loyalty like royalty

by

hi friends.

a few summers ago, i found myself coaxed into a girl wrestle in the midst of a sweaty crowd, on the floor of a theatre in nyc. 

i didn’t meant to find myself there. it just kind of happened, like joining a sorority or getting kicked by a mule. you put yourself in the proper circumstances and you don’t even have to try.

it was an improv festival and there was a lot of day drinking going on. 

my roommate at the time and renowned thrower-under-the-bus- er was dannielle owens-reid. you may recognize her in such blogs as “lesbians that look like justin beiber,” and from such films as “not another celebrity teen movie,” where she played justin beiber. anyway, dannielle volunteered me before i knew what was even happening. i moved to the front of the crowd, blindly accepting whatever was about to happen.

the girl i was face- offing with had demons in her eyes. seriously. 

ask anyone who was there. 

this girl, crouching on the matt in front of me, crouching like a peeing drunk in the wild, this girl had swallowed some anger in her life and she was looking for a release. i was in a bad way. i wanted to take it back, to laugh this off and sink back into the people behind me. at least kick her in the teeth and run. but i felt the pulse of the crowd. people drinking. people having fun. people here, palms open, gifting me with the opportunity to perform for them. be a star! be a star! so i took off my shoes and crouched into fighting stance? ( i think? do fighters crouch?)

emily rose was killing me. k.i.l.l.i.n.g. me. i did expect this to be aggressive. i did not expect her to lunge at me like a cat out of cage fire. she was skinny but strong. her bones cut into me like steel beams into soft calf skin. 

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i think we fought for two hours. had to be. she kept pinning me and flinging her hair in my face and mouth. at some point, breathless and limb-weak, we broke apart and someone who was delegating this wrestle, leaned in to check our pulses or whatever.
 

it was at this moment that time stops. in a panting, look- sweep of the crowd i find the eyes of a friend. kneeling on the ground next to me, keeping his hands out, as any good spotter would, my friend matt. sweet, kind, baby- headed matt. matt with a war past. matt who had seen a thing or two, but you would never know it because he was as gentle as any pop pop i know.

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i was exhausted and kind of scared. i had to win, had to win, or at least not lose and i could see that he knew that. in his eyes i could see he understood my need to be liked, loved, adored. he could see i was a duck in a swirling pond about to go under. he looked at me, his eyes strong and steady, and with a nod, just lipped “now!”

old demon eyes was distracted. i leapt! sneak attack! she went down, hair like streamers backward. in less than a second she was on her back, a crab flipped over. the crowd actually screamed in happiness. it might have been my proudest moment.

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i mean, it didn’t last.

i don’t even think i won.

i think we fought some more and eventually someone called a draw. but for an hour afterwards, i was a hero. local improv legend matt besser who had been an on-looker (and pressure to the cooker, honestly) told me later that he admired my fighting style. i will never forget those words.

but here’s the thing: it wasn’t my fighting style. i’d like to claim it but it was quick advice whispered in an olympic second. it was a word from a friend that gave me the courage to spring forth.

matt ulrich was a friend, indeed, a friend i had known for many months. and trusted in a way that you begin to trust people that you go on stage with, without any preparation. (i speak of improv)

but he was not a close friend. we had not spent summers growing up together building sweat lodges, or roommates in college pulling the best pranks everrr! we were just casual friends. and this is the idea that i just can’t forget. one of those things that just burn burn burns in my mind, something i will never shake and always remember. why did he do that? why did he help? had i ever done anything for him?

i have had great friends in my life so far. best friends in boarding school, lifetime friends from college, friends like families that you develop away from families in the cold of the greatest city on earth. but i am always always happily blown away by the friends that you make that you aren’t even really aware that you’re making. 

in our youth thru thirty while searching for life partner, a lot of time is spent contemplating loyalty.

is he faithful? can you be faithful? will he stand up for you when someone is talking down to you? will you stand beside him when his world crumbles around him?

all this time and energy looking for loyalty, expecting it, from a partner. but how loyal are we to our friends? how good are we to them? even the ones that just brush against the outside of our lives?

