For those of us who follow the Oscars, The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences dropped two bombshells recently.

First, they’re going to democratize the membership of the Academy to include the likes of Morgan Freeman, Hugh Jackman and Viola Davis. To which I say: Good.

Second, they’re going to expand the number of best picture nominees from five to ten. To which I say: Bad. Very, very bad.

The idea behind the second reform is to drum up better ratings for the broadcast. But it’s also designed to give pride of place to the sorts of commercial movies – comedies, animated films, blockbusters – that have played second fiddle to more serious, downbeat, artsy films that have tended to dominate the awards in recent years.

I, for one, am saddened by the change. I love these small, iconoclastic Indy films. I fear that if we dilute their influence at the Oscars, we will only further dilute their influence at the cinemas, which is already waning. And that’s a real loss.

Two movies I saw in the past week confirm this feeling. The first, The Wrestler, tells the story of a down-and-out “has been” pro-wrestler who tries to turn his life around by reconnecting with his estranged daughter, falling in love and leaving his profession. The second, Rachel Getting Married, is about a drug addict who takes a weekend off of rehab to attend her sister’s wedding and all the guilt, anger, resentment and pathological family dynamics that ensue.

These are both small, fairly dark character-driven movies about deeply flawed people who are trying to change their lives in ways both small and large, and run up against how hard that is to do in practice. Not surprisingly – and I give nothing away here – neither has a particularly happy ending.

And I find that sort of grim realism…refreshing. Movies can’t be there just to allow an escape. (Though if you’re looking to be cheered up, be sure to watch the interview with Mickey Rourke in the DVD commentary about how he turned his life around as an actor.) As Jon Canter writes in yesterday’s Guardian, the “feelbad” factor is under-rated:

Feelbad confronts you with the darkness, futility and awfulness of existence, but does it with such imagination, bravado, soul and wit that you find yourself exhilarated.

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

*****

Speaking of addiction, there’s a thoughtful essay on alcoholism and addiction by Clancy Martin in this week’s London Review of Books.

Image: 1:6 Oscar Statuette by Shaun Wong via Flickr under a Creative Commons License.

This Friday, I point you to some worthwhile reading around the blogosphere:

1. Find out when middle-age kicked in for you by taking this musical quiz in the Chicago Tribune.

2. Apparently, the key to avoiding dementia  is getting married…and drinking more coffee.

3. Have a look at the best advertisements to save the planet in The Guardian.

4. Newsweek tells us that boomers have been responsible for economic stability over time. Speaking of economics, have a look at the Freakonomics Q and A with White House economist Austan Goolsbee. He’s very thoughtful and also pretty funny.

5. Two great ways to catch up on the news: The Daily Beast Cheat Sheet and Michael Kraskin’s Politics Dailies over at politicsdaily.com.

I have a confession to make:  Delia Lloyd is not my real name.

I felt like I needed to come clean because I joined Facebook yesterday. (Yes, I’m one of those octogenarians driving up the average user’s age.)

And because for me, Facebook is primarily a personal social networking tool (at least for now), I decided to join under my legal name – which is….drum roll please…Delia Boylan. So just in case you cyber-stalked me in the last 24 hours and noticed the same head shot, same bio, same appallingly bad taste in music:  yes, it’s me.

And the whole process of coming to that decision made me think, again, about my name.

I’ve always hated my given name. For starters, it makes me sound like an Irish scullery maid. And then there’s the small problem that no one – in the U.S. at least – can seem to remember it. I’ve grown accustomed to answering to pretty much anything that begins with a D, including “Dee.”

When I was a kid, I disliked my name so much that once – during a high school production of Dames At Sea – I was given the chance to make up my own name for my part (I was in the chorus.) While the other girls eagerly chose things like “Tiffany” and “Sparkle,” I chose – wait for it – Ann. That’s right. Ann. I was dying to have a normal name.

Later on, when I got married and had made my peace with Delia, I still had the (easy) opportunity to change my last name. And while all kinds of different friends weighed in on the politics of whether or not to take my husband’s name, that was an easy one for me. I didn’t like his surname either. So I stuck with Delia Boylan.

