Tonight is a remembering back one, a casting in reverse to some days early in May when i felt alive-really alive-not just content, or sun-baked, or comfortable-but engaged and alert and excited. i had that happy little kid feeling of anxious anticipation . . . perhaps i will meet the man of my dreams walking down the street. maybe i will end up behind the bagel counter, serious, sincere, and slinging bagels and tofu spinach spread with the best of them. it could be that i meet up with writers not afraid to sit in dark corners with dim lights in order to hash out characters unsavory and climates not tropical. the person catching my eye on the train across from me smiles and i notice that she has orange dyed hair and screaming bright neon blue running shoes. she has a death grip on her high tech computer bag. i love her. this city where i spent five glorious days was just like me! constantly moving, rarely sleeping, and usually too loud. i smell better than this place, for sure, not everyone reeks of violet french perfume-some prefer the stench of rat, but there was so much talking! and eating at odd hours! and crowds of pigeons, people, taxis, signs, and food carts. i loved every single caffeine fueled, high energy, pavement pounding second of my time there. no regrets. no regrets. i felt alive. i felt glad to be human, glad to be busy, glad for discovery around every corner, glad for experiences planned and unexpected, glad for the connection and conversation.
When people ask me if i enjoyed my visit and i explode with happiness just being asked, more often than not they scoff and tell me that if i lived there i would feel differently. you were just visiting, they say, you would get so tired of the people and the trains and the crowds and the stench. and that is precisely when i know that they have not done their homework on me. oh so wrong they are! i have so much energy i am banging off the walls of this city. how do you costume 300 kids people ask? why do you work so much? don't you ever want to relax? but here's the thing, ever since i was little i have had this internal voice-louder than a heartbeat-that lets me know that my time on earth is limited. i hear the tick and tock of my life's moments flying by and believe you me, even in the heart of the most beautiful, perfect, tranquil city on the planet-i can still hear that clock coming for me. it seems as though there is still so much to learn, and experience, and discover, and know and just witness! i am the eternal snoop just going everywhere with my notebook and noticing and writing down ideas and impressions and trying to capture my time here in some measure of a way. the past couple of years have brought me too much time spent rewatching the same films, living for the next installment of some favorite show, and sitting on my ass in front of a computer. wait! i am not old yet! please don't roll me off to some corner and sit me in front of a television! the streets are calling, dodging those taxis, admiring the smartly dressed, walking dozens of miles a day, feeling the weather change, clouds rolling in and out eclipsed by building of super human size, have i truly spent my time? am i too old now to do much more than dream?
i realized that if i tore the porch fence wall completely off of my back deck, then when i sit in my hauled off the street wingback chair i can see out into sancho's field next to me and practically for forever. it feels good. it doesn't look that impressive, for sure thousands of miles away from the scene i just described to you, but i do feel a bit better about life. tearing off that wall let's me glimpse the old theatre and got me to spend a couple of days felling waist high weeds in the field itself-like i did two years ago trying to recover from sancho's death. and i didn't tear the wall off-i got my screwdriver and spent the better part of an afternoon removing it in an oh so professional way. if you are young and reading my words, do a better job than i did at staying connected and vital so that when you are as old as me you don't have to be constantly dredging up your cups and whining in them trying to figure out what the hell to do next. and it also doesn't escape me that i blogged (still so hate that word) for a solid month straight LAST september so i know that part of my restless about to break down the walls of my cage going bat shit crazy gypsy wild woman spirit is simply a matter of being in between theatre seasons. work will start again soon and there will be precious little time to sit in my chair and dream about anything. but right now, while the sun is setting and another night closing in, another day gone, i am remembering back to a time when my feet hit the pavement and i felt home again. really home. like i belonged. LOVE ALWAYS!!
No comments:
Post a Comment