Why I Wasn’t a Theater Kid

I get the question a lot.

 

Why wasn’t I a theater kid in high school?

 

It’s a fair question. I’ve asked myself it on occasion. Why wasn’t I a theater kid? I love theater. I always have. I was in plays as a kid.

I was in plays as a kid.

 

Why did I stop?

Why did I stop.

 

I learned something as a kid. Something that I didn’t manage to unlearn until my senior year of high school.

 

I was in plays as a kid. As a side part. An ensemble member.

 

 

Now, I don’t harbor delusions of grandeur. I don’t think I was some amazing star kid.

But I know I was good. Good in a way that I’m not, now, because I stopped trying. I got singing solos at concerts. I was pretty good.

 

But I never got to be a lead character.

 

These weren’t my stories. I didn’t get to be the star. My face wasn’t the one people wanted to see.

(A remind, for those who haven’t kept up- I’m an American Born Chinese, and I grew up in a predominantly white town. See more on that here.)

 

And I got that. From the many child plays I was in, to Into the Woods Jr in middle school. I got it. Not my place. Stories like Mulan are mine- Cinderella is not.

(I was too young then to realize the stories I would be allowed to play- Miss Saigon, The King and I- were caricatures of what I should really get.)

 

It meant I didn’t feel it was my place to come back, to be a part of theater in high school.

 

(None of this, by the way, was a conscious thought. I did not realize this was why until the other day, when I was reading someone else’s thought piece- found here– on Miss Saigon, and realized how I felt about theater was intrinsically part of my identity.)

I joined marching band- color guard, specifically. (I only was part of it for 2 years.)

 

But in 2015 (my senior year), Hamilton debuted. Phillipa Soo played Eliza Hamilton in front of the Nation and was beloved for it.

In 2015, Allegiance debuted. People adored it. They loved George Takei.

In 2016, Ali Ewoldt became the first Asian-American Christine Daaé in The Phantom of the Opera, one of my all time favorite musicals (and honestly what probably would have, at one point, been one of my dream roles.)

In 2017, Diana Huey was cast as the first Asian- Japanese, specifically- as Ariel in an American production of The Little Mermaid.

 

Clearly, what I learned as a child was incorrect. These stories were mine, too, though getting them is an uphill battle.

 

I’m not saying that the world is suddenly fixed. I’m not saying that I wanted to get in theater, and was stopped by wild racism.

I’m just saying that once upon a time I didn’t see myself represented in theater. Now I do.

 

And that’s kind of cool.

 

Do You Want to Be My Friend? A Lesson on Trust, and How Long It Lasts

I have Trust Issues™. I am That Person. I don’t trust people easily. I have a hard time believing what people say. I have a hard time believing why they’re saying it.

I am broken. I am damaged goods when it comes to trust.

I make a lot of jokes about it. I make a lot of characters that it’s true of.

 

I don’t think people realize how serious I am.

 

 

I don’t think people realize. How broken I am. How much I struggle with the basic, everyday trust that you’re supposed to have in your friends.

 

You can talk shit about me. To my face, behind my back. But if I find out you’re talking shit behind my back, if I find out you were listening to someone else talk shit about me behind my back.

I’m going to be afraid. Forever. For the rest of the time we know each other. I’m going to be afraid that I can’t trust you.

 

And it’s fine if you talk shit behind my back. If you feel the need to vent about me. I get that I’m a lot, that my personality is a lot. I’m abrasive and a little awful. I irritate people. I’m mean.

 

I hear that a lot. From my family. From my friends. It’s fine, I know it’s true.

 

(I even know why I do it.)

 

(But we’ll get to that later.)

 

 

I know that it is not easy to be my friend. I am “not a good friend”. I am “difficult”.

I try very hard to not be fragile. To not be demanding. To let you choose, to let you dictate. I’m not especially good at it sometimes. But I do try.

I try and let you say whatever you want, even though it means I’m never super sure where I stand, never super sure where I fit.

 

(I want, desperately, to be taken seriously, but I’ve long since excepted that that will never be the case.)

 

I just want….I just want friends. I had a different friend, every year, throughout elementary school. My friends dumped me a lot. I realized quickly on that I am not anyone’s first choice of friend. I’m rarely even their second choice.

 

I have this permanent fear ingrained in me. From when I was young. And it continued well into middle school. And high school.

When people tell me things, there’s usually an ulterior motive. There’s usually an intent to hurt.

 

I fear people.

 

And I know I shouldn’t. I know that I have people in my life I can trust, I should trust.

But there’s always that voice, in my head, that irrational voice that says I cannot trust anyone. That people are going to hurt me.

 

I know that I should trust my friends. That it’s rude of me not to.

 

I know.

 

But sometimes. Sometimes I have a hard time believing. And it’s not like I want to ask for reassurance- I wouldn’t want to be annoying, or ask too much of people.

 

 

 

 

Now to the other thing.

 

I am difficult. And abrasive. And mean. Because then, if people don’t like me, it’s because I’ve given them a reason to.

They don’t just dislike me for me. (They always do, though.) They dislike me because I made them dislike me. (I’ve always been sort of a control freak.)

 

 

 

This is all just my own brokenness. It really has nothing to do with my friends now. They don’t deserve to have to deal with this version of me.

But life has a way of fucking you up.