The Great Escape

I ran away over 13 years ago.  I was four years old and my older brother and I were tired of bowing to the demands of our youngest brother, being forced to eat broccoli, and being asked to make our beds.  Sick of the choking injustice, we hatched a plan to leave and never come back.  I packed up my Barbies, Wood-Kin paper dolls, Jelllies sandals, and blanket into my kindergarten backpack and met Adam at the front door.  Clutching his pillowcase full of Hot Wheels, he fearlessly led the way off the porch and down the sidewalk.  We made it to the end of the driveway before our grand escapade was halted due to the spying eyes of our younger brother.  My mom called us back inside and sentenced us to the horror of Windex-ing the bathroom mirrors. 

Since our compromised mission, I have often contemplated running away.  I even packed a bag of t-shirts but decided to stay because my mom made brownies.  

One time, I declared out of rage, “I’m running away!” To which my mother coolly replied, “Go on, there’s the door.”  With that challenge in mind, I grew up slowly realizing that emptying the dishwasher was not a prison sentence and David, though the baby of the family was not the designated favorite child.  My parents were not monsters, and taking out the trash required little to no effort at all.  Turning 16 and receiving a car should have reignited my desire for escape, but I realized I had homework to do and a dog to feed.  But the most peculiar thing is that when I wanted so desperately to leave, time had held me captive.  But with college on the horizon, time has set me free. As it even pushes me forward, my mother’s voice echoes in my head.  “Go on, there’s the door.”

Ladies and Gentlemen....

Artists are weird people.  Do they classify as people?  They’re easy to spot and impossible to forget.  Ugh, I just used a cliché right there.  And there I go again.  The world is an artist’s stage.  They talk to no one, yet talk to everyone.  Artists can be painters, drawers, sculptors, musicians, actors, dancers, writers, photographers, cinematographers, and other lengthy named professions.  I suppose they are people, I mean, they do breathe, walk on two legs, circulate blood, scratch their heads, and eat (though some forget to occasionally). 

These artists are easy to spot, primarily through their talents, but also through their personality.  I have been involved in theatre for many years, and will be the first to proclaim from the roof tops how absolutely strange, questionable, sometimes terrifying, yet utterly endearing “drama people” are.  Walk into your nearby Starbucks, what do you see?  No, not the sorority girls ordering their white chocolate mocha latte java chip frappuccino extra foam hold the whip cream two sugars please.  Look in the corner at the huddled group with laptops and funny hats.  Walk down the road and see the girl yelling, “hold it right there! Don’t move until I grab my camera!”  Look at the fingers of an artist.  Are they caked with clay, stained with paint, or blistered from a guitar?

I always knew I was going to be a writer.  Growing up, I was the one that had tons of imaginary personalities.  They weren’t just imaginary friends named Blankie or Rachel 2.  To me, these were real people with real physical features, real emotions, and real stories.  Laney, girl who played basketball and worked in her grandfather’s car garage on weekends.  Christopher, the boy who lived on a cattle ranch in New Mexico. Maggie, the rich Italian girl whose family was stranded in the Amazon rainforest.  Anna Maria, the Spanish orphan trapped in a boarding school (inspired by Francis Hodgson Burnett’s A Little Princess, one of my favorite childhood books).

For artists, life is simply an art gallery, a theatre, a lit stage, or a best-selling book.  There may be critics, (there always are) but that’s what makes us shine.