Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

May I take just a few minutes of your time to tell you about a character I played, who I never thought I'd choose, and I never thought I'd enjoy? Of course I may.

Last Saturday in improv class, John gave each of us a personalized challenge for the French Braid we were about to practice. If you aren't familiar with improv (yeah, like I have any non-improviser readers...?), a French Braid plays three separate scenes in rotation, and with some luck, they often have a blatant or subtle connection by the end of the whole piece. Each scene is visited three times: 1a, 2a, 3a. 1b, 2b, 3b. 1c, 2c, 3c.

My assignment was to play a character who was bold, strong, in-charge, and male. I'm not going to speculate right now on why that character needed to be a man - especially as I've been drafting an in-depth reflection on gender in improv. The point is: as soon as I knew who this character was, he completely ran away with me.

I found myself onstage in 3a, with two other players who were beginning a support-group type of meeting. One of them had been given the challenge of creating physical oddity, so his character had a spinal disorder. I decided to play for contrast: inability to move my spine at all would certainly keep me in an upright pose that lets boldness come through. I'd missed the chance to be that scene's in-charge person, so I was someone who had been in charge earlier in life, and wasn't especially happy about not being in charge now. That meant I was old. And injured. And male. And at a support group.

Then I knew: my character was a Vietnam veteran. He had seen all kinds of shit, was angry at the VA, had been getting screwed for years. Finally those bastards sent him to a support group, with a bunch of hippie feelgood crap and ungrateful punks who had never seen the face of Death. I didn't reveal much at first in 3a - all of that dawned on me while the "group leader" spouted the hippie feelgood crap, and I simmered and grumbled to a barely coherent outburst at the end of the scene. (At least, I think that's about what happened.)

Scene 3b was my flashback. I didn't know that's what it would be, but I threw myself to the floor as soon as the stage was mostly clear from the organic edit, and whisper-shouted "Charlie, two o'clock!" My buddy next to me was going to get us killed because he kept popping up and making noise, and I did the only thing I could: pulled him to the floor, hissing "Get DOWN, motherfucker!" Until that point, I thought I'd pulled off a time jump, and the scene was taking place in a combat zone.

Then Jonah, my bless-his-heart teenage scene partner, popped up again, and asked "Who's Charlie?" Then someone walked on... asking for my vote, I think... and I shot him. "You can't just shoot people!" or something close to that, from Jonah. And I said, "It's my flashback, and I'll shoot whoever I want to!" So I shot everyone else who came onstage (all for non-combat reasons). And it felt like it worked.

Except for one thing: I don't know a thing about guns. I didn't even think about the details of the gun. I realized at the edit that I'd used the only gun I've ever used, and it's made of fingers. Dammit. Now I have to learn something about gun handling, beyond the basic pistol. I should probably also pick up a little military jargon, maybe watch Apocalypse Now or Full Metal Jacket. I really like seeing military characters played with detailed jargon - Guy Maggio is amazing at that. I imagine Ed Doris would be, too... don't know of other improvisers who are vets. If I'm going to revisit this soldier/veteran - I don't want him to become stock or fallback, but I really lost myself playing him - I want to do him justice.

Gossip

If anyone can help me find a certain quote about gossip, and the author of the quote, I'd be very grateful. The gist of it is that when you share a piece of negative gossip with its subject, when you tell someone what has been said behind her back, you do as much harm as the people gossiping - if not more.

For the most part, I think that's true. Why should my perception of the world be poisoned with someone's misinterpretation of my actions or personality? I know I'm a good and kind person. You probably know that too, or you wouldn't bother reading my blog. If I alienate someone, I probably have a good reason, like being pushed to the point at which my sanity is on the line.

I'm not perfect. I have my limits. I like being shown appreciation and respect for the work I do, I don't like having important work interrupted (and extra loaded onto me) for the sake of someone's vanity, and I have little patience for incompetency or ignorance in so-called superiors. As you might expect, I don't survive long in corporate settings - but I usually recognize my own misery and get the hell out before I start acting out. At least, now I do. There was a learning curve.

Here's a paraphrased snippet of dialogue from my life, a number of years ago:

Friend: Patti doesn't like you.
Me: Of course she doesn't. I don't play her games.
Friend: She actually said, "Jenifer X.* is a mean person."
Me: Whatever. She doesn't know me. I think most people know I'm nice, and I'm sure they can figure out why Patti says I'm not.

Here's another... with the same friend, after I quit an organization for which we both worked - and after this friend had shown some true colors by publicly distancing herself from me:

Friend: I went to the board meeting. They're still going to pay you the rest of the stipend.
Me: I'll take it, but I don't really care. I wouldn't have quit if I wasn't willing to give that up.
Friend: Geoffrey said it was to keep from having any trouble with you.
Me: Not because I worked my ass off, and gave them more than they were paying me for in the first place? That's ridiculous. I'm done with them. I'd have thought they realized that.
Friend: Well, I just thought you should know that's how they felt.

Neither of these juicy tidbits came to me as a surprise. But a true friend would (a) disregard someone's negative opinion of me, maybe even speak on my behalf, and (b) have the decency to remain positive with me when I'm obviously trying to sort out some shit and keep myself reasonable and functional. I didn't ask this "friend" what was said - I knew damn well that I had alienated people, and she knew damn well that I knew. No assumption: we had talked about it. But that second snippet? That's the last time she and I talked, because I wasn't so sure anymore that she was such a good friend.

