What's Lost and Gained

I had my handbag stolen.  It was 2 feet away from me under my coat at the club.

Bank card. Drivers License. Phone. Camera. iPod. Journal.

gone.

All of it I really loved.  I had a white Blackberry Curve that matched my white ceramic Chanel watch (super chic).  I had an iPod touch had a red case with white racing stripes (given as a going away present from a dear friend back home)...and newly downloaded Angry Birds game to keep me entertained on the train.  My camera was less than a year old...and had been grabbing both keepsake travel photos as well as quick snapshots of new friends.

So it is lost. It's just stuff after all.  I keep hearing the line from Harold and Maude:


 "Well if some people get upset because they feel they have a hold on somethings. I'm just acting as a gentle reminder, here today, gone tomorrow so don't get attached to things. Now with that in mind I don't mind collecting things. I've collected quite a lot of stuff in my time. Yeah, this is all memorabilia — but it’s incidental, not integral, if you know what I mean."


The only thing I really minded losing was my journal.  I keep notes daily about classwork and discoveries both for personal reference and as a resource for the final part of my dissertation.  This was a new journal, only three weeks old.  But it still is irreplaceable.  Or is it?  I talked to a classmate today about the possibility of re-writing and seeing what had really absorbed over the past three weeks.  It might not be as detailed in description, but it might be more poignant in depth...in that it would not be the things that I simply wrote down, but that have made their way into my true understanding.


Did I lose faith in London?  Nah.  Have had things stolen in every city.  


Did I lose my experiences? My friends?  My sense of safety?  Nope.


Did I lose the fun that was to be had for the rest of the night?  No!!


What did I gain?  I gained a real life understanding of how happiness is not contingent on life going just as you planned it.  I gained a true sense of the community that does love me and reached out to help me: from the friend I had just met that night that called my bank from his phone at 3 am so that I could cancel my card, to the classmate that bought me a rose on the street corner to cheer me up, to the high school friend of my brother's that offered to wire me cash if I needed it.  I was amazed by the support and love that poured out to boost me.


So, today when I was coming home from class, gripped in a massive wave of insecurity...I started thinking about this sense of loss and gains.  I started trying to unpick what had thrown me on this sudden 'LOSS' side of thinking.


I feel like I've been working with a pretty unbound flow recently - enjoying the work - reveling in the play. I've been continuing to find new avenues for strength and exploration in my voice and movement work.  I've had my first round of clowning.  As frightened as I have been from the first week of class, when our teacher gave us the outline of the course, I knew that after neutral mask, after half mask and after commedia...I would have to face down clowning.  eep.  Give me lines.  Give me actions.  Give me a character.  But please don't put me on stage - with no guards or defenses - and ask me to be funny as Caroline!  (This clowning is based in more Lecoq style training rather than what you might think of with circus clowns.)  It is basically about tapping into what is most vulnerable and unattractive about you - personally - and showcasing it for the entertainment of others.  Sound scary?  Yeah, did to me, too.  But I found a great pleasure and challenge in the work.  Because I have worked for many years in comedy, I definitely found a comfort with the entertaining part - but that was more about my desire to work the audience than allowing them behind the mask, as it were.  As I explored, I started to edge into the realm of the 'sad clown', a vulnerable and deeply open self... and will continue to delve into it.  


Today I played a tea bag.


That's right.  A tea bag.


We were assigned to carefully study and portray an inanimate object - and portray its story: beginning, middle and end.  I know, I know...I had the same reaction at first.  I'm paying HOW MUCH MONEY to pretend to be a tea bag?  But this really wasn't one of those "be a tree...feel the wind" acting exercises.  First, it requires keen observation.  Each time I poured hot water into my cup, I found new things to try. Oh! There is an air bubble trapped inside it that keeps it moving up against the top of the cup!  Oh! When you dunk it in and out of the water, the top part exposed to the air is actually heavier than the part still in the water! The more specifics I observe in life, the more I can bring into my performance. This is true of every thing that I observe...people, ideas, objects. Secondly, it challenged the imagination.  Instead of creating an exact replica of the inanimate object, we were to embody the texture, the weight, the tempo - and allow our imagination to fill in the gaps, and to inform an interpretation when our bodies were unable to match the required action. (How do you float to the top of a cup?  How do you dangle, dripping, above the cup?)  Because my process is usually so incredibly linear: text, actions, obstacles, given circumstances etc....I have been happily exploring the non-linear, the creatively circumspect, and the imaginative inroads.  It has been part of my work over the last few weeks that has been most rewarding - and hardest to define.  


So, if the work has been good....full of exploration and creative flow...if I'm working from a sense of general gain....why do I suddenly feel at a loss?


I looked more specifically at what was underneath my insecurity, and found that it had much to do with worrying where I fit with my classmates.  I worry that even though I have felt an expansion in my approach, that it may not be received well.  I don't trust my new pathway - and if I am honest about it, it is probably because it doesn't feel earned.  I place so much value on what I've EARNED in life.  Hard work = something to be proud of.  If I'm working less directly, if I'm exploring more creatively, it is hard to feel that I have accomplished something.  It feels - what? too easy maybe?  The other part of this has to do with how work is received by an audience.  (Also known as: "Do they like me?")  I can feel that my work is going well, that I am learning and growing, that I continue to have solid work ethic and am dependable as a friend and a scene partner - but that does not mean that someone else is going to look at my finished product and like it.


And this is where I MUST let go.  I cannot control the reaction or the taste of anyone - classmates, faculty, the general paying public.  I can only do what I can to bring life onto the stage.  Specific, creative, delicious, unpredictable life.  The rest is out of my hands.