Kings and Centipedes (Or "Another Another Song Stuck in my Head")

Yes, centipedes.  We see them every now and again in our house, and it another reason that I'm hoping for a cold winter, to make sure that they are at least mostly wiped out again.  They pop up every now and again, some small black moving thing just in the corner of your eye, more startling than terrifying.  There was a particular incident last week where I had taken my glasses off and was about to turn the water on for the shower when I saw a fuzzy black blob moving in the tub:  suddenly, I was very awake, and when I put on my eyes again, it was officially the biggest centipede I had seen yet.  Andy's beard shampoo (yes, it is a special shampoo for his beard) was the closest blunt object I could find.  

Thank you for your sacrifice.

I had a proper icky-dance after that one, all the same.  So, suffice to say, I don't have a high opinion of centipedes.  So the title of this song caught me off guard in any case.  

But click here and check out the song for yourself:  "Kings and Centipedes" by Stepdad.

I've put another of their songs up here before, "Must Land Running," for those that might recall, and this is definitely more of that Stepdad flair.  "Kings and Centipedes" starts off without much real warning--it is bright and rolling and a few flavors of upbeat that can catch you off-guard if you're not expecting it.  It definitely falls into that category of "songs that I have a hard time NOT dancing to."  

As with many songs, the chorus drew me in:

"Rise to your feet my god, you must maintain your dignity
Rise to your feet my god, what have you got to prove to me?
Rise to your feel my god, you must maintain your dignity
There's lots of middle ground between the kings and centipedes."

Particularly that last line.  That was the real hook for me.  This one was of those songs that I listened to over and over and couldn't immediately figure out why it touched me.  "There's lots of middle ground between the kings and centipedes," has always meant to me that there is room between the very best and the very worst.  It's easy to polarize opinions of yourself, where we get into a rut of I'm really good at X and really bad at Y.  For some reason, we don't give ourselves any middle ground whatsoever.  I tell you truly, you don't have to be the very best in order to be good at something.  If you are not the very best, that does not mean that you are the worst at it.  

Let me say that again:  if you are not the very best, that does not mean that you are, by default, terrible.  

There is so much middle ground there; can we allow ourselves that luxury?  Creative careers have a real problem with this especially, where if you have not won a Pulitzer or sold your art somehow we start thinking that our art isn't good enough.  If you're not a best-seller, why are you writing?  It's hard to keep creating when you don't feel recognized.  Do we have enough heart to keep pressing on even when no one tells us it's good?  Can we believe in ourselves enough to know a) it has goodness in it and b) it doesn't matter anyway?  

For the first part of the chorus, "Rise to your feet my god, you must maintain your dignity," I haven't decided whether it's an exclamation from an encouraging source--Get up, for the love of Pete!--or if someone is talking to their inner ego.  Either way, the voice is commanding that they keep pressing forward, even through the circumstances of whatever has brought that figure down.  

And then another call to take heart and stand up again with the reminder "What have you got to prove to me?"  What are you trying to prove?  Who are you trying to prove it to?  And why do we hold ourselves to impossible standards of all or nothing?

The verses reinforce the idea of pushing past these walls we've created, with the repeating order to "Bang the Timpanis!" either to create a rhythm to trudge forward again or in celebration and otherwise recognizing some of the weight on the world pulling the figure down.  I like to think of it as a conversation with a good friend or with yourself, finding the courage to start up again after a low moment.  There's another area of focus in the verse "Dying to know how do the rumors lock up your majesty and will the new ones set you free?" as well as "Did I really change the way you think about everything?" The opinions of others really can factor strongly into how much or how soon we want to jump back up and try again.  

But the key point that I want to really hammer home is that I hope you will give yourself the leeway to not be the best or the worst.  Talent is on a scale rather than a yes/no checkbox.  How good you are at your job is not based off of how good someone else is at their job.  Doing the best that you can do and being the best that you can be is more important that being THE best.  Love yourself enough to allow you to be who you are and to celebrate that.

And get yourself a Burger King crown to make yourself feel better if you need to.