Good thing I led with Guerrilla Theatre yesterday. What a beautiful transition into this thing of beauty that keeps me going.
Let’s Comedy has done what it set out to do. We’re creating a community of comedy. It’s not perfect. Even we fight with each other. Even we struggle. Even we have fallings out. But we fight and we struggle and we fall together. It hasn’t also been easy, but it feels worth it. Things have morphed and grown, and I love where we are.
Do I get frustrated? Boy howdy. Do I get mad? You bet. Do I love every minute? Hell, yes.
Open mics. Local comics. Regional comics. National comics. Fort Wayne to Indy to Detroit. We’re growing.
I’m so thankful for each opportunity and door and friendship and conversation (even the hard ones) that exist because of this group. That Guerrilla Theatre exists. That I’ve met so many amazing people, and not just famous humans. I now have some of the best friends in the world, the most amazing support system of other female comics.
But when it comes to this team specifically, I’m so incredibly thankful for the men I work with. Who have fought along side me to create safer spaces for women, minorities, and the LGBTQ+ community. Maybe not always successfully, but we fight and we try and are constantly working to be better. Who have worked to bring people together. Who have loved me when I’m being a brat. Who have called me out on my own bullshit. Who have become some of my dearest friends. Every day, every show has not been simple, but we keep working.
Ryan, Jared, Ian, Alex, Corey, I love you all.
Even tonight, we have two shows and our first album recording, and I’m so proud.
I’ve been very out of commission for almost two weeks now. Please, let me explain why, because I think I’m about to have a hard time with my emotions.
In July I went to an urgent care clinic because I was having the strangest pain in my vagina and pelvic area. They suggested an ultrasound, but didn’t have any idea what could be wrong. They also managed to trick me into a pap smear, which terrifies me, because of all that’s happened.
I went about my life. I lived some months just thinking my body was just being a jerk about bowel business. October 19 I called in sick for bowel stuff. My boss is absurdly understanding and a human I’m actually friends with, so I told her everything. I stayed in bed a couple more hours. Before I couldn’t handle the pain anymore.
I waited in the waiting area for a while with my mom. At least an hour. A woman with an actual screw loose in her head fell from her wheelchair, and no one rushed to help her. A man having a stroke sat and waited. It was going to be a long day.
In the emergency room, I was taken seriously. The very first time I went to the hospital in similar condition, I waited and saw no one, until I was handed midol and told to leave. This time they were kind. They believed me. They were concerned. I know my body. I know when it’s rejecting me like it’s middle school all over again.
The ultrasound technician insisted I not get my roommate for the day until after she’d done the highly invasive ultrasound. Here’s the thing about a vaginal ultrasound. It’s terrible. It’s worse if you’re in pain. It’s worse if that pain is what they’re seeking out. Prodding inside you. It’s worse if you’ve been sexually assaulted and don’t want anything shoved up inside you. There’s no amount of kindness and forewarning that makes it easier. It’s worse when they cannot locate the offending ovary. It’s worse when it needs to be done, but it’s taking too long, so you just turn your face away so they can’t see the tears on your face.
When she couldn’t find the ovary, they sent me for a CT scan. The men in that room were also kind. One of them held my hand while tears silently rolled down my face.
When the gynecological surgeon got out of the operating room he came down to explain some things to me. That there was a mass. He couldn’t tell where it was, so we’d have to wait for the CT scan results to see if it was, in fact, in my ovary or if it was in the spaces between my intestines. The ovary was an easier solution. The bowel was going to be a problem.
He came back after the CT results came through, and with plans of a new bellybutton they took me upstairs to the operating room to get the monster out. Until I was unconscious, I was telling the anesthesiologist about Let’s Comedy. He was very politely enthusiastic about the ramblings of a quickly fading woman.
There was another teratoma, which is both a cyst and a tumor. It had caused a torsion of my right ovary, effectively killing it. Both were removed. When it was removed the tumor broke open and spilled some fluid on my skin. I have burns on my skin, that are more painful than “some irritation suggests.”
