I had written a letter to him earlier this week. Today I
edited it and handwrote it out; it covered six pages. Everything that
went unsaid. A final goodbye.
Tonight I delivered it to him.
Then I drove to our usual hang out by myself, had a glass of cabernet sauvignon, and said goodbye to him in my heart.
Our friendship is over.
I know it's best for us in the long run, but right now my heart is broken.
I went to see the play Equus last night, put on by Nearly Naked Theatre in Phoenix.
(For those of you who don't remember, Equus is the play that
Daniel Radcliffe performed in a few years back and everyone flipped out
because his role required full-frontal nudity. And holy hell,
full-frontal nudity there is! Both male and female.)
The show was phenomenal. It was long, but fascinating and deliciously
cerebral. The story is a strange one, about a boy who randomly blinds
six horses with a metal spike and the psychiatrist who takes on his
case. But it delves into so many topics with abandon; religion,
sexuality, psychology, family, emotional development...I was rapt.
Even though I haven't been active in some time, I still keep a close
eye on the goings-on in the local theater scene here in Phoenix. Awhile
back, I saw an audition notice for Equus. They had already cast
the main roles, but were looking for actors/dancers to play the six
horses. I immediately got the shivers. I wanted to do it so badly. I had
every reason to: I'm a dancer, so the movement wouldn't be difficult
for me. My favorite step in ballet is the pas de cheval, which translates to "step of the horse." I've even played a horse before in a musical called Man of La Mancha
a few years back (and fucking rocked if I do say so myself). And yet,
something kept me from sending in my headshot and resume. I had some
concrete personal reasons...I don't have loads of time/energy to spare
so rehearsing and performing may have been difficult on top of
school/work, I was shy about wearing the sexy costumes (click on the link at the end of the entry, then ENTER to see what the male horses wore), and even more shy about the scars that cover my legs which would undoubtedly be on display if I was cast.
I realized last night that all those reasons were stupid.
The horses entered and moved gracefully and beautifully across the
stage, wearing their gorgeous headpieces which transformed them into the
illusion of horses, and I was immediately filled with so much regret. I
could have pulled off the female costumes, and the scars would've been
camouflaged by fishnet thigh-high stockings. I was only half-surprised
when I felt myself starting to cry. I had missed out on an absolutely
INCREDIBLE opportunity for reasons I thought were valid, but were really
just paralyzing fear. I was scared of being vulnerable onstage again,
scared of balancing school/work and rehearsals/performances, scared of
meeting new people and experiencing new things. I was just fucking
scared. Of everything.
I've always been scared. I'm a scared person with a lot of fears;
some rational, some irrational. There was a period in my life where I
was able to push through that fear and do scary things. I made myself do
scary things, and often. But now I'm right back where I started from.
Looking at the audition notice for a role I'm perfect for, and turning
away to hide under the covers; acting like it's no big deal that I'm
chickening out. It IS a big deal. This paralyzing fear is taking over my
whole life and I can't stand it anymore.
So I'm done. I want to do scary things again. I don't want to miss out on opportunities like Equus
anymore. I want to believe that I can handle scary things when I need
to; that in the end they'll be beneficial to me and my life. Six
gorgeous humans-as-horses have inspired me to not be scared.
I started that night. I walked straight up to the director of the
show and introduced myself. We've been Facebook friends for a couple
years (long story as to how that happened) but I've always been too shy
to meet him in person. But we finally met last night. It felt good to
overcome a fear, even if it was just a small one.
I don't want to be scared anymore. So I won't.
P.S. I might go see Equus again this weekend. If you get a
chance and live in the Phoenix area, SEE IT. Even if you only go for the
naked people. :) It's a great show. Visit http://www.nearlynakedtheatre.org for more information about the show and this great little theater company.
I really thought I had a pretty good idea of where I wanted to be in a
couple of years. I wanted to graduate obviously, then stick around for a
year or two to work, build my resume, and save money. Then I was going
to pack up all my stuff and my cat, and move to New York City where I
would choreograph musicals...and win awards...and get drunk with Susan
Stroman on a regular basis. (Okay, I'm exaggerating. But not about the
choreographing musicals part.) The fact that living in New York City is
ridiculously difficult only made me want it more. I was all set with a
basic pathway.
