How did We Get Here?

I took this picture last year in my dorm room at Turner House at the University of Edinburgh during the 2014 Familiarization Trip. The Helpless Doorknobs script was still unfinished, the costumes had never been worn, and the question I scrawled at the top of the page was still unanswered:

what is yellow?

I was back in Scotland 10 years after that first deliriously exciting, magical trip I took in 2004, which now feels like the remnant from another life.

I remember my first application. I remember working very hard on the essay questions: What is your philosophy for teaching theater? What makes your program unique? What do you think is the importance of bringing students to an international arts festival? For the second half of the application, I printed, cut out and glued photos, programs, director's notes and festival adjudictaion score sheets into an elaborate 15 page portfolio. Then I learned I had to make 8 copies of that portfolio so I cut and glued and cursed spray adhesive many, many times over. I bound them up and mailed them out, nervous about the outcome of our application.

I remember getting the call on the phone telling us we'd made it, and that the representative made a big show of surprise: "Oh...wow! You were ranked really high among all the accepted schools by our National board." I asked how many schools applied, cynical even then at the statistic that AHSTF prints: "3500 nominated schools!" I always assumed nominated meant "put on a mailing list," because I got "nominated" by asking a grad school pal to refer me, which she did, never having seen any of my work with students. I was told that slightly over 150 schools had completed the application, of which around 50 were accepted, which would whittle down to the eventual 40 or so that would get the money and make the trip. These numbers made a lot more sense when I finally got over there and learned that the quality of the AHSTF schools ranges as much as the quality of American High School directors I've encountered in my career--from those who will forever outpace me in talent and intelligence to those who lack even basic theater skills. I will say this, though--even the objectively "bad" shows are being produced by programs that are unquestionably unique: extremely rural schools, single sex schools, etc.

I remember walking away from Pollock Halls dorms past the swiming center (which at the time was labled "the natatorium" ) and being suddenly hit out of the blue by a tremendous wave of excitement and pride. I just could not believe that a person like me had managed to secure a place for my kids at an international festival. It became a flashbulb memory for me, and there have been times when I've doubted myself or been frustrated with the limitations of my skill set and imagination that I've brought up that image in my mind of walking in the Scottish rain, grinning widely with the joy of having worked and lucked my way to that exciting point in time.

It was far less momentous the second time around. Tim and I returned from VTA 2013. We collapsed on the ramp of the Midsummer set in utter and total exhaustion after a very long, very intense weekend with the kids at the state conference, clutching our plastic trophy and relishing the small feeling that maybe, just maybe, we were going to succeed in building the EHS theater department into something we could be proud of.

We rested in silence for five whole minutes before I started us down the rabbit hole.

"So the deadline for the Scotland application is on Monday..."

It was Sunday, around 4 or 5pm.

"...and I've got to finish painting this set, and you're still hanging instruments and we haven't cued the lights, and the costumes...are going to have to appear by magic, and I'm just too tired to work on something that won't even matter until 2015."

"But if we do this, we'll get to take the kids to Scotland," Tim replied.

"Yes."

"And they'll get to perform, and see shows from all over the world."

"Yes."

"What do you have to do for the application?"

"I'll get my computer."

Instead of pouring over the essays and revising them for hours, I just typed my answers into the online form off the top of my head, scanning briefly to proofread. Instead of painstakingly sticking together an epic arts-and-crafts project for the second half of the application, I typed in a YouTube link to a video we'd already made about our program for Parents' Weekend. Technology has advanced in a decade.

Having finished the application, I picked up a paintbrush and went back to work on the set.

Fast Forward to the Familiarization Trip of 2014, which was both strange and wonderful because in ten years nothing in the AHSTF itinerary had changed. I walked around the city with the other AHSTF directors, and that feeling of tremendous excitement hit again. But this time, instead of discovering the place for myself, I was anticipating watching my current crop of beloved students discover it. For some of them, a trip overseas is no big deal; they are an international group, and a few of them are blessed with the means to travel often and well. For others, this is their first or second trip to Europe; a rare and valuable chance to experience a different country. For all of them, it is their first time performing on the world stage, and getting a very close look at the life of working actors.

I read somewhere that "if J.K. Rowling was living in London, the Harry Potter books would never have materialized. There's just something magical about Edinburgh, and it's not hard to see why her imagination turned to wizards."

So here we are, on the threshold of our biggest Mainstage adventure yet.

On your marks,

get set...

#test #pretrip #originstory