07/13

As I reread these lines, I wince at my dishonesty. Why couldn’t I say what I meant the first time? The truth is, I often dream about the stadium performance because it’s such a warm, beloved mem­ory and represents many of the ideals that I strive for, resilience being one of them, but also the exceedingly rare feeling of tran­scendence past accessible feelings. This was a great day. I’m told that everyone dreams about their work. Yet at the heart there’s a problem I’ve been unable to work through, which I’ll explore now.

My déjà vu back then was regarding the obvious truth that I’d performed this exact show before, and it weighed on me like those intrusive thoughts that can dislocate us from ourselves. This was nonetheless strangely pleasurable, as if I was flying through an open, calming space, a seed blowing in a wild field.

At one moment, I could hear my voice and see myself singing on the screen and thought, ‘Wow, that is incredible! My name is IU and I’m singing. Is this really me? Why am I thinking this now? And which one could I be, the one thinking, or the one act­ing as if undeterred by the other’s thoughts?’

I knew that I was performing, yet I recognized that the one who had trained dance and music for years in the studio, she was in control, and I was watching from afar. Other people would only observe this former version of me, a girl who looked pretty as she created the songs which engulfed them. I felt like I’d been par­tially removed from the situation I was creating, and it was exhila‐

rating to be on the other side of myself. How far, I wonder, can the brain go in scaring itself? Surely this is a unique gift to the human animal.

During tours my déjà vu can grow, and just when it becomes unbearable, the tour ends. One practice to ground myself is to select one fan in each crowd in order to imbue meaning to each performance. I would weave a web of emotions around their life, or rather my imagined life for them, like I was writing a song to that stranger. During each song, I could channel their story and dramatize it similarly to when I’m acting a character. I used to think this was my own invention, but a friend pointed out that this is how all entertainment occurs, regardless of where you’re looking. She was saying that when you’re a kid and singing the song you’ve just learned to your mom, you might as well replace it with a story. During the story, you disappear until it’s over.

We play with the world to learn how to interact with it. Playing may be for when the stakes are low, though for me the opposite is true. There’s no adulthood for me to practice towards. Instead, I play on behalf of others, and to them it becomes seri­ous. When you’re playing with others, you’re asking for their opinion as much as you’re sharing yourself. Whether or not I’m capturing my friend’s moving words, I think about it often, and am always reminded of childhood and how my mother played with me.

Years ago, my mom got LASIK eye surgery and remarked that the world was less beautiful than she remembered. She thought that a fuzzy vision which blends things together was more suitable for the details of life. I couldn’t help interpreting this metaphori‐

cally. Now I look back at the song Glasses and see that this playful satire, however jovial, magnified my own distorted perceptions. Maybe it’s better to see the world from afar, yet isn’t there another option? Glasses are removeable lenses.

In one of those good nights of chatting, that same friend asked if I tell jokes to make people laugh, or because I want them to think that I’m funny. I sure hope it’s the former! When I was first asked this question, I was a child. Back then I wanted people to be laughing and happy, and it never went further into thinking about myself. However, how far out can you stand before losing sight of this difference? Maybe the joke is that, when you squint, both motivations contribute to a greater joy. There are things we understood better as children than as adults and rehearsing these purer motivations can help us to be happy and centered for our whole life. I was a funny kid, thanks to God, thanks to my family, so that I learned how to make myself laugh.

When I tell jokes or bring songs to my fans, it’s rare to remain fixated on any one of them, rather, I do my best to make them feel they’re all being addressed to. However, that day I was zeroing in on one fan whom I’d never seen before, and yet this felt like a childhood friend that I needed to reach out to for my sake. He had an American face, an awkward way of dressing, and held him­self with that startling mix of confidence and insecurity which I see often in the West. I mean this quite respectfully. I felt I’d got coffee with him, maybe, within a film. He seemed like a teen in a coming-of-age story who’d just run away from home. Now he was in the middle of a strange place, challenging the crowd by ventur­ing to the center of where he didn’t belong.

When I observed this boy, I heard deep vibrations and saw static overwhelming him like the noise of old TVs. I’ve had migraines from a lack of sleep that stole similar amounts of vision. I found myself looking at the boy more often, despite choosing him on a complete whim to ground me. Each time I looked at the boy and gathered a more complete picture of him, I heard this vibrational noise, and that other part of me who was not perform­ing, she took more control.

Why him? It’s easy to say that we keep going not for ourselves, but for everyone else. Believe it or not, I don’t always trust myself. I sometimes take inspiration from the many impressive groups performing now who are able to wrap their audience in a warm blanket and lull them to sleep. By being in a group, they can defer to one another instead of fielding all of the attention themselves. They are masters at bringing you into a shared space full of love, so that you are in on it, and everyone can be a part of something greater.

My grandmother spoke of this feeling of togetherness when she prayed. She was Catholic, and it left a mark on me. I’m sure that what we do together at concerts is partially spiritual. We come to understand these moments of togetherness on our own, is what she told me. She was right about this. I sing songs to find an authentic way for this transaction to take place. Actually, I was wrong before, I don’t keep going for ‘everyone else,’ it’s much more modest than that. We do it for anyone else.

I looked at the boy in the crowd. My friend out there seemed completely lost, and my heart broke for him. I don’t think he was supposed to be there, this eerily American boy, this quiet lost

puppy who had forgotten home. I continued to watch him as I sang, which prolonged the vibrations and visions.

I sound crazy! Pretend this is only a story or metaphor. None of this is real.

