Revels

Thursday night was the big holiday extravaganza that my school produces every year. This is not the swaying-on-the-risers-while-singing-Jingle-Bells po-dunk concert that you and I might have participated in many moons ago. Rather it is a 20+ song multicultural bonanza, involving dancing children, singing children, violin playing children, marimba playing children, drumming kids, signing kids, kids singing in French, Spanish, Japanese, and Arabic, kids fighting a dragon, and kids making star patterns with swords. It is the Lower School event of the year. Regular classes essentially come to a halt for the 3 weeks leading up to Revels, and in the last few days the music teacher had my little 1st Graders in daily two hour rehearsals. Deep.

But all of the hard work pays off, the show is amazing. Steve came and watched, and I was so happy and proud to have a good friend see my wonderful students in action. As soon as the lights went down and the 5th Graders began their welcome song I started weeping. I was just so impressed by the whole student body. I spent the whole evening whispering furtively to Steve, “Look, there’s Ryan! He’s the one who makes fairy houses on the playground every recess! He’s singing so loud!” And stuff like that.
I didn’t have time to go home before the concert, so I wore a semi-nice outfit to school and applied some make-up in the bathroom while a 4th Grader brushed her hair beside me. I look way prettier when I wear make-up, but I am to lazy to put it on every day. I was made keenly aware of the effect of my efforts, as every single one of my students told me how “different” I looked. “Willow! You look really different right now.” “Willow, you are wearing a LOT of lipstick!” After 4 or 5 lipstick comments I wiped most of it off, but even then it didn’t stop. Even teachers and parents remarked on how I “clean up nice!” Very odd feeling, having my face talked about so much.
When I lived in New York I wore make-up when I went out sometimes, but almost never during the day. I just “couldn’t be bothered,” as the Irish would say. No one would ever look at me when I was out and about sans make-up. I generally feel like a pretty girl when I am in Portland or Denver or Tacoma or whatever. but in New York I mostly felt invisible. Sometimes it was a bummer, like if I saw a cute boy on the subway and I wanted to wink at him, but he wouldn’t make eye contact with me because of my big coat, big purse, Duane Reade bag with box of tampons clearly visible through the flimsy plastic, frizzy hair because New York does that to me, and probably a runny nose. Gross. I wouldn’t make eye contact with me either. So sometimes I felt bad about the invisibility. But mostly I felt cool, like I had a secret. In fact, that’s how my alter-ego, “Miss Nancy Novak” was born. Now she is a sassy girl-about-town, but originally she was my mousy, slightly frazzled, relatively plain hanging-out-at the library identity. When I was walking around my Upper East Side neighborhood, avoiding piles of miniature poodle poop and getting bumped by women in fur coats, or waiting on a table of drunk, sleazy tax attorneys, I would make myself laugh by thinking, “God! I am so much prettier than I look right now!” Such a funny idea- being prettier than you look. I spent a lot of time by myself when I lived there because I worked nights at the bar, so I would go to matinees alone, or read in Central Park if it was warm, or order a sandwich from the corner deli and have it delivered to my apartment if it was too cold. And I would entertain myself by thinking about how all of the people I talked to or passed on the street were completely unaware of my superhero self. Nothing about the way I looked or acted indicated that I was Wonder Willow- smart, brave, funny and nice. Instead I was anonymous and forgettable. And that can be really lonely, and really dangerous. There’s a risk of letting Wonder Willow go, and being Nancy Novak all the time, or rather, believing that you are only Nancy, and never Wonder. I think I left New York because it got too hard for me to keep those two identities going. Moving to friendlier, mellower cities (Dublin and now PDX) allowed me to chip away the wall between my selves. Now I am exactly myself all the time- with friends, at work, at school, with strangers. It can be fun to have a secret, but keeping it takes a lot of work. A big part of Perfect Heart is to unburden myself of secrets, to not keep any of myself hidden. And good lord, it is a relief.