I was home that night. I was cranky and mean and still owe my parents a lot of apologies for how much I snapped. I spent the next few days in a recliner watching Daredevil season 2 and Luke Cage and Murder, She Wrote.
The next two weeks were spent shoving down my emotions. “Focus on dealing with the pain,” I kept telling myself. “You shouldn’t deal with your emotions and your pain at the same time. You’ll never stop crying.”
I don’t know that I ever wanted to have kids. I don’t know that I ever really could. I’ve always known I’m supposed to be a foster parent. I don’t know for sure yet that my other ovary is functional or fully functional. What I do know is emotions are starting to surface, and every once in a while I cry. There’s a difference between opting out of child bearing and waiting to find out if you’ve lost that capability. Or not knowing for sure ever. Compound that with the lies I’ve been fed most of my life by conservative evangelical leaders and friends that my worth as a woman is met up with my production of humans. (I know this is a lie, reminding me is not a helpful action. That’s something you’re affirming for your own sake. Please, don’t take a beat to affirm that this is a lie). I know my worth as a woman, I know my worth a person is so much more than procreation. It does not make the mental and emotional destruction any easier. It only makes me more aware of the cognitive distortions, which compounds the feelings of being crazy. I have not even begun to deal with this. I’ve slowly breached some conversations with people who have prodded successfully, but ultimately am still delivering information in the form of facts and laughing absurdly at the current feeling of emptiness. I’ll be fine. I will. Right now, I am. In a few days, I’ll probably cry on someone unsuspecting.
In my brokenness, I told several people, I didn’t care what it took. I only wanted to be able to keep my word and perform at the annual Dead Comics Party, a night where wonderful people resurrect wonderful people. I’d been pining for this show for five months. I couldn’t miss it. I sat in my recliner reviewing my bit, but couldn’t do it out loud, because it hurt my stomach. I had shaped a wig before I got sick. All I wanted was to be in Indianapolis on the 25th. I didn’t rehearse my bit aloud until that day. Sitting on my friends’ couch shouting. Standing in my friends’ bathroom shouting. Petting my friends’ dogs shouting. Between each line an enormous gasp of pain. Finally, three minutes and 25 seconds of ignoring my pain and thinking, “I wish I could be doing better.” I walked off proud of myself, but knowing it could have been better, if my body had been better. That to say, I got to spend an evening being one of my heroes, a genius, who coincidentally died of ovarian cancer. Here’s what I could muster.
First, last Monday I started my new job, and I love it. It’s going to make things so much lighter for my brain. Already I can feel so many burdens being lifted. I can feel myself opening up space for things I enjoy and need far more than stress and pain. Chiefly, this means my brain is open to leave work and go to rehearsals without the burden of loathing. I can go to rehearsals and have a brain ready to create. I can go to rehearsals ready to delve into a thing I love.
Second, I left rehearsal Friday night full of energy. I was considering going for a run, but decided to go to the bar to see if our show was still happening. I haven’t been able to do much with Let’s Comedy, and I’ve been feeling guilty about that. I wanted to be able to be as supportive as possible. Comedy has always been something that I care deeply about, but ultimately it does sort of fill this weird space. It’s a round object in my heart, which turns out is heart-shaped. It fills so much, but not all of it. And here comes theatre again, doing its job, but I don’t want to leave comedy behind because it has taken such good care of me and brought me such wonderful people. But after the show ended I had a bad interaction. I was saying “good-bye” to some friends and noticed someone a little twitchy behind me looking at me and pacing. I decided to cling to my pal a while longer until he moved along and I could duck to the back room again where I made a break for my car. I ran for my car. I drove home. I’ve never run to my car before. Not unless challenged to a foot race I knew I’d lose. When I reached my house I sent texts to several people. To my people. The people I knew could talk me out of the car, because I found myself in my ritualistic spot in front of my house immobilized. “Does he know where I live?” “Did he follow me?” “Why does this keep happening to me?” “Is this my fault again?” “Is it always my fault?” They convinced me out of my car. That I was safe. Inside was safe. Some of them were just down the road if I needed them. I grabbed Gilda Catner when I got inside. I locked the door. I locked it again. I carried her up the stairs. I didn’t change my clothes. I didn’t do anything. Holding Gilda, I crawled into the utmost corner of my bed and sobbed. I fell asleep some time some hours later, Gilda still in my arms.
