raison d'être.

College feels like a million miles away. It feels so far that it nearly feels like it didn't happen, or barely happened. I don't remember it. I didn't drink heavily. I didn't party hard. Sometimes I'm shocked by the amount of "doing" that I just didn't. I went to class; I auditioned for one play (and got so embarrassed by forgetting my monologue that I dropped out of the theater school entirely); I wrote for the Daily Iowan; I hosted a weekly radio show for three years on KRUI 89.7. I  called it "The Early Morning Airstrike."

Higher education — it's supposed to be this time of self-discovery, learning, adventure, finding out what you're good at, trying things — but I don't really think I did those overarching things. I was busy doing this and then that, creating friendships that when looked at closely these days aren't all that close (at least not anymore). Both of my college roommates ended up in Los Angeles post graduation, yet we seldom get together. It's no ones specific fault. We just lead different lives, have different interests, different priorities. We're different, after all. When I really think about it, it's unbelievable that we've made it this far because we are so different.

This time last year, I was just ending a sub-chapter back in a University setting. I was behind a desk, working in an office, watching students linger outside classrooms, skateboard past signs that say "No Skateboarding," and wear business suits as an assignment — And now a full year after that, I'm left wondering, where did it all go? Even if you're in the same decade, it's unbelievable how different a 20-year-old is from a 29-year-old. The incremental change each day of those 365 days from 29 to 30 hits you the day before your birthday. It isn't incremental at all. And now that keep hitting these painful numbers, it feels like I've somehow moved further away from something rather than toward something else. I don't think I'll ever feel my age again. Maybe when I'm 80. By then my hips, knees and eyes won't let me skip past the truth like they do now.

I'm not old. I'm not. I'm really not. But, I feel old. I feel left behind. I have this overwhelming sense that my life is passing me by. I'm sure I'm not alone in this. Like I didn't just waste a couple decades. It seems that for most people their job is where they find their satisfaction, their reason to be, "raison d'être." And as a performer, it's tough to know that my career is somewhat in the hands of others. Yes, I can create my work — I can write for myself — I can join teams and perform shows, and so on, and on, and on; I can do all of these things, and that is amazing. But what does it matter if no one sees it. If no one thinks it's good enough to pay for. Where is my worth? I have so much control, but what is control anyway?

Google defines it as "the power to influence or direct people's behavior or the course of events." But this is only a half definition to me. Control can direct, sure, but when you're out of control there is also a direction, and it's not always down. The relationship between control and success is a lie.

I have so much less "control" than I think. I can do what I can to direct the course of my life, but life will do what it wants, and other people in their lives are doing the same, and my life will intersect with theirs, and there will be "right time and right place," and then the less popular, but more common, "wrong time and wrong place," followed by the confusing, "wrong time and right place," and then of course, the ever frustrating "right time and wrong place." If we're looking at life as a Punnett Square based on life situations: Time and Place as the main variables — "right time and right place" accounts for just 25 percent of what life hands you, the rest, darlings, is unfortunately 75 percent the mismatching of everything else. We cannot control time. So inevitably control is for nothing.

If I want to make any money at my creative craft, that alleged control I love to have so much, goes to the birds. Others write my paycheck. It's incredibly tough.

Where does that leave me?

It leaves time as the constant variable that won't allow itself to be controlled.

the past/ sitting/ and the future.

You can light the fire that's in your head

Put it off, tomorrow will come instead

We don't watch the tower that tells us when

Pull the wicked flower out from its bed.

The Dodos, "Walking"

This time last year I was passing through Arizona, crossing the border into California, and eventually rolling up into Los Angeles onto Russell Avenue. A new apartment in my continued life, a new part.

One of the most generous, caring and scattered people I've ever met and loved forever, Carly Mandell, was in tow. And sweet, thoughtful, generous and gentle, Alli Arnold, was waiting with fresh homemade cookies and beers. Everything I saved from my old life was with me, ready to be part of what my parents called my "new adventure." (I originally thought that was a rather condescending sentiment, but then again, when my sister Colleen moved out here in 2008, my parents referred to Los Angeles as "Camp Hollywood" for two years.)

Three-hundred-sixty-five days isn't that many days (even if spelling it out makes it seem the opposite), and the longer I am here, the more I realize that truth. It's so funny. The first question new people ask of you tends to be, "How long have you been here?" or some derivative, and after about three months, I literally became old news; that felt so good. It feels good to be considered part of this insanely transient city where people are like migrating birds, telling themselves: "I'll give it a month," "I'll give it a year," "I'm just testing out the waters," "I'm going to see what I'm made of," etc.

But then you meet the people that are here for decades, that grew up here, that have no intention of leaving — and you're a baby to them, this one-year-old baby with chubby cheeks, a can-do attitude, and more blind faith in their talent than maybe even armed with talent. But as Steve Martin says in his book Born Standing Up, "Persistence is a great substitute for talent."

