Illusions are meant to conceal.
A note on perfection.
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I love a medical drama. My show of the moment is Brilliant Minds. It’s set in New York with a motorcycle-riding protagonist and characters just as brilliant as they are flawed.
After binging for a stretch, I text my physician friend, wondering if she wears her stethoscope at work. It felt excessive that in nearly every hospital scene - whether seeing patients or lounging in the breakroom - one was draped around a doctor’s neck. She responded that it was fake. The work of an overzealous prop master - the last time she laid eyes on hers was about two years ago.
I smiled, and replied, “I knew it!” but couldn’t be mad at their efforts. I know of the urge to tell a compelling story, even at the cost of authenticity. In this case, the little things meant to sell it became overkill, and once I knew better, I couldn’t unsee the illusion or return to my pre-text ignorance.
Anyway, the show is emphatic like that. Everything is dialed up. The storylines progress quickly, emotions flare before fizzling out and the fun inconsistencies don’t end with the props. My favorite discrepancy - one that makes the stethoscope thing feel minor - is the use of exterior shots for the show’s Bronx General Hospital.
To be clear the visual is appropriate. Set back from the street, with a stone-column entry and domed cupola, the place passes for a medical institution. It’s a multi-winged building that retains two sky bridges connecting it to annexes across the street. All it’s missing is a heliport on the roof or side yard to truly fit the bill. It looks like a hospital because over a century ago it was one. Before being renovated and converted into its present use, subsidized housing, the building served as a haven for the ill.
As a native New Yorker, I’ve passed it many times, its appearance sets it apart from the surroundings. Yet, despite the distinguished exterior, its current function is as an apartment building. There’s no coming and going of ambulances through its wrought iron gates. The “hospital” sits on a corner across from a deli and laundromat. It isn’t what it seems but it presents convincingly for an audience.
And I get that.
I’m familiar with compelling an image that feels more vibrant than the current state. Wanting to be seen as one thing on the outside while feeling like something else entirely inside. Directing a scene of my own making. I understand what it’s like to want things to look different, be different, to resemble something coveted but eternally elusive. I know intimately the act of passing off an imagined state as real.
Illusions are meant to conceal. Sometimes to convince an audience, other times to reassure oneself. They make a story cohesive and drive it forward.
But illusions and authenticity stand on opposite sides of truth.
That facade - the passing off as one thing for another - is only believable to those not in the know. It only fools folks at a distance. Those native to the landscape see the prop. They can tell the stethoscopes are fake.
And while they aren’t what they appear to be, illusions still require effort. There’s no shortage of work in showing up—only in doing so authentically. A thing’s beauty isn’t found in its function - the role it plays - but in the attention to detail poured into its creation. This means authenticity isn’t absent, just buried beneath the act.
The hardest part isn’t upholding the illusion but knowing when it is no longer in service to you. Sometimes, all it takes to end the performance is to shout, “Cut! That’s a wrap.” and move on.
TODAY’S TIDBIT
The Brooklyn Museum’s exhibit, Consuelo Kanaga: Catch the Spirit is live this spring through August 3rd.
The traveling exhibition is a retrospective of Kanaga’s modernist still lifes and celebrated portraits, of which she is best known for capturing the beauty and resilience of Black and Indigenous communities during Jim Crow.
COMMUNITY CORNER
🧠 Our bodies hold on to things our minds try to lock away. For You, Whom I Don’t Remember by
is an utterly beautiful account of what happens when it all comes tumbling out⚰️
I loved your retelling of death of another kind at a funeral. There’s Glory in evolving into a fuller version of ourselves.💬 Curiosity sometimes makes me wish I was a turtle so I could duck into my shell. I’m learning to grow more comfortable with being asked certain things and
’s, How to start a great conversation no matter whom you're with gives me a place to start with inquiries.LET ME KNOW
Have you ever taken time to consider how you conceal yourself?
Do you enjoy medical dramas?
Illusions work, until they don’t. Is it a gift or a curse humans experience denial?
What are you watching? I’ve been told to get into Adolescence.
I’ve been on the side of telling a lie long enough to believe it. The metamorphosis of the illusion is dangerous when it’s progressed to that point. Honesty and authenticity has served me well. No need to remember or uphold. I can live.
Yes. I loved this: "The hardest part isn’t upholding the illusion but knowing when it is no longer in service to you"...and when you get to the point where you start to fool yourself.