France, America, Just Some Experiences

This morning as I was leaving the gym, a man who looked to be in his late fifties, maybe early sixties, looked at me and exclaimed "hey, you're an American!" I was confused for a moment until I realized that Hervé (the French equivalent of Avery!), the man who runs the gym, must have told him. I smiled at Hervé who was sitting behind his desk and looked back at the man.

"Yes, I'm American! Have you been to the U.S.?"

"Yeah I love it!" He high fived me and squeezed my hand, clearly thrilled to be touching the noble digits of an American.

"Where in America are you from?"

"I'm from right outside Boston."

"Oh Boston! What a lovely city! It's so beautiful. Beautiful. Very cultured people. Great. And the chicks! They are so beautiful!"

I laughed and smiled and the man, whose name I never got, laughed louder and smiled wider. He adjusted his wide brimmed hat and colorful scarf.

"I lived in Manhattan a long time. Loved it."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah! You ever been?"

"Of course, I love New York!"

"Yeah, Washington Square. Great place. And the chicks! They are easy, eh? HA! American women, oh man. You know what I mean?"

He made a not quite so subtle humping motion towards Hervé's desk as he illustrated what he meant.

The guy seemed to have really enjoyed his time in the States.

"But America...it is sad now, is it not? People are unemployed. They travel a thousand miles to find a job and still can't get one. Your government is no good. The Republicans keep getting in Obama's way. He did nothing wrong and they're blaming him for their mistakes. It is bad. And the rich people get so much money! They look at the poor and walk away."

"Yeah it's definitely pretty unequal. I read that 1% of Americans have 24% of the wealth."

"Wow. Yeah I hope it gets better. Americans are good. A good people. They deserve good things."



A week ago, I met my friend Rachel at Place d'Italie to get dinner at a restaurant she'd said was great--Chez Gladines--and it was. We were walking by a commercial center when we saw an old man carrying several bags, dressed in heavy clothes, and walking with a cane. After a moment, his cane slipped, he dropped his bags, and he fell to the ground. He was still. Suddenly he began moaning and clutching his chest. His legs tensed slowly and released. A crowd formed around him. We asked him if he was ok and he was unresponsive for a few seconds. Then almost at the same time, everyone took out their cell phones to dial the police to get him help. In a mix of French and some words that to me sounded more like Italian or Spanish possibly, he loudly interjected.

"No! Don't call the police! Please! Don't call them. I'm Roma. They will lock me up and kick me in the head and send me away. Don't call."

Everyone lowered their phones and looked around at one another. After another moment, the man clutched his chest and moaned again. Then he was still and we asked him if he needed help. He started to try to get up off the ground. Some people walked away, but Rachel and I stayed, quickly looking between our phones, each other, and the man.

"Sir, do you need help? Are you ok?"

He didn't respond. Medical technicians came out from the commercial center and began to get him off the ground. He acquiesced. Once he was on his feet, they walked him into the building.



Several weeks ago, when my friends and I were getting on the RER train to head back into Paris after class at Gaulier, we were being perhaps a bit louder than usual. A man stared at us intensely with wide eyes.

"You speak English?!"

"Yes."

He continued to stare silently. I ventured a guess at why.

"You don't hear English too often on the train?"

"Never! Where are you from?"

"I'm from the U.S., he's from Australia, he's from Singapore, she's from Brazil, and she's from Italy."

"Ah. I used to live in the U.S."

I got up to sit across from the man, who was dressed in a suit and held a briefcase on his lap. He looked Russian to me and his accent wasn't quite like many French accents I'd heard.

"Where did you live?"

"Santa Barbara. I studied at UC Santa Barbara for two years. Got my master's there."

"Oh wow! It's beautiful there isn't it?"

"It is, yes."

"What did you study?"

"Environmental science. I worked in the oil industry for a long time."

"Oh, wow. But you don't anymore?"

"No. What did you think of the BP oil spill?"

"Uh, I was against it. Yeah."

He continued his intense gaze at me, unblinking. Not smiling. He didn't think it was funny.

"I think Obama waited way too long to respond and missed a real opportunity to do something about alternative, clean energies. He waited months! It was ridiculous."

Pause. He didn't respond.

"Where are you from?"

"France!"

Oh, that answered the question. Still, something sounded a bit bizarre, but what do I know.

"Where are you from in America?"

"I'm from right outside Boston."

"Oh, ok."

