Let’s review. After traveling to England for a semester abroad, I was inspired by my spiritual fore-sisters who sought knowledge and inspiration and intellectual stimulation before it was really possible or proper for a woman to pursue such things. I was inspired to record my own journey in seeking these same things, which became this blog.
Elizabeth Montagu was the leader of the Bluestocking Society, where ladies who didn’t suffer fools could get together for a chat.
Since January, I’ve been wandering. I took an opportunity to act in a play, and that decision started a half-year adventure of departures and arrivals in different cities, all determined by rehearsal dates and show schedules. This year, I’ve lived in New York for 2 months, Cleveland for 2 months, was a vagabond for a month, and am just beginning the next two months of living in Boise. In some ways feel like I’m on hiatus from real life. My usual support system is thousands of miles away. A new one has crystallized, but I am constantly feeling the anxiety of the temporal nature of my new reality.
And this is the life I have chosen for myself, to pursue a life in the theater. And while I know that pursuit can and will take many shapes in the course of a life, right now it means constant change. So I am trying to be at peace with this change of place, change of people in my daily life, change of self.
But being the bluestocking girl I am, I feel lucky to be currently surrounded by creativity. I have no responsibilities other than to do that one thing that I love to do more than anything in the world—put on a play! And that is a rare and privileged thing in the life of any creative person. So I want to take advantage of this gift and fill myself up as much as possible while I have the opportunity to do exclusively that.
So far that has meant reveling in things like…
…this view during rehearsal (yes, this really happened). And I’ve been doing yoga and meditating…like, on a regular basis. And spending time outside, riding my bike and hiking and seeking out the natural beauty of this place. I jumped in a freezing cold lake the other day and felt great about it.
For a girl who has lived in New York for almost 6 years and who loves nothing more than being inside museums and theaters, this feels very…not ME!
But the truth is that ME is only partially my habitual tastes. It’s also where I am now, who I choose to spend my time with, what I choose to do with my time, what I think and worry about and what I don’t think and worry about. The problem with thinking about this part of my life as a hiatus is that it casts my experiences, musings, relationships, and changing perceptions as part of UN-reality. But this is my life, my REAL and ONLY life, as transitory and unusual as it may seem. And so I am simply living differently for the moment, and trying desperately to be living in that moment.
You can take the Bluestocking Girl out New York City, but you can’t take the Bluestocking out of the Girl.
-American Bluestocking
Adventures of An American Bluestocking 