Eventually, I received enough confidence from the performing half of me to let the other half take care of things. I’ve woken up from dreams in a frenzy, thinking that I was just seconds ago per­forming, then seeing the darkness and the time on my clock. In these moments I was possessed by the half which had grown greedy, always lying dormant except when on a stage. It sometimes took me an hour of pacing around the room reminding myself that I’m at home or the hotel in the bottom of night. It’s hard to convince myself that I can relax, and it probably has something to do with my sleep problems. This was maybe the only time that I can recall the dissociative feeling of awakening during a perfor­mance, which I doubt was a coincidence given the strangeness of this boy.

I observed myself from a distance while watching him. I should’ve been scared observing myself. Recalling it makes me afraid, though I was strangely emboldened then, like a doll being played with by someone else.

I’ve been worrying recently, am I performing or living? How do I know that I’m feeling things rather than pretending to? It’s a question I hope you never have to consider. Since that time, I’ve done a lot of thinking about my role as an artist, wondering for example if the questioning keeps me alive or lets me slip deeper.

I tried to influence my performance by witnessing him. I told myself a story. The more impossible, the more it must be real. I

detailed many things about the boy. For example, I knew that he was in love with me. I think many fans believe that they’re in love with us, though they’re not. However, this fan was different. I sensed that it didn’t matter how I acted, or what I looked like. I told myself that his love was unrealistic and unconditional. He was, rather than a boy, the perfect idea of a boy. When I was 15 and had just debuted, I used to think about convincing the world to love me. I was not thinking of any person in particular. Well, here he was. One secret they purposely hide from you is that the attention is never enough, which has to do with the thing I want to say. With the idea of this boy, I thought, maybe it could be enough.

I understood him as being a fan ready and willing to accept anyone if the timing was right. That he chose me was random, but he chose me, and I have great affection for that choice. Neither of us wanted to break the sanctimony of our relationship which only existed in our fantasy of one another. Yet not only that. It was not only that.

He needed this himself, that was a dearly important part of what made him so utterly perfect for me. Maybe he was a cute dis­traction, an adorable young man to dedicate the songs to, some­one who needed me while asking for nothing. He presumed only what I remembered to foreshadow and made himself known by knowing me. A perfect fan needs a relationship like this, or else they will wilt. I don’t believe that it’s selfish for either party to love the other, but rather a necessity for our survival like with bees and flowers, only he must also remain independent from me.

All of this logic is confusing to me too, yet the story I penned was intoxicating.

They ask for nothing except to love you more completely than you could ever love yourself. I’m not convincing enough, so let me explain it in action: he wanted me to dance with him. And each dream which I’ve had since of this boy, who may not even exist, was a pure white dream whose gravity pulled invariably closer towards an infinite center. And every moment I fell further in, long past the point of no return. I can’t tell any more if I’m still falling, or whether up is down, or whether there is no light or only light.

It’s getting very late, so I’ll wrap this one up. I finished the show without any major hiccups. Like always, I kept mental notes of my technical mistakes, and they were forgivable and boring. As I’ve developed as a professional, it’s become more important to elude criticism. Whereas before this was in self-protection, now by revealing myself I might distract you. I write my songs so that they may operate on as many levels as there are people to imagine them, then they cease to be mine.

Anyways, over the following months, the boy became an important part of my thoughts. I don’t think he even spoke my language. His mystery compelled me, and I knew that as I contin­ued to care for him in my mind, many more obvious truths would come to me, just like how when a good movie ends, all the loose strings are slowly pulled together in your mind to reveal an emo­tional object.

I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, but becoming IU has been the majority of my life. The problem I’ve been unable to work

through is that I’m more than IU. No, I don’t know, maybe it’s meaningless to tease them apart. You may know that only recently I’ve changed my acting credits from Lee Ji-eun to IU. I often feel that there is no difference, or maybe the difference has less to do with myself than how I am inside others. Maybe these true things are invisible to me.

Many celebrities have tried to dispel the myth that fame can bring you happiness, saying things like, ‘I wish everybody could become famous and rich so that they can see that it’s not the answer.’ These are misguided though sincere attempts, that’s my opinion. Feeling like you are valued is important. Nonetheless, now it’s your chance to criticize me.

Imagine you set an impossible goal to travel to the top of the tallest mountain range in all of the lands. The mountains kiss the stars, and for you it takes years to climb the peaks. Each night you’re granted a wonderful skyline that is even more beautiful than the last. Each day you’re filled with awe and the promise of something greater at the next mountain’s peak. And then, one day not unlike the rest, you arrive. It’s everything you’ve wanted, won­dered, and hoped for. How long do you think that achievement will sustain you? Because every day I wake up and still look. This was my dream, and I know many of you will relate with your own successes, while others are still climbing. Some days, it’s true, I feel that I’m still climbing or even that I’m content to maintain the altitude, grateful for the chance to travel, to have been born with the luck and inheritance on this Earth, in this particular time, to do what I know firmly I was born to do. Other days I’m envious of those who’ve never begun to ascend this path.

I’ve earned two insights after all these years. First, it’s far more rewarding to share the view. When I said that I’m more than IU earlier, I wasn’t just talking about Ji-eun. Second, the mountain, the views, and the climb were all only things to do. Not distrac­tions, just one way to live life from a staggering variety. I’m so grateful, though I would’ve found ways to be happy doing other things. I think I would’ve made a fine gardener, for example. Or an English teacher. A ramyeon taste tester, a journalist. I used to dream of being a diplomat, a lawyer, and the list goes on. It’s taken a long time to accept that I can retire when I want. I don’t owe anything to anyone, not anymore. Honestly, nothing frus­trates me more than when other people try to speak for me. When I made a song about it, I got praised for standing up for myself. However, I was only saying what everyone was thinking. I will stop there. If I need to say more, you were never listening in the first place…