Now I don't know where I'm going anymore.
I'm wondering if I really will end up in New York. Recently, my mind
has drifted off to wondering about going abroad instead. To London,
Edinburgh, or Dublin. (Probably London or Edinburgh if anything, since I
have basic knowledge of the arts scene there...whereas I don't know
much about the scene in Dublin. I just know that I LOVE
IRELAND.)
But there are problems with moving abroad. For one thing, I can't really
fathom the logistics of an international, transatlantic move. I was
having enough trouble figuring out how I was going to move across the
country, let alone how to move to a completely different continent. I
emailed an acquaintance of mine who recently moved to London and asked
her to share her experience moving abroad. Based on her reply, I
realized that I'd have to sell or give away basically everything I own
and start over. Figure out visas and insurance and bank accounts and
cell phone plans. And I have absolutely no idea how my kitty would fare on
a long flight to Europe. But that will definitely be figured out, because there's no way I'm not taking him with me.
The fact that I'm honestly not sure if I even want to choreograph musicals anymore or if I'm cut out for it also complicates things significantly. But that's a whole other topic, I guess.
Not knowing where I'm going is causing me so much anxiety. While my future plans have definitely evolved over the years--I've cycled through wanting to own a dance company, to travel and study dance around the world, to be a freelance contemporary choreographer, to choreograph musicals--I've always had a basic idea of where I would go. This is probably the first time in many years that I have absolutely NO plans, and no idea what the future holds. I really, really hate that.
So, a few weeks ago, I emailed Phoenix Theatre's production manager inquiring about choreographing for them next season. I initially got a response saying that no positions were available, but they will definitely keep my information on file. Not too shabby, especially considering I never expected to get a response!
THEN.
I got another response. It said that the Artistic Director, Michael Barnard, wants to meet with me!! What?! They said that while they are still unsure about positions available for next season, Michael Barnard likes to know who is out there for future reference. So of COURSE I responded back saying I was interested, and we have a meeting set for this upcoming Friday at 10:30 AM. I can't believe it! I'm so excited, and so nervous as well!
Additionally, I am auditioning for Phoenix Theatre this week, the day after my meeting with Michael Barnard. Hopefully meeting with him will make me less nervous? I hope so. I'm planning on singing "A Trip to the Library" from She Loves Me and "Maybe This Time" from Cabaret, then doing a monologue from Talk Radio. I almost have the monologue memorized, and need to go through my songs a few more times. Then prep all my audition materials--resume, headshot, music, etc. I also need to prepare a press packet to bring to my meeting with Michael Barnard.
AHH! Things are happening! Even if there aren't any choreography jobs available and/or I don't get cast in anything, at least I'm getting my foot in the door there. Not bad!
I couldn't be happier that this stupid week is over. I don't know about you, but I'm ready to think about cheerier topics.
Like pink hair.
I am absolutely ob-SESSED with pink hair, and always have been. I have no idea what sparked this obsession, but I lovelovelove it. Putting a little magenta in my hair a few months ago made my heart go pitter-pat.
Now I'm dying (DYE-ing? Heh heh...) to go all-out for realsies this time, and bleach my hair so I can dye it bright pink (and maybe try other crazy colors like blue and purple, for shits and giggles). I've always wanted to try this, but haven't done so for a myriad of reasons. The main one being that I actually love my natural hair color and think it's a really pretty shade of brown; I'm worried that bleaching/dying it this much might mess up that pretty natural color forever even after the dye fades out. The other main reason is that I know how much work goes into maintaining the color. I think faded color looks so gross, and I'm not sure I have the energy to re-dye it every couple of weeks. So right now, I'm interested in maybe dying my whole head the same dark magenta color that I used to highlight it a few months ago. That way, I'll still have a head of pink hair without having to bleach first. Stepping stones, y'know.
