Natacha Astuto has a habit of speaking while her hands move with the passion of her words.  When she’s thinking of what to say she glances at the right corner of her face, like she’s tickling her left brain.  During the hour that she and I conversed via Skype last Monday night (10 pm PST which was 7 am in Switzerland) she was eager to express as clearly as possible what I tried to draw from her.

The Last Train (La Dernier Train) is debuting in its English translation production at the Hollywood Fringe Festival this year of the Horse in Chinese Zodiac.  She got connected with James Svatko through Stage32.  He came upon the story, read it and called her to say he wanted to produce the play and wanted to play the lead.  As a most weathered playwright she accepted his interest with politeness while maintaining an arms’ length perspective of ‘well, let’s see’.  It’s a natural self-preservation reaction to wanting to be swept away with grand dreams and emotions, but wanting a cushion landing if it was only a dream.

That encounter happened last year.  When January 2014 rolled around, he called her again, and this time he said it was really going to happen, and Natacha decided to invest emotionally into the project which brings us to today.  It was 7am in Switzerland, and Natacha looked a little tired from last night’s performance, but she was alert and wasn’t missing a beat.  I posed my first question- what motivated her to write the play with this dark and sinister theme?  “To be honest” she started, and I thought this was already telling that something unexpected was coming forth.  She said there was not any particular personal or newsworthy event that inspired the writing.  It was simply that two actors approached her with the parameters to write a play with 4 characters. Natacha added her own curiosity to explore a setting that was enclosed, or in other words limited input and output. In French, the expression is Huis Clos, which translates to “No Exit”.  Jean Paul Sartre wrote a play by the same title and told the story of three people in the afterlife forever together in hell.

So this was her spring board, and what caught my attention was the setting of a jail cell and its literal and figurative analogy to our own personal selves – the prison of our minds limited by our mentality and imagination – if we are so inclined.  In a play of 4 characters the idea of lead and supporting seems to be grey.  I think it’s becomes a constellation of individual characters revolving around the theme of where does evil lurk.  This is my take on it, because I’ve been on the hunt on this topic.  The play is not bounded by that theme alone. Art is alive.  What the seer brings into the chemistry or the formula will influence what they get out of it.

Natacha meditated upon the parameters and she came up with a story of two men who had been incarcerated for twenty years in the same cell for crimes we are not privy to.  She wanted to know what happens to people who’ve been removed from normal society for such a long period of time?  My initial take was that she had come upon a story that touched a nerve in her soul and the catharsis of understanding the events came through in writing the The Last Train,  and I found out I was wrong.  Her process of creating The Last Train was internal and organic, which is what makes this story original, and the story telling so provocative.

She covers a lot of ground in 1 hour in the English version.  The French version that is playing in Europe is 75 minutes long.  What translation differences occurred?  It was mostly colloquial references, for example, using ‘Alex Trebek’ of Jeopardy.  Did she change the names of the characters?  (I found that the character of Jack evoked the spirit of Jack the Ripper, and that Louise resembled Clarice (Silence of the Lambs)  in sound .  ‘No,’ replied Natacha, she did not even catch on to those nuances.  I’m esoteric in my beliefs that storytellers are channels of a story, and this came to the playwright in her deep meditations to evoke a story of 4 people in an enclosed chamber.  That is a formula for explosive cabin fever.  Louise was shortened from the original form of Heloise.  Historically the name is attached to Heloise d’Argenteuil who was the lover of Peter Abelard, a scholar and theologian from the Medieval period.  She was also a scholar and her beauty, insight and intelligence sparked a deep stroke in Peter’s heart, who belonged amongst the ranks of the church.

Natacha created characters with whom she can relate to.  There were aspects of each person that she can identify with either personally or through stories she had brushed with and absorbed into her own being.  Jack and Robert are cellmates and they relate to one another similarly as a married couple.  They take care of one another in their own terms.  Though bound by the cell and the daily routine of prison life there are still secrets that each person carries, and neither has the willingness to expose what lies beneath the façade.  But how long can each person bear the weight of the masquerade?

Secrets have a strong sinister voice that is unspoken, but yet very powerful. The idea of caching secrets into the play is a tool Natacha has used in this play and her other plays.  In writing secrets into the story, she gives a loud voice to victims who have not been able to speak of the unspeakable.  There have been people in the audiences who have found consolation in seeing her plays, and came to talk to her to express their gratitude for giving them a voice.

In this story, the two jailbirds are under the care of a woman, Marianne.  This is an unusual compensation in a male dominated environment.  As a former employee at a women’s prison, she was selected for an experimental exchange program recommended by psychiatrists during the nineties.  She found she was more suited working in the all-male environment and remained in her post.  Jack, Robert and Marianne had created a functional triad with the two men acting as subordinates under the authority of a motherly figure.  She is kind and vulnerable, and the two men perceives this, but do not abuse it.  Her language is soft.  When she leaves them, she says ‘See you guys later.’  She unwittingly exposes her vulnerability by confiding that she’s worried and senses Jack’s fear, and this is the feeling-nurturing behaviors associated with women.

