out of their way for pancakes.
Today: Love is still my answer, although I have come to realize it’s a word we use far too little in the right context. As I near the end of my life (I’m not there yet, but I can see it from here), I have been saying it to more and more of the people I truly care about.
2. What is your least favorite word?
In 2015: A tough call here, and I’m going to cheat a little with a hyphenated word — “free-market,” when used to glorify what Jacques Chirac called “capitalisme sauvage.”
Today: Along those same lines, I would change it just a little and mention another hyphenated word — “middle-class.” Everybody in this country says they’re part of the middle class, whether they’re so poor they can only dream of it or so rich they left it behind long ago. “Working-class” is so much more accurate.
3. What turns you on creatively, spiritually or emotionally?
In 2015: Both spiritually and emotionally, the amazingly alert, intelligent look in my 6-month-old granddaughter’s eyes.
Today: She’s 8 now and more alert and intelligent all the time.
4. What turns you off creatively, spiritually or emotionally?
In 2015: People who do nothing more than parrot the words of someone else. For lack of a better word, and perhaps to make the point, call them “Dittoheads.”
Today: Eight years ago, the late Rush Limbaugh was the leader of the right-wing band. Those who used to be dittoheads graduated and became Trumpanzees. Sadly, they’re even worse.
5. What sound or noise do you love?
In 2015: The sound of a waterfall.
Today: There is no more wonderful sound in the world than the voices of my grandchildren.
6. What sound or noise do you hate?
In 2015: Dogs that won’t stop barking.
Today: I never hear dogs anymore, but the noise that annoys the hell out of me more than anything is when someone else is running a vacuum cleaner.
7. What is your favorite curse word?
In 2015: Sadly on my part, the “f” word. Call it freakin’, frickin’ or whatever you want, it’s one of the few words that can be noun, verb, gerund, whatever. I believe Lenny Bruce was the one who said, “Shouldn’t ‘f**k you’ be something you respond to by saying ‘Thank you?'”
Today: No difference.
8. What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?
In 2015: Politics.
Today: At 73, too old to do much of everything, but I would have loved to be an actor or a standup comedian.
9. What profession would you not like to do?
In 2015: Anything involving waiting on people.
Today: Same.
10. If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?
In 2015: “What took you so long?”
Today: What? You think I should question God?