It’s no surprise that over the past few years, I have exhausted, exasperated, confused, disoriented, and misled myself. Repeatedly, in case I missed some lessons the first go-round. I blog about these instances frequently.
But lately, I’ve surprised myself.
Leaning into little whims here and there. Some make sense and play nicely with my introversion and creative side. Stay home. Paint, doodle, crafty junk.
Others are a little more odd. I hate to cook and anything kitchen-y. But I’ve purchased rolling pins, cookie gel, and baking mixes with far more than three steps. These are surprises.
The biggest surprise started on Tuesday, December 17. I know the date because of the heartache that would come four days later. I know the day of the week because Tuesday is Couch Lady Day. On this particular Tuesday, she and her therapeutic jackhammer performed quite a number on my psyche. I was in a fog before I met with her and a full funk after.
The funk clung as I doom-scrolled Facebook (because scrolling is THE most mental-healthiest thing to do when one is in a funk—insert huge eye roll here). Up popped a call for auditions from our town’s community theater.
I clicked on it. “Barbecuing Hamlet.” Sounds fun. Sounds light. Doesn’t sound like heavy machinery or a buzz kill or something that’s been overdone. It’s something I might go see…
Then down the rabbit hole I tumbled. Further. Further. Further still. Funk and jackhammers and sense of time slipping away.
The roles were listed.
And the auditions were that night. Time snapped back in my face.
Like on a Tuesday. That particular Tuesday, post-mental jackhammer.
But one description intrigued me. I chastised myself for being intrigued. It’s not like I was going to try out for this thing. I would go see the play, though. I’d gotten that far.
But that description…
Opal Bell: “A lady with a lot of pent-up energy, 35-ish.” I guffawed. Snorted even. Scared a cat.
Although I’m ten-ish-plus years too old for the role, I do buzz with anxiety at least ten of my twenty waking hours. Add in that jackhammer…
What am I thinking?
I clicked away.
Then back again.
Let’s overthink this. Quickly. Because time’s wasting.
Opal’s part was listed way down on the cast sheet. I assumed, having zero—and I mean zero—experience with auditions, this meant Opal says three things. Four lines, max.
I can say three things here on the blog—it’s safe behind my laptop screen. I can say a few things in fiction tales when I’m not in a paralyzing writer’s funk. I can say three—maybe four—things to the tremendous wait staff at El Caballo Blanco as they offer respite from my kitchen disasters.
But I probably can’t say three things on a stage. Definitely not four. And not on a Tuesday.
I clicked away. Then back again.
I found the “cuts.” Wait. What’s a cut? Ooooh. I got it. The part they want you to read for the audition.
Opal’s cut is a fun little paragraph. Okay. Probably not even in the play. Just a sample or something. Because Opal’s only gonna have three lines.
I closed my eyes and pictured sitting in a room across a table from three managerial-type thespians and thought, I can read with emotion, right? I’ll just go…
Wait. What’s happening? My brain is fried and my whims are running amok.
I clicked away.
And back again.
Danced with it. Thought. Then overthought. Over-overthought with my too-tired brain.
After all the overthinking, I had the cut memorized. Inflections, meaning, umph. All voice work in my head, mind you. Just words.
Wait. What? Nope.
I clicked away.
But then the Hubs walked in from work and I just… Something snapped. Or clicked away then back again.
Suddenly, I didn’t want to cook supper (okay, this part was not sudden—I never want to cook) or eat supper or watch TV or read or write or sleep or think anymore.
I may have glitched. The Hubs certainly believed I was experiencing some untoward mental event as evidenced by his rapid-fire questioning of my intents and goals and, and, and—and I didn’t have answers for any of it.
I was up and off the couch in a frenzy, leaving a shocked Hubs and three miffed felines to fend for themselves.
In the dark drive down to the theater, that overthinking part rears up. “You should be writing.”
This voice shames me for taking energy and attention away from the goal, even on tiny things. Let alone something so… out of character.
