When I was a kid there was a skipping game we played. It had a rhyme that went:

Vote, vote vote for little ….(insert name) ie. Suzie

Who’s that knocking at the door?

Well if it’s ….(insert name) ie. Mary

Let her in and we’ll sock her in the chin

And we won’t vote for …. Suzie

Anymore,

Forty-four, shut the door, get out!

Upon which Suzie had to exit the double dutch skipping ropes. Then the same rhyme went on with Mary’s name inserted at the beginning and someone else being invited in and then Mary getting kicked out.

You get the picture.

The older I get the wiser that little rhyme seems to me.

Honestly at the time when I’d be skipping to it I had no idea what it meant.

Half the time we didn’t even know all the exact words, you know how they can get garbled.

My hubby started watching American Idol while I was puttering around on the computer down at my desk and lo and behold, though I vowed I wouldn’t, I got hooked again!

But it’s so sad!

So sad to see all those people with genuine talent and you know by hook or by crook only one will emerge ‘as the winner’ with all the ‘votes’.

Then we’ll sock them in the chin and we won’t vote for the last ones any more, forty-four, shut the door, get out!

And what’s the saddest thing?

So many of them that are on the verge, with maybe one judge saying yes and the other saying no, and they start crying and begging, saying almost the exact identical thing every time! “Oh this is MY WORLD!”

REALLY????

You’re WORLD?

If you don’t get this then your life ceases to matter????

So sad!

Do they really realize what happens to the winners?

Most of them go on to mediocrity in their careers. Honestly they do. I mean I watched the whole season when David Cook won and I’ll admit it, I was rooting for him, but since winning, the only song he’s come out with is ‘Time of my Life’ or whatever it’s called and it’s not half as good as the stuff he sang on the show! Same with David Archuletta. I mean ‘Crush’? How hokey!

What a great set up! American Idol has them work their butts off so that they’re probably burned out by the time it’s all over!

And then except for Carrie Underwood and Kelly Clarkson (I guess that’s the other one who was successful), they don’t go on to really top the charts.

Or…maybe I just don’t know about it. I’ll admit it, I’m not any kind of expert on what’s hot in music.

I did watch Oprah once when she was interviewing Fantasia and Fantasia was confessing how she’d almost committed suicide because of the fame.

I wish I could give them some advice.

If I could I’d tell them, go ahead and sing your heart out, but find meaning for your life from within. If it’s not inside there, you won’t ever find it outside your self!

Learned that myself, the hard way.