What if the Show DOESN'T Go On?

The last blog was all about anxiety, which is essentially a prolonged dot-dot-dot anticipating an outcome. It can grow and become disorienting to the point of delusion and irrational thinking. There's a point where this trapped feeling does need to be released. Sometimes the release is a fizzle. Once you work through your concerns, you realize it was no big deal; the suspenseful music built up to a silly toy puppet springing out of the box. Other times, we actually do have to face something unexpected and hard. This is when we can get SPOOKED.

Spooked is that exclamation that comes after the dot-dot-dot (...) of suspense. It's the final exhale, or more the scream, after those slow low level chords are played in a horror film. Lately our family is experiencing what happens when there's an uneasy feeling that spirals into terrified.

Our little one is no stranger to walking into uncomfortable situations and working through them, almost every first day of school or camp. Second guessing herself before dropping in on the big ramp at the skatepark. Anytime we travel and she's in a flipped time zone and out of her routine. We've always been in awe at how tough she is and is eventually able to work through it. This is the first time however where she's been spooked.

It finally happened, she has to face the scariest thing for a young girl, and a parent! Scarier than the boogie monster under her bed, the animatronic witch that went off when she first trick or treated that gave her nightmares, scarier than pulling off bandaids or getting shots at the doctor. Noemie has encountered her first ... MEAN GIRL.

I knew it would unavoidable, it's still so hard to watch her well up as we pull up to the building where she will most likely encounter her again. The building isn't her school thankfully, but it is a place that she had been dreaming of going to for so long - the theatre! So it's not just any mean girl, it's a THEATRE MEAN GIRL.

It was clear after Broadway Bound Summer Camp that Noemie's loud, bright personality really shines on a stage. She's VERY comfortable memorizing lines, singing solo parts, in front of an audience of strangers. She even had the instinct to comfort her fellow actors that were nervous in a scene. She loved every part of it, her only complaint is the stage wasn't big enough. So we signed her up for the bigger Fall production of Annie.

There was nothing in the first 3 weeks of rigorous rehearsals that seemed off. She was excited, she couldn't wait for the next one, she invited everyone she knew to her play, even strangers. She even got really obscure parts and didn't care. It would take up her Saturdays and she didn't care. She didn't make any friends yet but didn't seem to care.

Then last week, I was dropping her off, and as I was walking her up the stairs, she mumbled, "I don't want to go." She'll sometimes throw this out there before school to see if she can get away with staying home. I respond the same way I always do. I make sure she's not sick, and if she seems okay, then I assure her I'll pick her up as soon as it's over, and we can do something really fun. This seemed to work UNTIL... twenty minutes later, I get a phone call from one of the directors. She's crying so hard they can't make out what's wrong. I'll need to come back to get her. I'm thinking she actually might be getting sick and needs to rest, only to watch her come home with way too much energy and an unaffected, smiley demeanor. Glad she's not sick, but what is UP?! We talked about it a little that night, and she mentioned she was overwhelmed, she needed a break, but she doesn't want to quit. She promises she'll go to the next rehearsal, then breaks out in Annie's classic Tomorrow.

The next rehearsal comes, and this time she didn't wait for me to leave. She started to puff up in her face right as we got close to the rehearsal room. I've never seen her just completely frozen with fear. She couldn't go in; she didn't want to. She said, "It's too much work, it's too hard, the other kids are so much older than her, and there are SO many kids." She's not wrong. The upstairs of the playhouse looks just like the orphanage from Annie, with the same old spiral staircase and girls with attitude running the place. It's a hard-knock life up there. This time, I was growing impatient because if she doesn't go to this rehearsal, it's likely she'll be kicked out of the play. The play she invited her whole world to. The play she was so proud to be a part of. The play that also offers NO REFUNDS if your child quits!

Before I lost it in front of my crying child, I sat with her and turned off the unreasonable stopwatch, the one that was counting the minutes we were sitting on this bench while she was falling behind in her rehearsals. I just sat with her. I stopped trying to convince her. Instead I listened to her and asked really specific questions. It was also helpful to ask her a more specific question than just "What's wrong!?!" I realized there was a real switch flick from loving it to not, something specific had to have happened. Finally I asked her if "anyone did anything that made her feel small?" There it was. She was super lost in a scene and asked an older girl that looked nice what page they were on. She was met with an eye roll and she was completely snubbed. Seems like such a tiny moment, but to a girl that is already feeling small, this totally squashed her. She got SPOOKED.

I wish I could say that she marched into the next rehearsal with new confidence, knew her lines and sang proudly, proved to everyone she belonged there. The truth is we're still working through it. Even with big pep talks, maybe a little bribery, she still needs a moment to wait for the tears to dry before she walks in. I was able to flag down one stage manager to explain what's going on. They will do their best to handle the situation and get her up to speed, they also need to be reminded her name and which play she is in. Even if she feels unknown and small, she is still showing up. She still wants to see it through.

It makes me think about the type of protagonist Noemie has always been drawn to. The Studio Ghibli main characters were always a kid, usually a girl, that is a little different. They land in a place where they feel out of place.

They struggle to fit into their environment. Then it's the fact they are authentic to themselves, kind, and are a little different is what helps them face their challenge. Their biggest obstacle is they can't fake something that doesn't feel right. They need to say something. Even if it means causing a scene. They don't try to defeat a bad guy, but give them a chance and try to understand them. They don't have a happily ever after or resolved ending, they have a gained perspective.

An absurd comparison comes to mind when I think of Ghibli's style of story telling - Scorcese. The master of powerful epic, often uneasy, graphic cinema. Characters, dialogue, and long uncomfortable scenes that feel so real and so uncomfortable to sit through. His unapologetic style of not trying to do the pleasing, box office friendly thing is why his earlier work was completely ignored in Hollywood. His lifelong editor, a sweet older lady who has edited every one of his rough, disturbing scenes, said it best: "He's very much against hitting anything on the nose." He doesn't want to spoon-feed the viewers a perspective; he wants to put up something troubled and very human. Scorsese said when he made New York, New York, at the very end, instead of Liza Minnelli's and Robert De Niro's characters walking off happily ever after, he just had them walk away without any closure. His pal George Lucas pointed out, "There's another 10 million dollars in the box office if they're together." Scorsese's response is, "He's right. He's dead right, but I can't say that I'll give you a happy ending. I don't know." He does the uncomfortable thing because that's what happens in real life.

Maybe Noemie's struggle needs to play out like a Ghibli film, feel undecided and not know what she wants like a Scorsese film. Just like Kiki, Chihiro, and Haru, she has to navigate this her way. Her process might not be like the other girls'. She is the type that is going to say something and cause a scene. It won't be smooth. She will get spooked. The show might not go on. We all have to embrace (including Mama) that that's OKAY.

This week, let's embrace the uneasy moments in life, purposefully putting ourselves in the dot-dot-dot experiences. It's okay to dive into the scary things where you don't know how they're going to end. Because no matter what is on the other side, whether it's something silly or spooky, an exhale or a scream, you will still walk away with a deeper perspective and confidence in what you're capable of.

I will say that the next time a mean girl tries to spook Noemie, they'll be dealing with a totally different girl, a girl from hard knocks.

Excited to make your bodies sweat, smile, and embrace what's on the other side of uncertainty . . .

XO,

Celeste