In addition to daydreaming about dying my hair, I also ravenously collect pictures of awesome pink hair. (And other fabulous colors.) I have an entire file on my computer devoted to all the nifty photos I've found, and today I decided to pluck out a few and make a digital inspiration board. (The first of many boards to come, as this is like an eighth of my entire collection.) I'm kind of a dummy in that I don't keep track of each photo's source when I save it...but chances are, most of these came from Google searches, Fuck Yeah Pink or Sex Hair. No copyright infringement is intended. If anyone stumbles upon this post and sees a photo that belongs to you, LET ME KNOW and I will either remove your photo or credit you!
I was just reading over some older LiveJournal entries from my first semester at the U of A. It made me realize just how much school and I aren't really working out. I think I need to be done with it for awhile, and do something else. Or just take more time off until I figure out an academic plan that I can realistically follow through with. But honestly, I think I need to give up on it for now. I adore my classmates so much, and wish I could finish this journey with them. But I can't. It's only making me miserable, and it's done nothing but make me miserable in the past. I think I'm done.
"If neurotic is wanting two mutually exclusive things at one and the same time, then I'm neurotic as hell. I'll be flying back and forth between one mutually exclusive thing and another for the rest of my days."
--The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath
1/16/11, JFK, 5:51 PM
I'm completely heartbroken. My entire body HURTS; I'm in so much pain that I can't think straight. Which I suppose doesn't matter, because so many things are running through my head that trying to sort through them would just hurt more. Why do we do this to ourselves? Why do we intertwine our lives with someone else's if it's all not going to work anyway? Everything is so complicated, and is only made more complicated when everyday things become associated with one person. Everything makes me think of him. I can't breathe, I can't think, I can't deal with this. I don't know HOW to deal with this. I don't know what I'm supposed to do or how I'm supposed to feel. And I wish that he was the one. As much as I love him, I know in the back of my mind that we are probably not meant to be together forever. But whoever that person is, I wish that I could find him. Because this hurts too much.
I've never been a "dater." Ever. I never understood how my friends could just move from person to person like it was nothing. I don't trust easily, and I don't open up easily. And I mate for life. When I love someone or something, I love with my whole self. Which is why I don't make friends easily, either. And it's why Steve was basically my first relationship.
This all hurts like hell. I can't stand it.
LATER, Airplane, 9:10 PM-ish
By myself in a plane full of people, 154 miles away from PHX. The captain just said we should be on the ground at "40 past the hour, and at the gate shortly after that." The woman sitting behind me is traveling with her dog. I'm sitting in the window seat, and if I tilt my head to the left towards the window, all I smell is dog breath. I just watched The Hours. I love that beautiful, sad movie. Then I watched the "Maps" music video, which I love so much that I actually bought it off of iTunes a long time ago.
I always associate that song with people leaving. Every time someone leaves, it feels like a death. Like I'm being abandoned for something so much better. People go away to their new lives, and "Maps" runs through my head. WAIT -- THEY DON'T LOVE YOU LIKE I LOVE YOU. Everybody leaves me. They leave me and go somewhere else. But I stay here, alone and stuck.
I remember before Derek was accepted to Cornish, him and Christian and I were going to move into a house together. I can still imagine what our house would've looked like--probably one of those cute, small houses near campus, with hardwood floors and warm light. The walls covered in photos and memories and art and the silly things we collect. It would be a little scary living in that area, I guess, but I wouldn't mind because I would be safe with my friends around. Inside jokes and singing the theme to Three's Company. Derek and I doing Greek homework while Christian has her latest art project spread across the coffee table.
But none of that actually happened. Derek moved to Seattle and Christian got a job at The Loft. She found a whole new group of friends, a new identity, and a new apartment. While I slowly started to fade away and float around campus like a ghost, not sure what I was doing or where I was going. Then I made the decision to transfer schools, and had one of the best years of my life preparing. Dancing, writing, taco/movie nights after class with Todd and other dance friends. Then I moved, and things felt both terrifying and wonderful. The ASU Dance program was kooky, just like me. I got cast in Kiss Me Kate, discovered the theater scene in Phoenix, met and started dating Steve.