The men bide away their time in their own ways.  Jack has a snowglobe and becomes curious about its self-contained environment.  ‘Where does the water come from?’ he asks Robert who becomes exasperated with Jack’s inane conversation about a stupid snowglobe when he only wants to get out.

You don’t give a damn about anything! You don’t even look up

when I talk to you! You’re just here, waiting to leave fucking

feet first!

Act 1 has very strong overtones of Waiting for Godot, I told Natacha.  She chuckled.  She said that James Svatko made the same comment to her.  “What?! I’m not a Samuel Beckett’, she said amused, both thrilled and humbled to be compared to a wholly alive artist/playwright.

The monotony and bubble of the cell is cracked open by a female visitor, and the hidden thoughts and motives of the men rise to the surface. The stakes are heightened and we are drawn in closer to witness the unveiling of secrets.

Natacha is a bright artist and I am very lucky that I had the opportunity to speak with her about herself and the play.  One of the other questions I posed to her was if she found any disparity between men and women in having exposure as a playwright.  She pondered this question deeply.  Her first response was no.  She explained that she already thrives in a man’s world working professionally as a mechanical engineer.  Being in a man’s world she behaves simply as a person doing the work that is mostly filled by men, but it’s not about the gender.  It’s about doing the work.  She is aware of a common theme in comments by other people that they were surprised that a woman had written a play in a setting that was primarily male oriented and about two men in a prison.  Storytelling is a vocation.  It’s a job that can be done equally well by any man or woman.

Natacha has written 6 plays in total.  The Last Train is the first one to be translated into English.  Her storytelling and writing style is purposeful and engaging.  Get curious and thrilled!  Go see The Last Train.

The Last Train is playing at the SCHKAPF, formerly known as Artworks Theatre.  ADDRESS: 6567 Santa Monica Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90038. tel. 323.871.1912

The schedule is:

• Thursday June 05 2014, 10:15 PM | 1hr
• Saturday June 14 2014, 6:30 PM | 1hr
• Thursday June 19 2014, 10:15 PM | 1hr
• Saturday June 21 2014, 6:30 PM | 1hr
• Thursday June 26 2014, 10:15 PM | 1hr

By Analyn Revilla

Top 10 reasons to see plays at the Hollywood Fringe Festivals:

10. Participation in the Hollywood Fringe is completely open and uncensored. This free-for-all approach underlines the festival’s mission to be a platform for artists without the barrier of a curative body. By opening the gates to anyone with a vision, the festival is able to exhibit the most diverse and cutting-edge points-of-view the world has to offer. – That was straight out of the horse’s mouth – http://www.hollywoodfringe.org/learn/index/89

9. Theatre hopping in one night in the same theatre or just mozyin’ on down to the theatre next door to catch the next act.  Two weeks of staying out late theatre-bar-theatre-bar hoppin.

8. Live entertainment with breathing, salivating, thinking, reacting and overacting people in their own skin. This is the opportunity to boycott computer animated movies for two weeks.

7. Make an artist feel appreciated.

6. Surprise yourself.  If you can’t stretch your body, stretch your mind.  It’s yoga for the imagination.

5. Because Theatre is the new Cool (always has and always will be). I liken Theatre to Miles Davis – a classic cool who will always be cool, because he was fearless in reinventing himself.

4. 278 shows! (I think this is about right from the search on the website) to choose from in 2 weeks

acting · american · comedy · dark comedy · hilarious · identity · los angeles · love · new york · one woman show · relationships · storytelling · adult themes · comedic · comedy · dark humor · death · drama · dramedy · ensemble · family · funny · gay · music · musical · musical theater · one person show · one-act · original · satire · solo show · storytelling · theater · women · world

3.  Fancy is back! (I saw FANCY: Secrets from the Bootydoir last year, and was amazed by the talent. Chris Farah is a hot blooded story teller.)

2. A new and brave talent on the scene from Europe – Natacha Astuto wrote the thriller The Last Train. This is the first English version of the play that has played for 2 years in Europe in French. It won both the Grand Prix and the Young Jury prize at last weeks’ FESTIVAL DE CAHORS, FRANCE.