When someone brings a piece of gossip around to the person it's about, they might see it as a favor, and intend no malice. That's why I want to find this quote - it was so gracefully worded, I'd like to have it on hand if I ever run into that situation again. Or if malice is the intent, I'd like to have a graceful way to deflect the negativity.

And as I've mentioned, I'm not perfect. I've been known to indulge in a little gossip myself. I'd hope I've kept it mostly harmless, but if I haven't, I'm sure the karma has balanced out. At any rate, it's something that's been on my mind, and I'll be making a conscious effort to curb the harmful variety.



*I had a different last name at the time. Other names in this piece have been changed.

Swiss Cheese

I have no idea how long I've been feeling this way, but I woke up with the metaphor this morning. There are giant holes in me, and they get bigger by the hour. There's one person in my life who doesn't make demands of me, and I end up taking him for granted because I have nothing left when the rest of the world has had its way.

Everything I'm doing? I don't want to do it anymore. I'm not magic, I'm not special. You people don't need me as much as you think you do. You're capable of solving your own problems. Just let me go, dammit, let me go. My infrastructure is crumbling fast, and if I put off repairs any longer, there's going to be some kind of major disaster.

Don't worry, I won't back out of most of my current obligations. But I'm going to be more protective of my time and energy... and there are some things on the chopping block.

Huh?

Improv practice was the last place I wanted to be this evening. I was annoyed all day at having to go. Not that I had anything better to do - I just really didn't feel like being around anyone, or pretending to have fun when it was obvious that I wouldn't (didn't even want to) have fun. I even had a little anxiety attack in the afternoon because of that and something else I didn't want to do, and other things that have been left undone - yes, even blogging.

So how the hell did I end up doing better improv tonight than I've done in, like, weeks? Jess said I seemed to be working out some angst, and Denton was impressed that none of my characters reverted to that Shrinking Violet bit to which I'm so attached.

Sunday was my one-year-onstage anniversary. I told myself I'd reflect after a year on whether I like performing, or would rather go back to tech. I... kind of like it. I like the people I play with, and they like performing, and I can handle it, so I guess it's okay. I love the creative experience; I've just never had much of a craving for an audience. Plus, my life seems to have more emphasis on tragedy than comedy. It's just how I am. I like my operas with a body count.

Art snob.

The group creative experience is a different animal than what I'd always been used to: solitary arts like writing and drawing, or finding a separate function from the rest of the group, like stage managing. I took piano lessons, but I was never in a band. I was never even on a sports team (nor did I want to be). Sometimes, it turns out, I like feeling like part of a whole, and it doesn't threaten my individuality to say so. It's also been harder to let my emotions come through in a character than I expected it would be. I've never thought of myself as a private person - I'll talk about anything and everything - but I also like to come across as being able to handle anything and everything, and not letting shit affect me. What's really funny is that I sometimes can make myself believe that it doesn't.

Ohhh. 2+2=4.

My Own Variety of Theism

Before I write a whole bunch of travel stuff and improv stuff, and a little family stuff, I want to clear up an apparent logical impossibility in my previous entry. I said that sometimes I (irrationally) feel I'm being punished for something "by a God* that doesn't exist."

I'm not really an atheist, but my belief in what could be out there, in here, somewhere, as a Greater Thing Than Man, varies from day to day. My spirituality is fluid - not malleable; that would imply that I'm easily influenced, which I am not when it comes to these matters. There are so many possibilities, and I don't take any one of them as absolutely, perfectly True. The experience of humanity changes from moment to moment - so must, to me, the Implied Beyond.

I can tell you a few things in which I can never, ever believe - starting with the concept of a deity who punishes people who do the best they can under excruciating circumstances. If there's Something, it could not be so cruel as to punish us for our humanity and free will.

I don't believe in absolution through anything but one's own heart and that of someone you've wronged. I don't believe in saviors, whether resurrected or not yet arrived the first time. Neither can I believe that any one group of people is more blessed than another, or that the ownership of a piece of land can be mandated... technically at all, but certainly not by some entity that does not make its intentions known to all concerned parties.

I believe in Good and Evil in terms of human behavior. Helping people is good. Selfishness is evil. Joy is good. Deliberately causing pain to others is evil. Nobody is 100% one or the other. Getting things off your chest isn't evil, even though it can be unpleasant. Empathy is good.

It would be comforting to believe that people who live by malice and greed, yet evade repercussion in the human realm, might be punished on a greater level - whether by flames and demonic torture, or reincarnation as a dung beetle - but I just don't see the evidence for it. Besides, a dung beetle doesn't see its quality of life as lacking.

I think it's outstandingly arrogant of humans to assume that there's a god with the same kind of consciousness that we have, or any kind of a plan around which we can wrap our puny minds. No, no. G-d does not speak the language in which you pray. G-d didn't write the rules by which you live. Those are human constructs. They may work, but they are not Divine.

At the same time, humans do seem to have a hard-wired instinct for wanting Something Greater. So when a conscious G-d exists for me, She/He is a scientist (and a hermaphrodite). Earth is a petri dish, and our duty is to follow the truth of our experience, push for further discovery of our own capacities, and make our report with accuracy.




*Style Note: When I'm feeling particularly connected to my Jewish heritage, I follow the convention of not spelling the G-word. It gets typed or written "G-d" in secular contexts and on pieces of paper likely to be discarded. There have been huge debates on the appropriateness of spelling out various Names in electronic media.