But then, round about 2001, I changed careers and decided that as part of the psychological move out of academia and into journalism, I would take on an entirely new persona. And whether because of an inspired moment or because I simply lacked much imagination, I chose my husband’s first name – Lloyd – to use as my last name professionally. (I like to tell people that it’s post-post-feminist…no one knows what to do with that).

My old boss once asked me how it felt to use the name Delia Lloyd, to which I responded: “It’s the best thing I’ve ever done.” She looked a bit puzzled. So I sheepishly added: “I mean, next to having my two kids and marrying my lovely husband and all that.”

But it’s true. Whereas once I felt a little pang every time I had to utter my real name, once I started using “Delia Lloyd” on a regular basis, I found that I loved it. (And as a producer for a daily talk show I spent eight hours a day on the phone, so I quickly got a lot of practice…)

There aren’t all that many things you can change about yourself once you grow up. You’re pretty much stuck with your hair, eye color, stature, what have you.  But adopting a new name – even if it’s a nom de plume – can be really liberating. It’s like changing careers. You get to reinvent yourself and that very fact introduces a little frisson into your life.

I realize that there may be professional drawbacks and confusions with this down the line. Penelope Trunk maintains that you should only blog under your legal name. (She would know. She ended up changing her legal name to match her blogging “handle.”)  But other people – like Colleen Wainwright, a.k.a. the Communicatrix – seem happy to move between the two.

As for me, right now I’m really loving the opportunity to move between the two faces of Eve Delia. Its just one more variant on slash careers!

*****

Speaking of slashes, I’m also loving my new blogging job over at PoliticsDaily.com. Have a look at this week’s posts, one on the G8 Summit and the other on the evolving Murdoch media scandal in the U.K.

Two-Faced Tasha 1 by sethrt via Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

Every Wednesday I offer tips for adulthood.

So I was signing up for Facebook yesterday – more on that tomorrow – and in my profile, they asked me to list my favorite music.

I wrote: “You wouldn’t want to know. Trust me.”

And that’s because – let’s face it – I’m not much of an audiophile. Sure, I love to sing along to the soundtrack in Tesco. But I’m not the kind of person who goes out and buys CDs, downloads tunes onto my Ipod or otherwise follows any developments in the industry. As I believe I admitted once before, I’ve even been known to watch the odd Barry Manilow concert on TV.

There is one exception, of course. But not one I was quite ready to share with my friends on Facebook…yet. As readers of RealDelia know full well – I LOVE show tunes. So here, without further ado, are five songs from musicals to inspire you in adulthood:

1. Marian, The Librarian – You haven’t lived until you’ve watched Robert Preston seduce a very young Shirley Jones in this most winning of love songs from The Music Man: have a look.

2. If Ever I Would Leave You – On the more serious end of things, here’s Robert Goulet (because really, what’s a musical revue without Robert Goulet?) singing one of my favorite all-time love songs – one that’s full of the agony and longing of romantic love – originally from the movie Camelot.

3. You’re Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile – The title says it all. From Annie. Have a listen.

4. It’s a Fine Life - Here’s a song about making the best of whatever comes your way from the musical, Oliver! It’s a duet sung by Nancy (Bill Sykes’ gal) and her sidekick, Bet. (Truth in advertising: I once played Bet in a Jr. High Production. Ah, those were the days…)

5. Make Them Laugh - Because laughter is the key to adulthood, watch this clip from Singin’ In the Rain whenever you’re feeling blue.

Image: Singin’ in the Rain by elycefeliz via Flickr under a Creative Commons License.

No. I don’t have a jammed keyboard. That title is a reference to the famous David Bowie tune.

I’ve been thinking about change all weekend – and how we come to make the big changes in our lives.

It started when I had coffee with a friend whom I rarely see anymore. She showed up with her husband and before we even ordered, she glanced over at  him and asked: “Do you want to tell her or should I?”

I glanced furtively at her belly, wondering if she might have some”news” to impart. (My own personal rule: never ask someone if they’re pregnant unless you literally see the child’s head crowning with your own eyes.) But she didn’t look pregnant. She did, however, look extremely happy so I ruled out life-threatening illness or death of loved one.

