9/11/09—A Tale of Two Audiences

I thought it might be the altitude. It made me wheeze just walking across the parking lot and totally doubt my ability to lift Emilys and Elenas way up over my head. Would I be able to hang from my toes while gasping desperately for breath? “That must be it”, I thought as I heard the crickets chip during our first show. The babies cry. The chewing of gum. Every sound but applause.. What the hell?

First of all, we were exhausted. We'd rigged and teched the show earlier in the day, nourished only by the amazing burritos that Nick Spence had delivered to us. (Nick Spence, who painted our van, designed our t-shirts and posters and postcards and is just a general awesome dude.) I'd taken the van to get fixed. We warmed up acro. We put on make up. We put out fires. I think I'd forgotten to stretch. Basically, we were al frazzled. It was our 3rd city in a week.

The 6PM audience ambled in. They sort of mozied. A bit of a golf clap when Cameron introduced the show. Blank looks for the song and dance. We were deflated.

There are different styles of audience. There are different types of act. Maybe we didn't match the two up well enough. This was the polite audience, watching quietly and applauding only at the end of the act. Some people like this. Some people want the act to be taken as a whole and there's definitely something to that. But when you're up there busting your ass, actually in physical pain and trying to make it look easy, it's nice to get a little encouragement. Even when we did the splits, there was just a smatter of applause. Even after my biggest, craziest most unexpected drom, only the crickets gave it up.

It was a little disheartening. Even more so because we knew there were circus people out there. We just wanted it to end. So it was strange at intermission when we sold a bunch of shirts. Hmmmm...odd.

Of course, when Amanda performed there was a hailstorm of applause. It's her home town and she is loved. It's like everyone was just waiting to see her insane hat manipulation and comedy trapeze.

Then, to our total amazement, as we walked up to take a bow, people stood up. They weren't standing to leave as fast as possible. We were getting a standing ovation! They actually liked us...they were just a quiet audience.

Standing O or not, I didn't know how the hell I was going to get through the next show. I couldn't breathe. My muscles ached and my arms were shaking. I ate a powerbar and felt a little better. I forced everyone else to eat one, too. We had 20 min to the next show and I popped my head into the lobby to see how ticket sales were going. Sold out with the waiting list getting longer by the minute. There was such a buzz of excitement out there that it broke my heart to turn everyone away. So screw it. We wouldn't turn them away. We couldn't let them in the building due to fire code, but they could watch from outside. We threw open the curtain at the back of the stage and opened the garage door. This time, people poured in to take their seats, and huddled around the open garage door. It was a beautiful night, warm, starry and magical. All the energy that had eluded me in the first show came rushing into my veins.

The second Cameron went on stage they started cheering. They were a roudy audience. When Cameron played “Ask a ringmaster”, fielding questions from the audience, she got questions like “How many licks does it take to get to the center of your ringmaster?” They clapped for every move we did. I nailed my back flip and they went nuts. We even screwed up our acro act royally, but they still gave us the love.



At the end of that show, we got a standing ovation again. They leapt to their feet. No one would leave after the show. It turned into a dance party to “What A Feeling”, everyone doing their best Flashdance moves. It was still hard to breathe, but at least I felt like trying.

We went back to the mansion we stayed in, and crashed hard.

9/10/09--The Death of the Grump.

I had tried to tell Amanda several times that we were getting into Santa Fe in time for “some crazy thing with stilts and giant puppets, where the whole town goes out and parties” and she just wasn't connecting what I was saying to the annual Zozobra celebration. But when she finally figured it out she went nuts. For the 6 hour drive to Santa Fe, I emotionally prepared myself to dance in a field surrounded by hippies, fully anticipating a little Burning Man.

Now, I've never been to Burning Man, but if I ever get the chance, I fully plan to not take it. Spending any amount of time in a desert with any amount of people wearing any amount of patchwork sounds like torture on so many levels. Throw in things like “art” and “compassion” and “PLUR” and I'd sooner be water boarded. Hippies taken one at a time can be judged on their individual merits, but an entire desert city of them would just be too much. However, I respect Amanda on many levels, one of which is her non-hippiness and her enthusiasm for this crazy event led me to bury my skepticism and give peace a fucking chance.