In some ways I thought moving here would change everything, but it didn't. It didn't change my drive — it encouraged it. It didn't change my energy — it grew it. It didn't change my goals — it clarified them. Making this move has made my life more pointed. I know where I want to go, and all of my choices (I hope) are evidence of that, down to the variety of jobs I've held since landing in La-La-Land.

Even now, after months of go-go-go, for the last four weeks I have spent an unusual amount of time sitting down — first in my car — then in a chair — that's in my office. So much sitting at this new job, a short term gig that will take up my days until the end of the year. It's too much sitting for me. I don't know how so many people do jobs like this for their whole lives. The only logical reason that one could do this much sitting is because it's what you have to do in order to keep living in Los Angeles because living is expensive and when you're not at this job you're trying to be a paid actor. (Run on sentence to illustrate my psychotic ability to do a million things, however frantically/poorly.)

I am so thankful that I know this won't be how I spend my life in the long run. I am so thankful that I am not content to bounce around from day-job to day-job without the hope that my persistence, talent, comedic sensibility, look, and all these things a million people have, but that I somehow illogically think will make me different — will actually make me different.

And it's fine. It's fine that this is what you have to do. People don't talk about the grind they had before they did what they want to be doing. It's the first chapter to the rest of your life. So right now, yes, it seems that most of my life is going from one sitting job to the next job I sit at, but fortunately for me, there's a smattering of film projects, sketch shows, improv performances and auditions in between. I am so thankful.

But seriously — I cannot believe how much sitting I do. (My next post will be a break down of the amount of sitting I do, if you're curious.)

So here's to being here for another year, and all the years after that.

my mom: "The Truth Hurts"

The backseat of my mom's old car smelled like sour milk and soccer cleats for the better part of a decade. Ah, the mighty Ox. That's what we called her giant black suburban. The license plate was OX-48800. It's not like we had to reach very far for what became a classic nickname. That's the car my siblings and I all learned how to drive with — from learning to parallel park or how to get out of a fish tail situation on an icy morning, to getting in our first fender benders or breaking both the front and back windshields.

I'm thinking of her car now because I'm thinking about her. I'm thinking about her whole life, her life before me, before Larry, before Colleen, before Sean, before Timmy and before Kevin. I'm thinking of her before my dad, before she was a wife and a mother, before she was a nurse, when she was just a young woman, lost, like I am now. I wrote my first solo show, "Heart/s," last week and performed it Sunday night, and honestly, I could not have done it without her; she is such an integral part of me. And for those who saw the show, and for those that will come August 29th in Chicago, you can and will see how much so.

We talked on the phone the other week. It was during my lunch break from a gig I had at a production company in Santa Monica. I was driving to find a Mexican restaurant nearby the office. I'm shocked by the lack of solid burrito spots in Los Angeles. In Chicago there's a burrito restaurant on every damn corner, and they are all the best. Taco Burrito on Lincoln and Diversey, aka Los Tres Ponchos, is really the best, but they are all very good. Garcia's in Lincoln Square? Yeah, also the best. I mean, I could go on, but I have to stop. El Burrito, under the Addison redline? So good. Ok. I'm stopping. Not El Jardin. I'm not a fan of that spot (also in Wrigley — though I will say they do have a pretty stellar margarita).

Anyway, I called my little momsicle to talk because I miss her. I miss her all the time because I love her. Sometimes I feel like I don't know her though. I think a lot of people feel this about their parents. Last night in my Groundlings class one of my classmates did a character based on his father, and when asked what his father's point of view on life was, the student was in some ways at a loss. And when I reflected on how I might do Mary Sheila Marshall as a character (and she is a total character), I don't quite know what her point of view on life is either. If I had to say anything it would be, "Life is hard, things are hard, get over it because complaining doesn't make things better." A painful aphorism of hers is, "The truth hurts," which is a hard thing to hear when you just want an empathetic ear and someone to stroke your hair while not saying anything at all.

Whenever I ask her about her life she is vague, focuses on whatever she is doing at that moment and gives me a little rundown of what her plans are for that day. It's frustrating. It's frustrating to try and get to know someone I've known for almost three decades. She's shocked whenever I tell her I feel like I don't know her very well. I know her, her inclinations, the inflection of her voice, her catch phrases. I know her face, the roughness of her incredibly strong hands, the smoothness of her cheeks. I know what she looks like when she's just woken up, what she looks like when she's already sleeping, and when she's going from being happy to being sad. I know her — but so much of her is her history, so much of her is the past that makes up her present.

Can we ever know other people, truly? It's a widely believed notion that we can only be close to six people at a time. That makes sense. I only have six people in my car speed dial. Most family phone plans are limited to six. The big table at restaurants typically maxes at six, and then you have to add additional tables. As Marshall children, we know what it is to wait for the big table at any given restaurant, read: The Silo in Lake Bluff, Illinois, a Marshall family hot spot from 1990-2000.