The same voice also keeps my words all locked up when I do have the energy to open the laptop.
I push against it. I was getting nothing done doom-scrolling from my sofa anyway…
“I have nothing more to say. Not for the blog. Not for the shorts. Not for the manuscripts in progress. All the words I have at the moment are in Opal’s little paragraph. Let me play for an hour or two. Maybe this will clear the funk. Then I’ll write.”
“This is a waste of time.” That Nag of a voice never runs out of poison darts. If Little Miss Muse is the playful, winged imp on one shoulder, this inner harshness is the demon on the other. Heaven help me when the two of them go at it. That’s why I get a whopping four hours of sleep at night and an occasional bonus diagnosis from Couch Lady.
I arrive at the theater. Had the drive been three blocks longer, the Nag may have won out. I’d have returned home carrying a pizza with “sorry for my glitch” spelled out in sausage bits.
I step into the building. I’d been in this space years ago when it was the newspaper office. The front counter remains, but beyond it are rows of green padded chairs and a small stage.
I’m greeted warmly by people I don’t know and will likely never see again unless I come to see the play. Some of them might be in it.
I smile and take the papers a woman hands me. One was a liability form. Standard, I suppose, in case one were to trip over a prop during a performance.
The other one is specific to the audition. It asks what part you’re trying for and, at the bottom, it asks if you have any, in essence, glitches.
This, in essence, causes me to glitch. And I’ve not even said three words yet. To anyone.
I stare at the blank space after the question. I glance up. Others have come, maybe ten people. They all seem to know each other. I feel I’ve crashed a family reunion.
I stare back down at the glitch blank. Examples were allergies, seizures, or… phobias. Do I tell them? I mean I’m over the bridge thing, and I don’t see any daffodils anywhere, but there are other things. If I start listing them, I’ll have to ask for extra paper to fully disclose them all and will they call Couch Lady to confirm? Will she tell them about the jackhammer I require when I glitch? What is happening right now? I mean, even being in this building in the first place is a glitch…
I decide to save a tree and leave it blank. I will sit in a room with one or two of these people, read that paragraph, and leave. They don’t need to know about my glitches.
Director Lady calls for everyone’s attention and makes us Go. On. The. Stage.
Cue the stress sweats.
I was prepared to read words from a page while seated at a table in front of one to three managerial thespians. You know, how it is on TV.
I was not going to be on a stage.
Major glitching ensues. I could leave. Turn on one heel and walk out the door. But if I get back in the car, the Nag will start in, and, well, this is not the Tuesday to let the Nag have a say. And I really don’t want to buy an apology sausage pizza.
So I step on stage.
Then the dreaded question every introvert hates: “Give your name and something about your acting experience.”
Kill me now.
I have no experience and I can’t remember my name.
It’s now that I may have dissociated slightly—
Okay, I dissociated all the way because I can’t exactly remember what I said—or did. Director Lady had warm-up exercises. No. No. No.
Where’s the little room with the calm little table and a person or two with a clipboard?
It was in my head. That’s where it was. There was never going to be a quiet little room.
Then Little Miss Muse shows up. She loves all things drama and adrenaline, and, well... This is her thing and likely the source of this crazy whim to begin with. She takes over, her behind the wheel and me helplessly buckled into the passenger seat. At least the Nag is tied up in the trunk for the moment.
The Director Lady finally allows us to retreat to the safety of the plush green chairs. I want to slide under mine. I don’t get the chance.
She has people go BACK ON THE STAGE for the auditions. No little room. No little table. Right there in front of all of us.
No one else seems surprised by this format. Why would they? They’re all pros. Like, yeeeiiikes. They aren’t just saying words from the cut sheets. They’re, like, acting. Moving their arms and stuff. And they’re sooo good.
I look down at Opal’s cut. Another wave of stress sweats. I’m going to be dehydrated by the time this is done.
