the lies we tell.

What a cheesy title. Sorry about that. This is a post about lies. (We used to do journal entries in J-1 and then end them with 'this is a story about... so, same idea).

Remember when you were a kid and your mom or dad would be leaving to go somewhere and leave you home alone but they said if someone called, not to tell that person that you were home alone, so tell them your mom or dad was in the shower or something? Well, I was terrible at that lie. I'm terrible at every lie, but I look back on what should be the simplest of lies and remember a stuttering, stumbling 7-year-old going "Oh, uh, um, my, uh, she's, um, I think she's in the shower?" And yet, however many odd years later, here I am in theatre, still incapable of telling the smallest white lie. They're just not my style. I will avoid the truth, but if you ask me point blank, I just can't lie.

I found in talking to one of the questioners (see back entries) that as all those life questions get thrown out like it's the weather, I skirt all around, with ums and ohs and shrugs and nods. If there's a question I don't know the answer to, I'm completely and utterly speechless.

But you're taking the time to read my blog, so here's some truths about me I do know. Little facts I don't go out of my way to make public knowledge- not like I'm hiding them or anything, but just things that never seem to come up, perhaps? I don't know. Anyway... In the indeterminable future, I would like to run a marathon. Perhaps start with a half or something like that, but run a marathon. Or maybe even a freaking triathlon. I love swimming and biking, running is the hard part. So the running is the important part to defeat. I weigh on average about one hundred forty-seven pounds, as far as I know, the most I've ever weighed to date. I think flirtatious people in relationships are skeeeetchy. I think it's possible I think this because I've been a flirtatious person in a relationship and I know the thoughts that have crossed my mind when flirting while in that relationship. And yet, I find myself attracted to and simultaneously turned off by flirtatious people in relationships. Maybe it's the fun with no fear of commitment, but then there's that feeling of what kind of person would be in a relationship and flirt with someone else? Am I projecting fears about myself on other people? I'm currently listening to Death Cab's "Transatlanticism" album because it's my favorite of all of theirs- I listened to it on repeat junior year of high school. I obsessively do sudoku puzzles. I love mental math. I still sleep with my retainers in. For reasons undisclosed even to myself, I make it impossible to love me. I haven't worn a dress in over two weeks and this bothers me. I have yet to figure out where I completely one hundred percent fit in. Before my grandmother passed away, she gave me the Anne of Green Gables books and I still have yet to read them- but I should. They're sitting on my bookshelf in my room here, because they are special enough to have needed to travel with me the 1300 miles. I really like breakfast, but I rarely get up early enough to properly eat it- I miss first semester of college when Erin, Andy W, and I would get up early just to go eat breakfast together daily. I think being outside with a drink on a warm night with terrific company is one of my favorite things in the world. The older I get, the more I hate talking on the phone- I don't seem to be getting any better at it than I was at 7, though I tried and enjoyed it for several teen years.

This started as a blog about lies, but sort of turned into a blog of random facts... I am a scatter of strangeness. Take that and this for what you well. I am still in the process of "growing up", of figuring out who I am, who and what I want to be. So for now, I am a scatter of random facts, trying to figure out which pieces make up the significance of the future. One of the multitude of things that only time will tell...

X's and O's, Peace and Love.

decisions then, results now.

This is just one of those isn't-it-crazy-how-I-got-here posts. Basically, I was thinking, what got me into theatre? First, I danced. When I was going into first grade, we moved. I started all over at a new school, having only done it a year prior. For an extremely shy kid, to do it all over was terribly difficult. When I started second grade, my mom thought maybe dance would help me to be less shy or to make more friends (not that I didn't make friends in first grade, but still) or something. So she took me to sign up for dance, where I met Kathy, one of my teachers, who told me I had the perfect legs to dance (at 8! Who knew!), something that I have never thought to question since that day, because who would just say that to an 8-year-old? No one. IT MUST BE TRUE.

Anywho, fast forward to freshman year of high school. Still dancing, on the drill team, yada yada. One of my best friends convinces me I should audition for the musical. I do, terrified, do a horrendous job, and don't make it (to this day, thank you dad for going with me to brave the cast list results). How utterly disheartening. Regardless, this somehow started a curiosity and interest in participating in theatre. So for that, I have to thank a girl I no longer talk to. I digress.

After that musical, I saw all the shows, sometimes would go into the theatre and watch a minute or two of other rehearsals throughout the year. My sophomore year, I auditioned again and made it. Thus began the bloom of friendships that my teen years thrived upon, some of the best and brightest and funniest and full-hearted people I have ever known, who filled me with joy and love and confidence and laughter. The fact that I am still in theatre is owed entirely to them.

As, I had a choice once to give it up. End of junior year, I ran for the officer board. There were ten spots and I tied with one other girl for the last spot. Our teacher made the final vote, and since the other girl had already been on the board the year before (and perhaps for other reason as well that I'll never know), she chose her. And that absolutely flat out broke my heart. I spent a long summer trying to figure out if I still wanted to do theatre, as that was a tragic hit to my self-confidence, and now, looking back, probably a complete destroying of my relationship to my teacher, as at 17, she voted against me. I think I see it as more profound now then I did at the time, but my god, as a teenager, for someone who is supposed to help you and support you and build you up and teach you and make you a better person and belief in you- to vote against you, to say you are unworthy or not good enough- holy crap. How much more opposite of what you're trying to do with your position in my life could you be going by being the person to make that sort of decision?

But back to the amazing people that I could never give up. Ten people on that board. Two were the boys who reassured all of my teenage fears by showing me they had the exact same ones, by showing me what I was going through was what we were all going through. By holding my hand, by making me laugh when I cried, by making me cry from laughing so hard. One of them knew I still wanted to be on that board, and while going through his own stuff, didn't want to be on it anymore, so two-thirds of the way through the year, he resigned his position- to me. And he and the other nine officers made me my own officer ceremony, with official words and lights of cell phones in lieu of candles. Ten people did this for me. Ten people found me worthy.

I may be over-dramatizing the whole thing quite a lot, but it is because of those ten people and several more I met in that department that I am who I am and where I am today. They touched my heart and had a profound impact on my life and shared my passion and drive for theatre. They are people that are not easily forgotten, even when I live thousands of miles away from all of them. There is a love and a respect and feeling of gratitude that will never go away. They are fantastic human beings and no matter where we go in live and how far geography may separate us, there was a time when all of our hearts worked as one and for that, I am forever humbled to have been a part of something so special and it is why I continue to strive to work so hard at what I do and who I am today. So thank you, my loves, for sharing you with me. All my love to you.

X's and O's, Peace and Love.