One day before Karen's modern class, one of my classmates named Stephanie looked over at me and said, "You look really pretty today, Katy. Really happy." And I was. I felt like I was glowing. I had finally broken out of a years-long cycle of Tucson stagnation, and found my own deliriously happy place to start doing great things in.
And then everything fell apart. I fell apart. Suddenly, I couldn't get up for class anymore and couldn't figure out why. I fucked everything up. Or rather--my body did. I worked so hard to get to that great place in my life only to enjoy it for one semester before my body completely betrayed me. My health abandoned me. Then everyone started leaving again.
What scares me is that I'm at the point where I almost don't want to feel better. I don't want to work hard to get my life where I want it to be, only to completely fall apart again. I can't do it.
We've landed.
1/21/11, Bedroom, 12:31 AM
This is the predicament I'm in. I experience things so deeply. TOO deeply. And I never get over anything. I realize that pain and loss and change are all normal parts of life. But I feel like at some point, people deal with it all. It might take time, but they eventually heal. I don't heal, regardless of how much time passes. Things that have happened 2 years ago, 5 years ago, 10 years ago, 14 years ago still hurt like they happened yesterday. I'm only 23, and have an entire lifetime's worth of change ahead. But I can't keep experiencing these seemingly normal life things over and over again, because they destroy me so easily. Even as years pass, small parts of me are still baking cookies with Christine and Margie. Still remembering how cold and waxy Christine's skin felt when she was lying in a casket. Still 12 years old sitting at a parent-teacher conference with my Mom, listening as all my teachers listed everything I was doing wrong. Still dancing to "Nothing Else Matters" on Utterback's huge stage. Still drinking Dr. Pepper and pulling all-nighters in Graham-Greenlee. Still watching Twin Peaks and eating Del Taco with Steve on weekends. Still walking around New York City watching Steve be perfectly fine with everything while it takes me every ounce of energy not to cry all the time. And so on ad nauseam. I never really move on. I'll always be doing Greek homework in the adorable house that never actually happened. I can't get any of this out of my head.
What I really don't understand is how and why I got here. For years, I watched my friends find their little niches and desperately wanted to find my own. And I did, after working hard to get there. Only to get sick and ruin everything. I'm not doing this again. I'm not going to get better just to plummet all over again. I feel like I'd rather give up and succumb.
Spent a couple hours with my family in Tucson yesterday to celebrate my Adoption Day (which is actually the 15th, but I'll be out of town). Played Scrabble and my Mom sent me back with a pumpkin pie. Om nom nom. She also got me a Disney Princess greeting card that plays "A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes." 'Cause I'm five years old, for real.
Went shopping at Old Navy today because I desperately needed some new jeans. Turns out they were still having massive clearance sales, and I ended up getting a quite few pairs of jeans at deliciously low prices. Including a pair of skinny jeans! And they all look really good on me, which rarely happens. Scorrrre.
My Dad called earlier to ask me to send him some ASU tuition statements for tax stuff. The conversation wasn't all strained and awkward and felt a little more natural. I hope things will continue to get a little better between us.
My doctors appointment the other day went pretty well. He took a billion vials of blood to run a bunch of different tests on and ordered a sleep study, which I'll probably do in the next few weeks. Anxiously awaiting results.
Derek is coming to visit AZ tomorrow! I haven't seen him in at least a year so I'm excited to catch up.
CRAPPY:
I'm exhausted and scary depressed ALL. THE. TIME. I was so tired the other night that I barely remember being at Marissa's epic Harry Potter birthday party. The one thing I do remember is being so tired that I had trouble talking to people because I couldn't think of the right words to use. Later in the evening, I went into my room to check something on my laptop, dozed off, and drifted awake at like 6 AM. My life.
My hair is ridiculous. Every time I've washed it since getting it cut, it just turns out greasy and disgusting. I try to only use a tiny bit of shampoo/conditioner, but still can't wash all of it out. Or something. It's driving me insane. I'm also pulling large clumps out of it. Awesome.
NOT SURE HOW I FEEL:
Going to New York on Thursday to visit Steve. I feel like I really need to see him to get some closure, so I can figure out how to be friends. But I guess I'm kind of dreading it at the same time. I really just have no idea how to do this.
