I keep saying I’m going to audition for a play. Since I got a lead part (as the Toy Scout Elf) in my 4th grade production of some stupid holiday musical and got to sing a SOLO (!!) I’ve always thought I was destined to be on stage. In college I took a class called "Theatric Interpretation of Literature" where you acted out short stories and poems howver you interpreted them, and I got to perform in front of hundreds for some interpretation I did. Sadly, I don’t remember what it was, though I do remember that ALL of my then-feuding-over-crumbs-left-on-the-counter roommates came to support me. I loved that feeling, loved stepping out of myself and becoming someone else, loved the release it brought. My teachers said I was a natural.

I haven’t done anything with it since. At least, not in the traditional sense.

But I’ve acted…oh how I’ve acted. I’ve acted ok when I’m not, portraying the bigger person when all I really wanted to do was climb out of my skin and get OUT OF  THERE. The bigger person, I know how to be, despite the fact that being the bigger person is rarely fun. Allthewhile playing the understudy, I wanted to be the lead.

I’m also a virtuoso of propriety at times (not always, as DebauchAubrey would convey. But sometimes.) I’ve feigned happiness when I was anything but, indifference when it was called for, callousness when I was raw. Saving face, protecting my vulnerability, was always the main goal, and it was only on occasion (read: after a few too many glasses of wine) when a select few saw how things really affected me, saw the indecision and unfettered and unwarranted embarrassment that was the reality of the situation.

And yet now, in this world where I’m trying to be honest with  you, with myself, I find myself wondering if I’ve been too convincing. When I pushed you away, maybe I wanted you to push back. When I left you alone, maybe I wanted you to come get me. When I told you what I wanted, maybe I was just telling you what you wanted to hear.

Maybe I wanted you to fight for me, something in all the years I’ve known you I’ve never seen you do. Or maybe it’s too late, maybe I’ve assumed my role as it was given to me, read the script that I wrote myself, recited the lines as only a true actress can. I’m just tired of my life being a stage and you reading the reviews…it’s time for my curtain call, and for once I don’t want any applause.