Pages

Sunday, August 7, 2011

Afraid

{This is a monologue written for First Stage - Intern program at Stageworks Summit - Summer 1988}

I'm afraid.
I guess of rejection.   I'm afraid of not being wanted, or loved, or even accepted.   So I retreat.  I pull back from the world to hide and watch.
Especially among people I know who've turned me away before.  Oh, that WAS years ago, I'll grant you that...but...I'm still afraid.
Do you know what I mean?
Do you know how it feels to want to join something but to be too afraid to make the first move?  and to pull back into your mind and watch, just watch.
Almost as if you were a child again peering through a window watching others at play, yet too shy to join.
Do you?
Some of you must.  I can't BE the only person who feels this way.  
Maybe I'm just insane...crazy...locked in my head...
Too much reading I suppose.  Too much daydreaming about romance, adventure, fantasy ... life...

"She's just too far gone to be real"

That's what you think.   Isn't it?   At least...some of you do.
Do you know what it's like to want someone... to love someone...and to let chances to show him slip through your fingers because you're too afraid of rejection.   You think to yourself (trying to work up nerve)  'what's the worst that can happen?  A 'no' right??'   but a 'no' isn't the worst is it?
Rejection.  Utter disbelief of your feelings.  The loss of a friendship
THAT'S what you risk losing...and to me the 'odds' aren't good enough to risk the loss of a friend.  
There are so few that I can talk to...I mean really talk to...to throw one away.
So...I'll just fantasize about the risk paying off...Dream of Life...
And when I'm threatened I'll just...retreat from reality...
into my head..
where I can't be hurt...
or rejected...
or loved...
but...at least...I'm...
safe


End Scene.

1 comment:

  1. Laura....this one made me cry. I have felt every word you wrote...and sometimes, I still do. More often than I would ever like to admit. SAFE is such a lonely, lonely place to be.....:)

    ReplyDelete