Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head

As a young girl I had a Hummel (or probably a knock-off) music box - a ceramic statuette of a boy and girl on a bench, cuddled beneath and umbrella - that used to play that song.  I loved that music box... but then it fell off my dresser and broke.  Something made me think of it the other week and now that memory seems even more fitting as so many ideas and bits of bad luck (I recently mused that I have the Midass touch: everything - trying to reconnect with an old friend, holiday gift buying, my career, etc - I touch turns to shit) or no luck or just the absence of things I strive for or the presence of things that are bothersome keep pelting me on the head.  Even including an actual icy rain from last night that leaked through the theatre's roof in three different places - including one upstage center.

[Alternative titles for this entry, by the way, were: Must The Show Go On?, and Neither Rain Nor Floods Nor Leaks On Stage Shall Keep The Actors From Their Appointed Rounds.]

Yesterday was a total BEYOTCH weather-wise.  The kind of weather that makes everyone feel like a homeless mongrel dog - cold and wet and windy.  And it POURED.  We're not talking, like, that sort of chilly New England-y misty type day - it was like god spraying you with a cold garden hose.  And one of my crosses during the show is outside so I can re-enter from the house.  And there was about 6 inches of standing water where I had to walk, making the dilapidated wooden stairs to that entrance even more treacherous.  But I did the cross anyway so I could re-emerge as a soggy bird (yes, a goddmned bird).  Plus there was the leak on stage (no small drip, drip either) and one right outside the dressing room entrance. 

Then on the way home I shared a cab downtown to get closer to my train since there was NO protection any umbrella could afford from that misery, only the cab broke down and I had to walk to the nearest train, anyway... which wasn't running.  About 90 minutes later I was finally home and in a nice hot shower that, if I had one wish, I would still right now be enjoying.

Someone mentioned last night that maybe I should move to LA.  This has been suggested before... but I also received a wonderfully warm and friendly email this morning from a solidly working actress out in LA offering me hope and her insight as a professional as well as that of a woman whose been in the business (and on this earth) a bit longer.  She didn't push the notion of switching cities but...

I don't know.  I'd need a day job and a car and I still have a bit of lingering debt... is it possible?  Is it a good decision?  A change would be nice... as would staying in NYC.

I feel silly.  Like my dreams and hopes were stupid, you know?  Like, "Oh wow, what a schmuck I was for thinking I could do it.  Now everyone is looking at me like, 'Poor thing - she couldn't do it.  But I sorta knew all along she wouldn't'".  I rarely if ever feel this way about my career because I do know that there's no reason for me not to succeed - as a very smart, attractive and talented woman, I know I can deliver. Or, maybe I'm delusional like one of those people who puts on tan linen pants in the winter time with pink athletic tube socks and black ballet flats (I worked with a woman who wore that combination once) and looks at myself in the mirror and thinks, "Yes - that looks good".  Maybe my gauge is off.  Maybe I am bad or undeserving - or maybe I am good and deserving but should just realize I need to pack it in cuz it ain't never gonna happen.

Whatever.  I think maybe I'm just too stubborn to give up.

--Susan Atwood

Comments

[Stacey Jackson]

Miss Susan,

All I can say is that many, many careers begin when actors reach their 30s when they are no longer competing for ingenue roles against impossibly gorgeous actors who are there to be just that. Gorgeous. You are talented and funny and you are moving forward...but if you are never happy, what is all of this worth? You sent me a very helpful list of "things that we can control" and "things that we can't control" some time ago. You helped me a lot...but take your own advice this time: concentrate on things you can control. I hate to see you so unhappy. Once you decide what you want and how you want to go about it, you will feel a lot better. It's a marathon, not a race. And you've had more success, as you have said, this year than any other year so...isn't that progress? A step forward? A confirmation that you are in the right business? I wish only the best for you. Now you need to believe in the best for yourself.