Pleasant Surprises

So there I was, sitting at home, mind my own business,when the phone rang.  It was an unfamiliar number with a local area code.  I answered, half expecting a desperate plea by a struggling local non profit for money or volunteer time or both.  Instead I heard, “This is _____, the director of _______. ”

I was instantly flustered.  I asked her how she was, interrupting her as she wass offering me a part in her production.  My brain froze momentarily.  It just didn’t make any sense.  I didn’t audition to get a part.  What was she thinking?

 

But I had a part.  A good part.  An interesting part.  A part that I was really excited about.  I just couldn’t wrap my brain around it.

She gave me a lot of information which I could not focus on at all.  thankfully she also explained she would be sending an email with all the information I needed.  I stammered like a moron and uttered incoherent sentences.  Or at least that’s how it felt.  I thanked her an hung up the phone.

I immediately thought of a million questions.  How often would we be rehearsing?  What nights?  When was the performance?

But this was all superceded by this pleasant feeling of surprise.  I really hadn’t expected to be cast.  And I had been.  It was a tremendous ego boost.

Now I just have to find a babysitter sso I can rehearse.

Stiff Muscles and Bad Nerves: Reprise

So I did it.  And lived.  And actually did pretty well.

So the question becomes, what do I do if I get a part? 🙂

Stiff Muscles and Bad Nerves

It’s like exercising a muscle after a sprain.  Everything is tight.  You don’t move the way you did before.  You have to think about things that previously were unconscious.

 

I don’t know what possessed me to decide to audition for the playwright’s festival.  Maybe the rekindled desire to immerse myself in theater.  Perhaps a renewed sense of purpose.  Most definitely in part because the actors will be paid.

 

The process of preparing for an audition has been harder than I remember.  Finding the right monologue, learning it, practicing it, perfecting it.  Worrying about whether you have any talent.  Wondering what the hell you are doing.

 

I picked a comic piece.  I’ve practiced by myself, in front of the mirror and in front of the Fiend.  I’ve even subjected some folks at work to it.  No amount of practicing is lessening the feeling that I must be crazy to think I can do this.

 

I remember a time when auditions didn’t have such a profound effect on me.  I would always be a bit nervous.  But when I’m practicing now I’m vaguely nauseous.

 

In all fairness it has been a long time since I’ve auditioned for anything in this way.  I know I will be up against folks who audition as easily as they breathe.  I have a sneaking suspicion it will feel a bit like a firing line for me.

 

I may not get a part.  I may.  I think right now that doesn’t matter.  The largest part for me is doing it.  Exercising the stiff muscle which has not been used for so long. Working through my own fears of failure and embarrassment.  Remembering why I love this and trying my best.

Innocent Monologue

**This wa a piece I wrote a a prep for an exercise in an improv theater group I work with.  It was an exercise where we to come up with a character and a story that fit a particular archetype.  My archetype was the Innocent.  This is what i came up with.  It’s written as a guide for performance, but something about the character struck me.**

 

It was my very first job out of college.  I had wanted to work at a newspaper for as long as I could remember.  I so excited the morning of my first day. I put on my new suit, the one my mother picked out for me.  I tried seven different hair styles, trying to decide which was more professional.  I was ready to go forty minutes early.  I puttered around the apartment and still showed up at the office fifteen minutes before anyone else.

 

The editor was a big guy and he was a bit…rough around the edges.  He gave me a quick tour of the office and showed me my desk.  He introduced me to the other reporters and told me to shadow one in particular.  She didn’t seem overly friendly but I was sure once she got to know me it would be fine.

 

Working for a small newspaper was hard.  I was the new kid and that meant the worst assignments.  Some days I would work for thirteen hours straight, starting the day in the office, conducting phone interviews, doing research and ending by covering town meetings in the evenings.  But I was learning a lot and that was really great. 

 

The editor wasn’t exactly nice.  I’d do one little thing wrong and he be all over me.  And the woman I was supposed to be shadowing was always teasing me.  I tried to laugh it off, but it really got to me.

 

For a while I let it get me down.  I started to think maybe I wasn’t cut out for being a reporter.  I tried working really hard and doing everything exactly the way the other reporters and the editor told me to.  That didn’t seem to make the editor any happier with me.  The woman I was shadowing made jokes about me needing my shoes tied or my diaper changed.

 

I decided it was their fault for not helping me learn.  I mean I was new to this, right?  And if I wasn’t getting better maybe it’s because they were doing a lousy job training me.  The editor never gave me any constructive criticism, he just asked if they had taught me anything in college.  And the woman I was supposed to be shadowing was worse.  She never gave me any advice.  She just leapt on every opportunity to make me the butt of her jokes.

 

I realized that I needed to keep trying.  Things weren’t going to get any better if I just threw in the towel.  So I kept at it.  It wasn’t easy and there were a lot of times I wanted to throw my hands up and walk out of the office.  But I didn’t.

 

One night I had to cover a planning board meeting.  I wasn’t really looking forward to it.  They were usually so dull.  But this night ended up being very different.  There was a presentation by a local developer regarding a new shopping plaza he was hoping to build.  Everyone had a very strong reaction to the proposal, and very few of them were the same.

 

The debate got pretty heated during the meeting.  I decided it might be a good idea to conduct a couple of quick interviews after the meeting adjourned.  I got a ton of great quotes.  I went back to the office and researched the developer and his projects.  I wrote piece that night.

 

The next morning I turned it over to the editor.  I knew it was the best piece I had written.  Even so, when he asked me to come into his office about an hour later I cringed.

 

“Well kid, I don’t know what to say.”  My heart was in my mouth.  I was convinced he was going to tell me it was no good, just like all my other pieces.  “Great work”

 

I was stunned. I knew the piece was good but having him say it made me flush with pride.  He patted me on the shoulder and walked me back out to my desk.  “Good job rookie” were his parting words as he headed back to his office.  The woman who I was shadowing looked up.  “Must have been a helluva piece.  He never gives out compliments.”

 

Something changed that day.  It’s not to say the editor never gave me a hard time again or the other reporter stopped teasing me.  But I understood my place in the paper.  I was the new kid, so I had to put up with some stuff.  I was paying my dues.  But now I knew that I was good at my job.  And more importantly, I knew that everyone else knew it too.

Simple Pleasures

Last night The Fiend and I went to see a theater group I am involved with perform at a fundraiser for a social service agency.  The theme was victory over violence.  Audience members shared touching stories and the performers interpreted them so beautifully.

 

The Fiend was so well behaved.  Her reward was getting to dance her little heart to the great reggae band that played later on that evening.  That was my reward too.

 

We had a great night watching the performance, spending time with lovely people and dancing to great music.  The Fiend and I drove how basking in the contented glow of an evening well spent.  It struck me how simple it had been to make us both so happy.  Good theater, good music, good company. 

 

The pursuit of happiness, or at least my pursuit of happiness, often gets muddied by lofty expectations.  It is a challenge to realize that happiness is in the moment, not in the future.  Every moment that spent wishing for happiness in the future is a moment where happiness is lost. 

 

Happiness does not cost anything.  It does not exist in things or places.  It exists inside each of us.  It is when we let go and live in the moment that we find it.