We chatted a bit about the States and he started to kind of avoid my gaze. The conversation came to a lull and he went back to reading his paper. I talked with my friends some more, when, after a few minutes, he interrupted me.

"Do you know what I think the world will resent America for for a long time?"

I hesitated. "No what's that?"

"Two things. The war in Iraq and the financial crisis."

"I agree with you. And to that I'd add Afghanistan, too."

His gaze started to get intense again, unwavering.

"But especially the financial crisis. Your country's problems have hurt the whole world."

"I agree."

He didn't really care that I agreed though. He had found an American to unload on.

"And I think it was so absurdly selfish."

"Yeah I agree with you. It's unbelievable how little the financial institutions cared about the effect what--"

"It wasn't just the financial institutions. It was your government."

"Yes."

"And it wasn't just the government. I think that every single American shares responsibility for this crisis. Every American."

Silence for a moment.

"Really?" I countered with.

"Yes." His death-stare continued.

"Why's that?"

"You all live in the system that created the crisis and did nothing to change it. You voted for the people who made it happen."

"But you really think every American is responsible?"

"Yes."

"But we had no say in what happened at AIG or Lehman Brothers or anywhere. And so many Americans were seriously screwed by this thing. How are we responsible?"

"Because you all did nothing."

This time, I started to feel uncomfortable and had trouble meeting his unflinching laser stare.

"And I think America is doomed."

"Doomed?"

"Yes. You're all in big trouble."

"I kind of agree with that a bit."

"I think within ten years, America will barely be a speck on the map to the rest of the world. You're falling. You'll be replaced."

"Who do you think will replace us? China? India?"

"No."

"Who?"

"France and Germany."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Wow, France and Germany?"

"Yes. And within fifteen years, I bet America will dissolve."

"Really. You think it won't exist anymore?"

"Yes. It will collapse. The country is too different everywhere you go in it. People can't agree on anything. Your government gets nothing done. Are you going back?"

"Yeah I'm going back in a bit over a month."

"You shouldn't go back."

"Well I already have my return ticket. And it's my home."

"Still you should stay in France. It makes more sense to stay in France or somewhere in Europe. You really shouldn't go back...America will collapse."

I looked in his eyes. We stayed there for a few quiet seconds.

"Wow. You really think so?"

"Yes. Believe me."

"Wow."

"I hope it doesn't, but it will."

He was so dead certain. The ride ended in silence. Then, when he got off, I extended my hand.

"Uh, nice meeting you sir. Good talking to you."

He mustered a polite smile and shook my hand. The laser gaze was gone, though.

Cultural Value? Or Odd Person? Or My Ignorance?

From the moment I got on the RER train at CDG Airport with my mom's cousin Jeffrey and his daughter Alice to head into Paris on Thursday, August 26th, it was clear that I had arrived in another land with a culture vastly different from the one that had sent me here. Every day since then I've tried to better understand this place and its values, as well as the differing and opposing views held by Paris's diverse populations.

However, it's hard. When I observe a majority of people behaving a certain way in certain situations, I feel as though I can consider that behavior a convention of their culture. But when I see several people behave a certain way or hear several people say a certain thing or talk a certain way, it's not as clear. Does this thing this person says or does reflect on the culture in which he/she lives, or is this just someone's own thing they do? Am I thinking too much in terms of "what does 'this culture' think or do?" No matter what, every day I'm faced with lots of questions in just trying to make sense of what's around me.

Take for example, my kung fu class. Every class we practice holding stances for a long time so that we internalize the form and build up muscular endurance. When my kung fu teacher has several fresh red dots decorating the crotch of the pants of her white uniform, does that represent a French aversion to tampons? Or does it reflect back on the Orthodox Pei Mei Nam Anh Kung Fu School? OR is it the expression of a broader mind-conquers-body value of the martial arts, rather than just Pei Mei? How does she not notice? Does she notice and not care? Aren't periods supposed to be uncomfortable? Or has she just so transcended the plane on which her body exists that she can objectively look down on menstrual cramps with little more than mild amusement, smile, and descend deeper into the stance of the tiger?