There's something about that not being able to be close to many people — it's hard to spread the love to more than a select few. And I suppose, with six kids, a husband, parents, nine siblings of her own, and a slew of friends and acquaintances, Sheila Marshall has become an expert in loving others. She might be all over the place, but it's only because she wants to be everywhere at once, sharing in the lives of the people around her, and letting them know she does care deeply. She really does.

I hope to be more like her...minus her adages and the reality check no one asked for. (But, I suppose I've already inherited those things about her too.)

Preludes and Post Scripts

"I am moved by fancies that are curled 

Around these images, and cling:  

The notion of some infinitely gentle 

Infinitely suffering thing." 

-T.S. Eliot, Preludes

I regularly find myself remembering snippets of poetry that I had memorized due to my high school pastime, Forensics (also known as Speech Team). If you've read back to old entries I talk of my love of T.S. Eliot often, specifically The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, which to me, sums up the tone of loneliness absolutely.

People say that those who surround themselves with people the most are typically the loneliest. They're trying to fill that void. I feel as if I am that way. It's easy to get lost in others as an escape from ourselves. I've been trying to get away from doing this — but instead of feeling like I know myself better, I find that it's daunting to realize I may not know myself as well as I assumed. It's strange to spend all day every day being myself without thinking about it, and then with others I am someone else, a hologram. I am there, but not present.

To be in the latter half of my 20s and finding these findings seems so old. I know, I know, "You're not old!" But I'm not young, either. I'm not like a spritely young graduate. I'm not a bourgeoning teenager. I'm not a child. I'm not a young adult. I'm not an old adult.

We call people in their twenties, 20-somethings. We can't even come up with a real name for it. I'm a 20-something. What that something is, no idea.

I am a person chasing after it — what is "it?" There is no label. I could say I'm chasing after a career in the arts. I'm chasing after a dream to be a creator. I could say—. I could say it all — but what is it that we want in the end? When people die are they shouting from their insides, "I wish I had written just one more play!" "I wish I had just finished putting the shutters on the house I wanted to flip." "I wish this," and "I wanted that."

Doubtful that it is things or a to-do list accomplished. A bucket list, sure, yes, we want to do things, but to what end, who for or who with?

What turned out to be the preview to when my grandpa Harry died, when he thought it was the moment to go, that is, his 10 children and numerous grandchildren, his wife, were all surrounding him. Father Trout was there to anoint him with last rights. He asked my grandma Celeste to sing Danny Boy for him. It was very climactic, truthfully told. And we kept waiting for him to close his eyes the last time, breathe his last breath, say one last thing. But it didn't happen that way. The doctor came in after what seemed like only a few minutes, but was in actuality much longer, and said Harry was not yet going anywhere.

It was the strangest thing. We all had collectively decided this was the time, and then it wasn't. But, I got to see what my grandpa Harry wanted to be like in his last moments. He was lucid until the very end. And in some ways, he got to be there for his last moments twice, instead of just wasting away sedated. That seemed like such a gift to me.

Surrounded by the people who make us who we are — I suppose that's what I want.

"Those who sharpen the tooth of the dog, meaning
Death 

Those who glitter with the glory of the hummingbird, meaning
Death

Those who sit in the sty of contentment, meaning
Death 

Those who suffer the ecstasy of the animals, meaning
Death 

Are become unsubstantial, reduced by a wind, 

A breath of pine, and the woodsong fog 

By this grace dissolved in a place" 

-T.S. Eliot, Marina

Something like it.

There were pictures everywhere in his apartment. Not pictures of family or friends, or anything that would speak to who he really was, but rather these faux antique prints. They were cool, mind you, but it bothered me. I couldn't quite figure out why until now. Something inauthentic about the nature of his life. I laid down my coat, as I had a few weeks before, on the floor. He picked it up, put it on the back of a kitchen chair. It hung there limply. We sat. We sat and starred at one another for a few seconds, each taking the other in. It felt like it had been a while, yet none at all, and at the same time it genuinely felt like it wasn't real. Oh, the irony.

A few weeks really isn't very much time. Don't we all let time slip by without even noticing? Years go by before our base instincts of "Wait! What's happening in my life" kick in. It's adult time, and a lot can happen in adult time. Blink, and you're thirty, or fifty, or dead.

It was late when I came over. Rain swept across the street, my wedges drenched in January precipitation. Not wearing enough make-up for it to run. Buzzed in. Door opened. Welcomed.

"So what's been up?" I asked, knowing his answer would be as void of content as my question.

"You know, just been busy." Ding ding ding. A pause. "You know."

But I didn't know. That's why I asked. How easy is it to get out of actually knowing a person? Very easy.

"Yeah," I smiled. "I know."

A few minutes later, jokes exchanged, conversation came easier, and with that a comfort we all long for. But it's a fake comfort. A fake relationship. More like a relationship that in the end no one wants, so we discard it like the groceries we intended to eat, but instead let spoil.

There are smiles that in the end mean nothing, and a connection that is no connection at all. So we sit at the bottom of the bin; it was anything but pretend, because it happened. And we both wish it didn't.

"And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile" -TS Eliot. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock