2008-10-12

That which doesn't kill you makes you not dead.

I took my friends Jon and Craig to see Carrie Fisher's one-woman emotional yard sale, "Wishful Drinking," last night. And today, I went to see it again with my friend Tattoo Chris.

It's interesting to watch the same show two days in a row, as an audience member. One of the things about live theatre is how shockingly intimate it can be. For me, it's both comforting and terrifying. So much of what you do as a performer is very much dependent on the audience, whether you want to admit it or not. And in a situation where you're deliberately breaking down the fourth wall and making conscious contact with the people watching, it's even more of a crap shoot. One of the best pieces of advice I got was from a director of mine in college, who told me to remember that aside from maybe a couple of critics, the audience is ON YOUR SIDE.

So you have someone like Carrie Fisher, who has just been through the wringer in more ways than one, getting up there and spilling it all (well, most of it), and it's one of the most courageous things I can think of. And I remember that I see this several days a week, only people haven't paid upwards of $80 to listen. Either way -- you sit in a theatre, or you sit in a church basement -- and you laugh and you nod and you totally relate.

It was particularly poignant sitting with Tattoo Chris at the matinee today. When I was first getting sober, and sitting in the back of meetings looking at my watch and not listening all that much, I'd see this crazy-looking motherfucker, just COVERED with tattoos, and I'd think for a second or two that I could do this. I could probably maybe stop drinking. Gradually I started sitting a little closer to the front, started introducing myself to all of these maddeningly happy-looking people, and met Tattoo Chris. We've been friends ever since.

"That which doesn't kill you makes you....well, it makes you NOT DEAD," Fisher says at one point. But there's the understanding that you can endure some pretty horrific stuff, and emerge changed if only for the fact that you now know what you're capable of. I remember Augusten Burroughs told me (not that we have intimate chats over ginger ale -- he's just the sort of writer who actually does answer his own email) that the first year sober is a series of hurdles: the first birthday without a drink, the first Thanksgiving without a drink, and so on. And each time is a little triumph. Of course, later on, you might also have your First Cancer Scare, your First Major Move In Over Ten Years, or your First Funeral For Someone You Grew Up With, to say nothing of some other pretty crapulent stuff that you might have avoided if you'd been keeping your own house in order, so to speak. But no matter -- you get through that, too, even though it sucks and it's scary and it feels like someone's taking a cheese grater to your heart at 3 in the morning. You get through it without retreating into a bottle.

The tattoo on my leg that I've been changing up reflects a lot of that. Among other things, it now includes script, in Gaelic, that translates to: "the girl that sorrow has made beautiful." Now, I'm certainly not saying that my life has been just this unending pit of despair. But it's a reminder that I can endure. I can glow in my own darkness.

lisamcc at 5:34 p.m.



2 comments so far
Jess
2008-10-13 06:17:19
I frikkin' LOVE Carrie Fisher!!! I've read everything she's written. That rules that you went to her show.
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Lexi
2008-10-13 23:28:37
Dude, what a beautiful essay. This is what I love most about your diary. You view everyday things, write about those things, but then you put on a new filter and provide an intimate introspective. This is so much better than just a review of the show.
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