As I'm in France, I often encounter French people, especially on the metro, but sometimes in classes, too. On more than just a few occasions, some of these people have smelled. They've smelled bad. A handful of those bad smelling people have smelled bad enough that my mind needed to justify it. Is there a bloc of French society that looks down on what we consider "cleanliness?" Do they define it differently? Or is there a recessive allele in the French gene pool that codes for a life threatening allergy to the water that comes out of a shower head? An allergy so severe in its attack that its sufferers are immediately thrust into anaphylactic shock upon even entering a bathroom? If so, must they shower with an epipen? Is it fair of me to ascribe this in any way to their being French? Or am I just aware of the stereotype and looking for people who fulfill it? After all, there are plenty of smelly people in the U.S., and I've never thought twice about attributing their odor to anything other than their own personal ambivalence towards soap.

Almost every day I give some money to homeless people. I just feel so guilty that I have it and they don't that I need to. I know a euro or more won't save their lives, but I like to think it can at least help, if not slightly renew their faith in the capacity of fellow humans to care. But lately, I've noticed something. In the last week alone I've seen at least three homeless men, either camped out in the rain or in the metro, cradling sickeningly adorable puppies. Puppies cute enough that you'd think they had been plucked directly from the pages of an ASPCA calendar. This also makes my mind enter that justification process. If there is a question chemical, it floods my brain, and if there are question receptors, they hungrily bind it.

"How much do puppies go for in Paris? That puppy looks pretty new--when did he get it? Moreover, why did he get it? Does the companionship of a fresh puppy improve the loneliness of a homeless life? If he's struggling to stay alive, does adding a puppy to the mix represent a wise choice? Is this even his first puppy? If not, what happened to the others? How much in donations does he receive every day? Without the cost of sustaining the puppy, is it enough to feed himself? Including the cost of the puppy, can he sustain himself? By what percent does the cuteness of the puppy increase his donations? Does it at all? If it does, will the increase be enough to satisfy his and the puppy's needs? Or is the puppy actually so cost-effective that it pays for itself and yields a higher daily donation for this man's own costs? Is it pessimistic of him to have bought this puppy? That is, does he believe that people are uncaring enough about other people that they can't donate to a homeless man unless there are literally sad puppy eyes staring back at them? In his experience, is this really true? If I don't donate to this man, am I now also responsible for the possible starving death of a puppy? Or can the puppy actually feed itself? I consider myself a sensitive person, but am I being insensitive by detaching like this to wonder about his situation and his motives?"

Sometimes on the metro, especially line 1, musicians come on and play for five or ten minutes, solicit tips, then leave. Usually it's an accordion player with a prerecorded accompaniment amplified through a speaker, or a singer with similar accompaniment, or several horn players. Very often, except for the singers, the musicians are really good and I almost always give them money to share my appreciation for them sharing their music. I'm nearly always the only one on the train smiling, tapping his foot, and swaying with the music. And it really is good music. On Thursday I saw a pair of men, one on clarinet and one on sax, play a fantastic version of "When The Saints Go Marching In" and an exciting rendition of the great old Jewish classic, "Hava Nagila." To anyone observing the situation from elsewhere, it would've probably appeared as though everyone on the train, other than this slightly tired and foreign looking unshaven guy (me), got the memo that Sarkozy had recently outlawed public displays of enjoyment. The men played on, seeming to appreciate my enthusiasm, while every other person sat still, staring into nothing while appearing to contemplate their dear old grandmother's slow descent into irreversible dimentia and the inevitable tragedy when the family decided it was time to pull the plug. Again, the questions came.

"Are these people so used to hearing great, spontaneous music in public spaces that now, it's just annoying? Or do they just not like music? Does "Hava Nagila" bring back horrible, torturous, repressed memories of family holiday parties gone sickeningly awry? Or are they all secretly having the time of their lives? And they're just afraid to show it because they think everyone else will judge them? Why don't we have this kind of public performance on transportation in the U.S.? Wait...do we? And have I just missed it?! If we don't, can I somehow make it happen? Oh, wait I've seen people in the T stations and the NYC subway stations playing music! But not on the actual train. Can that happen? Does it happen? If it can happen, do I need a permit to do it? I know you need one to play in the station, but what about the train? Do these guys here need permits? Do you audition for one? If so, then why aren't lots of the singers any good? And why hasn't the accordion caught on in the U.S.?"

For some reason, almost every thing I see here I try to explain to myself through the lens of my being in France, but I just don't think that works. If there's one thing all cultures share, it's smelly people. We've all got em. That may be the main lesson I take away from these almost four months.

Clown at L'École Philippe Gaulier

Philippe Gaulier, founder, principal instructor, and all around guru of The Philippe Gaulier School, is the Dumbledore and Dr. House of the theatre.

