Not Ready for Primetime
Was it an image or a word spoken, or maybe it was a commercial for some product I won’t ever need to purchase – whatever “it” was, a memory flipped to the forefront of my mind, sending me back in time to age 13 and 14. And a friend from that time period who I lost daily contact with when we reached high school and found separate tribes that spoke more to who we were and who we thought we were becoming.
In our junior high school years, “R” and I met because we were both enrolled in the instrumental music programme for our three year “tenure” (torture would more aptly describe the time at that particular school – neither of us happy with the system or the discipline instilled in students – male and female, though to be fair, the males suffered much worse than the females). We both played the clarinet – she was third chair and I was second (though I did graduate to first chair by grade 9). My friend “R” was a bit of a rebel – bent the rules without a care, and was disdainful of the teachers, one or two still come to mind. That meant suspensions on occasion, not being allowed to make the school trip to Ottawa in grade 8, and she was denied the opportunity of being in the school band for the two years that the rest of us took part in.
Every year in early May, the school staged a revue to highlight the arts. Students who had talents were invited to perform, two plays were staged and of course, the band was there to accompany as well as perform all the wonderful music we were creating (none of it current, all of it obscure to 13 & 14 year olds – “Finlandia” by Sibelius is permanently planted in my memory). “R” being unable to join us in “the pit”, decided that she would perform ON the stage and both years she played key roles in the student productions.
I had never had any desire to be on the stage. Acting held no appeal. It was enough for me to be part of an ensemble and while students who were in the band were discouraged from taking part in the plays, one or two were given permission to do so. Encouraged by my friends to audition for a role I demurely declined, leaving them to the greasepaint and the glory. As outspoken as I am now, I was the shy, quiet girl who really didn’t want all eyes trained on me.
Over the last few days since that memory surfaced I’ve thought about the number of times I’ve said throughout my life “I could have been an actress” – and meant it. Not because I’ve wanted fame or to be noticed – I’m thinking about the number of times over the years that I’ve worn a “mask” and pretended either that everything is just fine or to give myself courage to step out of my comfort zone. The donning of another persona to hide or “fake it until I made it”. In fact, most of us are actors at some point in our lives. I think of people in my life who have presented one face to the world at large and yet had a very different face inside the home.
Photo of me (not Henry VIII) taken at the Tower of London, April 2015
I think about the stories I’d read my children at bedtime or when I volunteered in the kindergarten. The characters in the books all had different voices and personalities and as I’d read, I’d act them out, bringing to life the flat characters who appeared on the page. I did that not only to make it entertaining – it was in my view a way to encourage children to want to read for themselves and discover the possibilities that the words on the page and the illustrations provided.
By the time we reached high school, “R” no longer acted in productions and neither of us stayed in the instrumental music stream. Playing the clarinet was decidedly “uncool” for a 15-year-old girl who had discovered new pursuits. “R” left school at 16 as soon as she was legally allowed. Discouraged with formal education, she went off to discover what the adult world had to offer. We lost touch permanently soon after that. She was working in an office with people some of whom were much older. I made new friends, taking trips abroad and discovering adulthood in a different way. I wonder how much of “R’s” life in her adult years was “put on”, what masks she wore and if the experience she enjoyed in her early teens carried her forward throughout life. I rather hope it did.