The Flip Side

This year has been really hard. Incredibly hard. Sure, I'm not trapped under a real life rock, or anything, but it felt that way sometimes. I didn't get in one bike accident this year, but two (and the year's not out!). The flip side: I went 25 years without breaking a bone. 

From start to last there has been a looming feel of what I will hereon refer to as "unsurity." At the risk of  revealing myself too much, between January and February I felt really alone. I finally got a full-time job at the Goodman, but it was all in reverse and cut deeply into family time, friend time, relationship time and performing time. It's since gotten more manageable, but there's still this feeling of not exactly liking where I'm at. Unsurity. The flip side: now I really am alone, and that's making room for me.

Then the first bike accident happened. I was back from what ended up being a difficult trip to Mexico, not quite the recharge I had hoped for. Then the day after Valentine's Day I get nailed by a car door and find myself even more hampered on crutches for a few weeks. If one more person says to me, "Four weeks? That's not so bad," I will murder you. You have no idea (unless you do), so don't tell me what it is that's appropriate or not to go through, especially if it was not my own failure that caused said accident. Let me nail your ankle, and then have the audacity to say your recovery time's not so bad. The flip side: I got to go to Mexico, and I don't actually hope anyone gets in a bike accident, and I'm more empathetic now.


The seesaw then came and went with a successful trip to New York with my favorites, The Grrr, improv team performing at the NYC Improv Festival -- combine that with the Second City inviting me to join their Conservatory ranks, and we've got the makings of a joyful spring.

And it was. Still, there was an inkling, and always is, that I'm not doing enough, or trying hard enough, or working enough, or getting paid enough, or in a successful enough relationship. It's a spiral, and I try to steer clear of it. Work began really getting hard with the hour changes, going from working in the mornings to mostly evenings. I forfeited performing opportunities and the feel of free time. Relationships and friends were unintentionally tabled. The flip side: I know I'll never feel like I'm doing everything I'm supposed to be doing, but I have hope that eventually I will.

The stress of all of this made me an unenjoyable person on the whole, I'm convinced. June had me turn into the latter half of my twenties, and of course, that feeling of being 26 and nothing more was just part of the tailspin. The flip side: at least I'm not in the latter half of my thirties, or in any of them for that matter.

July brought on performances, and thank god for them. Finally part of something bigger than myself. But, maybe the upswing was not as high as I  thought. The thing of it is, when your expectations are low and you're in the midst of everything, it's hard to realize. The flip side: you get out of it.

But of course, August and September could easily be considered the worst months of my adult life so far. The flip side: I didn't die...

For the sake of continuing this festival of feelings, let me paint a picture for you to feel bad about. My relationship ended, I watched my roommate's also end, then I flooded my kitchen and the apartment below me, and, oh yeah, literally fractured my pelvis in three places. Life. Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? Are. You. Kidding. Me?

The flip side: I'll find someone else, so will my roommate, water dries, and bones heal.