The depth of his knowledge knows no ends; the man has been working for more than four decades and has taught and learned from some of the great artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. His former students include Emma Thompson, the founders of Chicago's 500 Clown Company, Sacha Baron Cohen, and countless other phenomenal practitioners of theatre arts. He is renowned as the best teacher of Clown and Bouffon in the world, and his faculty are brilliant (and incredibly limber).

However, Philippe Gaulier is also an asshole. He will not cure your ailment until he's insulted and ridiculed you and made everyone laugh at you for how "fuckeeng boreeng" or "fuckeeng idiote" you were.

Many of his exercises are designed to include an element of potentially huge embarrassment, and if they don't include embarrassment, the embarrassment comes when you receive your almost daily dose of scathing abuse.

On the first day we did one of his favorite exercises. We partnered into couples (there are twenty four of us in the class) and danced to whatever music Philippe chose to play from his iPod over the speaker system, and continued dancing until he saw someone look bored. He stopped the music.

"Which of you seenks your partner eez boreeng? Raise your and!"

Timidly, a few people raised their hands.

"Which of you seenks 'my partner eez like Adolf! My partner eez fascist! I want to kill my partner'?"

As we laughed, more people raised their hands and he began to single students out.

"You! You danced like you wanted a wheelchair!" he yelled at one girl. "It was awful. Awful."

"And you!" he pointed at me, "You dance like a gay man in one of zose gay clubs!" I started to consider taking this as a compliment since I think gay men generally move better than straight men until he brought it home with "eet was orreeble. Just so bad."

Philippe's insults very often demonstrate remarkable creativity. After a Portuguese girl performed an exercise, he posed the following question to the class:

"Does everyone ere know oo 'Salazar' was? Salazar? Salazar? No? Well years ago in Portugal zere was an orrible man named Salazar oo did orrible sings to peepul. Ee ad a secret police and zey would take peepul away in ze night and keel zem. Oo says 'Salazar's police did not keel enough; zey missed one'?" The point was taken.

Another one of Philippe's favorite exercises is his variation on "musical chairs" in which the person left out of a chair is given the chance to "save his/her life" by singing to everyone in a compelling and beautiful manner (while clearly having fun, the most important thing). After one student made a failed attempt to save her life, Philippe asked the rest of the class, "Do all of you know Pol Pot? Do you know oo Pol Pot was? No? Years ago zere was a man in Cambodge and ee did somesing orrible. But was what ee did nearly as orrible as what I just saw? NO!"

Philippe's working knowledge of genocidal dictators is impressive, and even more impressive is how frequently he draws on it when talking about poor performances. He also likes to compare quiet, powerless voices to a "leetle cat oo az lost iz balls and says [high voice] 'meow, meow, my balls, my balls!!'"

So how is it possible to learn anything from a man who so enjoys berating his students? How do I have fun? Well, honestly, his insults are usually hilarious, despite being sometimes borderline or full on racist and almost always really offensive, and personally, I find it refreshing to receive such horribly blunt criticism from a teacher, because that's something you pretty much never get in America, especially in the Arts. Part of what Philippe is teaching us is to laugh at ourselves and accept critiques without taking them personally, even if they're just incredibly harsh. And when he gives compliments, which is happening more and more frequently, they're very gratifying. "Not bad at all" is a good compliment from him, but to receive something like "you ad great fun, zere was a good complicité (I'll go into that)" is wonderful. And when he told one woman "zat was fantastic," we all clapped.

Classes are divided into two sections. The first hour and a half (2-3:30) is the movement/aerobics/acrobatics section, taught by Tomas, a Swiss-German dancer/acrobat/gymnast/unbelievably flexible and strong dude who is more sensitive than Philippe but is still very honest and quite a task master. For five or ten minutes we play games like six-square--like good old playground four-square only with six squares and one two-person team per square--or various "walk the space" theatrey things that make us run around and throw things to each other and jump and roll and generally just warm up. For the next forty-five minutes, Tom leads us through various stretches and aerobic exercises that loosen us up and make us sweat and tremble. He frequently introduces difficult stretches as "zis vun is a bit Nazi" or "zis vun is a Chinese-style exercise, so get ready, ya?" I've just accepted that in this place, things which people would consider "racist" or at least "culturally insensitive" aren't a big deal at all. At this point I know to expect pain whenever it's time for a Chinese stretch or exercise. Fair to the Chinese? Probably not. But hey, it is what it is. And for some reason the leg and back stretch we're supposed to do against a wall if we find ourselves in too much pain is called a "vegetarian cup." I don't know. It just is.