“Go ahead,” her husband said.

“We’re moving to the coast,” she announced. She was positively beaming.

“The coast” in this case is Cornwall – a beautiful section of rural England that runs along the Southwest coastline. This couple has owned a second home there for years, in a small village right by the sea. The town is about as different from London as you can get:  there’s one main street with a few restaurants, a one-room library and a school.

In other words, this wasn’t just a “let’s pick up and go to the burbs” kind of move. We’re talking Green Acres. You know – chickens, foxes – that sort of thing. They’d already sold the house in London (the very one they just spent nine months re-furbing) and were set to complete (close) by July 31.

What was amazing to me was how quickly they’d arrived at this life-altering decision. They were driving around Cornwall one afternoon in April, saw a “for sale” sign and thought it would be fun to take a look. A few hours later, they made a bid.

“But didn’t you agonize?” I asked. Much as I myself am a big believer in change, I’d have to do a lot of thinking before making that dramatic a shift in lifestyle.

“Not really,” she answered. “We drove to a café and sat down and thought about what we wanted out of life. And we realized – why wait until we’re 60 to have the kind of life we want when we could have it right now?”

Why indeed?

What they came to realize was that, as lovely as their life in London was “on paper” – big house in a nice neighborhood, three children happily ensconced in excellent local school, weekend getaway – the financial pressure to maintain that lifestyle meant that they didn’t spend nearly as much time together as a family as they wanted. In particular, their hectic schedules meant that rather than spending time outdoors  – something that was particularly important to my friend’s husband – they spent almost no time at all enjoying nature.

So they decided to cash it all in. Literally. The sale of the London house will more than pay for the entirety of the new home in Cornwall. And because both primary and secondary state (public) schools are excellent there, they won’t have to pay private school fees until university. Best of all, both of them will now telecommute 3-4 days a week, freeing up an awful lot of time to just…hang out.

I was truly impressed. As we get older, I think many of us live with a sort of “deferred gratification” model of adulthood: someday we’ll lead the life that we want. But in the meantime, it’s so much easier to just stay right where we are (same house, same job, same neighborhood) that we don’t pause to think about what a change might look like.

Of course, sometimes change isn’t called for because we like where we are. And sometimes it’s just not feasible for all sorts of reasons. But sometimes, you just need to be willing to make a bold move when an opportunity presents itself, like – literally – seeing a “for sale” sign on the road. And you just dive in and see what happens…

Image: For Sale Broker by Neubie via Flickr under a Creative Commons License

This Friday, I point you to some recommended reading around the blogosphere:

1. Apparently, even God grows up. Read about Robert Wright’s latest tour de force -  The Evolution of God – in the New York Times Book Review. Whether you are Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Atheist or To Whom It May Concern, it sounds like there’s something in this book for you.

2. Interesting article from AlterNet about the inability of modern universities to adapt to the digital age.

3. Lovely essay on the New York Times Motherlode blog by Amanda Goehring about the daughter she never gave birth to. And speaking of kids, for a quick laugh have a look at The Deep Friar’s 20 Truths Kids Should Know about Adulthood.

4. Funny piece in the Denver Post about what it’s like to look for a job when you’re 50.

5. Finally, if you’re interested in the brewing political crisis in Honduras, here are my two cents over at Politics Daily.

The writing was on the wall when I found myself lingering in Tesco (a major British supermarket chain) just so that I could sing along to the soundtrack playing in its aisles. I mean, c’mon folks. How often do you get to listen to Men At Work’s Land Down Under and Celine Dion’s  My Heart Will Go On in one 10 minute interval?

Then, last Friday night, I found myself squirreled away in a recording studio in the seedy end of Camden Town. About eight of us middle-aged parents decided to forsake shame and concoct a mums and dad’s band to perform at the upcoming school summer fair. We called ourselves The NERMADS, which was short for New End Rock Mums And Dads (Our children attend New End Primary School in London. I personally preferred the moniker “Nermaids” but it didn’t fly…or swim). Some of us played guitar; others the saxophone; most of us sang.