I woke up with her in my arms. A pounding headache from dehydration. I made myself leave the house. I wanted to blog something completely different on Saturday. I was writing letters. Letters I keep starting, but can’t ever seem to finish.
Because Saturday, third, I learned that Jim Leugers died. Jim Leugers was an incredible comic and artist and human out of Indianapolis. I didn’t know him well enough. What I did know was the effects of him in the community around him. Jim was this big beating heart and like arteries he pulsed this beautiful thing through so many people. So many of them, whether they realize it or not, are intimate reflections of Jim. The ways they take the time to encourage or guide people after a show, kindly or otherwise. The ways they take the time for each other at all. Comedy is such a different beast than theatre to experience, but I think what I love about this particular community is the way Jim impacted it. Because he kept it from becoming so isolating. It’s something that I hope doesn’t get lost, and I don’t think will get lost, simply because Jim isn’t here anymore. He influenced so many people, it’s impossible for that to get lost. Those reflections of him, those kindnesses (surly though they could be), I see them in so many people who knew him well, and I’m not even sure if they know where they learned it. It’s an enormous loss to his family, to his friends, to his community. But he isn’t gone. He’s genuinely left behind so much of himself in so many people. Last night I was driving someone home from a get together that was held in his honor, and he just kept saying, “I can’t believe he’s gone.” And I said, “Nah. He’s not. Just think how stupid it is that you can see pieces of him in even the dumbest people who knew him. He’s everywhere, and that’s the most annoying thing he could have done.” But it’s also the most beautiful. He shaped a whole community in Indianapolis, and who knows how far that reaches? He traveled. His friends traveled. Pieces of Jim are everywhere.
The night I found out, fourth, someone told me to never stop talking about what has happened to me, which is why I’m writing this at all. Because so many of us have been silent for far too long. This is for Spencier.
So fifth. When I was living in Indianapolis, after my third assault, I was reaching my breaking point.I think I reached it. I think I was ready to give up completely. I was done. I was going to give up on everything. Suicide was hard on the table, and I was so silent that no one would have known. I wouldn’t have known who to tell or how to talk about it. Or even why to talk about it. One day a friend of mine friend college who lived in Fishers suggested I just try going to the Indianapolis Museum of Art. “Look, you like art. It’s free. And maybe you’re just not getting out enough anymore.” He didn’t know. He couldn’t know. I wouldn’t let him know. But it was a good suggestion. So that Saturday I put my bravest face on, and if memory serves my cutest “I’m going to look at art” outfit, and I went. I wandered, and I wandered. Most of the day. It was at the very least calming. He was onto something there. Then I wandered into a room. A room where the ceiling was covered in colored wires and tiny speakers. There were a lot of people in there talking so I didn’t get it. I walked the room and looked outside. I read the placards. It wasn’t until I read the placard that I realized what was happening. The room cleared of the noisy people. I curled up on the floor in a corner, and I sat silently. I listened. I listened for over an hour. I cried. I wasn’t alone anymore. I changed my mind. I went back to that room every week until I moved back to Fort Wayne which happened four years ago tomorrow. Every time I need to go to Indianapolis, if it is my power I make a trip to that room. It is now $18 to get into the museum, and it’s worth it for me to regroup. I spent almost three hours sitting in there today. When I walked in today, I came in as the whispers of “I love you” began to swell. I sat silently as school groups shouted and ran around.
At one point a woman came in and sat beside me on the bench. We were both just looking up at the speakers. I was crying. I could feel her crying too. As she got up to leave she put her hand gently on my hand and said, “Art can do that. Enjoy your time.”
A Broad Abroad 