“Ground your feet. Focus on your breath. Loosen your jaw. BREATHE. “
The things we’ve learned so far. I mean, I understand theoretically but.
But then, I can’t. I have my lines implanted in my brain and I’m in front of my classmates but I’m not nervous because I’m detached from this stage. I observe myself from the outside, see myself in front of me, performing in this dimmed studio. I know what I’m going to say. What Jen’s going to say. I also know what Franny’s going to say.
Mika, or Franny, looks at me, with her serious face.
“You’re going to be seven months pregnant in my wedding. SHOWING”
I should reach out to the box of Wheat Thins with my right hand, look at the calorie label, and touch her belly. Smile, like I would if I were to make fun of my non-existent younger sister.
“So? I’ll make you look skinny.”
Yep, Franny’s going to be mad. Okay she’s mad. What was my next line.
Sarah, our professor and director, looks at the clipboard.
Her body fills up an XL size shirt, and somehow wears a skirt on top of a pair of long pants. Flat shoes are better than heels to ground yourself, she says, wearing a pair of light brown Uggs-looking boots. Hair tied in a bun with, if I’m not wrong, a piece of cinnamon stick. From the first day of class, her fashion has been noteworthy but it was her eyes that astonished me. Her blue eyes were always shining. It shouldn’t be because of the lighting that I could glimpse the glitter in her eyes from a distance.
“How was your experience?” Sarah asks after each scene.
If we were to say anything about the character she’d stop us and ask again, how was your experience. She’s not asking for an intellectual answer or an analysis. The question is, how did it feel.
“I felt like I’m outside my body, like I’m looking at myself reading the lines instead of being here on stage.”
I say.
“Don’t anticipate the lines. Be present.” she reemphasizes. “Take everything off of your partner. Let every word land on you, and then let your character respond. Receive, transform, send out.”
We were on the NJ transit train, heading to a Christian retreat conference happening from Thursday to Sunday. If there was anyone that didn’t belong out of this five group of people, it was me. It’s not equivalent to feeling uncomfortable going to church. It’s a retreat. You need to be hardcore Christian and, well, I’m not even Christian. I’m from Japan. I celebrate Christmas, go to the shrine for New Years, and then visit some temples and look at Buddha statues for school field trips. If someone were to ask me about spirituality..? What does that even mean?
I was there because of Vann, my Cambodian ex-roommate who sent me a link three hours before the deadline for registration. All ridiculous invitations are from her. The one concern was that the event was free for Ivy League students. I’m sure Jesus is a little upset by this discrimination. I said sure I’ll come, I had basically completed my requirements to graduate, so there was nothing to lose. Hearing my yes, she was the one surprised. “Oh wow. You’re coming?”. I wasn’t expecting that response from someone who invited me. Great.
So I sat next to her, in this surprisingly sluggish NJ transit train and was reviewing the basics of Christianity. I asked for advice to be prepared for the all-day retreat. Vann took her eyes off the window and our eyes met.
“Sometimes, you just need to stop being an observer.”
Says Vann,
“People will be doing all sorts of weird things like lying down on the floor, falling down, all that. Don’t look at them. Or judge. Don’t be distracted. Let yourself experience. Sometimes you need to let it happen to you. Not just watch.”
Huh. I thought. I can try that.
“And if you get lost, open your heart. And ask. Ask God to show you He’s there”
Ehh.. I made a face. Now I’m lost again.
—
The reason why I started reading Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis was out of series of coincidences or maybe I was destined. I happened to go along to Church with my roommate, a pastor read a passage from the book, Vann’s friend happened to have two copies, and then, she gave one to me. What I’ve gotten so far from the reading is that you can’t go to church and read the Bible to learn moral lessons or listen to sermons like a Ted Talk. Don’t be halfway in. You gotta believe in Him, love Him and commit. Yikes. I’m not even one-fourth in.
—
We arrive at the Sheraton hotel in the middle of nowhere and the conference begins. From morning till night, we sing, we discuss, we read the Bible etc.
Now we were separated into groups and it was time to prophesize each other. Prophesize? Prophesize.
“Is it like, fortunetelling?”
I whisper and ask.
“No, we pray for each other and say the things that we see or hear about that person” Vann says.
It’s my turn. To be prophesized. Seven of us are sitting in a circle and I move my butt forward into the center of the group. We close our eyes.
Someone starts talking.
“I see a stage. And you’re at the backstage. People are calling you, inviting you to, come over, stand on the main stage and in the light. But you’re there at the backstage in the darkness, looking at the mirror.”
Woah, this voice should be that mustache philosopher looking person from Princeton. I’ve never talked to you. He would probably be surprised if I told him I’m currently taking an acting class.
The Penn athlete girl talks.
“I see a light. Not a spotlight, but a natural — light.”
Me too. Someone says. Laughing. “Funny, I saw the same exact thing.“ She says.
Some other night during the conference.
Do you believe in God?
Mmm.
Do you believe in something, bigger?
Yeah.
Do you talk to Him Then? Try to know Him?
Eh what? No.
Third day of conference.
I’m inundating myself with Jesus. Ugh. Standing, singing, sitting, listening. Full-day. I don’t know what song was playing but I thought, I’d give it a shot. I snickered, this is ridiculous though. I close my eyes.
“Just show me you’re here, God”
It was the most incredible thing.
I saw a circular, black object the back of my eyelids and warmth from my stomach or my I don’t know guts?
Then, I was a baby, don’t ask me how I knew, I simply did. I’m lying down in a crib looking up, my father is to the left, my mother is next to him, they’re both smiling, looking at me.
What the..
I later doubt if this experience was a type of hypnosis but at that point while I closed my eyes, I was calm. Peaceful. I haven’t talked to them for a long time, and they are already separated. Why did they all of a sudden appear like this?
And then I saw an iceberg, and a polar bear.
What was this supposed to mean? HEloow? God? Does this mean, like, the world is beautiful? Hello???
Oh no. I’m afraid I’m seeing delusions. My brain hurts. Does it mean to stop thinking with my brain? To feel? And I feel warm tears falling from my eyes.
Okay, I’ll have to admit.
I think there’s something or someone up there.
I’ve always been thinking 98% of the things that happens around me, were because of me. I got into the high school I wanted, I got into the college that I wanted, and my parents are great. In general, I wish for something, and somehow I get it. I’ve been thinking those were due to my luck, or purely my abilities, but Christianity tells me to attribute this to God.
And they say life isn’t to live for yourself but to live for what you were meant to be, the purposes, meaning, you were given when you were born. Not living for ourselves, but doing what we were meant to do. Why we exist. What’s the purpose. What are our backgrounds, what do we have? What are our skills? And we will be asked at the end,
“So, what did you do with the gifts you were given?”
Throw away the arrogance, and surrender.
And be humble and.
“It’s been four years. How has Brown been? How have you grown?”
Simple question, but since Vann was asking, I knew I couldn’t get away with a short simple answer. I shrug, “I dunno, how about you” but she glares at me saying there should be more than that. “When I talked to my friend earlier, we talked for two and a half hours,” she says, raising the bars.
Fine. I pause and think. Sometimes I am reluctant to talk to her because I get reminded of how shallow I am. Can’t we talk about the caramel latte I had this morning and how the leaf shape formed by the foam was so symmetrical and how pretty it was? Like omg, best day ever. Well, probably not. So I think.
“Stop thinking”
Vann says. “Just blab out.”
1:00-3:40 Mondays and Wednesdays. Our acting class ends every time with the 18 of us circling up, holding each others hands.
We know what comes next; the reinforcement. Each of us will start with the sentence “I reinforce…” along with one or two words that we’d learned from that class. Our heads turn, as comments pop up one by one in a circle, of what they highlight from the class. Comes to Sarah. She’s the last one. We all know what she’s going to say.
“I reinforce, run at the edge of the cliff”
It’s scary, to let yourself present. Letting yourself out there. Just you. Naked.
Sarah, her ocean eyes are always glittering in the dark small room. I don’t know why her eyes are always watery. I can see she’s seen a lot of things. Being hurt maybe, but there’s love. Maybe when you see too many beautiful things, it reflects through your eyes. Because you love, not just the things you love, but everything.
Left hand is bigger, right hand is smaller and skinnier. Our jointed hands raise up. Everyone holding both hands high up. Showing your stomach is one body language of being vulnerable.
“Thank y’all for your risk and your rigour”
And bow. The floor. Black floor. Foot marks.
Release our hands – and clap.
Ah, it’s the end of April. Nope, don’t think about the future. Stress? Graduation? Need to find an apartment? What the fuck. What the actual fuck. I laugh. At how small I am.
Ground your legs. Focus on your breath, loosen your chin. BREATHE
How you feeling?
I laugh.
The world is good.
It’s, it’s
Beautiful.
Kia Sadahiro 