Home Is...
...where when you have to go, they have to take you in?
...where you hang your hat?
...where you keep your leftover thai takeout?
...where your cell phone bill is mailed?
...where you have Top Chef Tevo-ed?
...where you have to help with Box Office?
...where you and your collaborators go for beer?
Several friends of mine and I have been billing this summer as the one where we decide what to do next. "Next" being post-MFA. And by "what to do" we mean "where to go." And by "where to go" we mean "New York or Chicago?" We've been asking questions about production opportunities, advancement opportunities, networking opportunities, visibility, romance and heartache, cost of living, cold winters, public transportation, community, ability to have a real life, etc. etc.
And yes, we've got the ever-expanding mental list of pros and cons for each city. And no, neither city (NO city, despite those sweet nothings Los Angeles is whispering in your ear, Norma Jean) is gonna give us a lottery ticket, orgasm and Oscar upon arrival. That much is clear.
We could always go to one or the other and "just see," then change our minds. Well, they could. For myself, I'm not so sure.
I did the math today. I have lived in 15 different homes or apartments in the last 11 years. In three states and two continents. Each with the intention of staying. I have owned and bought, sold, or chosen to leave 8 different beds. I have called each place home, and in the process, I have called NOWHERE home, carrying the few belongings that mattered to me (and there are very few) on my back, saying "Yes" to places and people with a silent "For Now" always left unspoken.
At some point, "Nomadic" runs the risk of meaning "Homeless."
Maybe Home is Where You Plant Your Ass.
Maybe Home is something you make by saying "Yes" and ignoring the "For Now." Maybe home is something you have to WORK to make in a place, painting walls and putting up plays and getting invested and getting messy with the people who are in front of you, keeping your easy, lazy philosophy of "everything is temporary" to yourself and participating in the collective delusion that we can and should make something permanent, that it's possible to dig in to a place and to each other without having half your heart out the door.
Maybe it doesn't matter WHICH city I pick, as long as I pick one and mean it, and do all the hard, fun, necessary work to make it my artistic home.
Maybe it's time to plant some roots, and see what grows.
5 comments:
For myself I have found that home is where my wife is. The city doesn't matter so much except as it affects as comfort level.
I moved to Austin following her to UT and was heartily disappointed that I had left a Great City where I had two jobs that I enjoyed and that were open to working with each other, and I had found a community of people to make theatre with for a littler podunker town without my jobs or my people.
But because my comfort level was in her, I was able to find all of those things again here in Austin.
If you are creating work you like and that is progressing you as an artist there isn't really a Should Move imperative to my thinking.
This of course should all be viewed through my support of "It's okay to have good original theatre in places other than NY, LA and Chicago ;) )
I love this post.
I can totally see your dilema.
Sometimes Home creeps up on us.
I always intended to move at some point in my life, to live somewhere else, to shake it up, but at some point I turned around and realized I've lived in Austin almost thirty years. (This was originally at the core of my play "Highway Home" although it's not as much anymore. So as you know well, it's something we all deal with.) Many times over the last couple of years I toyed with the idea of moving to a bigger theatre town.
Now I'm here fighting Cancer, surrounded by the love and support and help of so many wonderful friends and family and I know why I stay here.
Home is finding that balance between support and challange. If it means move, you move. If not, you might stay. But right now, I'm glad I'm here. I'll move if I need to. I'd move for the right relationship. But I can be happy spending the rest of my life here.
You're young and starting out and you can create your home where ever you want it to be. After awhile though, it gets harder and harder to change it. And while that sounds like (and can be) chains, it can also be a wonderful thing.
Follow your gut. It'll lead you to the right one. And then you can keep mattresses for 17 years, hair dressers for 23, friends for even longer. Then if you move, you have a solid base you can return to, need be. (Or to at least visit!)
Have fun!
Michael
Hi Jenny,
First of all, great to see you in Brooklyn last Thursday. Hopefully, we both came away from it feeling as if we'd done all the talking. (I know I did.)
Second, thanks for including me on your last post's list of Chicago playwrights to watch. What an honor!
And now third: that "home" thing. Between the ages of 19 and 30 I'd lived a life similar to yours, now: 12 years, 23 apartments, four countries and two continents. Following my nose, listening to my gut, making horrible choices, and landing in some pretty awesome places with excellent people.
Ultimately, I don't know if I chose Chicago. I tend to think that Chicago chose me. I've moved away twice and come back twice. For whatever reason, it just feels like the "home" you described. It works for me -- and perhaps I work for it.
Part of it may be that after several years I met Matthew in Chicago, and since he has had "real" jobs here, then here is where we've stayed. But as Michael says in his comment, Matthew and I regularly talk about shaking things up, packing up and moving in order to give us a fresh perspective on things. And while the partial answer has been to travel to exotic and not-so-exotic places -- just to ask ourselves "what if?" -- the end result is that we feel ourselves pulled back here.
What's he saying, George? I guess what I'm saying is that it's OK to feel pulled and uncertain about "where." Ask yourself what adds up, what must be accounted for in your next step, and then just do it. Long for home, but acknowledge that sometimes it sneaks up on you in unexpected ways -- and that home is as much something you look back on as forward to.
I know some very wise men.
Three of them, even!
(What at terrible joke...)
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