A Creative Mama’s Story

Oh my! I think I can. I think I can. I think I can.

My first leading role in creative dramatics was as The Little Engine That Could. I was 7. The same age as my daughter. I held a little cardboard cut out of a train engine in front of me and skooched across the stage an inch at a time chanting, “I think I can. I think I can. I think I can.” Today, I need to be reminded of that moment in my life. We are chugging towards opening night of The Laramie Project. It is time for me as a director to get ready to hand the show over to the actors and the stage manager and step aside. I’m looking forward to that part, but I’m not ready. It’s one of those Both/And things. I am both ready to hand the show over and not ready. I could keep diddling along with this production forever tweaking this and that, coaching the actors, working out the kinks with the background projections, but…Thursday will come with or without my cooperation. Opening night is rapidly approaching and there will be real live human beings sitting in the seats watching what we have put on the stage and there is absolutely NOTHING I can do about it. Here we go!!!

On the other hand. This Sunday things were under control at the theater and I got to spend the day with my daughter outside in Peace Park wandering around the Earth Day exhibits and watching her run and jump on a giant inflatable earth. We have not had a day to ourselves in a long long time. I miss her and I am ready to let go of the show so I can return to her. It is much easier to balance mothering with writing than it is with theater projects. Theater projects have a set schedule and the cast and crew are counting on you to show up. Towards the end of the rehearsal process there is no getting around it - you are at the theater every evening and every weekend. Writing, even collaborative writing, is paced differently. I can write with the energy available to me no matter what kind of energy that is.

Then, there’s the rest of my life - work, relationships, physical health, spiritual health. About the only things I have been able to maintain is a bit of spiritual reading that refreshes my mind and heart. And then there’s work. The job, of course, is easy to maintain because I have to be there. And, if I’m there, then I might as well work. The more I get done the better off I am.

My physical health has been suffering though. I am plagued by allergies that have turned my nose into a water faucet and left me with a relentless cough. Last Friday my body gave up. I had been taking too many different medications trying to get my allergies under control and banish the cough. My stomach rebelled and decided I was to spend the entire day in the bathroom curled up on a towel waiting to vomit. Yuck! That was graphic. Sorry. Basically my body hit the wall and said, “No more!”

A llittle bit of additional stress was added by ending the romantic part of an 8 month relationship and deciding to “just be friends” and applying for a promotion at work. When it rains it pours. I’m just going to hold on and ride this one out to opening night. Our cast party is Saturday night after the show and I’ve scheduled a massage, manicure and pedicure for the afternoon. Maybe my mind and body will forgive me for the crazy schedule and all the stress if I give myself a little bit of pampering.