After we're all warm and loose, it's time for acrobatics. Day one we started working on handstands and headstands, and from there we've moved on to standing on people's shoulders, standing on people's hips, cartwheels, somersaults, backward somersaults, front flips, back flips, butt sits, airplanes, and handstands on chairs. The handstand is the building block of almost everything we do, so we work on them every day. I can do handstands and headstands against walls and against people, but getting up there on my own with no extra support still eludes me. However, I did successfully balance a chair handstand last week! That was one of the most incredible feelings I've ever had. Acrobatics has put my body in elements I've never experienced before and made my body do things I thought were impossible. The combination of mime, kung fu, and acrobatics is a phenomenal one and every day I find that something I did in one class helps me do something I'm doing in another. It's very exciting for me to see that so many physical limitations I thought I had are really psychological, and that through work, I can overcome them. It just takes work and patience and the humility to ask for help.

After Tom's class we have a fifteen minute break and then Philippe. We usually start Philippe's class with "Simon/Samuel Says" or the partner dancing kill boring people game, but lately it's mostly been Simon or Samuel Says. After we play the game for 45 seconds to a minute, Philippe stops and asks who has made an error. If you did something wrong, you have to ask for kisses from your classmates, however many you want, and if any of them say no, then you must walk to the front of the class to where Philippe stands, and he performs the torture ritual, where he grabs and twists your arm behind your back, then gives you a "French shampoo" which is just rubbing your hair, then "ze guillotine" with his hand, then "ze Guantanamo" which is him pushing your thumb down into your hand really hard. After one more round, we're usually done, but ONLY if he says "simon says ze game is over," otherwise all the students who prematurely moved to sit back down must line up against the wall to be either kissed or slapped by their more intelligent classmates.

Then, the exercises, which are really more games than exercises. All are geared towards establishing "complicité" or, complicity, with the scene partner, and having fun and sharing it with the audience. That is the basic thing of this school's philosophy, as can be seen in everything that Sacha Baron Cohen has ever done. Have fun, share it, and be willing to do anything. The complicity especially is huge. There needs to be connection with the scene partner. Or else, for all intents and purposes, you're alone. And if there's another person on stage but you're performing like you would if you were alone, ya look like a dumbass.

My two favorite exercises so far (partly because I got compliments from Philippe when I did them but mostly because I had lots of fun, which I guess is WHY I got compliments) were things we did last week. The first, which we did last Monday, was another complicité exercise, as well as a tool to work on "acting in major." Philippe talks a lot about how an actor can act in major or minor. An actor in major commands the stage and shares pleasure with all the spectators, while an actor in minor quietly and attentively listens and supports the actor in major. In this game, two actors walked to the stage. Each was given a scarf to tuck into the back of his/her pants like a tail, and the goal was to grab the other actor's scarf and keep your own. In playing the game there had to be complicité the whole time; the actors needed to be connected and grounded in each other's eyes and work off of each other without one person steamrolling the thing too much. Once an actor grabbed the other's scarf, it became his turn to act in major. He could sing a song, perform a poem, say nonsense syllables, pretty much do anything as long as it was compelling and fun. He also had to taunt his partner (who would play in minor) with the scarf until Philippe indicated that the partner could try to get the scarf back. If the partner got the scarf back, then it became his/her turn to play in major. I liked this game so much because it became incredibly physical. It's a sport. When I was done the first time, Philippe said "Zis one is a bit primative, no? But ee ad good complicité and ee was fun, wasn't he?" This felt awesome, even if he called me "primative" because I tended to try the same scarf-getting tactics again and again with lots of energy and not many new ideas. Then when I did it again later with another partner who was TONS of fun (my first one was fun too though don't worry) he said again "good complicité, and you ad great fun."

