Happiness

My mom told me that my brother wanted me to at least once write about something happy. Upon hearing that I was confused as I thought all my stories ultimately had a happy ending. However, it is apparent that he wanted something more specific.

What makes me happy is being surrounded by crappy people. Let me explain. I started a new class this week, an Improv class. To say I was nervous was barely even scratching the surface. Normally when starting a new class I have a tiny bit of anxiety but it quickly passes as I am pretty confident in my acting and am usually sure I will be at the very least, in the middle of the pack, if not one of the better actors. This, however, is a totally different ball of wax. I am not all that confident in my improvisational skills.

As the day of the class loomed near I started to wonder if Karma had caught up with me. I say that b/c I am the first one to judge some one's bad improv or comedic chops. I consider myself a comedic aficionado - when it comes to other people's work that is. If I had lived during theater tomato throwing times I would have been in the front row with my satchel full of juicy ripe tomatoes ready to throw at a moments notice.

In talking with a good friend who is already in the class and who I consider to have amazing improvisational skills (remember aficionado) I was telling her how nervous I was. As she was trying to calm my nerves I said, "I just need there to be some bad actors in the group. As long as there are some crappy people around me I will feel better." As sad as that may be, it is the truth! The more crappy people I have around me the better I feel. Instead of just being secure within my own self or sure of my own capabilities I want to see the demise of someone else and then I will gain some confidence. The worse part is that I should feel guilty about that and I don't. I also, should want to be surrounded by talented people who will bring out the best in me, but I don't want that either. To me the perfect setting would be a mixture of talented people and crappy people.

The day of the class came and I woke up with a cold. Great, how was I supposed to improvise with a cloudy head? Bloody Karma!! As I drove to class I began to freak out more and more so by the time class started I was seriously going to shit my pants. This was the worse thing I could have done is subject myself to this torture. Especially when one of the games was to mimic the person to your right and then transform their character a little bit so the person to your left could mimic you. This was so horrifying to me that I turned my classmates hoity toity character into a crying pitiful girl and there was no part of me acting.

But as the night went on the tides began to turn. as I watched pairs of actors go through their scenes I realized that some were really good but a few were really bad. I know I would be better than them! Karma was on my side. This is exactly what I wanted and I got it. Some talent with a side of crap! And that is what makes me happy!

Breaking the Cycle

I have been in an abusive relationship for about 6 years. I have been punched, kicked, laughed at, spit on and told I am just not good enough and yet I still go back. Every time. Of course I am saying this theoretically - sort of. My abusive boyfriend's name is my Acting Career and I cannot let him go.

I vowed this year would be different. This year I was going to take back my life, be in control of my own destiny. No more pity parties, no more tears, no more excuses. This was the year I was going to break the cycle. However, 4 weeks into 2010 I am already crying, broken-hearted from yet another swift kick in the head. How did this happen? I had such will power just a few weeks ago and today I find myself curled up in fetal position rocking back and forth (rhetorically speaking of course).

What am I going to do? I can't leave him, believe me I have tried but I just go back. I love him. I truly love him. Like any abusive relationship I am lured back by a shiny little trinket of a new agent or a phone call full of promises from an audition. Sometimes all it takes is the sweet musings of another actor's stunning performance. I am weak. I know. I tell myself this time he will change. He will show me the same love I show him. This time it will be a mutually respectful relationship. But it never is and I never learn.

I can't go on like this that much I know. Changing the pattern of this relationship has not been easy as demonstrated by this morning's breakdown. However, I did notice a difference in today than other days. I sat on the couch trying to stop the tears with my poor husband wondering what was upsetting me. This time I said to him, "nothing, I don't want to be crying over this" and after a couple of minutes I stopped my crying and got ready to start my day. Any other time the dropping of a few tears would have turned into a 3-day tsunami of emotions. Today, however, I was able to pull myself together in relatively record time and enjoy a day out with Kris.

I know I am not alone in this. There are other victims out there bearing the sufferings of a similar relationship. That is a huge comfort knowing we are allied in abuse. I am also learning, albeit at a snails pace, that I can't change the spiteful, mean-spirited attitude of my acting career, but I can change myself. I can change how I react and what amount of power I let it have over me. So I am not going to let this little misstep today get me down. I am going to forge ahead and continue working on myself so someday I can look my acting career in the face and just as Royal told Pagoda, say "this is the last you put a knife in me!"

Old Lang Syne

The New Year us upon us and just in the knick of time if you ask me. It was touch and go there for awhile but I somehow managed to squeak through 2009 still breathing, my fingernails clinging to the edge of the cliff of life. However, every year when I am ready to move on to the next and wipe the slate clean, I am hit and hit hard with one last fuck you from the ending year – my birthday! I was born on December 31st. During my younger years it was a kick-ass time to have a birthday – everyone is in their most joist mood, champagne is flowing, people dancing at their best and in lieu of all that celebration I got to be the IT girl of the night! I had some amazingly fabulous birthdays! But that all came to an abrupt stop at the end my 29th year and a gray hair appeared on my head and I realized, gone are the days of birthday frivolity, enter the days of birthday wrinkle paranoia!

The worse part of it all is that I did this to myself. I wasn’t due to be born until January 2nd and instead I came two days early. I was a self-saboteur even in the womb. I made it so I cannot relish the ending of one year and enter the next with a newfound lease on life. No, because of my own self-destructiveness, when the clock strikes mid-night on January 1st those aren’t tears of joy running down my face welcoming the New Year!

I have to say it is exhausting to be depressed on New Years Eve. I, too, want to ring in the upcoming year with gusto instead of spending it worrying what being a year older means. I want to recapture the feeling on December 31st when I turned 17 and had to try and pretend I was sober talking to my parents all the while swaying into walls. I want to dance on the bar like I did on December 31st when I turned 21. I want to go to a beach party in Thailand like I did when on December 31st when I turned 24 (even though I had to go back to my hut sick). I want to be the last once dancing in a club like I did on December 31st when I turned 26! And I want to wake up January 1st hung-over just like I did on every January 1st until I turned 30! Hung-over, from drinks of joy not the ones I downed trying to dull the pain of aging.

And so I made a resolution for 2010. In the paranoid lead up to my birthday I started to realize that my age is as arbitrary as the date January 1st. It doesn’t mean anything unless you want it to. So I have decided that I am nothing years old and it is going to be a fabulous year! And at the end of it when everyone is singing and celebrating and ready with their resolutions I am going to be right there with them – drunk and dancing on a table!!!