Embedded Files
There was a carpeted floor and a couch
And a big, boxy TV.
Hours of recreating “the lift”
Cue music: I’ve…had…the time of my life…
And thinking that if I practiced enough
I could be like Rita Moreno.
The most patient dance partner parents in the world.
There was a keyboard in a temporary classroom.
My first audition for the middle school’s production
Of Meet Me in St. Louis.
“Meet me at the fair…”
Fake blood.
Frilly dresses.
The best.
There was a set, and costumes, and actors.
The best I’d ever seen.
How did the Gazelle’s move like that?
These people – these performers – this was their job?
A beautiful, burning jealousy.
I must do this.
There was a gym with imaginary walls and like-minded people.
In the midst of teenager-hood
(How difficult to be a teenager.)
A summer away.
North Carolina’s Governor’s School for Drama.
Suzuki and viewpoints and Shakespeare and glorious weirdness!
Late night ice cream and dances and talks of how we’ll change
the world.
Discovering the art and drama of acting.
There were mountains and practice rooms and 16 bar cuts.
There were toxic classrooms and soul-saving voice lessons.
There was friendship and support while many college programs
Deal with jealousy and sabotage.
Singing in stairwells for acoustics.
Hours in the dance studios – we all still know A Chorus Line.
It’s engrained in our collective and individual muscle memory.
I discovered Shakespeare
And heartbreak
And films
And friendships
And furthered a determined, ferocious work ethic and drive to prove
That I can do this.
I can do this.
I am doing this.
There were rehearsal spaces and load-ins and 80-hour work weeks.
We were exhausted and thrilled.
A full-time actor in a professional theatre.
In a cornfield.
With some of the most talented and beautiful people that I’ll ever know.
I performed.
And I taught.
I taught students and their eyes lit up, and they pretended,
And they helped each other, and they were maniacs,
And they were beautiful,
And I helped them be those things.
A pull like performing – teaching.
I had to do this too.
There was panic. There were empty streets.
Quiet streets that were never meant for stillness.
There were jobs that were eliminated – my entire team.
And then there was an opportunity.
A beautiful program and training to further this pull to teach.
This drive to be available to help students
Navigate curriculum and their teenage years.
(How difficult to be a teenager.)
A swinging door.
Closing on one job and moment of adulthood
And opening onto another moment.
Pasek and Paul say it best – “the middle of a moment.”
How terrifying and special to know that you’re in the middle of a moment.
There were Zoom calls and meltdowns in break out rooms
And rehearsals and 10,000 screens set up all at once to teach
These wonderful, these EPIC humans.
Developing a community through theatre.
A community for people who are often excluded
From social and artistic communities.
Life skills developed through theatre classes for
Autistic adults and teenagers.
(How difficult to be a teenager.)
Communities and support help.
Theatre should not be exclusive.
It cannot be exclusive.
There was a new job opportunity. There was
A rental van packed with books and clothes and games
With memories squeezed in amongst the boxes.
There were good-byes.
They sucked.
There was a new state – a whole new part of the country.
A new home.
And there was an audition.
And a callback.
And then a rehearsal schedule and laughs and friends
And costumes and late nights and performances.
There was dancing.
I got to teach the Charleston and lifts and iambic pentameter.
And it was very, very good.
Now there is a classroom.
And it’s usually full of teenage students.
(How difficult to be a teenager.)
Teenage students who sometimes don’t follow directions
And who turn in assignments late and who talk
As if their ability to speak might leave them at a moment’s notice.
And they are wonderful. And they matter.
We are learning together.
We are growing together.
We have travelled so far.
I have come so far.
And there is so much more to go.
How wonderful that there is so much more to go.
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