Sun Rising

Yesterday was my last-ever fast food shift.

 

It doesn't feel real yet. There's still a part of me that expects to have to get up at 5.45am on Tuesday morning, because I have, every Tuesday, for nearly four years now.

I have a new job, in the theatre industry. I'm not on stage (or even backstage), but it's still theatre-adjacent, and it may very well be the closest I'll ever get to a sustainable career in the arts. I get to sit down on the job now -- that's a novelty. In fast food there literally is no sitting. There's barely even just-standing. You're always doing something, carrying something, stocking something, cleaning something, and you're always moving at full speed. Do that for 40 hours a week and... well, let's just say that my body hurt more after one fast food shift then it EVER hurt after any of the long weeks of dance rehearsals over my 20+ year dance career. The theatre is also paying me more to sit on a chair at a desk than fast food ever paid me to run myself absolutely ragged every single day.

I had been looking to switch careers for several years already. I was burnt out of fast food by June 2022, but held on to the job because I know now how hard it is to get a job in this economy... especially for somebody with a brain as broken as mine. I didn't want to leave until I knew I had something lined up. That didn't happen for almost two years.

After a year and a half of unsuccessful job-hunting, I injured my back pretty severely, and I'm pretty sure the restaurant only put up with my ever-increasing need for time off because even though I could hardly walk, I was still their fastest worker. (My doctor forbade me from doing any kitchen duties, and they had to schedule three people to take my place there. Prior to my injury, I worked the kitchen alone every morning.)

That back injury was a blessing in disguise.

When I finally got a doctor's note to cut my hours (which in itself was an adventure for another post), that finally left me with enough time (and more importantly, enough energy) to actually job hunt, and to actually follow up on leads and applications. And after two years, as we stared down the barrel of homelessness due to lack of income, I finally got a job -- an upgrade in nearly every way, in an industry and at an organization I liked and believed in.

As I walked home yesterday from my final fast food shift, I had sort-of-accidentally started playing Connie Scott's Forever Young album. And as I trudged through the final blocks of that final walk home, these words lilted over a bed of gentle keys into my ears...

You that are weary and in need of rest

You that are brokenhearted and oppressed

You shall find comfort here...

 

There'll be an ending to the twilight zone

There'll be a sunrise like you've never known

Morning will soon be here...

 

(from The Coming Dawn)

 

The sun is indeed rising. I can breathe for the first time since I was in Mary Poppins (July 2018). Maybe this is what hope feels like.

For years I was in a stupor -- get up, trudge to work, give everything I had, my soul, my spirit, for pennies with which to pay the growing bills, trudge home, stare at the wall in a fruitless attempt to find the energy to live, go to bed, dream of every possible horror life had to offer (if I even dreamt at all), then do it all again. I moved slowly, in a fog. The world around me was grey and cold and hard.

And now I'm waking up.

Anatomy of a Trigger

The worst thing I have ever been told in my entire (albeit relatively short) performing arts career was not "you'll never make it" (thanks, Mom), "you're stupid" (thanks, extended family), "when are you going to get a real job?" (thanks, Grandma), "you'll never pass the exam" (thanks, dance teacher), or even "God can't love you because you're a dancer so neither will we" (thanks, home church).

It was during a meeting with the director of my college program midway through my final year. It's fairly well-known that I'm not a flexible human being. I just wasn't built with long ligaments. Grace, sure, but not flexibility. This program director had been on my case about my (lack of) flexibility for a while by this point so I wasn't surprised when he brought it up again in the context of a course selection meeting. He threw all his old tired phrases at me about how you can't call yourself a dancer if you're not flexible and how I should be stretching more and I said, "I've been stretching every day for two years."

He looked me right in the eye -- pale water-blue eyes right into my blueberry ones -- and said, "You know what? I don't believe you."

I could have slapped him in that moment.

In one single sentence, he destroyed every ounce of self-confidence I had ever managed to scrape together. He invalidated not only my daily two-hour dance practice sessions, he invalidated nearly twenty YEARS of training and practice. I had suspected for years that no matter what I tried it was never good enough, and here was proof of it -- the man who had mentored me, who had called out my ability to act in the first place, who had even saved my life less than two years earlier, had just confirmed it for me. I wasn't good enough, and I never would be. No amount of practice would make up for the fact that I was just destined to suck.

That one sentence nearly killed me.

My depression intensified. I hated myself with a renewed passion and vengeance. I would practice dance until I literally collapsed, then get up and keep going until I collapsed again. And then I would get up and keep going some more. I neglected legitimate academic homework for practice. I went home for Christmas break and took pictures of myself doing a two-hour stretch session on Christmas freaking Day so I would have proof that I was actually trying. I was logging six hours of practice per day, and berating myself for not doing more. My sleep schedule -- which has never been solid to begin with -- slid completely off the rails as I stayed up later and later in an attempt to get more stretching in, to figure out why the heck I couldn't be good enough given the intense hours of practice.