being back in spartanburg, the town of my adolescence and early teen development, i am running into old friends. friends that i lost touch with, or thought hated me, or that i thought were too dumb to get out. (what a deep deep asshole i am.) i find friends in bathroom stalls, friends behind counters of bars, friends thru facebook and then phone calls and then staying up all night listening to records.

i am finding people who are not against me. not judging me. not ready to crouch and spring for my throat. there are a lot of friends that i let go when i left here. i guess i had to at the time. life happens and you keep your eyes forward so you know what you’re next move is. but that doesn’t mean you can’t pause sometimes and just be really kind to someone. help them out just a teeny bit. get in their corner for a little while.

i feel very wonder years here but. i’m going to try to start being a friend to everyone. it’ll be hard because so much of my time is taken up with eyore-ing around, but i’m going to try.

thank you to all friends, close and not so close.

thank you for kind words.

thank you for sending me that thing in the mail.

thank you for late nights on back porches and front porches and talking under the stars.

thank you for just smiling at me.

and eye contact while toasting.

thank you for picking me up from the airport and going with me for coffee.

thank you for getting me back up when i trip and fall hard and break my teeth on the pavement.

thank you, matt ulrich, for helping me not get my ass kicked.

i got your back, ninjas!

clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose! 

 

trust me, i’m trying.

by

well, i am.

i am also whiny and slow-moving. i have started my first blog three times. i don’t know if i think i am attempting some great feat here. am i tricking myself into believing my very first post will be read and reviewed by millions after dinner tonight? the whole family gathered around the computer like it’s a radio? i am orson wells and it’s entertainment hour? i am full of delusions.

ever heard of spartanburg, south carolina? no?

ok.

well, i live here now. here. in spartanburg. south carolina.

i moved here recently from chicago where i was pursuing acting. and now i am at home. with my parents. and i’m 30. but i’ve got the sensitivity of a child allergic to the sun. i am the center of my world. i cry at the drop of an iphone (frequent) and i have already screamed at my dad that i need my privacy. i am a bucketful of sloppy emotions. all of them. but i am trying to paint this fence called life.

nothing much happens in spartanburg. here are my top three:

1. arm stung and the swelling of the arm-

i got stung by a yellow jacket when i went out to look at the roses. i found this very symbolic. i am still reliving the image of the poor bee wriggling off of his stinger, my wrist already red and starting to puff, but the bee. the poor bee. why did he do that to himself? i vacuumed his carcass up today. he has given his life for what? was i a threat? was i? stupid bee.

2. discovery of temperature-

it’s very cold. outside the temperature is hot and sometimes the pavement is actually mushy. but inside, where i do my very important 30 year old work, it’s freezing. i dress in sweats like a nana. my bones actually ache. i’m not used to air conditioning, parents! i have been living the life of an artist, struggling to feed myself and stay on track, and there was never any time for central air. only time to complain about it. now it’s too cold. too cold!

3. insulted by the ignorant-

a lady in a shop asks me if i got my hair cut because of miley cyrus. i don’t know what she was talking about but i can only assume miley cyrus cut her hair and it looks like mine. three breaths later she offers that i move to atlanta, to midtown, where there are “no blacks.” she mouthed that part, but i heard her plain and clear. she couldn’t see what color my heart is.

those are my top three. so full of life, my life now.

i am trying to change my life around, ok? i am trying. i know the things i don’t like about myself and i am doing what i can to stop those behaviors, relearn positive,  and go west to my destiny. i am taking some time away from boyfriends, and social events, from seeing plays, and auditioning and from getting swept away in my former coffeehouse social club. i am trying to strip all distractions away so i can stare myself in the face, my wrinkly cherub face and say, ” this is what you are doing now. you are alone. you are ok. just please make something of yourself so we can say it was all worth it.” and i know it will be.

it will all be worth it. it will all be worth it.

say it in the car, driving just to drive, just to have something to do. say it. it will all be worth it.

say it on your bed, in between tears, the phone ringing on the other end. no one answers. you’re alone. say it. it will all be worth it.

say it in a bar, to the old guy who is listening to you, your for-now only friend. he fought an actual war, but he still sees your personal one as significant. say it. it will all be worth it.

sometimes life is a pile of shit. sometimes we don’t even know ourselves. but we have to hold on, keep going. it will all be worth it. it will all be worth it. it will all be worth it.