I signed adoption papers for a theatre family this one time...

JUST GET ME HOME

Christmas Carol Tour concluded in Colorado on the side of a mountain. We were exhausted but somehow found the energy to dance in the dressing room.  Maybe it was the altitude.  Maybe it was the fact that we were insanely anxious to move on and enjoy buffet-style dinners with family around a table decorated for Christmas. I found myself unfortunately getting sentimental.  We were at this resort in Colorado that seemed a postcard.  The scenery was gorgeous. Earlier in the day I met a woman who lived in that community while on a shuttle going up the mountain where we were performing later that night. She was a perfect snow bunny in her skiing gear and she produced another perfect little snow bunny in the form of an 8-year old boy. His goggles were perfect, the way he held his skis was perfect and the way he minded his mother was perfect.  Maybe perfect scenery and beauty produced perfect results.  However, it dawned on me as we scaled the mountain on the shuttle with the perfect snow bunny family, that if I lived in that town, my senses would become numb to beauty since beauty was around me at every turn. 

I think if God dealt in currencies and was seeking a place to stay here on earth in the States, he would buy a big chunk of real estate in a perfect resort town in Colorado, and sit and look out from a solitary deck at the mind-baffling creation He had made.  It was hard to believe I was still in the States when I heard the crunching snow beneath my boots as I looked out onto a mountain full of trendy French skiers on the slopes.  Even in the restaurants in this over-priced resort town there were handsome men with German accents asking what I wanted to order.  If I had a million dollars just lying around at my beck and call, I would buy a tiny log cabin in Colorado and sit on the back deck all day in my pajamas wrapped up in a wool blanket drinking coffee just staring at the scenery like a bug attracted to an open flame.

Boarding the shuttle after the final performance was a bit crazy.  There were drunk people to my left and right that only hours before were whooshing down the side of a mountain like a North Face ad.  Then there was us.  Stripped of all make-up and void of hoop skirts, some of us actors celebrated the fact that we were all out of jobs.  After the drunk shuttle took us safely down the mountain and as we waited for our bus to arrive, Tim shouted, “Hooray for unemployment!” We all cheered as if it was a joyful call-and-response, as opposed to what it really was…a cry of desperation. With weary legs, we all boarded the bus and prepared for a very long road trip back to Omaha. We were dropping off several cast members at Denver Airport along the way so they could make it home in time to see grandma open the present they bought in Wyoming at a tacky rest stop. 

Through a series of very unfortunate events, we drove all through the night only to arrive in Denver five hours late.  Horrible snow in Colorado prohibited us from making good headway, while our bus company failed to be equipped with appropriate-sized snow chains. Something to the effect that state law in Colorado prohibits entry on a certain stretch of interstate without proper snow chains on the tires if the vehicle is a certain weight and size is what prohibited us from getting on with it and calling this the end of tour.  I took a sleep aid, but it might as well have been a placebo.  I only sat there miserable and only half lucid.  The Currier and Ives grandeur was starting to fade into a mix of pre-menstrual syndrome and exhaustion.  Not only were some of the adults feeling irritable, some of the kids in the cast were in tears. I felt their pain.  I wanted nothing to do with Colorado at that moment.  People inevitably missed flights in Denver.  Goodbyes were rushed at best, while some of us in the back of the bus didn’t even have time to get out and give a proper goodbye.  I shouted a half-awake goodbye from my seat as one girl waved to me at the front of the bus.  I tried not to get overtly sentimental at that moment, but those goodbyes were like being yelled at out of a deep sleep.  Call it Christmas, call it exhaustion.  Whatever it was, I was sad.  I was terribly sad that this tour was over, knowing full well unemployment was waiting to greet me once I returned to Chicago.  I was also terribly irritated that those of us left on the bus had ten more hours of driving to do.  

I finally fell asleep before sunrise. When I woke up I couldn’t have been more down in the dumps by what greeted me at the window.  I was used to the striking terrain of the West for a good while, but once I went vertical out of shallow sleep on two bus seats, the monotonous Nebraska terrain failed miserably to impress me.  If the landscape of the West was an Equity production, Nebraska was community theatre.  At the next rest stop after the sun came up, I bought six powered donuts at a gross gas station and sat on the bus with the other girls and uncontrollably wept.  At one moment I was laughing through the tears, then the laughter gave way to more crying yet again.  My friend Keith looked at me with disbelief and laughed a bit.  He was trapped on a bus with hormonal, exhausted girls.  God bless him.

