The gift of closure

Every day, life hands you a gift. Rarely, it hands you a Very Big Gift.

Sometimes that Very Big Gift comes in the form of unexpected closure.

We all want closure, right? Many of my clients are very explicit in their desire for it. One client described the loose ends in her life as constituting her very own Circle of Hell, a fiery inferno of What Ifs, I should’ve saids, ‘I wish’es, if onlys.

It’s human to crave the end of something distressful, and also to believe that we must see the end of that something to truly heal and move on. We as a society tend to like symmetry, and full circles, and clean cuts.

Yet, we live in world that’s inherently asymmetrical, the circles more like wavy ovals and rarely all the way closed, and the cuts jagged, hard to stitch up. The world we live in is messy. And despite our best efforts, we as people are messy.

It is for these reasons that I, more often than not, end up in a tough love position when my clients tell me that they need this thing to move on in their life. They need that apology. They need that validation. They need to be heard, or seen, or noticed. Need, need, need, they say, and I smile, and nod, and then say, “no, you don’t.”

You see, it’s a matter of want. We want those edges sewn up. We want to know we’ve said all we could, or that we were understood, or that there are no hard feelings. We want to apologize or be apologized to. We want the mess cleaned up, swept up, stowed away.

But we don’t need it. And in fact, I think it’s the believing that we need something from someone, in order to move on, that keeps people sunk into distress, despair, and with bad habits on repeat. When we rely on the reactions of someone else to determine our healing, we put the key to our contentment into someone else’s pocket.

Closure in the form of an interaction with another person, a certain thing you want to say or want said to you, is certainly something you can crave, yearn for, and seek out. And sometimes, if you’re really, very lucky, you just might get it. But hear this: You Are Not Entitled to It. If you get it, consider it a gift. Consider it an ultimate win.

Nine times out of ten, people don’t get closure in the form of an interaction with another person. They get it from somewhere inside of them. They learn to think about the situation in a different way. They accept that there are things that will never get to be said, or heard, or felt. They accept their lack of power in de-cluttering all of the chaos in the very messy world, and they find ways to move on with their lives. It can be done.

My life is just as messy as anyone else’s; maybe a little more so. That being said, I’ve got some broken circles hanging out limbo, swinging from branches, taunting me with their lack of completion. One of these broken circles, in particular, was not only broken, but also on fire. It has kept me up at night. I’ve cried about it, raged about it. It comes up in my dreams and I wake drenched with cold sweat and cursing my pockmarked and hypersensitive heart. And because I thought it was the best thing to do, I worked very hard at making peace this thing, internally. My gut told me that it wasn’t fair to involve the other person who held the missing link in my incomplete circle—because my circle was my burden to carry, not theirs.

I made progress. I left the circle hanging up in the branches, scorched and ashy, but no longer burning. I became able to tolerate its brokenness. I accepted it as it was.

Then I happened to run into the person who had the power to complete that tattered circle. And because I am both very lucky and also because there is goodness in the world, the person gifted me with closure. I said some stuff I’d wanted to say. I got some questions answered that had weighed on me. I felt heard and forgiven and valued, and I hope the other person did, too.

To be clear: I didn’t deserve this interaction. I didn’t earn it. I wasn’t entitled to it. It just happened. It was a gift.

I’ve still got a lot of broken circles hanging out in my branches—unfinished business and unanswered questions and points of grief and loss. It’s pretty human to have a few. And I know with a certainty that runs bone deep that many of my circles will never be closed; they’ll always be missing a piece, or bent beyond recognition, or crafted with a dotted line.

But I’ve gotta tell you: I am grateful, grateful, grateful to have one less now.

Half my life

I recently turned 35. I’ve been with my husband, Jeb, for 17.5 years. Do the math: I’ve been with this man half my life.

Yet not even the knowledge that comes with time can stop me from sometimes being plagued with doubt. I often worry whether we’re doing marriage “the right way.” I don’t know about you, but I do this thing where I look at other couples and assume they have it all figured out, everything in their life is perfect and wonderful. I go so far as to let others’ lives play out like movies in my mind. Other couples, watching every TV show together, spending all night talking. Agreeing on every single opinion about every single thing in life, ever. Skipping through dewy meadows in their perfectly pressed clothes and clean shoes, then going home to their pristine houses. (Y’all are killing it, in my imagination.)

I wonder if people do that with me and Jeb. We have an exceptionally well-documented life via social media, due to Jeb being a photographer and also knowing a lot of photographers. A quick perusal of either of our Facebook  accounts reveals lots of pretty pics of us, all made up. Tons of snaps of our kids being awesome. Photos from tropical vacations, and warm, cozy holidays. Our social media screams “We’re happy! SO FREAKING HAPPY!”

And that’s about half of the truth. A lot of the time, we are happy, content, doing fine.  

And a lot of the time, we’ve struggled.

Getting married is easy. You find someone you love. You think, yeah, I could spend my life with this person. You have a celebration and your friends and family all show up and everyone cries. The world is your oyster; everything is possible.

It’s staying married that’s hard.

If you’d have asked me at twenty-three, which is how old I was when I got married, I’d have predicted that over the years, I’d change very little—I knew who I was, what I wanted, the road I was headed down. I had it all figured out.

Except I didn’t and I didn’t have enough foresight to see that I didn’t.

People can change a hell of a lot over time, and I think it’s possible that Jeb and I changed more than most. I pursued many years of higher education, and due to that, was exposed to ideas and people and adversity and growth and culture in a way that molded me, shaped me, carved me into a different person. As for Jeb, he left his job as a public school educator and became a full-time photographer/creative. He learned that he needs to be making things, thinking outside of the box, and not answering to a hierarchy to feel fulfilled through his work.

We also became parents of two kiddos in a span of twenty months, so as we were stretching and learning and developing our singular identities, we were also immersed in the task of keeping tiny humans alive.

The years marched on. I got my PhD and started a private practice. The kids started school. We went to family celebrations. We hung out with friends. We did date nights sometimes. We traveled. We pursued individual hobbies and interests. We built a house and moved to a lovely new neighborhood.

And then one day in our thirties we woke up and realized we had no idea who the other was. I won’t speak for his side of it, but my personal awakening came with the question: Why are we together? We had different groups of friends. We didn’t read the same books, or necessarily gravitate to the same kinds of media, or have any hobbies in common. I loved Jeb, but I didn’t know why I was with him anymore.

At about the same time I was grappling with these serious questions about my marriage, I became depressed— so depressed I couldn’t even see straight. It seemed like every decision I’d ever made in my life was wrong. I questioned my entire existence as a human being: where I’d come from, what I was doing now, where I was going. It was hell. And Jeb got angry and withdrew. He didn’t know what to do with me; didn’t understand what I was trying to say when I talked about my questions, about my doubts, about what wasn’t working for me in our marriage. In hindsight, he was depressed, too, but men sometimes look different when they’re depressed. (Google Masked Male depression for more on that.)

And we fought. Good Lord, did we fight. There were tears and storming out and many nights spent sleeping apart. I spent the night of our 11^th wedding anniversary at my parent’s house, that’s how bad it was.

We contemplated separation. We ate meals together with our kids and had our best “everything is fine” faces on, even as I researched apartments, always late at night, or at the office, while I wept my way through my fifth box of Kleenex.  

But in the chaos, something miraculous happened. We fought for each other. Even through all the squabbling and miscommunicating and passive-aggression, we kept coming back to the same point: we wanted to try. We wanted our family. We wanted to see if we could find each other again.

So we tried. We went to therapy together, and went to therapy individually. First, we bent. I started trying harder to listen to him when he was sharing something he was excited about, even when I was exhausted from listening to people all day, and even if what he was saying didn’t interest me. He started greeting me when I came in the door after work, and went out of his way to tell me all the ways he appreciates me. Essentially, we slowly figured out the ways we had been failing each other and made the others’ emotional needs a priority again. We made a few big shifts, but mostly, we made a million little changes.

And after awhile, we had bent so much that we softened; the rigid edges of us melting. I let him back into the places in my spirit that had long been steeled against him. Though he isn’t and will never again be the man I married, he became a man I wanted to stay married to.

I don’t think that Jeb’s my soulmate. This is because I don’t believe in soulmates, this idea that you can meet someone and POOF, love happens and it’s forever and you don’t have to do anything to make it work. I used to buy into this stuff, and sometimes that wily belief wants to come weaseling back in—mostly when Jeb and I are struggling. I think, during those rough times: “Oh, if only I’d found my soulmate and married him, then I wouldn’t be going through any of this arguing or pain or doubt.” But you know what? I call bullshit. What I really believe in is two people fighting for each other and choosing each other again and again and again, every day. I can’t think of any better definition of love than that.

I didn’t write this for some kind of “atta girl.” I’m not aiming for you all to see me as a paragon of morality, because believe you me, the level of fuck uppery that I’ve reached during these years of growth and struggle has been unreal. I also fully anticipate that I will in some way, at some point, mess something up again.  Our struggle isn't over. It's not a thing that ends. I think marriage/partnership is less like a straight line with some kind of destination that a couple can arrive at, and more like a circle with little pit stops along the path, some happy, some sad, some totally fucked up. And round and round the circle you go, hopefully learning how to navigate the rough times as you know yourself and your partner better.

I also didn’t write this to shame those of you who have divorced or ended long term partnerships. I don’t think every relationship can be saved, or should be.  

I wrote this for the folks like me, who are sitting there comparing their imperfect relationship to everyone else’s “perfect” one, lurking and hiding in secret shame. If your marriage is messy, if there’s some stain on it that you wish wasn’t there but is, if you’ve hurt your partner or been hurt, if you’ve wondered if you made the “right” choice in a partner—you’re not alone. You’re more normal than you think. The more I talk to people who I’m real with, and who are real with me, the more I realize that every long term romantic relationship has problems. It’s what we do with the problem that matters.

As for me, I’m going to keep trying with Jeb for as long as it makes sense to try. Being with him for half of my life hasn’t been nearly long enough.  

Photo: Sarah Gudeman   http://www.sarahgudeman.com

Dust

8/13/17

Sometimes I write bittersweet things. Is there anything more beautiful than that edge between joy and pain? Here's a little snippet from a work-in-progress novel. 

***

It’s been months.

Days pass where I hardly think of you at all.

Days pass where I am buried and smothering in you.

I don’t know which is better.

There was a time that I wanted every trace of you away from me, because the shards you left sticking out of my skin were bleeding and painful. I picked you out with tweezers. I threw the bits and pieces of you into the air and watched them soar.

And now I bleed less but I remember less. I can hardly remember the way that your chocolate eyes crinkled and your hair grayed—just a little—at the temples. Your face is all blurry, like a moonlight lake reflection of you, not Actual You. I’m not sure what your voice sounds like anymore.

Sounded like.

Remember when you started talking about me in the past tense? I do remember that.

I’m not sorry that I met you. Months ago, when I was bleeding, I was sorry. But now I can see that if I wouldn’t have known you, there are so many other things I wouldn’t have known, some of them so precious to me that I wouldn’t be willing to give them back, not for anything. Not even if I could.

And so even though maybe you ruined my life a little bit, I have no choice but to welcome in my grudging gratitude for you.

I don’t know what to wish for you. When I think of you, you’re smiling. Happy. Looking at your new lover like she is made of magic, your light reflected in her eyes. On my very best days, I think of this and send you warmth, and kindness, and “I’m so glad, I want this for you, you deserve happiness” -type intentions.

And on my lesser days, I wish thoughts of me would steal over you and soak into your body like heavy August damp.

Maybe in years, when so many days have passed that I’ve lost track, and the memories are faded and yellow and brittle with age, this will all mean nothing.

But even then, in some recess of my heart you will stay. You held yourself out to me with cupped hands, and I drank you in. You’ll be with me even as memories turn to dust and scatter in the wind.

I suppose I hope you are being you. Wherever you are. 

To the friends who saw Me and liked me anyway

On one of the last days of my undergraduate career, one of my best friends wrote this in my graduation card. “When I met you, I didn’t like you. I was a fool.”

Youch.

But it only took me about thirty seconds to completely understand what she meant. Why she’d felt that way. 

You see, I wasn’t the easiest person to get to know, in my younger years. It was weird: I was SO excited to go to college. I’d thought I would reinvent myself, create a new identity. I was all outward confidence and gusto, and if anyone would have asked, I’d have told them I was planning to take UNL by the balls.

Yet I didn’t know myself at all. There was all of this stuff happening on the inside of me that I couldn’t see.

I entered my freshman year convinced that I’d already made all the close friends I was ever going to make, EVER. I thought that only people who’d known me my whole life, since the beginning, would really care for me. In other words, I didn’t see myself as likable. It was more like I saw people as tolerating me—and not because they wanted to, but because they’d had to.

That (unconscious) attitude followed me around UNL for my first two years. I was closed off, reserved. I didn’t put much time or effort into making new friends. I poured every ounce of energy into academics, the one thing I knew I did well. I’m pretty sure I came off as a quieter, less spirited Hermione—the 11-year old Hermione living in the 19-year old me. (I even had really poofy hair. Hermione central!)

Yet even though I had no idea how to find it or build it, there was a big and growing part of me that craved community. Belongingness. So I applied to be a Resident Assistant for UNL. I’m forever grateful to the late (and wonderful) Sheryl Haug, the woman who chose me to be a part of her staff at Cather Hall. She saw something in me and gave me a chance. Without her, I’d probably still be Grangering it up, able to tackle serious math theorems but unable to make friends. 

I got a chance to meet my future fellow coworkers the Spring of my sophomore year. I had super unchecked anxiety at the meet-up, and this came out of me as rigidity. Shut-down mode. And it didn’t matter, because these people weren’t going to like me much, anyway.

Though not a lot of real info got over my walls during that first encounter, there was this one guy who stood out, who I thought about long after the day had passed. He was everything I wasn’t yet everything I was. He was blunt, sarcastic, uninhibited. I was none of those things. Yet he also seemed to love Moulin Rouge and kids and music—like me. He scared the bejesus out of me and I dreaded seeing him in the fall. And, because life is life, he was the very first person I saw when I rolled up to move into Cather Hall the following August. We saw each other, and he—who wears all of his emotions on his face—gave me a lackluster hi, obviously not thrilled to see me. And I spoke through my teeth to my dad, “I don’t think I’m going to get along with that one.”

Our whole staff went on a retreat together, immediately, the same day we all moved in. It was a weekend full of ice breakers, trust falls, ropes courses-- you know, all that bonding crap. But I'll be damned if it didn't work. I let down my guard and started to let people see who I actually was. And they didn’t hate me. And that guy, the one who scared the shit out of me? He quickly became one of the best friends I ever had. (His name is Brett Hall and he is a stand up guy.)

