--Ecclesiastes
These are dangerous words.
I've mentioned it before, but I am obsessed with purpose. Based on past events in my life, I know that it's really not a good idea for me to have no sense of purpose. Really, reeeeeeally not. I have stayed far away from Ecclesiastes for a long time because it's a dangerous book for me to read. Yet, now, there are three books of the Bible printed out and on my walls--the Song of Songs, Job, and Ecclesiastes. (My inner romantic, my inner masochist, and my inner cynic?)
I haven't struggled with my purpose for a while now. It is very clear to me that I have been vigorously called. The specifics of that calling are being revealed to me constantly, almost overwhelmingly so. I am getting a lot of information rapidly, from varying sources--and that's the crazy thing. When something from a sermon echoes with something from Design class which echoes with something from rehearsal which echoes with something from Re-Inventions of Love which echoes with something from The Hidden Sky. Yes, I'm good at drawing connections between unrelated things, but many of these connections are so obvious it's difficult to take them as anything but a sign. I'm trying really hard not too seek out signs, because then I'd find them in absolutely everything. In a push-pin. But they're glaringly obvious. I have a vague idea of how they might come together, but very vague. It's something to do with love, suffering, voice, sound, sensuality, the body, asceticism, mysticism, monasticism, contradiction, trance, the miraculous, God within everyone and everything, image, synaesthesia, theater, bridging gaps. I think part of this means working to bring together theater and the church in productions both in content and production teams, and sharing skills between the two groups. That part I'm decently clear on. But there's also a lot about my relationship with God, my relationship to others, my daily ritual and how I am to approach the world that is hugely unclear, and I am simply trying to follow where I am being led. (After getting context on Rumi in class on Thursday, my brain exploded, and I yelled to God, "WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO TELL ME?! WILL YOU JUST GIVE ME A SIGN?!" ...and then I realized that the problem is that there are so many signs. Next time I'll ask for a burning trash can or something to talk to me and lay it out clearly.)
One of the things that IS particularly clear, though, is that I'm called to the theatrical, and I think that's why Ecclesiastes is becoming particularly important to me.
When you work in the theater, you don't work on a continuous path. It's not like working in a restaurant where every day is the same routine for 10 years. In the corporate world, there are projects, yes, but not like in theater. In the theater, you are employed for a time, during which you work to create an entire world... and then once the show is over, that particular world and experience is gone, never to return, and you're unemployed. The peaks and valleys of working in the theater are extreme, and since theater is generally so product oriented, it's very easy to put all your stake about how that product turns out. Like, if the show fails, the whole thing wasn't worth it. I think the additional danger for those of us who feel called to theater is that everything that is not a transcendent theatrical experience where we reach out towards God, we might view as "invalid".
Ecclesiastes reminds me that, ultimately, everything I do on Earth will be forgotten. Someday, the productions we spent all of our time and energy on for months will be nothing. Someday, even Shakespeare will be forgotten. All will return to dust. The towers that we build will crumble. Which means that the true meaning of life does not lie in product or accomplishment. That, once again, my calling is not to "make great art", but to DO something THROUGH that art.
I have recently started doing something, particularly this school year, that I used to never do, that I used to find terribly uncomfortable.
It's called "smiling at people".
I know, I know--I used to think it was overrated, too. Moreover, I've had this idea in my head for ages that I'm "not good with people" and therefore when I saw people who charmed the pants off of everyone I figured they just had a kind of charisma I could never have.
Then I started wearing a bowler hat, and people found me significantly more intriguing and would generally be friendlier to me, which made me less shy, so I started making connections with people that way.
But actually, it's as simple as smiling.
I swear.
Asking people how they're doing helps, too.
There are people I see almost every day. Security guards, NYU bus drivers, the breakfast cart guy on Astor, and the fact is, they're all people. They're people, I'm a person, and yet we tend to treat each other like machines. (Except for the breakfast cart guy, who treats everyone with love and humanity. I was away for a whole summer, and I came back and he was like, "HEY! Is that a new tattoo?!") It's silly, it's embarrassing, even, to be in constant denial of the humanity of those around you. On the street, sure, we're all going places, we're not going to stop and engage everyone, but at the grocery store? At Starbucks? These little exchanges we have are person to person, and if you treat them as such and just SMILE AT PEOPLE, a lot can happen. I have never had an exchange longer than "Thank you!" "Watch your step!" with the bus drivers, but when I get on the bus I have a brief moment of connection with another person, and that's good enough.
When I came back into my building tonight, there were two people swiping into the building before me, so I waited. The security guard was standing there scowling slightly, watching them swipe their IDs. I walked in, he glanced at me and his face immediately lit up, and he said, "Hey! How are you?!" and we chatted idly for the minute or so before I headed upstairs. I generally have pleasant exchanges with this particular security guard, but I've never seen that contrast before, between the people who didn't acknowledge him as a human, and then myself, who did.
And now I can't even say it's the hat. I gave up my bowler hat for Lent. So it's not the hat. I am still recognizable and loved, and I think it's because I smile.
When I came to NYU, Emily gave me a picture book she made for me called something to the effect of, "How to Meet New People". Partially as a joke, partially because I have historically been just that socially hopeless. And one of the things was "Smile at people!" (I think with something that said, "It makes you seem less scary.") And I scoffed, but now I bow to Emily's expertise.
I am struck by this particular passage in Ecclesiastes:
"If one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up! Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone?"
In a Book that claims that all is vanity, it seems that the connections between people are not vanity. That what is NOT meaningless are these moments of human connection.
It is difficult, as an artist, to come to terms with the fact that your work will not last. People joke about writing the "Great American Novel", but underneath the laughter is the very real, and very common desire to create something that will outlast the ages, something that will continue to speak the truth to the world without end. But I think we all know that it won't happen. No matter how many awards you win, in 2000 years, who will know?
What IS meaningful are those connections with other human lives, that affect all of us here and now and in our lives and world. Those are what are remembered where memory matters. They can be created through art, or they can be created through smiles--and those moments that I share with the security guards each day are as important as crafting a theatrical piece.
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