Countdown

There's a frisson in the air around me as we rehearse and plan and plot and have random outbursts of exuberance around The Grand Opening of The Play.

I am reminded once again that building a passionate life for one's self is the only way to live in this short and often damp-squid infested paths we are on.

For who hasn't been beset by disappointments and frustrations and just trudging along raising the children, working in jobs we often hate, putting food on the table and a roof over all of it? None of us have that exemption certificate. We often have to defer the day when we can live in our bliss and do what we damn well wanted to do for the last twenty-thirty-forty years. If we are still alive, that is. Or it hasn't been kicked out of us.

I feel incredibly fortunate that I can bloom this late in life. To sit down in a lovely old Newfoundland pub yesterday and meet with some other late blooming kindred spirits and chew over plays and books and short stories and funding and arts grants and lighting and sound and the best stages and Irish playwrights. And feel part of this creative force. And be asked to maybe act again. Something I hadn't thought about at all. And a director suggesting a film of my play. (What?) And secretly nursing the knowledge I had recently been awarded an arts council grant for who wants to brag. Me. Artiste. Validation. Small grant. But an affirmation of value as I had to submit my play to the committee.

Another lovely thing. I was five minutes late to the rehearsal last Thursday through no fault of my own. And as I walked into the theatre, I was greeted by music - the cast had already started working on some challenging harmonies. No one sitting around waiting - loving the play so much they had already begun without their director.

I pinch myself. As if this is some kind of dream I am living and I will wake up.

Never in a million years did I expect this kind of life.

Yeehaw!