My RA staff friends became lifelines to the self I wanted to be. I didn’t want to be stiff and scared of my own shadow. I wanted to be fun and silly and brave. I wanted to laugh a lot. I wanted to believe that I was a likable person, even if I’m not everyone’s type. These friends taught me that I could be...well, me.  And they brought me Razzles and ate Thanksgiving dinner in my room with me and drug me to Tarentino movies I'd never go to otherwise and drank Parrot Bay with me and bitched about hall government with me and hugged me when my great-grandma died and covered my socials for me when I was too depressed to handle them. They were always there. (Literally. I lived, worked, ate, and went to class with these people.)

For a long time I’ve known what these guys did for me. I’ve talked about it in graduate school classes, and with my clients. I even pseudo-used this life experience as inspiration for my dissertation, which focused on social adjustment to college for rural students. I don’t know if I ever really thanked them, though.

So, to all of my Cather Staff peeps: thank you, thank you, for seeing all of my weird quirks and liking me anyway. I don’t know where I’d be today if it hadn’t been for you.

You will all be my friends 4 Life.

Big Pimpin'. (Yeah, I just said that.)

Find me on Twitter and Instagram @AllisonLBitz  


I never thought I'd see the day where the word Pimp appeared in my blog. Once, during a therapy session with one of my clients, I made the offhand comment that promos for the movie The Giver seemed to be "Pimping TSwift pretty hard." Later, I worried so much this had been an anti-feminist thing to say that I emailed the client to apologize.

And now you know a little bit about what I'm like. Holla back y'all!

Okay, so lemme get straight into some Pimp Juice:

Be Still in a visual nutshell

About Be Still

Living in the community of rural Fairfax, a town where sports are almost as important as church, and where a family's last name matters a whole heck of a lot, isn't easy for every teen. Fortunately for high school freshman Shelby Novotny, she has it all: basketball talent, a powerful family name, good friends, stellar grades. She's even earned the respect of her community through her unyielding patience for her mother, who struggles with bipolar disorder.

When Shelby's basketball coach, who's a longtime friend of her father's, takes an interest in helping her develop her talent, no one bats an eye. Everyone trusts Jeff Vogel. His last name has been part of the Fairfax social thread for generations.

Yet Jeff's interest in Shelby goes beyond her basketball abilities.

Shelby falls in love with Jeff. It's wrong, and she knows it, but it's meant to be, so she persists. For years, she lives a double life, maintaining her Good Girl image while also having as many trysts with Jeff as they can manage.

Three years later, Shelby finds out that her star crossed-destiny was all of Jeff's design. She learns that he has had student "loves" before her, and he seems to be working on the next one already.

Shelby finds herself torn. Report what she now realizes is abuse, and send a row of dominoes tumbling down: Dad loses his position as school board president. Mom goes into a depressive episode. Jeff loses his job and likely his family. The Novotny name, forever tarnished. If anyone believes her in the first place.

Yet if she sits on her secret, it's only a matter of time before the next girl meets the same fate as she and the girls before her.

Be Still is an 90,000 word YA contemporary fiction with series potential.

Q & A 

What else does Be Still have going on?

• Snarky dialogue
• Parents who are doing the best they can
• Strong father-daughter dynamics
• A dad who moves from passively supporting rape culture to taking a stand against it
• A fantastically witty mom
• A creepy, complicated antagonist 
• An adorable peer love interest for Shelby (not Coach! I'm talking someone her age)
• Rural, small-town culture
• Basketball! It's the backdrop for the drama... like how football was for Friday Night Lights

Who might like Be Still? 

• Readers of Rainbow Rowell
• People who loved The Most Dangerous Place on Earth by Lindsey Lee Johnson
• Anyone curious about what Nabokov's Lolita might have sounded like from the perspective of slightly older Lolita
• Lovers of One Tree Hill or Friday Night Lights

Why is it called Be Still?

The easiest thing about this MS was the title. "Be still" is something that Jeff says to Shelby with frequency. And there's more to it, but I want you to read the MS to find out!

Why did you write about such a dark theme? You seem like kind of a silly person. 

I know, right?! Laughing is my favorite. I am 60% silly.

And then I'm 40% pretty hardcore.

I feel like this MS came for me. I really do. It happened in my day job, where I work as a psychologist in private practice. One day in my first year, a client disclosed that she had been in a relationship with her band teacher when she was in high school. Okay. I took it as an anomaly. The next year, another client came in and told me the same thing, only she'd slept with her 8TH GRADE MATH TEACHER (when she was in 8th grade). And now five years into my practice, I've heard versions of the student-teacher relationship story many more times. Spoken painfully, tearfully, shamefully.  I thought to myself, "This is a story that's been untold. I want to give these young people a voice. I want society to understand what it's like to live in their shoes." Shelby was born out of this desire.

Why should you choose me as a mentee?

1) I will do what it takes to make my MS shine! I'm ready to listen to your expertise, and I'm ready to work. I'm willing to make major edits.

2) I am growth-oriented. Although I don't like failure any more than the next person, I accept that it's part of the process of getting better. I'm willing to take risks. I will be vulnerable with my mentor. My mind and heart will be open to your ideas. I see my MS, and indeed my very personhood, as always, always a work in progress.