The studio had all the requisite features if you wanted to fancy yourself a rock chick for  – oh, about three hours or so:  the nearly invisible entrance hidden beneath the railroad tracks…the chipped paint and dark lighting…heck, I half expected someone to be shooting heroin when I walked in. (Only the bathrooms disappointed. As one friend noticed, they were unfailingly clean. Sigh).

And it was a blast. We sang that old favorite Stand By Me, that folk lover’s dream Put a Little Love in Your Heart, as well as assorted rock tunes. (Check out some of us at the actual fair here and here.)

I’ve always loved to sing. I was in a women’s a capella group – The Ursa Minors – back when I was an undergraduate. And I briefly sang with a group at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago when I first moved there. But that was like 15 years ago and since then, I haven’t really sung with anyone (well, outside of those poor souls haunting the cereal aisle at Tesco).

I’m a big fan of pursuing hobbies in adulthood. I think that – as adults – we sometimes feel that hobbies are for kids: you learn to shoot a bow and arrow. Maybe you take some piano lessons or do an art class here and there. And you have fun. But once you grow up, that’s when the serious stuff kicks in: work,  family, LIFE.

But I think that’s a huge mistake. Because there’s something exhilarating about taking up something entirely new – or perhaps returning to an earlier interest – when you’re grown up. Perhaps you even take a class and discovered other like-minded souls. I did this with an acting class last fall.

It’s just…fun. And it keeps you feeling alive.

Which is why I’m incredibly psyched that – right after said performance at the school fair and after running the school raffle for a mere three years – I finally won a raffle prize. And guess what it was? A half-price coupon at London’s adult learning centre, City Lit.

When I got home, I sped through the course listings and happened upon this gem: a *brand new* course offering next year called – wait for it – Actors Singing From West End to Broadway.

An entire six weeks of show tunes? And you don’t have to have any formal training?

Bring it on baby. And Give My Regards to Broadway, because I’m bound for the West End…

*****

Speaking of show tunes, I came across this internet-age tribute to West Side Story – Web Side Story – courtesy of Middle Aged Women Blogging.

Image: Singers by Mr Mo-Fo via Flickr under a Creative Commons License.

Every Wednesday I offer tips for adulthood.

Yesterday, I posted about the sad state of infidelity in America (and Europe). In today’s post, I list five signs that your partner is being unfaithful:

1. They suddenly develop a rash of new hobbies. I had one friend who -  in explaining her husband’s busy schedule and why she barely saw him anymore – said: “Well, you know, Paul’s got a lot of hobbies. He does banjo and judo and race car driving. He’s also taking classes to learn how to cook. And then every other Thursday he goes to the symphony…” Um, honey, I think Paul’s having an affair.

2. Their appearance changes dramatically. The tell-tale sign of infidelity is the abrupt change in look. Watch out for the here-to-fore button-downed male executive suddenly sporting loafers, designer jeans and  “party shirts.” With ladies, it’s all about the accessories:  a new found zeal for exotic handbags, scarves and showy jewelry. Be really wary when someone starts parting their hair on the other side.

3. They use payphones. Ok, this was back before the advent of the cell phone/mobile. But we had one neighbor when I was growing up who could always be seen making calls from the pay phone on the corner. Which was really curious because she had a landline in her home. I remember my father saying matter-of-factly: “She’s having an affair.” I suppose the modern day equivalent would be someone who spends all their time texting and never uses email. Much less of an e-paper trail.

4. They claim to have a “penetration phobia.” My friends, you can’t make this sh&% up. This is literally what one friend’s husband said to her by way of explaining his sudden loss of interest round’ about bedtime. Ah yes, that’s a good one. Three children later and you’re only now discovering this problem?

5. They tell you they need to “get away” to do some writing. Along the Appalachian trail. Without the kids. I’m afraid Mark Sanford has forever ruined the notion of the writer’s retreat for the rest of us. Darn him…

Image: Pay Phone NYC by Gonzalo Fernandez via Flickr under a Creative Commons License.