“Let me have that,” Little Miss Muse hisses and takes the cut sheet and the wheel again. I’m not even shotgun anymore. She’s stuffed me in the backseat. “You are wildly unprepared for having any kind of fun.”
Yup. Tattoo that on my forehead. Fun is ferociously difficult. Happy is hard work. And I’m in a glitch. A mid-life chaos/crisis glitch.
An introvert. In a theater. About to go on stage and—
Director Lady says it’s my turn. I say words and maybe move one arm a little. I’ve no idea. It’s not me anymore. Little Miss Muse is operating the control board. She’s having a blast out in the real world, away from our writing office where most of what I’ve been getting done these days is moping and writing myself into dark corners.
Before I know what’s happened, I’m off the stage, and it’s over.
People are smiling. Everyone is so kind. Saying the audition was great for never having done one before.
I smile back (I think—or at least Little Miss pushes my cheeks up with her chonky fingers so my mouth makes the shape of a smile). The Nag yells from the confines of the trunk that these folks are blowing smoke with their compliments. “You’ve had your fun. That was nice. Go home.”
So I did. I went home. I was in a lighter mood and a little giddy despite the Nag’s negativity. I dare say I had fun.
I reassured the Hubs nothing would come of it. Back to normal. He settles. The cats settle. The Nag quiets. Little Miss Muse, though. She and I, we… hope?
Nah.
“We’ll go see the play,” I say.
“Yes,” She agrees. “That would be fun you can handle.” She pulls grape bubblegum from her mouth in a long string, winds it around her finger, then sticks it back in her mouth.
“Any of those folks will do great in any of those roles.”
“Yes. They would.” She agrees as she flicks a little purple glitter in my face. That’s always dangerous. Her purple glitter tends to allow dreams to show through the glitches. “But…”
“It might be… fun?”
“Yes, Beth. That’s the word.” Now she’s full of snark. Spinning and twirling in her lavender tutu. Cats go flying out of the room. They know she’s about to get out of hand. “Fun. Fun. Fun! You’re allowed that. We need that. Fill the artist well, right? Fuel the fiction, bayyybaaaay!”
Little Miss is right as usual, but the audition is over. I closed the topic.
Then Thursday brings news that Opal is mine. I’m still in shock that I even left the house on Tuesday. On a whim. Let alone the fact that I will have to get back on that stage. And say three lines and move my arms around and stuff.
Little Miss spends the next two days singing “a whim that worked” and various other theater jargon to the tune of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.”
Shock lingers on Friday. Happy, glitchy shock.
Then I read the whole script.
Oh, my word. Opal says more than three things. More than four, even. Maybe I should bow out. Let someone else be Opal. Someone who knows what they’re doing…
Friday evening, I get one of those phone calls that freezes your feet to the floor and permanently reshifts your reality. One minute, you’re fussing over a play, and the next, a physician is telling you “decisions must be made” because your loved one has had a “life-ending event.”
I rush to the hospital. Make the decisions. Stay through the night with my aunt, keeping her favorite music on a loop even though I’m unsure if she can hear it. Saturday morning comes. I’m at her bedside as she passes.
Life has shifted.
The following week brings Christmas and funeral plans, and the Nag tosses in glorious terror. “You do not have time for this Hamlet nonsense. Things will get worse, and…”
Fun is ferociously difficult. Happy is hard work.
I click away. For a dark few moments, the Nag nearly wins.
But then I hear the flap of Little Miss Muse’s wings and glimpse her glitter and hear the clomp of her favorite purple stilettoes on the hardwood floor.
She reminds me life is short and fragile and you gotta grab the happy while it’s in reach…
I click back again.
Me.
A glitching, grieving introvert.
On stage.
Saying more than four things. (Yes, with Little Miss Muse in tow and sometimes driving the bus, especially on Tuesdays.)
I even wave around an arm or two now and then, doing this whim of a thing that worked.
