the ending of a life

i remember when it started.

drama club wasn't really a drama club, it was just cameron coming over to school (probably for credit for his theater major) and playing games with the small group of kids (most all of whom were speechies or future speechies). ms gregory didn't do anything except walk in the room a couple times because there has to be a school sponser for a club. meetings were never announced, if you were lucky you walked into the auditorium after school one day and saw that cameron was there. and then the performance, which consisted of endless duos and help, with maybe one rehearsal in the little rehearsal room at the college, which held the performance also. and yeah, it was fun, but it wasn't drama, it was speech.

and my mom saw that i really wanted to be a part of drama. sports were too much of a pain to participate in since i had so much homework and we lived out of town, so she decided to get back into drama, so that i (and people like me) would have someplace to go and something to do.

the first meetings we got the basic group: tim, natalia, dan, andy, catte, saraphia, jess, me. shortly thereafter we rounded out the group with alex, steph, matt, and paul. for the first play we put on the largest play we've ever done: our town. and we had to beg people to be in the play, especially guys, and we pulled it off, and it was awesome. our town bred the first drama inside joke (damn george!), as well as some friendships that have lasted though now.

our town was followed by rest assured (and the birth of mrs. shmaltz and dan as the devil), tim's last play. tim was the first senior from our initial group to graduate.

in the next year or so we adopted scar and peter into our group, followed by sarah's little brother mark and a little crazy squirt of a kid who wore awesome shoes and a shirt of a tuxedo (by far the coolest seventh grader we've ever adopted).

plays came and went, i went on a major recruiting binge in tenth grade, and then it was time. the last play ever with the seniors. and what play was it? rememberin stuff. i still have mixed feelings when i look back on that play, but andy, catte, and saraphia definitely made that play so much more awesome than i ever thought it could be. they knew it was their last play, and they worked for it, and did an awesome job.

dan wasn't in the last play, but it was ok, because he was in a production, a type of poetry production. i went to it with my mom, and was just blown away by the content of the minds of these performers. and i saw dan, this awesome, talented, funny, crazy guy, and remembered the shy quiet kid who played basketball with my brother in eighth grade. was that a transformation.

and then they were gone. i had a hard time with that, them leaving, me knowing i'd probably never see them again in my life. but memories are good, and i still have memories of the past them, and can still share some of those memories with a few people.

last year. the year of the junior high boom. there were more little children at that first meeting than i knew what to do with. insane? yes. especially when we all thought back on our town where we had to beg people to be in the play. i again went on a slight recruiting binge and procured a kyle and daivd for drama club. and they fit in in about two seconds. and so it was: we fortified our happy family of drama club.

and i think it's safe to say that the diary of anne frank made a big impact on all of us. more than any other play that we did at school. it was just right place, right time.

and then now. i remember thinking last night that i had to remember the name of the foundation i was using, and then realizing that no, i don't have to remember. i won't ever be doing this again. and that was it. i didn't feel sad about it. i remember missing the seniors that had graduated before, but now that i'm a senior i won't miss drama. and it's weird. drama has been my life for the past five years. drama is all that i do. but... i've never felt like a part of drama. just like i'm watching all these other awesome people develop strength and confidence and a place to belong, but i'm still in the background. and i saw that even more this year. i've been in drama for five years, but people don't know it. and i guess i'm fine with it now. i took drama seriously, but i'm not an actress. i don't have the mindset for it. i can figure out blocking, i know when you say a line, how you say a line, where you look, where you stand, how you turn, when to pause, how to fix upstaging, how to project, how to walk, how to pantomime, how to react, how to use your body to communicate what you mean. i know how to do that because i know what feels wrong, what looks wrong. it's like my only instinct. but i'm not supposed to act. i'm not drama, i'm not a legacy, i'm just routine and procedure.

and so i'm not sad that it's over. we've been building up to this point for five years. i just feel bad for the ones we're leaving behind. but i know they're in good hands.

