377 days - Blog #67 there and back again, a theater lover's tale

Two weeks ago I left work and drove towards Boston.  I made decent enough time to have some extra minutes for a nostalgic drive through the familiar streets of Newton. I took the back roads to the theater on which I traveled to countless rehearsals and mindlessly home at some ridiculous hour of the morning after karaoke or lingering hours of conversation in the green room.  Some things had changed – like the obscene McMansion style condos that have erected opposite my old apartment (no, developers, those Victorian houses did not need eradication) or some much needed and yet still not much improving construction on Rte. 16.  But mostly… it echoed with the ghosts of those evening trips to and from the theater.

At some point during the day or that drive, I recognized that the date – September 19^th – was a Friday.  It registered in my mind as something I should remember… a birthday? (which it was)… but something else about that day… something on the edge of my brain.  Then I remembered, six years ago it was the opening night of the last show I directed.  The last show I did at the theater towards which I was driving.  And the passage of time came into a clearer focus, as the petty emotions clouded into a vague recognition of their stupidity.

Tomorrow is the anniversary of that show closing.  I plan to go to another theater, the theater in which I find myself cautiously settling at present.  The theater where I first directed a show and where I thought I would never return.

Maybe the dates are insignificant, as are the bookends of the appointments I have made on the anniversaries.  I could and should just enjoy the present of those evenings, the quality of the plays in which I take part as a member of the audience.  Holding onto the past is probably one of the worst things anyone can do in the realm of theater.

Only the reflection of the time that has passed and all that has filled it that wasn’t theater puts it all into a different focus.  I won’t say clearer – because I think sometimes clarity is relative to the angle from which you are looking at with the light.  But I will say there is some humbling and… well, forgiveness.  Of myself.  Of a passion that I love to hate as much as I love.

Never mind my George Bailey complex.

The last show I directed in Barre was It’s a Wonderful Life.  I had the PERFECT George Bailey and a stellar cast overall.  Not to mention a really great staircase that someone built as a centerpiece of the set.  But then… it snowed and half the shows were canceled.  I took that as a message from the universe to get the hell out of my own version of Bedford Falls and not look back.  I wasn’t going to find what I was looking for in the tiny town of dead center Massachusetts.  Not that I knew what I was looking for.  But I didn’t want to lose whatever dreamy eyed ambition I had by any attempts to save and maintain a Building and Loan.

So I went away.  I learned.  I fell down and got up many times.  I fell in love with other people and other things.  I became a writer.  I became one of those people who think the real Massachusetts only exists within the border of 128.  I witnessed some great artists.  I saw art do good in the world.  I saw good in the world make great art.  I grew up.  I was petty.  I was heartbroken.  I was on top of the world.  I missed home.  I went back.  I saw everything the same, but different.  I know my limitations.  I know my weakness to adhere to limitations.  I know how absolutely I love theater.  How great every little thing about it can be and how that greatness has a lot to do with the light with which one chooses to see.

So, tomorrow is an anniversary of an end.  Is it another beginning?  Well, probably not.  Because I’ve already started whatever it is I think I’m shaking up.  Maybe it’s just another shift of the light.  The spotlight that casts out the shadows and makes one see what is important in the here and now.