Educating Susan

I’ve been watching “Educating Rita” this morning and, needless to say, it resonated with me.

“And I thought, "Yeah, that's what I'm trying to do, isn't it? Sing a better song.”

And I have been singing better songs for a while now.

It hit me how far removed from my old life I have become in such a short time the other night, chatting with an acquaintence from my former life. She remarked on my artwork, remarked on my talent and then said, “You should have a manager.” I was touched, thinking she meant that my art was that good. “I mean,” she continued, “you have so many talents. It’d be great if you could just find someone to help you focus your talents on something.” My response? “Like my directing career.” “Yes,” she continued, “but really help you focus and get moving forward in one direction on something.” “Like my directing career.” “Yes, but find something that you can focus on that expresses your creativity and can move you forward in something.” “Like my directing career? Like the feature I have premiering next week and the three short films I’ve made.” “Yes, but…” And she continued to insist that I need focus. That I need focus. That I NEED FOCUS. I stopped short of either braying with laughter or smacking her in the head.

When I stand up before the capacity audience (okay, so it’s about 40 people) at the Ark next week, screening my first major work, “Cinderella Drives A Pick-Up,” I will stand up there and sing a new song. I will sing my own song, a tune of my own making, a song that only I have written. Sure, there were collaborators on the way who helped with some of the notes or some of the phrasing, but it is my own song. I will stand in front of those people – friends, family, collaborators, support group – and I will stand on my own two feet, no appendage supporting me, although more support than I have ever had in my life. But it will be me. Just me. Flaws, perfection, angst, and joy all rolled into one. And every frame that is on that screen, for better or worse, will be mine.

I am beginning to own my life. I know I’m a long way from truly owning it and maybe that’s why I’m still single. I don’t think I can share my life until I can truly own it. It’s hard because there are times when the loneliness runs very deep. Like when Cute Boy says good night to me and hugs me close then his arm lingers around my waist a moment longer before he lets go and it makes me want to just lean into him and have him hold me and … just hold me. But even if he could, I’m not sure I am ready. I don’t want to chance losing all that I have struggled for on a whim and throwing everything away just to be held close.

I will stand up next week, in front of Cute Boy and the OOMA and all those others who supported me and those who maybe tried to support me in my former life, and it will be the beginning of a new life for me, in that single night. This is the culmination of all of my struggles and all of my passion and all of my heart and my hurt and my anger and my pain and my desire and my everything. It is an achievement I never, ever thought possible and that my ex almost had me convinced was not possible. But Tuesday night, that possibility will come to reality and, for better or worse, it will be my reality.

I did this. I left a life that was killing me. I started a new life – blindly and naively and painfully. I tackled a career that is impossible, partly because of the career itself, partly because of being a woman of a certain age, partly because it’s just impossible to actually be that tiny percentage that actually succeed. I left behind almost everybody who I thought was important to me, although a few of them still linger around the edges. I walked away from the person I had become, a person I did not like, a person who was no one and sought to create a new persona, someone I would like, someone who was a person, someone fully formed.

I tried to make that person someone that the OOMA would want and embrace and love. I tried to make that person someone that those around me would respect and reflect what they told me they saw when they looked at me. I tried to make that person someone I am not because I did not know who I am. I tried to be what I thought I was supposed to be. And I ended up creating the same potentially disastrous illusion I had created during my marriage. I created someone who was not real and not true and not me.

On Tuesday, I will finally stand before all of you as the beginning of the real Susan. I am finding the truth of the soul who lives inside of me. That truth is a soul who is confident and wounded, who is wildly passionate and cautious, who loves without thinking and wants without understanding, who knows now what she is good at and what she is not good at, who is beginning to not need the hand-holding and babying of “is this good? Please tell me it’s good.”

I know that this is good. That this song is the song I should be singing. And I know it is a better song.