School starts next week, and I don't know if I can actually handle it. I'm scared. And don't feel at all rested or refreshed from Winter Break, just more exhausted.
I hope to go into a little more detail later, because there's so much to explain.
But basically, Steve and I broke up last night.
While he was the one to initiate the conversation, it was definitely a mutual decision. And an amicable one. As far as break-ups go, I'm so thankful that ours was relatively smooth (for lack of better words). It wasn't messy or bitter or mean. Very painful and very sad, yes. But not messy. And I think we were more open with each other than we've ever been. The fact is that the core of our relationship is spending time together, and the distance just grew to be too much. But we love each other and care about each other very much; we still want to be in each others lives, be there for each other, and remain close friends. But we just can't be together. I know everyone says that they want to remain friends as a futile way to make it all sting less. But that's not how this is. I believe that we really will be friends. I have absolutely no idea how to do that after being romantically involved for over two years, but I know I'll figure it out. We'll figure it out.
That doesn't mean I'm not sad, though. I know I'll eventually be okay, but I'm very sad right now. And I wish things could have been different. I'm feeling a million things at once which is why I can really only give headlines right now until I process everything. The only expression that sums all this up right now is I don't know which way is up. Which made me remember exactly how I felt the day I dropped him off at the airport. I realized that the last thing I wrote on that day still applies now, just in a radically different context:
I don't know if you've ever felt both happy and devastated at the same time...but it's very strange. I have no idea which way is up right now, but I know that I'm just following my intuition and entering a new chapter of my life and our relationship.
I really can't be 100% sure about this until classes actually start on Thursday, but I have a feeling that graduating college is something that is just not going to happen for me. Part of me is still fiercely hanging onto the idea of staying in school even though it makes me miserable most of the time. I'm waiting for that part to let go. I'm also waiting for the day when I can forgive myself for feeling like this, because right now all I feel is guilt. So much money wasted--both on tuition at the UA and ASU, and for many flights/hotel stays during BFA auditions...so much money, it's disgusting. And so much time wasted; my time, my teachers' time. Again, I can't be 100% sure about this until I see how this semester feels and I talk to some people. But I went to ASU today for an advising session and have another one tomorrow; it's not looking good. I just don't think it's going to happen.
"Let me know...
Do I still got time to grow?
Things ain't always set in stone.
That be known, let me know. Let me--
Seems like streetlights, glowing,
happen to be just like
moments passing in front of me
so I hopped in the cab and,
I paid my fare;
See, I know my destination,
But I'm just not there..."
--Street Lights, Kanye West
(I actually wrote this earrrly this morning--Steve's flight was at 7:00 AM--but I didn't really have the energy to post it anywhere but my LiveJournal.)
I just dropped Steve off at the airport...
And after all the hell I put myself through trying to wrap my mind around the idea of breaking up, we actually decided to stay together and try the long distance thing. I honestly have no idea where things will go, particularly because I don't have plans to move anytime soon (nor am I sure I'll ultimately end up in NYC; I'm interested in a few other cities). But breaking up just didn't feel right at all. We both felt like this isn't the end. And even though it's going to be difficult and neither of us really know how to do this, we want to be together and in each others lives.
But at the same time, I feel this huge void. We're still together, but he's not here. That really knocked the wind out of me when I was walking back to my car after seeing him off. He's not here. Things are different. And that void feels so huge that I want nothing more than to jump on a plane to New York immediately just to have a movie night over Pacificos with lime, fall asleep next to him, and go to brunch in the morning. I'm not sure how to deal with this, and it's going to be a huge adjustment. I'm lucky to have a Dad with billions of frequent flyer miles and a brother-in-law who works for an airline; meaning that visits won't be too difficult or expensive to arrange.
Basically, I can't believe he isn't here. But I am so happy that we're still together, and I love the feeling that I can still call him and tell him about my day.
I don't know if you've ever felt both happy and devastated at the same time...but it's very strange. I have no idea which way is up right now, but I know that I'm just following my intuition and entering a new chapter of my life and our relationship.
