On Saturday, I did absolutely nothing. I spent hour after hour on my couch not thinking, not feeling, not worrying about anything. I simply let each and every responsibility bubble up to the sky and breathed in my own little space where I haven’t had to be good or great, nor have I been judged today. I earned that day.
The story to that point has not been told, nor would I want to directly revisit each and every emotion I’ve gone through over the past few months. To tell you the truth, it hasn’t been easy for me to – in essence – start over again, or at least, that’s how it feels. Yes, be careful when you ask for something, because you’ll get it up close enough to see the imperfections, jagged edges, and patched up areas. Did I say that I’m starting over again? I’m more like…replanted, put in a bigger pot…with better soil. I’m just more exposed to the elements this time.
The last most people heard of me, I got a job that on paper looked like the perfect fit for me. It felt like the two sides of my life, the creative and the professional, were finally coming together. The best things about the job are obvious to most, and I really do count my blessings, especially when I compare where I am today and where I was a year ago. I can hear live music by some really talented artists, learn about their creative processes, and soak in their experience and expression in ways I haven’t thought of before. I can plan events, run them with the same feelings and intentions that I had on more productions than I can count over the past decade. I’m working three miles away from home for a great company.
The steep learning curve of the job has been the most difficult thing to ignore, because of the crazy schedule we have. There are few personalities in the mix, a team of five regulars and a handful of part timers who help with the events. My obsession with how well I fit in reminds me of how frustrated I was many years ago at both my job and at Playhouse, and in that case, it just took months, years…to break away from the pack and make a name for myself. That’s when I had time. I was at that starting point in my late 20s. I’m now back to square one at 40. Again, that’s just a perception on my part.
I find myself using the phrase “at my age” a lot lately, perhaps to remind myself that I don’t have a lot of time to waste, nor can I allow myself to settle into any kind of satisfaction with where I am at any given point in time. I’ve been completely focused on and distracted by the 10-12 hour work day, finding it difficult to unearth the inspiration it takes to write a script or even a blog entry. I’ve lost touch with friends and family, glancing over at a loose collection of open-ended emails and voicemails. When that happens, I begin to lose a sense of myself apart from everything else. Descend on a hill in 91608, where neon lights and loud music ring in a beautiful chaos every single day of the year, and look beneath the lights for a person searching for a voice again, watching people pass through in a brief moment of their lives.
Let’s call the act of doing nothing an awakening, because as I learned in acting class, even nothing is something. It’s a chance to breathe, to remember, to see one’s surroundings clearly, short of being reactive. It’s an opportunity to say that from here on, I can change things on my own terms, and to accept the fact that I wanted all of this, for better or worse. I can’t ignore who I’ve been on my way to whom I will be. There is no actual starting over, come to think of it.
There is only the beginning, which exists only in the now.
It’s about damn time that I saw my way through writing this.