I stopped eating, even though he never said anything about my weight. Partly because I didn't have time to actually make and eat food (that was a waste of valuable time that I could spend on practicing instead), but also partly in hopes that I could starve myself to death. If I couldn't practice myself to death fast enough to satisfy the insatiable need of ABSOLUTE PERFECTION, then I would take away food and hasten the process. And I grew to love that hollow ache in my stomach from the lack of food. It meant I was actually trying. It meant I was sacrificing. They say you have to sacrifice to be an artist and darn it, nobody was going to be able to say that I wasn't making sacrifices. Nobody was going to be able to say that I wasn't trying. Maybe if I starved myself I would be light and lean enough to be a good jumper without being exhausted after four jumps and maybe it would make it easier to get my leg up higher because it would be less encumbered with flesh. I grew to enjoy the feeling of my heart threatening to explode within me, the sound of my own strangled gasps for breath. My hemoglobin levels dropped to half what their normal levels should be and in response I pushed harder physically, because pushing through adversity is what artists do -- you're not a real artist if you're not facing insurmountable odds. According to the numbers I needed a blood transfusion and I talked my way out of it partly because I didn't want to be kept alive. If I died, I died. All I wanted was to be enough for everyone and maybe death was the only way to achieve that.

I was in the middle of a performance run at the time they found out how low my hemoglobin was and at the end of each performance I was coughing so much I would taste blood, so oxygen-deprived that I would start blacking out on the way back to the dressing room -- but every night I would dance even more full-out, push harder, strain further, smile bigger, knowing what the cost would be but doing it anyway because I would rather die than give a lackluster performance. I gave everything -- almost literally everything.

And it still meant nothing.

Nobody even noticed. At the cast party after the show closed, everyone was sitting around the table comparing texts that their friends/family/long-lost school mates were sending them congratulating them on their performance, and I got nothing. Literally nothing. I had friends at the closing show. They sent gushing texts to two of my castmates, fawning over how good they were... and I didn't get a single one. Not even 'hey, good job.' Nothing.

I had almost died to give the performance I did. Was it not good enough simply because I hadn't actually died? What more could I have possibly done? Was it even possible to be good enough for anybody or was the deck just permanently stacked against me? Should I just give up and save everybody the trouble of having to actually tell me to give up because I'd never be enough for them anyway?

I still don't have the answers to these questions.

Pieces of Starving

Written 23 March 2019.

Whatever this thing is that wants me dead -- mental illness, demons, whatever you want to call it -- is resourceful. I've started fighting to not be sad and negative all the time (because otherwise nobody will ever associate with me and I want human interaction more than anything), and in the absence of space to be sad, it's turned to other means.
In an attempt to get this out into the open but unwilling to burden my already long-suffering friends and acquaintances with yet another issue, I'm posting it here. If my friends see this, they see it of their own accord. I didn't force it on them, and I take comfort in that.

I've been restricting food. I've discussed this with my counsellor before on a couple of occasions, as it's popped up before. But each time it gets stronger. I only ate one meal yesterday, and it's 1.23pm as I type this and I haven't eaten yet today.

Part of it is finances -- I can't really afford to buy more food, so I'm trying to stretch out what I have.

Part of it is perfectionism -- 'you aren't good enough to deserve to eat.'

Part of it is scheduling -- between school and rehearsals and job-hunting, I don't have time to make food.

Part of it is exhaustion -- again, school and rehearsals and job-hunting take so much out of me that the thought of making and eating food makes me want to lay down and die because I just don't have the energy.

Part of it is for attention -- maybe if people notice I'm not eating they'll start paying attention to me, if only to intervene.

Part of it is suicidal -- if I stop eating, eventually I'll die. Maybe the too-soon death of one who literally starved for the sake of being good enough (too busy practicing to eat) will wake some people up. Plus, I'll be dead and won't have to fight anymore, and I'm just so tired of fighting. It seems pointless and I feel like I'm not really needed. Yeah, it would suck for the shows I'm in because they'll have to respace everything, but really, how much would it affect anyone's soul if I wasn't there? I'm shoved in the back anyway because I'm not good enough, it's not like anyone will notice I'm gone... and that's not their fault, it's mine. For not being good enough. For not practicing hard enough.

I shouldn't feel guilty for eating food, for spending the money, for not eating something other than eggs -- again, but somehow I do. It's not that I think I'm fat or need to lose weight, it's mostly just pure mental/physical exhaustion.

Sacrifice

Written 7 March 2019, 11.01pm.

I'm tired of trying so hard and sacrificing so much and only getting people telling me I'm still not trying hard enough/giving enough. I have sacrificed my time, money, sleep, meals, friendships, health, mental health... everything for this. And still it's not enough. What WILL be enough? What more do I even have left to give up to be good enough to satisfy everyone? Performing is all I have left. My life has become so narrow - there's nothing else I can give up, short of my actual physical life. And at the rate it's going, even that's not going to be enough for some people.