When I’m tired I cry.  It has always been this way, and I fear it will always be this way.  Some girls get cranky and mean when they’re tired.  Others get loopy.  I get “D. all of the above”, but most of all, I cry.  For no good reason I cry, and then the world feels settled again after a good, hard cry. I thought Omaha would never come.  I felt as though we were stuck on that bus forever with no end in sight.  It seemed that life would be a series of truck stops and hotels off exits on I-80.  I called mom and told her that I wouldn’t be home until four in the morning on Christmas day.  She was an awesome mom and arranged for a last minute flight out of Omaha on Christmas Eve.  When we arrived in Omaha, I said goodbye to those on the bus, and was truly sad to leave Theresa, Andy and Keith.  They grew dear to me on that tour. They all possessed the gift of making others laugh.  I envy that gift a great deal.

The general manager of the tour was kind enough to drive me last minute to the airport, and I left my car behind in Omaha.  The thought of getting behind the wheel and making the nine-hour journey to Evansville by myself was more than I could handle, so I was grateful for a plane ticket home.  Home is always a good idea when you are exhausted beyond belief and in desperate need of comfort food.

I sat and waited in that terminal, and I was alone for the first time in over seven weeks. I didn’t allow myself to get entirely close to all members of my cast, but for those few whom I grew to love, I missed them as I stared at the tarmac waiting for the plane to arrive.  It was Christmas and Christmas is a time to be with family.  In a way, theatre has a way of creating family out of strangers.  I was about to board a plane to see my biological family.  Truth was, I was shocked by how much I missed the family I just created over the past few weeks.  I wanted to call Keith so he could tell me a story in a funny voice.  I missed drinking champagne on the back of the bus with Betsy that night we thought we were going to die going down the side of the steep mountain in Colorado.  I missed trading stories about Tennessee and whispering in hushed tones about boys in the cast with Adriana.  I wanted to sit on the edge of the bed and talk about life stuff with Theresa and Dana and I hoped Andy would call and tell me a story about his childhood.  In theatre, people are always going through an imaginary revolving door and on to the next family, but sometimes I want to put everything on hold and take these people with me whenever I want to hear a story or have a good cry or enjoy a stiff drink in a hotel lobby. I didn't know it at the time, but this was like an adopted family.  Signing that contract was much more than just filling out paperwork for my taxes.  I signed adoption papers for a new family.  I signed on the dotted line that these strangers were my world for several weeks, without escape.  I am not sure the powers that were could have picked a better adoption situation.  

I boarded the plane and found the closest window seat as possible.  I turned off my cell phone for the first time in a long time.  My shoulders released all the stored tension from the last 24 hours as I put my head back. It was then that a slow, dull ache of quiet began to settle over my heart as I realized I knew no one on that plane. No one frankly cared about what I did on tour.  I couldn’t turn around in my seat and wink at Tommy for no good reason whatsoever, because he wasn’t there.  If I turned around in my seat to wink at the stranger headed home for a turkey dinner, he would’ve been shocked or horrified at the psycho sitting in front of him.  If I had stretched my pillow and blanket across the floor of the plane and into the aisle, I would have been recognized as a terror threat.  On the bus, that was a customary practice with no repercussion.  Bodies were strewn everywhere on that bus, and it took me nearly four minutes to reach the bathroom in the back as I crawled over arms and legs and fleece blankets.  But on that plane, I was not only alone, I was lonely.   Loneliness on Christmas Eve is an interesting sensation, since I was used to being surrounded by a slew of people at this time every year.  I was alone on the eve of a major holiday, but I thought about how I had these individuals like Keith and Theresa and Tommy in my story, if only for a brief part of my life.  My sentimentality eventually gave way to small bursts of laughter on that plane.  Over a small plastic cup of juice, my loneliness began to fade as I remembered little things like dancing in a dressing room and Andy’s daily bus songs. I’m sure the reticent passenger next to me was getting more annoyed as each entertaining memory flashed in my mind. 

I was over a thousand miles from that town with perfect snow bunny children in perfect Colorado, and sadly I thought about how I will never have millions of dollars in my bank account with which to purchase real estate in Colorado.  However, it was nice to sit and dream on that bus for awhile about the luxury some Coloradans experience as they sit in pajamas all day and drink coffee in the solitude of mountain-gazing.  I was headed home to Indiana where there was no snow or mountains or handsome French skiers.  But it was a place where people were genuinely concerned about my safe return as they prayed for traveling mercies for my snow-ridden journey.  Mom and Dad gave up Candlelight service that year to rescue me from the airport in St. Louis. I stepped off the plane and when I rounded a corner after a long walk down a sterile hall lit by unfortunate institutional lighting, they were standing there in Santa hats while waving enthusiastically.  I was home. Not because of a town or a place, but because family was waiting to greet me.  With smiles and arms open wide, they welcomed me away from the plane of unfamiliar faces.

On Christmas morning, I sent a message to my adopted family across the miles.  The message read, “God bless us…everyone.” Messages and phone calls came from the adopted family that day.  Whether it was as close as the dining room down the hall or the memories I made in and out of dressing rooms, I was blessed indeed.