wicked

No person, real or fictional, no monster, goblin or republican president has ever terrified me like the Wicked Witch of the West. All my fears come through that green skin. Her cackling face in Dorothy's crystal ball.

I don't even have to see her. Just the thought, just a snip of Judy Garland singing over the rainbow, a flash of any part of that film sends a feeling down my back. Like something close behind crouching down to get me. I'm not making this up. At six, Amelia still hasn't seen the movie. I won't let her.

Wicked - the book that gave the witch a name, Elphaba; and a story, the misunderstood, altruistic green girl who slowly goes crazy fighting the good fight and believes she's a witch - was the cheapest, quickest, most effective therapy I've ever had. I get her now.

The book starts before Elphaba's birth and ends with a different perspective of the movie. It details Ozian politics and twists things around until you can see evil isn't evil and good isn't good. We are all both. She's not who you think she is.

Wicked, the musical, blurs it even more, in a gorgeous watered-down, Broadway, kind of way. In the end Elphaba, the wicked witch of the west, the only person who's ever scared me more than me, sings my song.

Fly on, girl!