I came into a little bit of cash. I had a whole week to myself. I could have gone anywhere. I seriously considered flying to Venice. I’ve always wanted to go to Venice, especially considering the horrible reality that within my lifetime the entire city could be underwater.
I started researching hotels and neighborhoods, museums and restaurants, until I slowly realized- I’d be alone. In Venice.
This idea ended up getting thrown out for two reasons: one- because after getting over the inevitable midsummer stench, I imagine Venice to be an incredibly romantic city (I had not, at this time, ever been overly affected by things traditionally “romantic”. I don’t watch romantic comedies, read gushy girly literature and I am much more Rolling Stones and The Who than Andrew Lloyd Weber.). But to be alone in a city where I imagined being surrounded by beautiful couples who look like they are two perfect pieces of a puzzle stuck together for eternity, sharing their hand-holding bliss as they clumsily assist each other into the first gondola that comes along and giggle and smooch and gaze longingly into each other’s eyes as the stripe shirted pilot croons, did not appeal to any part of me except for my inner masochist.
The second reason is because I’m a 5’ 11” blonde American...and even though I’ve never been to Venice, I’ve been to Italy. And I know the kind of trouble that combination breeds. And I didn’t need that kind of trip.
So, it was with great excitement that I instead booked a plane ticket to London, a train ticket to Stratford, a car to the Lake District and Edinburgh and another train back to London. I’ve been to the UK many times and even lived in London for awhile while I studied classical acting, but, as of the beginning of this summer, I hadn’t been to the UK by myself since 2001. At that time I was waist deep in a completely avoidable shit storm that required me to travel back to London for the second time in two months; that trip ended in me bringing back 8 times more emotional baggage than I arrived with. And I sat on that baggage for years, not going back to the UK, not dealing with it, just sitting on the bags hoping they’d naturally disintegrate. Walls went up, vunerability disappeared and the future uncrackable me was created.
The current trip was great, though. Just. Friggin. Great...
...Until I got to Stratford. It was only the 3rd day. And thats’s when I saw the rowboats...those God damn rowboats.
I had just purchased a ticket to see “The White Devil” by the dark, violent, brilliant Jacobean playwright John Webster later that evening. I had a couple of hours to kill, so I took an innocent stroll along the river. The swans were swimming, famiies were kayaking, the flowers were gorgeous and the breeze was sweet. I was breathing it all in, feeling just fine.
Then suddenly, without warning, there they were. Three God damn adorably charming wooden Stratford rowboats. Empty, tied to the little dock, floating there on the river waiting for someone and their perfect companion to take for a sunset row along the Thames.
They were each labeled.
“Antonio”.
“Cymbeline”.
“Romeo”.
Their effect on me was instantaneous. Breath stealing. Blinding. Gut wrenching. I stood there, stunned and silent, with tears starting to stream down my face. I was staring at Antonio, Cymbeline and Romeo, mouth slightly open, as if they’d just called me a horrible name usually reserved for a middle school bully’s prey of the week. I felt offended by them. That they had purposefully invaded my perfect vacation, mocking me for being there, by myself, with no friend to row with me. That they had followed me and waited until I was finally at my most peaceful and took the perfect opportunity to sucker punch me right in my vulnerable little face.
Here I was, in the birthplace of the poet whose works I used to lust after but ended up falling head over heels in love with. The 450 year old playwright whose brain I would love to insert into a corpse and create an Elizabethan Frankenstein if I could. I was here, in the most important of places to my theatrical heart, and these little rowboats were mocking me for being there by myself. They creaked as they swayed back and forth and knocked into each other in a symphony of insults composed for my ears only.
“Lost”
“Alone”
“Unable”
These words came across my mind just as suddenly as the visual of the boats did. These are words I fear. Words I work everyday to keep out of my life. I tried to get away from them. I kept going along the path. But as I walked alone they multiplied!
“Banquo”.
“Orsino”.
“Benedick”.
....................................................................................*sigh*
OK, rowboats. OK. You win.
I sat down on the dock. Sunset in Stratford. I sat on that damp dock for half an hour. Staring at these row boats. Allowing myself to just look at them. To let my mind wander, to allow my eyes to puff up and explode with tears until my body couldn’t create anymore. I don’t even know the specific reasons I cried, other than the fear of those words.
I was just simply...moved. Vulnerable. Present. Affected. Human. Breathing. For that half hour, my life became very apparent. Very beautiful. Very full. Very important. Very confusing. Very scary. Very....alive.
A month before I left I was having a drink with a friend who, after hearing me blather on about my problems and fear, trying to get him to justify any stupid feelings I was having, said something so simple to me:
“Just feel it. Good or bad, just feel it."
I had thought about how to actually do that for a month. I had been trying my hardest to feel whatever it was I was feeling, honestly. I never succeeded. It was always forced, always obvious, always controlled...
...until this moment. It took a bunch of clunking, floating, empty rowboats labeled with names of characters I’d only seen on stage and paper, but had apparently, because of my studies and passions and past-times, quietly seeped into my being and helped me bring my wrinkled, forgotten, moth-eaten emotions to the surface. Those guys pushed that baggage out of my eyes and my pores....and possibly a nostril or two (see: sleeves).
If anyone had seen me sitting there crying they would have thought I was absolutely insane or incredibly dramatic. And they would have been right. It was embarassing. But it was necessary. I had given myself permission to be affected, for one brief but very important moment, by the romance of Stratford, of Shakespeare, of my own life. I actually allowed myself, for the first time in years, to “just feel it”.
...I followed it up by watching the most violent, sadistic, selfish, gluttonous, amazing piece of in your face murderous theatre I’ve ever seen. And this made me just as happy and excited.
BALANCE.
