One typical day in my teenage years, I found myself lazily lying in bed, perhaps on a Saturday afternoon. Although I had a plethora of activities, friends, and work for school, certain days left me almost paralyzed in a lack of momentum. On this particular day, I remember very strongly deciding that if I could just convince myself to move even a muscle in my index finger, I could also insist upon continuing with the same energy through each of my muscles until I would get out of bed, stand, and begin a productive day (or at least one with some kind of purpose).
Last winter, I anticipated my tendency to want to hibernate and started this blog. I forced myself out of bed and out of my apartment on a daily basis. I took major steps in improving the quality of my life. Somewhere along the way this winter, I have fallen back into my old hermit-like habits. Perhaps my skills in social media and in socializing in general allow me to hide under a guise of business while I sit in my warm apartment watching reruns and finding little projects to engage me for hours online, not moving from my spot on the futon.
I haven’t fooled myself, and I doubt this comes as a complete surprise to any of my regular readers who may have noticed the disappearance of regular updates on Skydiving for Pearls. Most of my site traffic these days comes from people wanting to hear more about my experience with Sarah Small‘s Tableau Vivant. Although I have a post about Monday’s most recent performance mostly written and waiting to come to life, I have neglected many things, including my joy in writing and my impetus for leaving my apartment and truly living each day.
Slightly less than a month ago, while sick, my fellow singing and blogging friends Maren Montalbano, Amy Armstrong, and I formed a pact to audition or apply for auditions at least five times per month. Neglected. Groupons and other discounted classes I’ve purchased, including a samurai sword class, two more classes with StripXpertease, an online voice-over class (which I just attempted to claim via email more than a week past its expiration), a cupcake class at Butter Lane, Jazzercise classes, a high fall stunt class, introductory pole-dancing exercise classes, and a stand-up comedy intensive workshop? Almost entirely neglected (I do have one scuba class scheduled for February). For anyone wondering, I couldn’t have afforded all of those things without some serious discounts via sites like Groupon, Living Social, and TheDealist. Still, purchased over the course of almost a year, I also can’t afford to let them expire while I sit on my couch like a tired American stereotype.
Yes, I need to start caring again about sleep, eating, exercising, keeping a clean apartment, doing my taxes, filing, practicing, living, and making a living. One way or another, seasonally-induced or not, I know we call this depression. As much as I know a trip to Florida to infuse me with sunshine and grand-parental love would help for a little while, I have to begin closer to home. So tonight, I begin again as I did one year, ten days, and according to WordPress an official count of 167 posts ago, moving one muscle, keystroke, and (believe it or not) earlier bedtime at a time.
Day 167
Today I learned that the smallest moves take the most energy – and moved anyway.
Skydiving for Pearls 
You are not alone in what you are going through, I could almost use parts of your blog word for word to discribe periods of times I have gone through in the past…though I have never owned a futon. Keep moving.
Unfortunately, you sound like I feel! Hopefully when the snow goes away so will our blah feeling!
Ms. Wright,
Just a repost question from November 29th. If you don’t want to respond, it’s ok, but I thought since you were working on a new post about the Tableau Vivant you may wan to combine the issues. I am sorry to hear about your feelings, though I think getting out of the house, showering and doing something (anything, reallly) is quite helpful. Kudos to you for doing so, for blogging about it and for holding yourself responsible to keep up your promise to yourself. It ain’t easy but you only get one life and you, for better or worse, get to run a business around your life. Being a solo practitioner is a hard and stressful task and you should give yourself credit for doing it.
And kudos to you for owning the Tableau Vivant and being so open about it. I suspect that one reason you get so many hits on this issue is that only your blog (apart from Ms. Smalls blog) comes up in Google if you search for it. You are the only artist to publicly identify yourself as one of the artists in the performance (at least by Google search standards). Not fully understanding the purpose or intent of the Tableau Vivant performance, I’m not sure why this is, or what is means or says, but others have apparently not embraced their performance in the same way that you have. As a result, you get the Google hits for having so publicly embraced your performance (and for being so timely to report on it, whereas Ms Small took some time to post the video and even she hasn’t written on it, and she uses your post to serve as her write up/tribute).
I read your blog a while back after the Dumbo Arts Festival and commented on your being a part of the Tableau Vivant show. You were kind enough to respond in the comments. For background, we stumbled on the performance when we went to the bookstore and was told a performance was about to start, so we stayed.
First, more power to you for posting the video where all your friends could see you. It is one thing to perform naked in public and have it disappear, or to have it appear generally on the Internet, but another to directly link it to yourself for the world (and your friends, family and future significant others) to find and see it. Perhaps this is part of your liberation and “skydiving” experience.
Second, and more importantly, can you please explain what the performance meant? we watched the original performance, and the video, and remain confused. I’ve also read Ms. Small’s site, but I still don’t get it. Since it was apparently such a significant experience for you, I’m also curious what you got out of it (beyond the freeing experience of being naked on a stage).
By that I mean I don’t understand the message or meaning other than the nudity and singing (beautiful by the way). Perhaps I’m not that understanding of modern art or concept pieces (I once saw a “play” in the East Village, I think by Mac Wellman, and had similar difficulty). Yes, it is rather interesting to see naked people, and the different bodies, sizes and types, and to watch them sort of interact or move about, and to have it done to music, but to what effect? How was the performance described to you when you auditioned and during rehearsals? What was Ms. Small telling or describing when she wanted the actors/actresses to move? Were the movements choreographed in a particular way for a particular reason? This was why I had googled Tableau Vivant after the show and found your blog.
Thanks for listening and I look forward to your response (but rest and have fun–no need for an immediate response, or any if you prefer).