High school musical

The year was 1776, and I was sitting in the stuffy meeting hall during one of the hottest days of the stifling Philadelphia summer. The vote was stymied, and I knew it was all because of me. Damn the stubborn southerners and their refusal to acquiesce on breaking free of the tyranny of evil mother England unless we continue the ridiculous practice of slavery in the New World! But then, alas, a distraction! Representative Ceasar Rodney of Delaware stumbleth and fell, the jaw cancer having weakened him. I jumped up and ran to his side, as the only doctor in the house. I knelt beside him and tenderly removed the bloody dressings on his wounded face. I examine the damage. It was the worst case of sharpie marker my physician eyes had ever seen.

For the whole side of his face read, "WHO'S MY BITCH."

And that was just one of the many times I nearly lost it during the middle of a live performance. We were doing '1776' and I had a pillow stuffed down my shirt. The gals thought it would be funny to screw with me onstage. Good times.

I was reminded of that recently for absolutely no reason. But it sent me spinning into one of my nostalgic fits, during which I am drawn back to the slick pages of my photo albums of yore. The process inundates me with memories how freaking uncool I used to be, thrust back into the reality in which I thought tearing up magazines and collaging the various images with my own photos was a hip form of alternative self-expression. (One of the collages that had made me most proud at the time was the one where I'd cut out a clever little tennis ball advert that read, 'Gentlemen, hold on to your balls' and manually photoshopped (in the days before I made myself learn how to use the digital version) it in with some of my wild college photos.) Yeah, I know, I was the epitome of awesomeness.

Anyway, I was in the throes of nostalgio-rama and found this:




And it took me back to a time in my life when I actually was cool. Or at least nowadays would be considered cool, given all the successes of the "High School Musical" franchise. I am proud to say that I lived the high school musical, from the on-stage drama to the backstage shenanigans. The above photo was taken during a performance of "Godspell" starring me as Sonja, the sultry, free-spirited disciple of the Hippy Christ.

I'm a huge fan of dramatic situations, and the theatrics of high school theater is the most fertile ground on this jealousy-ridden green Earth for it. Hormones bounce off the walls of the theater like tazer-fire in a magnetically sealed room. Jealousy over talent and assigned roles and a competitive atmosphere that makes the real world seem like a cakewalk. And where else can you fall in love with one man on one side of the curtain and hook up with another in the stage flies? Or where else can you watch a backstage cat fight over a boy who is clearly better friends with Dorothy? Or where else can a group of kids who didn't quite fit in with the high school cliques form bond over a growing cache of inside jokes? And in real life, seriously, you can't find a better setup for real-life outtakes.

Like the time during the dress rehearsal for "Crazy for You" when I was performing "Naughty Baby" for a crowd of teachers and students when I turned toward my captive audience (who couldn't believe the little choir geek was convincing as a sex kitten onstage) my buttoned-down red polka-dotted dress popped open and my boobs fell out.



I look back on my life in high school sometimes and wish that I had been cooler, or that I had grown a (proverbial) pair and asked a certain football player to go to the Commencement dance with me. Or that I had gone out more or stood up for myself more against the teen queens. Or, that my first time locking lips with a guy hadn't been a stage kiss. Shit, I wish I'd known then what I know now, yadda yadda. But when I really think about it, I had the fucking time of my life being a geeky theater kid. And I showed everyone my boobs.