Play Time Again.

Here I am again. Read our paper yesterday. Found at the bottom of a page tickets to the next play at the church. I knew it was coming and yet every time, it stabs me in the heart and I want to cry my eyes out. And then I get angry that it still hurts me after almost three years. I talked with DH some more about it. I worry that he'll soon get tired of me bringing up my pain every time there's a play and tell me to get over it like my mom would. I feel guilty that it doesn't go away. How do I explain the deep sadness in my soul - a longing for the fulfillment doing a play once gave me? Hmmm... maybe I should start like this:

I am a creative person. I am artistic - music, writing, drawing - almost to the exclusion of mathmatics. Most people are somewhere between the super mathmatics and the super artistic, whereas they have a touch of both. I am waaaay over on the artistic side and the math side is seriously lacking. Most people can memorize a math theory and muddle their way thru basic algebra problems without understanding how it works. I can't. If it doesn't "make sense" to me, I cannot answer the problem no matter how many ways of getting to the answer I memorize. Geometry is a nightmare. Anything with letters instead of numbers is terrifying. Physics? Forget it. Anyways, I have always excelled at music, acting, writing, drawing. As a young girl, most times, I couldn't distiguish reality from fantasy. My mind was a treasure of imagination and still is. I have a decent voice (I've been told excellent but I hesitate to say it) that I love to use. I've always adored acting in skits and tried to volunteer for any that came my way. There was just something so... magical... about becoming someone or something I'm not and doing it in such a way that people see me as that person. A truly good actor is someone who, during the show, has people thinking of them as whatever character they're playing, not their usual selves. Look at Hollywood actors! The best films have those who play the most believable characters.
Now, all my life, I've been told that there's something wrong with me. That my acting and singing and artistic abilities are silly and useless. They can't make a living for you or support your family (meaning your future husband and children). They are bogus mistakes and that I should try to find a "normal" job and have more common sense than to enjoy doing something so silly. Grow up and move on from "childish" things. I hesitatingly mentioned something about doing musicals or opera as a teen and was soundly rebuffed and laughed at and humiliated for being foolish. "People who get into that kind of thing have been working at it since they were kids, unlike you." Except, I thought that's what singing in a professional children's choir could do for me. And what about all those who break into acting (I don't want to be a hollywood movie star!) as adults and do very well? So. For years, I believed that I was flawed and foolish and my talents were some huge cosmic joke/mistake. I never searched out any theatre groups when I became old enough to not need permission. I never took any chances on learning to use my talents and abilities to their best intent. I ran off and married the first man who looked at me so I could have someone to 'take care of me' since I was, apparently, so unsuited to do so myself. I spent a few years slaving away at clothing stores and restaurants for a pittance. Radio Shack and McDonald's love someone like me who works harder than most other employees cuz they don't have to pay me what I'm worth. I've never made more than $10/hr (once back when I taught piano - something I DID NOT EVER WANT TO DO!! My mother always told me I should teach piano. The gall I had to swallow when I told her that I'd been offered and accepted a job as a piano teacher was sickening for me.) and, even this last time, I was making $8.50/hr - after my huge .10 raise. BTW, minimum wage is $8 here. Pretty difficult to survive paying rent, food, bills for yourself and two kids on that kind of money...
Back to things... When I moved here and joined the church, one of the fellas was trying to start up a drama club. I jumped at the chance. After I did my first skit, people were coming up to me and saying, "Wow! I never knew that you were so talented at acting!" And that was only a skit! We started a play and I was one of the starring characters. We rehearsed for six weeks straight. Almost every day for two hours. I helped build the set. I helped buy the props. I was the first to memorize my lines. I spent hours on that set, just sitting there in the silence of a near empty church, listening to the thoughts in my head. It was the happiest I'd been in many many years. I found a Christian book that talked about artistic gifts being from God and no mistake at all. I knew in my heart that this was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. That, finally, I was doing what I was supposed to be doing all along! Suddenly, I resented that I was a mother, that I'd never had the chance to try to follow my dreams. I resented that I'd had to wait until I was 30 years old to finally understand what my career would have/should have been. I was angry and I felt cheated. I couldn't understand my neediness, my insecurity, my fears of being alone and unable to fend for myself. Where did they come from? How could I not have tried to get into something that I had so loved to do all along? Why had I listened to my mother? I did four plays and many skits over the course of two years and I loved every one of them. I was so absorbed in them when I was a part of them. I was so happy doing them. And so depressed when they were all finished. I could barely wait for the next one to start. The last play, the one where I fell "in love" (obssession) with my male counterpart, I was so depressed at the end of it, I could hardly breathe. I knew that everything was falling apart and I couldn't understand why I was destroying my life again. I couldn't understand my motivation. I was having a difficult time handling my grief and emotional pain. Then when P. tore the rest of my life out of my grasp, I sincerely thought of swimming out into the cold, half frozen lake until I was too far out to get back. The coldness and ugliness inside me would only have helped the hypothermic lake to consume me faster. He took my drama and held it out of reach. He mocked my grief and pain and used it as sermon fodder. He never once tried to understand the motivating factors behind my actions, nor not condemn me. He, who was like my father to me as well as my friend, treated me like I had deliberately turned against HIM, betrayed HIM and that, somehow, I must be enjoying watching the life I'd built crumble around me. I see him now and he tries to command me. I only dig in my heels and back away further. My trust in people has been so damaged, I fear I'll never recover it. I still have pain where my acting has been cut off, just like phantom pain in a phantom limb that has been sheared off of it's trunk. Seeing the reviews in our little paper cuts like a knife on scar tissue, making the wound anew and scarring even more. Last year, when I saw that L's wife was one of the main characters, I felt it like a stab in the heart. I felt like it was a jab at me to show me how she was allowed to take my place as the wounded party (egocentrical, I know). However, I'm pretty sure she and L are back together and she probably treats him even worse than before since he'll have come back with his tail between his legs. Everyone only gets one side of the story and forgets the other or chooses to ignore it. And yet, I am responsible for that too. I can't - won't - tell anyone the deeper side of my issues. How can I when it can be used as a weapon against me? How can I when the people who are supposed to be trustworthy spread it like the Enquirer? How can I when fear of their wicked thoughts and gossiping paralyzes my tongue, effectively freezing it to the roof of my dry mouth? How can I trust anyone?
So I read our town paper and I feel the knife twist in my guts when I find the press on each play and actor. I feel the anger and pain anew when I realize that even if I were attending the church, P would not "allow" me to audition or even be a part of it. There are no other performing arts groups in this town anymore. My "friend's" theatre group out of the church is a non-profit organization that I am on the leading committee for. I signed on all the legal paperwork to be a part of this non-profit organization. In fact, I am the first on all the paperwork after K! K has his own company too. One that he's done a couple of plays for. He asked me to be in the first one, which fell through, but since having the twins, he hasn't contacted me or asked me again. I suspect it's because C, his wife, has a hate-on for me now. Sad, since we used to be friends. K is one of the few who doesn't treat me like an outcast. But to keep the peace with his very strong willed wife, I believe he'll never ask me again.
I have come to the decision that I will act again. I don't know when and I'm not sure how yet, but I will find something in some town close enough to here that I can join and perform in. I still believe that God has given me this talent as a gift and that no man has the right to take away that which God has given. I believe that with the strength and understanding of the motivating factors of my past, I can face a future doing the thing I love without landing in the pitfalls of obssession with another 'broken' abusive man that I can 'fix'. I believe that the more time I spend repairing the damage of emotional abuse, the more power I have over my future. I will succeed!!