The second exercise I loved was the next day, when we mimicked our classmates. One person would take the stage and just truthfully respond to questions Philippe would ask, some vulgar, some almost mundane, others quite interesting. When an actor felt ready, he/she could go up and stand next to the subject and begin to mimic. I cried from laughter during this exercise! My classmates were so funny! I also had a ton of fun mimicking this Argentinian woman who speaks fluent French. She responded to Philippe in French, not English. Philippe and lots of others didn't know that I can speak French, so when I started mimicking her French with a correct accent, also trying to get a bit of her Argentinian accent in there, I got some good laughs, and I played up her physical mannerisms and just had fun. When I was done, Philippe said "Ze fun was good, yes. And where did you learn to speak French? You speak good French." I sat back down on the bench with the others, and he turned to me again and said "it was good." Then after class he came up to me and said "why do you speak French?" I told him that in school we were given the option to study French or Spanish starting in sixth grade, and I chose French because I thought it sounded nicer. Again, he told me "you speak good French, yes."

That was a great week. It was really gratifying to finally feel like I was internalizing and owning the lessons of this place; that is that to perform well, you MUST have fun, you must connect with your scene partner(s), and you must SHARE the fun! Also, to have him validate those things felt pretty damn nice.

A few days later he brought me back down, though. We were doing a Greek chorus exercise, in which one leader performs whatever movements he/she feels like performing to the music Philippe has selected, and four or 6 or 10 people behind him/her mimic the movements exactly. This way a spontaneous ensemble is created. Well my group was six ladies with me in the back. We didn't do so well. I didn't do so well.

Philippe, as usual, was ready.

"STOP! Zat was AWFUL!" He pointed at me. "You! You look like a terrorist oo az died and gone to Allah and received is 72 virgins but az NO idea what to do wis zem!"

You win some, you lose some. More often, he's Dr. House.

Little More on Kung Fu

I don't entirely understand why, but lots of people are shocked when I tell them about what goes on in my kung fu class, not entirely because of how brutal it seems, but because there are women in the class and the same (generally, I'll get into that) is expected of them. That is to say the women get punched in the stomach too, the women also have to do three minute planks, and the women are just subject to all of the same things that the men are.

Recently the schedule of my class changed a bit in that on Mondays, Yseult's instruction is replaced by that of a lovely fellow named Emmanuel and another guy a little older than me but who is a second degree black sash (Yseult and Emmanuel are third degree black sashes). Let it go on the record that Yseult, who is a short, pretty blond woman who appears as the stereotype of what men find completely lacking in menace, routinely punches harder than Emmanuel, drives us harder than Emmanuel, and executes the technique with more devoted and concentrated intensity than Emmanuel. Emmanuel's great don't get me wrong, but Yseult is very, very powerful. It's funny to me/bizarre that so many people are so surprised that women can be subjected to these kinds of physical challenges and rise to them without breaking themselves. Uh, they can.

Oddly, though, sometimes the instructors, including Yseult, say things like "the men can do the planks ___ way, and if necessary, the women can do them this [slightly easier] way." However, the women pretty much never do them the easier way, and neither does Yseult, who can do planks supporting herself on two bent index fingers. Seriously. Bruce Lee stuff here. So there's kind of this weird option of a double standard that actually, people don't accept. Contradictions, contradictions. Oh well. But yeah, in summary, there are women in my class, and they too get punched and hit and stuff. I know my friends who may read this wouldn't be surprised by that and I wasn't, but for some reason I've encountered people who are really surprised.

Wow. Music. I miss you.

I've got a few posts in the works right now, and unfortunately since I seem to want to make most of my posts into essays, they're taking a while and are frustrating to write. So I've got drafts and I'm still organizing my thoughts on these things, and one will be messy anyway, but meanwhile, I've got something I'm so ready to talk about.

I'm realizing every day the height of importance music holds in my life. I've played piano twice in the ten weeks I've been here and lately, I've felt as though a part of me is missing. This is by far the longest I've gone without touching a piano since I was three years old, and the separation just became excruciating.

Several weeks ago I went with some friends to see a one man show at the Irish Cultural Center. The show, called "Mimic," was the (fictional) life story of a man with a phenomenal talent for mimicry who eventually found himself alone, miserable, and dependent on artificial, impersonal pleasure in order to survive because of his own personal dysfunction as a human without his own identity and the overwhelming dissatisfaction of living in his futuristic, individuality-obliterating society. The text this performer created was absolutely beautiful poetry, and as he sat at the piano and scored his performance, I found myself impressed by his skills (and soothed by his fantastic Irish accent) but longing to be in his place. When the show ended and everyone left the room, I went up to the piano and sat down. A Steinway. Steinway grand, I noticed. I closed my eyes for a moment, straightened my back, and started to play "Willow, Weep For Me." The first, most superficial pleasure came in noticing that my hands still knew exactly what to do. But then the music washed through me and an incredible warmth consumed me. I felt as though I'd been powerfully embraced by the arms of an old friend or family member I hadn't seen in years and hadn't thought much about until that moment of reconnection, when all the memories came flooding back. A part of me I'd neglected was alive again, and the feeling was overwhelming; I realized just how much of me that part was.