3) I pick really good GIFS in Twitter conversations. I work hard at this. Though I do have a couple that I tend to really like and overuse. My pick for this post WAS GOING TO BE the Meredith Grey "Pick me! Choose me!" scene, because duh. But a lot of people already used that for their pimping. So I will choose another favorite:

Hermione Raise Hand GIF from Harrypotter GIFs

4) I want to form a relationship with my mentor. I mean, of course I want my MS to get shinier through the mentoring process. But I love people, and I want to love you, prospective mentor. Not in a creepy way. Not too creepy, anyway. I probably won't window peep at your house or dig through your trash. But I might try to find out when your birthday is so that I can send you a card. Or find out your favorite stuff so I can Tweet all the right GIFs at you. And cheerlead your progress on whatever you are conquering these days.

I could have probably summed all that of that up just by saying I'M A HUFFLEPUFF, Y'ALL.

5) I am organized and task-oriented when the occasion calls for it. See my numbered list here? See?

6) I work hard. So, so hard. Rest and relaxation are actually harder for me to do than work. So if you want a worker bee...pick me. :) (also, if you want a poet, pick me. I guess).

What's your favorite color? 

Seriously, that, of anything you could ask, is what you want to know? Fine. It's blue-green, the color of the Caribbean sea.

What's your other favorite stuff? 

That's better.

I love my husband and my kids. And my kitties. And Stranger Things.

See us? Bunch of dorks. But man, we're the best dorks. (The kids haven't actually seen Stranger Things--we don't think they're old enough-- but we made them pose for the card anyway.)

I love Harry Potter. Maybe a little too much. (Is there such a thing?) I recently defeated my very HP-oriented group of cousins in HP Trivia, one of the greatest accomplishments of my life. My cousin with the Dumbledore tattoo was PISSED.

Other loves:
   TV: Parks and Rec, Silicon Valley, Downton Abbey, The Office, Game of Thrones, The Walking Dead, Mozart in the Jungle, West Wing
   Movies: HP Series, LOTR series, Beauty and the Beast (both), THE FIRST PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN. ONLY THE FIRST ONE.
   Music: The Head and the Heart, First Aid Kit, Lumineers, OK-GO, Strumbellas, Florence and the Machine, HAMILTON SOUNDTRACK, Garth Brooks, Queen, Tom Petty, Cake
   Hobbies: I'm a baller (league volleyball), voracious reader, loving gardener, and enthusiastic karaoke singer.

Books:  (*cracks knuckles*)....where do I even begin?

All the books by Rainbow Rowell
Outlander Series- Diana Gabaldon
All the books by Tana French
The Poisonwood Bible and Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver
Small Great Things- Jodi Piccoult
The Night Circus- Erin Morgenstern
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry- Rachel Joyce
East of Eden- John Steinbeck
Bellweather Rhapsody- Kate Racculia
The Sun is Also a Star- Nicola Yoon
The Forgotten Garden- Kate Morton
The Perks of Being a Wallflower- Stephen Chbosky
Broken for You- Stephanie Kallos
The Time Traveller's Wife- Audrey Niffenegger
 

Please don't be strangers, y'all. I want to know you. Hit me up on Twitter @allisonlbitz. 

via GIPHY

Big shout out to Brenda Drake for putting on Pitch Wars, and to Lana Pattinson for hosting #Pimpmybio!

The Room Where It Happened: The Time I went to Hamilton

If you follow my online presence AT ALL, you’ve realized that last Saturday, I went to Hamilton: The Musical in Chicago. I haven’t exactly been quiet about it. It’s been one of the most exciting things to happen to me since...birth? IDK. 

Excited as I was, I admit I was nervous about seeing the show live. I love the soundtrack so, so much, and have listened to it countless times- as recorded by the original New York cast, who of course all are the cream of the crop in terms of Broadway talent. Could ANY other cast live up to my expectations?

As it turns out: Yes. YES.

I’m gonna break the whole thing down for you. I mostly have a lot of thoughts about how seeing the show live compares to listening to the soundtrack. However, since I’ve also seen most of the Original NY Broadway performance (acquired via the Black Market for Nerdy Stuff, which only opens itself to those truly worthy. It’s like a Room of Requirement for nerds. And if you don’t understand that reference, you’re definitely not getting in), I have a few thoughts on performance differences—broad strokes, not specifics.

Okay, first of all, let me *literally* (say that like Chris Traeger) set the stage for you. The PrivateBank Theatre is located in downtown Chicago, nestled amongst restaurants, coffee shops, hotels, and other retail venues. The Air BnB loft apartment my friend and I managed to snag was within walking distance, which meant we schlepped by the theatre multiple times both before and after the performance we attended. Every time my eyes lit on the iconic gold poster of Alexander with his hand thrown up to the sky, my heart went BOOM. I’m thinking that feeling will never go away. I’m okay with that.

(Did you get the Chris Traeger reference? That nerd Black Market door might have just slid open to you.)  

