About:

My Scars Have War Stories To Tell…

Curtains open to Gloria who is sitting in a time-out chair in an abandoned house somewhere in Maine, it is chilly enough for her to see her breath. There are houseplants around her that are wilted and droopy. She has her eyes closed and her hands clasped like she is praying. Soon Aaron, a friend, comes out frantic with pantyhose on top of his head and over his face. He is running around her with many toothbrushes in his hand brushing her body, trying different ones, trying to get her clean. He becomes exasperated at how ‘dirty’, impure she is. He is doing this for awhile while she is sitting still with eyes closed. Then Collin, or Alex, or any of the other men in her life comes out on stage as a giant toothpaste tube, slowly coming to her like a bride in a wedding procession. When he gets to her he slowly undresses her. Aaron is still brushing her. As Collin, (et all…) is undressing her, he begins to spew toothpaste cum out of his head top. When she is fully unclothed, (except her underwear), “No War Today” can be read on her body as illumination from the sky. Aaron and Collin leave the stage one after the other mumbling, “Wish I could have helped her… “and Gloria remains sitting there, crying, head in hands mumbling to herself, “I tried, I’m trying, I don’t know what else to do….I feel so alone, defective…I’m losing the battle at making a connection, of keeping anything that is beautiful, alive, of being good so all that exists really is metaphor and melancholy”…

I am interested in that tension of being human where one transforms from hiding inside one’s cocoon (as a form of protection) due to maybe a trauma, lack of confidence, co-dependent enabling, or personality and out of a spiritual necessity, clumsily learns, tries to embody the potential they envision for themselves. They know they have to crack out of their shell, comfort zone to get to the nectar of their lives with some emotional sweat, to take off their mask to be able to experience some authenticity in being alive; there is some strength harnessed somehow to be able to don their wings (as another form of protection) and fly away and go where she wants to go towards, which is some awkward growing pains reflection of herself in her efforts…

I am interested in how we deal with pain, damage to ourselves, how we hold it, carry it with us, how we try to sandpaper it away from ourselves by burying it with dysfunctional and destructive behaviors and it becomes more than just a memory but an extra layer of skin, like a blanket we pull up as we are cozying up to go to bed with our nightmares and that person that we are sleeping next to.

I am interested in forms of protection, how we protect ourselves with what tools are available to us, and the stories contributing to that extra layer of our personalities. Protection, our biological ability to grow emotional and mental extra skin to cover over the sensitive scars and to shield our vulnerable innocence, sometimes is masked as coping mechanisms, while we allow our growth to be hampered by a delusional fantasy of healing or fear for a myriad of reasons. I am interested in how we came about needing to protect ourselves, what experiences caused us to ball up in our cocoons, our shells, masks resulting in arrested development or a continuation of our inheritance of dysfunctional movement, & damaging erasement… rather than gaining spiritual easement. I am interested in how our American historical inheritance of trauma affects us as citizens now. I am interested in humorously holding a mirror up to myself, subconsciously understanding that I am the one causing the pain and continuing the psychosis, and documenting my efforts to mitigate my family history and self deprecating flubbings.

Inspiration:

the magic in this world and the people who tell, create stories that make the magic real; the people and places I have met running scared from myself: I’ve lived in Florida, Wyoming, California, NYC, Boston, Hawaii, New Mexico, Maryland, and currently I’ve returned to my home state of Maine.

Goal:

to engage with that magic, which is joyful

Motivation:

to preserve my grace as seen reflected back to me as a child because if I have any goodness at all, this is where I will find it.