Holy crap am I glad I did! I knew right off the bat that this would defy all my prejudgments when I saw people who aren't white walking around. And not just one or two! Also, no dreadlocks. There were some fairy princesses running around, and some freaked out 18 year olds sitting on the ground crying and throwing up as the cops around them paid no mind at all, but I also saw people in baseball caps and little kids in wagons. NPR fans and dudes in low-riders. It seemed pretty much that every man, woman and child in Santa Fe had crammed onto this football field.

(Apparently it also seemed that way to homeland security, what with all the snipers on top of the surrounding buildings. Weird.)

Zozobra is a giant puppet that stands 50 feet tall. He is meant to represent all that is gloomy, depressing and generally a pain in the ass. For weeks before the celebration there are boxes in grocery stores in Santa Fe where you can write your worries and drop them in to be collected and burned with Zozobra. School kids do this in class, too—writing the names of their teachers or siblings to be burned (hopefully) unknowingly. Then, the entire city starts fresh. A brilliant idea. I'd love to see the bothers and annoyances to be burned if they did this in Chicago, all of them written on the back of parking tickets and building permits.

But even though this is an 85 year old Santa Fe tradition, this would never happen Chicago, and here is why: The very first thing to occur (following the awkward singing of the national anthem) is that the mayor of Santa Fe emerges from between Zozobara's gigantic legs. Now, while Mayor Daley rolls out of bed with Evil every morning, the Santa Fe mayor has him one upped by wearing what looks like a sorcerer's robe and saying positive things and not being heckled or haunted by his own evil deeds. The mayor talks about how Zozobra must be punished for stealing happiness from the people of Santa Fe, for making their babies cry, for making them lose their wallets and making their tires go flat. He sends the crowd into a frenzy, 10,000 people screaming “BURN HIM! BURN HIM!” and pumping their fists into the air. It's a sort of terrifying scene, to be honest. I imagine this same scenario being played out under the Mujaheddin only with real people at stake rather than an elaborate puppet. For a minute I feel sick and very gross. Then I remember where I am and what decade it is and that this is all for fun.

Zozobra waves his 40 foot arms in the air, fingers the size of our van flopping in the wind. His jaw unhinges and snaps back shut, groaning and moaning. “MUUURRRAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!” “MUUUURRRAAAAHHHHH!", like the House Bunny remebering names. I start to feel sorry for him. I have a problem with proscribing human emotions to non human things...puppies, stuffed animals, salt shakers. Poor things. They all know what's about to come to them. All Zozobra can do is wait for the inevitable...after 85 years, he knows damn well what's coming, and so does everyone around me.

“BURN HIM! BURN HIM!”

A flame flies across the field and hits him in the kidney, then more flames shoot out of his head. It takes a while. First his jaw keeps moving and his mouth fills up with fire. It burns up behind his green flashing eyes. Bits of his head fall off and balls of flame drop to his feet, staring a new fire there. Finally he's totally engulfed and crashing to the ground. He looks like a burnt out car, but you can still see his eyes glowing through the orange flames.

Lost wallets. Mean teachers. Foreclosures. Citizenship battles. Divorces. Broken toys. Sexual droughts. Pink slips. 401Ks. Broken bones. They don't matter for a while. They burn with the evil Zozobra. A shower of fireworks erupts.

We all look at each other. Seven girls who had no idea what to expect and one who did. We fall into a hug, 2000 miles from home, with no real understanding of how we got here, other than in a van, and no comprehension of why we are so lucky. I couldn't help it, I was getting all “PLUR-y”. Tears stampeded down my cheeks. We were exhausted and dirty and shell shocked by the enormity of our adventure and free to move forward without gloom. Thanks Zozobra.