The theatre itself isn’t huge. It’s an old, pretty, tasteful venue with red carpet, red walls, and ornate scrollwork and columns. Janelle and I had seats on the floor, Orchestra left, closer to center than I’d thought, and closer to the front than I’d thought. Walking in to realize that we had not just good seats, but AMAZING seats, was thrilling. Worth every penny.

The view from our seats!

I got a Hamilton Cocktail, which is Hennessy and Ginger Ale in a collectible cup—which really turned out to be a sippy cup of booze with the Hamilton logo emblazoned around the outside. I was pretty proud of it.

This is how the show starts: King George over the loudspeaker welcomes you to his show (everyone laughs). Then, even as the laughter is still dying down, the opening violin strain – the oh so recognizable One-Triplet-One-One-One-sweet violin line—enter Burr.  "How does a bastard, orphan, son of a whore..."

The first set of goosebumps rippled over me right then, the kind that start in your face and shoulders and fizz their way down your arms, leave a cold-but-not-unpleasant-tingle in your gut, and travel down your legs and into even your toes. My feet were cold, then sweating, then cold.

And then there was this burning haze over my vision. A lone tear overflowed and ran down my right cheek.

I know, I know, it’s a pretty dramatic response to attending a musical. But I tell you, this isn’t just any show to me. This particular musical represents a bunch of things that are dear and central to my identity and what I want to do in this world—social progress and equity for women and equity for people of color and immigrants and the importance of writing as a means of fostering social change. Lin Manuel-Miranda (LMM) has written about these things with the hand of Shakespeare but the beats of Biggie and it is NUTS. It’s the smartest piece of art I’ve yet to witness.

So, there’s my justification for all of my chills and crying, if you felt like you needed that to not judge me.

Anyway. Now just a bunch of thoughts about the show. (Those who don’t speak Hamiltonese might want to skip the end of this post, where I discuss my Madcap Bathroom Break.)

It was hard for me to imagine anyone but LMM in the role of Alexander, so I was especially nervy about what comparisons I might draw between LMM and Miguel Cervantes. HOWEVER, Cervantes was MADE for this role. He was so good. As soon as he walked on stage and his dulcet “Alexander Hamilton. My name is Alexander Hamilton…” cut through the theatre, I was a believer. A helpless devotee. His voice is great, but his acting is maybe even better. He somehow—and I say somehow, because obviously the dialogue is exactly the same across shows—played a humbler Hamilton than LMM’s, and I liked this modified take. (Bonus: Cervantes is easy on the eyes, ladies and gents.)  

Miguel Cervantes

I learned from seeing the show live that I’m *not* as loyal the original NY cast as I thought I’d be. Hearing and witnessing other actors in the roles turned out to be fascinating. I would compare the feeling to ordering a limeade after months of drinking only my favorite lemonade, and finding that I liked the limeade just as well. In this cast, I especially loved Daniel Breaker as Burr, Alexander Gemignani as King George, and really especially Karen Olivo as Angelica (she just SLAYED everything). Also, Chris De’Sean Lee was an awesome Lafayette/Jefferson. This is a hell of a role to fulfill per se, but then again, trying to live up to Daveed Diggs is probably a little bit impossible. 

The one actress who for me might always be untouchable is Phillipa Soo, the original Eliza. Eliza was played by Aubin Wise for this performance, and there were moments when she was slightly over or slightly under her notes—not the big long belting ones, but the notes in between the big belters. I was crushingly aware that she was Not Phillipa Soo during the whole show, and held my breath every time that Wise sang. Fortunately, she nailed Who Lives Who Dies and left me in my usual tears at “the orphanage…” (If you can get through that without misting up at least a little, I’m not sure you have a heart.)

Moral of the story: Phillipa Soo is the shit and probably I’ll never love any Eliza as much. I can accept that and still love other incantations of the show, though.

Okay, next point: The choreography, blocking, chorus/ensemble, and interaction between the characters brings the show to life in a way that the soundtrack alone cannot—and that’s saying something, because the soundtrack IS the musical. As opposed to other Broadway shows, many of which have more non-singing dialogue, Hamilton is almost entirely sung or rapped. There is only one scene—where Hamilton learns that John Laurens has been killed—that doesn’t make the soundtrack. Yet, even though you can listen to the soundtrack and get the complete storyline of the show, the live show is still SO MUCH COOLER. It’s incredibly dynamic. There are things happening on every corner of the stage for many of the songs, flirting and sidelong glances and eye rolling and all kinds of things that make the show vibrant and robust.