Unfortunately, those are the people that hold the roles in their hands.

How To Make Adrenaline Soup

Written 29 November 2016, 3.56pm.

Prepare three major papers. Simmer for three weeks.

Toss with two surprise (as in not-on-the-syllabus) presentations. Slowly pour in four all-nighters. Sprinkle in three cancelled classes.

Add snow (with all the childlike joy that comes with it). Reheat last Saturday's tuna casserole and add that as well.

Add a liberal shot of excitement for the Christmas musical.

Mix well and serve.

A Happy Check-In

So I got 80% on my book report. 96% on the music theory quiz.

We're starting on our Christmas music in choir this week.

Got two packages in the mail today. Both packages had food. One had a Crumbächer CD (Escape From The Fallen Planet) and a ballet syllabus music CD.

Spent most of the day with Vector's Dance in my head.

And I have ballet class tomorrow.

The only bad thing about this day was that I didn't get to work on choreography because I have a 1200-word paper due on Thursday.

A Rare Bug, A Dance With Excitement, And A Choreography Update

So after several years of sleeping an average of five hours a night and subsisting primarily on nachos and salsa, my body finally hit panic mode and crashed.

I've known for a while that something needed to change, but [insert excuse here]. To boil it down, I was probably just too lazy to change. I liked my routine, and I was sort of... proud, I guess?... of being able to pull off a nice life-like appearance on only five hours of sleep and barely enough calories to keep a dog alive. (And just to be clear, no, I'm not nor have I ever been anorexic... just too busy to make myself real food.) In the past couple of months, with an increased dance workload and the additional stress of a last-minute college application (more on that once I feel better), the boundary I was pushing finally broke and Tuesday morning I woke up with the fires of Hell in my throat.

I'm not kidding. I've had colds and sore throats before, but this thing is the Big Daddy, the sore throat to end all sore throats. Plus it also managed to infect both my ears (during Unofficial National Choreography Month, of course, when I'm supposed to be listening to music every second of the day), and mess up my lungs. There have been a couple slightly terrifying moments over the past couple of days when it felt like the muscles in my ribs forgot how to work and there was a second of panic as I tried to remember how to breathe manually.

I haven't gone to the hospital yet, but if this continues, I just might. I'm kind of trying to avoid it because the dance team's first performance of the season is this Sunday and... wait for it... my choreography is going to be in it!

If I'm healthy enough to perform.

It's a ballet solo (for myself) that I choreographed for the gorgeous White Heart song Eighth Wonder (more about the dance here). If I'm feeling well enough to do it by Sunday, it'll be the first-ever public performance of something I've choreographed. Unfortunately, I kind of need to be in top physical condition to pull it off. I don't know what it is, but no matter how warmed up and well-fed and well-rested I am, I can't seem to make it to the end of that dance without nearly collapsing in a heap of breathless exhaustion. And that was before I got sick.

And since I'm writing anyway, here's a bit of an update on the Unofficial National Choreography Month thing... no, I haven't given up. There's too much stubborn German blood in me to give up. Plus, I actually managed to choreograph the Guitar Solo From Hell (mostly), and was thus finally able to finish the never-ending two minutes and forty-five seconds that make up Youth With A Machine. (Just to be clear, the label Guitar Solo From Hell is purely from a choreographer's standpoint. From a music lover's perspective, it's a pretty stinking good solo. But it's almost impossible to choreograph.) The bad news is that it was Day Twelve by the time I finally finished the thing and I still had three more dances to do (four if we're still counting Going Public).

So I plunged into Future Now (which really, really needs to show up on iTunes already so I can tell you in detail how freaking amazing this song is). It's supposed to be a jazz dance for six, but it somehow became very balletic. This amuses me, because seriously, listen to the link. Does anything about it suggest ballet to you?

But despite having the fires of Hell burning in my throat and threatening to blow out my eardrums (at least that's what it feels like), I've somehow managed to choreograph up to the second chorus of that one. I'm having a lot of fun writing this one, and I think it's turning out really well. Or maybe I'm suffering delusions due to illness.

What's scaring me a little bit is what's to come: Fade Into You and Sanctuary. I actually don't know the song Fade Into You all that well (it's a more recent addition to my collection), and I'm starting to worry that I won't have enough inspiration for it. I plan on doing that one next. And what scares me about Sanctuary is the fact that it's nearly six minutes long and I'm going to have to notate eight people for the thing. If Youth With A Machine -- half the length with half the dancers -- took me twelve days, how long is Sanctuary going to drag on?

So, there's your HUGE, once-every-couple-months post about my life and stuff that interests probably less people than I think it does. See you tomorrow for Music Day -- provided I'm not in the hospital...