The piano is my oldest, most supportive friend. I remember when I was a toddler, sitting on my grandmother's lap on Sunday afternoons at the piano, both of us laughing as we played the duet she'd taught me.

I remember my first piano lesson--April 27th, 1999--as my teacher told me "this key is Middle C. Play Middle C." I did. "This next one is D. Play D." I did. "Does that make this one E?" I asked. "Yes!" She said. "And this one F?" I asked, more excited. "Yes!!" She agreed. "And this one G?!" I exclaimed. "Yeah!! Right! But watch out, because the next one is not H. It's A. We start at A and end at G, but Middle C is in the middle of the piano, which is why you and I started there." "Oh, right."

If there's one thing I've never had to learn from any teacher, it's how to enjoy playing piano, how to play with love and sensitivity. To me, that's almost always been the clearest thing. Whether it's because the first few years I learned piano I nearly only played music I loved--Good Day Sunshine, Help!, We Can Work It Out, Ticket To Ride, Thriller, The Entertainer, the Ghostbusters theme, the Starwars theme, and You Are The Sunshine Of My Life come to mind--or something else entirely, I don't know, but I've always loved playing. Then learning jazz piano opened my mind more and gave me more freedom while also exposing me to an incredible variety of music I didn't know but came to deeply adore.

Even during the two and a half years I didn't take lessons, I played all the time and kept writing and learning music. Sometimes it was ten minutes a day, sometimes an hour a day, sometimes an hour in a week, sometimes five hours in a week, but I don't think I ever went a week without touching the piano. This past year studying classical piano and practicing at least an hour a day every day brought me to a level I hadn't been at before, and since I finally had the maturity and self-discipline to make a devoted habit of really working on it, I gained new skills, but loving it was not one of them. The piano was already a part of me and had been since a long time ago.

On Thursday I went to a bar with a friend from my clown school acting class. It was a piano bar, and there was a young Brazilian man playing accompaniment to a young French woman singing mostly American songs and a few French ones. The woman was not a very good singer and her attempt at the American "R" sound was far too hard and just made words sound harsher than they needed to sound, a shame considering that her native accent would have done just fine. The piano player was the one who got my attention though. Technically, he was not too bad. He had good dexterity and could play lots of notes fast. However, his touch was just stale. It was shallow. It was hollow. Watching them and listening to them, my hands started physically aching. My whole body had an itch to get up there. To hear someone playing for a bar full of people and sharing so little love and so little emotion while being given a gorgeous and out of this world opportunity broke my heart. After not very long, I asked the manager if there'd be a break in the set and if they'd let "other people," meaning me, go up and play. Of course, she said no. I asked again half an hour later and the answer was still, unsurprisingly, no.

My teacher at clown school, Philippe Gaulier, despises being bored. He absolutely hates it. And he hates when an actor isn't having fun, or just as bad, isn't sharing the fun with his or her scene partner(s), or also as bad, they aren't sharing the fun with the audience. So in the last few weeks my tolerance for boredom/lack of fun has been seriously depleted. Watching this pair play made me wish, cruelly, that Philippe Gaulier was in the bar so he could've shouted at them, as he does to everyone in the class several times a week, "Zat was fuckeeng boreeng! So awful. Sank you for sharing zat orrible moment. Now leave ze stage!"

Harsh? Yeah. Pretty harsh. But deserved, and not in a punishment way, but in a benevolent way, actually. Philippe teaches people never to accept mediocrity from themselves, partly because if they do, in their heads, they'll hear him scream "ZAT WAS FUCKEENG TERRIBLE!" but mostly because the pleasure of sharing a beautiful, vulnerable moment with people is one of the most profound joys anyone can experience, and can be revelatory for audience and performer alike, and to waste an opportunity for that, for whatever reason, is beyond shameful. Love what you do and share that love with me is his primary lesson, I think. Question his means all you want, but honestly his method works, and the last time I played piano I felt that lesson in action.

I miss the piano. A lot. And if there's one thing I've learned from this separation, it's that I'm never going this long without playing again. It's too god damn beautiful to stay away from.