I noticed that I liked some of the songs better when I could see them live. My favorite listening songs: My Shot, Schuyler Sisters, Satisfied, Right Hand Man, Yorktown, Non-Stop, One Last Time. Here’s the breakdown of my favorite live songs:

• Schuyler Sisters— I will never again be able to listen to it without wishing I could watch it— it’s such a great ensemble piece. I love watching the sisters interact, I love Angelica’s dressing down of Burr (I love it vocally—it’s one of my favorite parts to sing in the car-- but I REALLY loved watching her lay the smack in person).
•  Every single King George song. Dude, talk about an actor who could bring down the house by doing almost NOTHING. On his first song, he walked out and stood almost stock still (like the stately King of England would), but his vocal inflections and slight facial expressions made the song hilarious. So. Good. Most of this shtick is missed when you can only hear the songs and not see the acting.
• Right Hand Man— The lights for “BOOM” (cannons) was just cool. Plus, you could see the actors spit on all of that crazy rapping, which I weirdly loved.
• Satisfied- Angelica’s face and inflections change everything. It’s obviously a sad, wistful song, but when you see Angelica foregoing the probable love of her life so her sister can be happy…it’s a gut wrencher, folks.
• Yorktown- (duh). Seeing the world literally get turned upside down on stage brings it all to life.

Also spotted in Chicago.

• The Reynolds Pamphlet – There’s this bit where a bunch of characters are throwing tons of pamphlets up into the air as a means of taunting Alexander, who is standing at the center of it, papers raining down on him, looking chagrined. It’s so visually chaotic and awesome. It’s funny to watch King George get in on the taunting. It’s also a really good visual set up for the next song, Hurricane.
•  Blow Us All Away – Watching Eliza and Alexander hold their son as he dies takes the heartbreak factor up to a new level. The interplay between Eliza and Alexander during this scene is something you just can’t see or infer from the soundtrack—i.e., when Alexander tries to take Eliza’s hand, she rips it away from him. Super well-blocked and acted.
• The Election of 1800—There are about a million things in this scene that can’t be seen from listening to the song. Burr and Jefferson are at stage left and right, while Hamilton is up above them, as the election’s outcome has now fallen to Hamilton’s opinion. When Hamilton makes his surprising endorsement of Jefferson, you get to see Burr’s face shift from smug to shock, and Jefferson’s hang-dog embarrassment transform to unabashed glee. Jefferson literally gallops around the stage—there’s so much stuff going on with his physical person throughout the musical (most of it is really funny) that you could only see through watching the show.
•  The World was Wide Enough—So many reasons this was way better in person. First of all, watching Alexander go through his whole scenario of “is this where I die?” and thinking through the reasons to stay, and reasons to go—with all of the characters popping up on stage as he thinks about who he’ll join if he goes—helped the song ring truer and hit home harder for me. Then, watching Burr’s reaction, seeing the regret on his face, realizing how truly devastating it was for him when he became a pariah—you can hear that in the song, but when you see the glaring faces, and the slump of his shoulders, the song becomes an even stronger empathy-builder.
• Who Lives Who Dies— Eliza’s finish takes out your heart and squeezes it until only pulp remains. So many feels.

So now that I’m seeing it all laid out like this, I’m realizing that I liked Act II much, MUCH better live than I do when I just listen.

Captain Obvious is going to make an appearance and and sum some shit up right here: If you can, see Hamilton live. Get yourself into the Room Where It Happens. The soundtrack is and will always be superb as a standalone, but the show is indescribably good. I mean, I’m really doing my best to tell how good it was, but in a way this task feels like trying to verbally describe the color “purple” to someone who has never seen color. Sometimes words are inadequate.

The most stressful part of the show? Trying to go to the bathroom at intermission. The venue had ONE bathroom, and ushers were herding people in and out of it like air traffic controllers. I’m not kidding, there were probably five or six ushers JUST handling the ladies’ room. So you’re standing there in line with hundreds of other women who have to pee, and then the lights start blinking, signaling five minutes to the show resumes, three minutes, etc., which stressed me the eff out, because I was also aware the lobby ushers would not let me into the theatre until after the first song if I missed the start of it, and it was “What Did I Miss?” and I DID NOT WANT TO MISS IT. Once I finally arrived at the threshold of the bathroom, one of those bathroom ushers pointed me to an open stall—I’m surprised they didn’t have these folks wearing neon orange vests, like gameday parking lot attendants—and I ran to it, peed without actually fully emptying my bladder because I was too nervous and also, cutting my pee off three seconds early was three more seconds to get to my seat. I summarily whisked my hands under a faucet mostly for the sake of appearances (that’s what hand sanitizer is for), and bolted out of there like the place was on fire. I made it back to my seat in time for Act II and jumped headfirst into a political abyss.

As a point of comparison: I almost missed my homebound flight on Sunday night. This experience involved Home Alone-ing it through O’Hare and obsessively checking my watch to ascertain that my flight door was still open. I arrived at my gate just in time for the final boarding call. But I’m not kidding you guys: I was more stressed out in line for the bathroom at Hamilton than I was at the airport. #values

Stressful urination experience notwithstanding, attending Hamilton in Chicago was easily one of the best experiences of my whole life. I know that’s a big statement, but it’s not hyperbole. It was incredibly meaningful to me. I loved every minute of that show.

I am now grieving the fact that Hamilton Day has now come and gone. It’s a hard thing, grounding my feet back into solid earth after a dizzying peak experience like that.

But, I’ve already decided…I’ll be back.

Just you wait. 