and now on to other things. projects, stories, trips, exams. acceptance letter and full tuition scholarship, the reinforcement that i don't want to go anywhere, i don't want to do anything, i just want time to stop. the reinforcement that no, i'm not dead yet and no, i won't die anytime in the near future. the reinforcement that i have to go through the motions because other people are expecting me to. and that's a thousand dollars down the drain, to a place that i don't want to see and people i don't want to talk to, and classes i don't want to miss and confusion i don't want to put myself through. and i don't want to see it and hate it, and i don't want to see it and love it. and sometimes i wish that i had never applied. the only thing that saves me for now is that they haven't sent out acceptance letters yet.

and i don't like to think about the future, the future that doesn't exist. and i don't want to think about graduating and quite possibly never seeing my friends again in my life. but i do. and that's where it all came from. i love you. i've told that to you before and i'll tell it to you again. i love you, and i'll always love you, because that's what love is. but you're leaving. and some of you are already gone, have been gone for a few months. and you're a different person, a better person, as it is and as it should be. and the fact is, i'm me, and i've regressed a few lifetimes (even if i do progress a lifetime a week). and i want you to have a full and happy life, i want you to love people, to have people love you, to find someone who makes you happy and understands you. i want you to live.

i want you to live, but deep down i still don't.

and that's where it came from. where the letting go of relationships came from. i've depended on you to keep me sane, to keep me here (mentally and emotionally) for the past three years. and because of this i haven't had to cope with myself. and yes, i love you and will always love you, but even though i maintain these relationships, i won't be able to fully count on them. i won't be able to look into your eyes and have all the noise in my head stop, i won't be able to feel your aura when you walk into a room and feel safe. and frankly it terrifies me. and i figured that the only way to keep myself sane was to start disconnecting now, to start letting you go little by little so it won't be such a kick in the head when you aren't here.

and i have to be able to write. i have to be able to say this, to say what i'm thinking, to say everything the way i want to say it. to be able to write in my blog and my journal and still mean it afterwards. "... but writing, writing i can put down all my thoughts and feelings as i come to them, i can go off on tangents and write everything that i mean, that i feel, that i'm unsure of. and it's all there. no forgetting or getting confused. and it can be read and read again, expanded on and explained as much as i need to. i can get my soul down, get the noise out of my head. when i can't write i can't fully express myself, which ultimately means that i can't fully understand myself, even if i am happy and content in the moment. but i overlooked one huge thing. if i'm content, if i'm happy, if i feel other people in my relationships and don't have any question about it, then i will be able to write. it will all fit into place, and it will be pure. a blue moment within itself." and i wrote this, and i meant it in the lifetime that it was, after thinking on what i wrote before and what i meant, on why i need to write. and i read it now and think about it. when i am happy, when i'm content, in theory, writing should be no problem. but when i think back on it, it's actually the other way around. when i can write, then i can be content. and all i seem to write about is death, pain, confusion, time, sleep, pure emotion and pure feeling, all the noise in my head. and i've been writing about that for years. and i think that's just who i am. i can't write about stereotypical happy cheery things because they don't move me, they aren't true to me. and for me, that's fine. i'd rather write about death and pain and pure emotion, because i feel wrapped up in it sometimes. and in truth, i like the feeling of something pure, even if it is pain and darkness and death, because it's pure.

and that thought alone makes me feel that i'm different from people. not all people, because i'm positive that there are people like me out there. and i feel fine about that. i've learned that that's who i am, and i don't expect other people to understand me or try to understand me. when i can write, i understand me. when i can't write... well, i indulge in other acts that get the same feelings out. which i think is fine for me, but again other people might not understand it, and i don't expect them to.

and i don't know if you'll understand this, understand what i'm trying to say or what i think i'm trying to say. but dialogue is good, it sets up points of explanation. and i'm willing to explain as long as i can, if you still want to understand.