Lives Wrapped Around One Another

It was January 2001 that I did my first show for Rorschach. In that time we as a company have come a long way. Starting as a company of vagabonds in found spaces using our wit and charm to lure audiences down alleys and into abandoned high schools, we have grown up over those years. We have a semi-permanent space and subscribers, but more than simply growing as a company we have grown as individuals and artists. People who I started out with have been playing some of the biggest theaters in town, appearing in films and producing television shows. There have been birthdays and weddings. Why this year alone, there will be four company members walking down the aisle.

We all started out in our 20s and have been inching our way into respectability as more and more of us fall solidly into our 30 somethings.

Randy Baker had a birthday on Saturday night. And it reminded me of all of the other birthdays and special times we have shared as a community and dysfunctional theater family.

- Moon bounce at Grady's thirtieth, when the power would cut out and the moon bounce would collapse on the people inside.

- Jenny and Matt's wedding when I the 55 year old bartender, who kept slipping me free drinks and telling me should owned her own house and then looking daggers at any woman who came up and talked to me.

- Mine and Deb's combined birthday when everyone was told to dress like Scott and Deb. The number of wrap around skirts and Hawaiian shirts was inspiring.

- Tim sitting in his back yard picking and a grinning for his 30th.

Cast parties and opening parties aside, we are all so wrapped up in one another’s triumphs and defeats, sometimes its hard to know where my life starts and someone else’s begins.

Sitting there on Saturday and listening to Grady go off about the Spanish Golden Age of Drama, talking to Liz about working at Studio, and making jokes with MJ and Styles about the personal grooming habits of several DC actors, reminded me how much fun this life can be. Sometimes I think that so many of these parties are viewed as business obligations, but every once in a while I am reminded that they can actually be fun.