How a lost a brother and gained a sister-- in one day

May 2012

The most poignant moments of my life tend to sneak up on me. Granted, some of them I'm able to see coming: for example, my wedding day, and the days I met each of my sweet babies. I knew in advance that these life-altering days would unforgettable, but I had no idea which specific parts of these days would get seared into my memory. I find that it's usually some small detail, something I wouldn't have predicted would be important, that ends up claiming the honor of making a wrinkle in my brain. Almost always, it's something that moves me deeply and unexpectedly. For example, I remember the receiving line at my wedding much more than I remember the exchanging of rings or vows or the first dance. In my mind's eye are the tears coming out of my grandpa's eyes, the spring in my mother-in-law's step. I can still hear the voices and laughter echoing in the back of the church. From Evie's birth, I recall the weight of her being lifted off of me, out of me, and the intense relief of being able to draw a deep breath. And with Jonah, I think of this song that my hospital bracelet played when I pushed my bracelet to his (a neat safety feature, so no weirdo can sneak off with a baby that's not theirs)-- which gave me a little thrill of joy every time we did it. How could I have possibly predicted that of all of the moments, these would be the ones that persisted? The ones that I can readily recall?  Yet my life as I know it is woven out of a million tiny details like this.

Last Saturday some new memories got woven into my life tapestry. My brother got married. Because I'm mostly not an idiot, I knew that the day would bring on lots of feels, and would leave me with lots of good stuff to look back on. Yet, as usual, there was this sucker-punching moment that caught me off guard. It happened at a time that I would have expected to be routine, cursory, a mundane detail: standing in line, waiting to walk down the aisle for the processional. Up to and even including that point, the day had been hellishly hectic. My existence as a human being had been reduced to that of a frazzled and purple-gowned personal assistant for my immediate family: the management of hair, clothes, everyone being at the right place at the right time, plus attempts at gracefully maneuvering the egos and bodily functions of two small kids in formal attire. (Have you ever tried to help a coiffed and incredibly stubborn 4-year old flower girl go pee? Not for the faint of heart.). After Evie disappeared for the umpteenth time and required a cursory search party, I began to fantasize about propping my feet up on a church pew and downing Morgan ‘n’ diets until smiling came easy again.

Yet as the service started, the noise in my head finally quieted down. I stopped, and for the first time looked, really looked, around me. I saw my Mom. She was striking in her mother-of-the-groom attire; that much I had already seen. Now, though, I Saw. I saw through all of the formality and fuss and noticed her fragility. Her pride, her tears, the bittersweetness of seeing her son happy yet so grown up. I saw Dad, farmer-gone-debonair in his tux and cufflinks, his eyes glistening and red-rimmed as he waited with Mom. For a man I have never seen cry, he seemed markedly unabashed about wearing his heart on his sleeve. The therapist in me smiled while the little girl in me wanted to comfort her daddy. Cue my own tears, the cup of my emotion finally runneth over as my parents made their way down the aisle ahead of me.

That’s when I got my sock in the gut: “my little brother is getting married.” In the span of seconds my mind flipped through the catalog of memories that I have stored for Nate. I remembered him as a guileless toddler, following me around the house because I held his tractors captive; as the little guy who ran around with these two other little guys, all in MC Hammer pants and neon t-shirts, who my friends and I labelled "the junior mafia." As a teen stumbling drunk and breaking one of Mom’s fancy lamps, spurring a ten-year secret between he and I, one that we guarded carefully until we were sure we were beyond the statute of limitations on such things. I recalled him leaving home, moving into his first apartment, experimenting with different hobbies and jobs and lifestyles until he found what fit for him. Over the years he became a person I not only loved, but also liked-- he became one of my closest friends. He was no longer a child in any way. He hadn’t been for a long time, but this fact finally hit home for me as I stood looking down the long aisle at that nervous and joyful man who stood waiting at the altar. I felt a pang of loss. Our past was gone. Our little Michl family of four was no more.

In almost the same breath, I thought of all I was about to gain.  Before I started my walk down the aisle, I looked back and saw Abby. The beginnings of tears were in her eyes as she clutched her father’s arm. My heart squeezed when I looked at her, and I remembered that already, I loved her like a sister. I wanted her to be in my family. I was happy to say goodbye to the past if it meant that she would be a part of our future.

And this is the snapshot image that will remain when I look back on the day: crying with my parents as we said goodbye to the past and hello to the future. I’ll remember other things, like Evie crawling under a pew and screaming during the ceremony, like the best man’s speech, like losing and serendipitously finding my sunglasses (on one of the groomsmen's faces at 11 PM), like eating a Skittle that I thought was a Reese’s Pieces (and this, my friends, is not a good surprise if you’re me). It was a day filled with stress and joy, dirty jokes and cocktails, old family and new family. It was an honor to be a part of it. Though I did have to let go of my “baby” brother, I got him back as a peer and friend, and I also got a sister-- I'd say that's a hell of a deal, and I couldn't be happier about it. 

Cheers, once again, to Nate and Abby!!

Originally published 5/6/2012 on ideclarelifecrisis.blogspot.com. Edited 5/1/2017.