Who We Are On Any Given Day…

“Character shoes are among the unsung heroes of musical theatre. They are comfortable, versatile footwear that makes a dancer look great without distracting from her form. Practically invisible, they are meant to be worn on a wooden stage. 

Performers often wear character shoes during auditions to be ready in case the director invites them to go into their dance.”

(Gahhhhhh!  That last sentence makes my butt pucker.)

If you look closely, you can see my black “character shoes” hanging at the window above my desk, next to the waving Liz. I keep them within my purview to remind me of the fact that I’m a character.  I know to you that seems pretty obvious, but when I’m holed up inside my little she-shack disguised as an office, I need to be reminded that I’m more than just a person who writes. Once upon a time, I donned those very shoes to sing and move in a way that resembled dancing if you squinted your eyes just right, or removed them altogether—along with any preconceived idea of what you thought “dance” should look like. 

I’m also a person who has friends, which is why I have all of the photographs of the people I love scattered around the space, so I don’t forget to call them or tell them I love them for no reason at all, which I’m prone to do—because I just glanced up to see them smiling back at me. 

I also have little pieces of nature, like driftwood or a couple of roses from my garden to remind me that I even have a garden and that maybe this afternoon, I should take a break from writing and walk around barefoot in the grass of that garden which lies on the other side of the fence. (Which is there to keep me from staring out the window at my garden all day.)

I have hundreds of inspirational quotes placed here and there to inspire me, although they’ve been there for so long they’re like visual white noise and I don’t really see them. Hence, I’ve been known to sit here for hours, surrounded by inspiration —feeling completely uninspired. 

Right now I’m staring at a stack of six journals, each more gorgeous than the next, with about two sentences written on the first page. They’re all gifts. I would never buy myself a journal because I don’t write shit down. I never have. I’ve never kept a diary or a journal, which continues to make the fact that I have a blog so incomprehensible to me. 

All of this to say, we are so much more than we claim to be. 

I may be a writer, but I’m a character too.  We all are. Some of you are parents but trust me, that’s just a fraction of who you are.  We pigeonhole, build a box and give ourselves labels and then we try our damnedest to conform to fit them.

I have no idea why we do it— if I knew, I would write a helpful handbook with instructions on how to escape that trap and then buy myself an island and never give any of this a second thought. All I know is that we do it—I know I do it. But it’s getting harder for me as I age. Too much water (or dance/spazzing) under that bridge. No identity crisis here—I’m hopelessly schizophrenic—in the best kind of way. 

When asked what I do I say I’m a writer, but in the next breath I want to explain that in addition to that I’m someone who loves music, food, motorcycles, foreign travel, and dogs; books, twinkle lights, Christmas, walks in nature, the beach, anything sparkly, and whiskey. 

But by that time, the person who asked has usually made an exit just this side of running. People don’t really want you to answer that question with anything but one word.

“Doctor, I’m a doctor.” 

“Oh, you are? Listen, I have this pain…”

The poor woman. She probably wants to jam a pen in her eye, or claim she sells tires—when all she has to do to end the conversation is start listing all the ingredient in her famous coq au vin.

I’m rambling now, trying desperately to avoid getting back to my real work. I suppose I could have written all of this in one of those beautiful, empty journals—but what fun would that have been?

Carry on,
xox