1. Women on the Fringe! This is the list of the shows that were written by women – shortened without the hashtags. Get the complete details on https://lafpi.com/about/women-at-work-onstage/women-on-the-fringe/

1. BURNT AT THE STEAK by Carolann Valentino

2. I CAN HEAR YOU…BUT I’M NOT LISTENING by Jennifer Jasper

3. LYDIA TRUEBLOOD – THE BLACK WIDOW OF THE ATLANTIC COAST by Liz Eldridge & Efrain Schunior

4. BETTER THAN SHAKESPEARE PRESENTS: MUCH ADO ABOUT SOMETHING, created by Megan Kelly and Kate Grabau (and William Shakespeare)

5. WOMEN by Chiara Atik

6. THE PENS SHALL HAVE THEIR DAY by Lesley Gouger

7. GWYNETH & BEYONCÉ: A Tale of 2 Virgins by Laura Keller and Christina Jeffs

8. THE CAVE: A FOLK OPERA by Melanie Rose Thomas

9. HONESTLY, OK – THE SEMI-TRUE STORY OF A GIRL AND HER SHOES by Nicole Dominguez and Lauren Stone

10. LOST IN LVOV by Sandy Simona

11. PIECES OF CARRA created by Rachae Thomas and Carly Pandza

12. THAT’S WHAT SHE DIDN’T SAY: A TRUE STORY OF TABOO, REDEMPTION & MUSICAL THEATRE by Bonnie Joy Sludikoff

13. THE LAST TRAIN (Le Dernier Train) by Natacha Astuto

14. FANCY: SECRETS FROM MY BOOTYDOIR by Chris Farah

15. SHAME BASED FUN by Sasha Fisher

16. GIMPLECAPPED: A JOURNEY OF “INSPIRATION” by Regan Linton and Laura Alsum

17. FROM A YARDIE TO A YANKEE BY Sardia Robinson

18. THE ALEXIS LAMBRIGHT TELL-A-THON: COMBATING ADULT VIRGINITY by Alexis Lambright

19. MARIA CONCHITA ALFONSO ALFONSO ALFONSO by Marina Gonzalez Palmier

20. BELLI GEMELLI: AN OPERA SITCOM by Kara Morgan and Heidi Tungseth

21. LOCKOUT by Ann Matthews

22. HAROLD & STELLA: LOVE LETTERS by Sheana Ochoa

23. THAT OLD BLACK MAGIC by Jacquetta Szathmari

24. CAN’T TAKE MY (EYES) OFF OF YOU by Fiona Lakeland

25. BONNIE’S FUTURE SISTERS by Meghan Gambling

26. AND SHE BAKES, LIVE by Daliya Karnofsky

27. VICTORIAN COURTING AND ZOMBIES book by Susan Sassi

28. WOMEN ON THE VERGE by Kimba Henderson

29. Poofy du Vey in BURDEN OF POOF by Courtney Cunningham

30. THE LAST TEMPTATION OF PAULA DEEN by Fell Swoop Playwrights

31. RIOT GRRRL SAVES THE WORLD (or, The Zine of Grrrl)’ by Louisa Hill

32. THE MERMAID WHO LEARNED HOW TO FLY by Kyla Garcia

33. WAITLESS by Cailin Harrison

34. DAUGHTER OF . . . by Susannah Blinkoff

35. CHITLIN BLUES: DANCING IN THE GREY concept by Constance Strickland

36. 52 PICK-UP by Rita Bozi and TJ Dawe

37. WHY I DIED, A COMEDY! by Katie Rubin

38. JESUS H: A SOLOR PLAY FOR THE ZEALOT IN ALL OF US by Mariah Freda

39. THINGS BEING WHAT THEY ARE by Wendy Macleod

40. GERMAINE by Rachel Germaine

41. PATHWAYS the DIGITAL MUSICAL by Lei Lei Lashawn

42. HAPPY AND GAY by Mary Steelsmith

43. LA BETE by June Carryl

By Analyn Revilla

I am faced with the dilemma of being honest with myself about things that aren’t savory to know even about me. Once in a while, when I can no longer hold it, I pee in a bucket, in the morning, because I don’t want to intrude while my husband has his shower. Is that really so bad? Is that TMI? And that it’s really okay that I did it, and others don’t really need to know my confession. Is it that I was just being lazy? I guess it is, though I mask it with the excuse that I don’t want to intrude on my husband’s shower time. Couldn’t I just get up earlier to pee before I make the coffee? Or just knock on the door and excuse myself.

7 Deadly Sins in 365 days is a funny book with outrageous suggestions, some of which I discovered I’ve already done, or put into regular practice. A book like this makes me laugh at myself, and poke fun at my own seriousness. I think we do some things we feel ashamed of, but do not really understand that reason for the shame. Was it something bred into us by society – our family and institutions? Or is it truly a self-conscious evaluation to determine our moral goodness.

Some of suggestions are harmless fun, while others require some evaluation of the consequences. Some harmless fun (or not so harmless, but socially deviant) are fart in a crowded elevator; pee in the pool – I know I’ve done one of these before but not on purpose or malice in mind. If premeditated then I’d put them in the basket of childhood pranks; while the other prescribed actions takes some real guts, some degree of craziness, I really wanted to do it anyway: blow all your savings on the lottery; get drunk before going to work; take a 24 hour break from your relationship.

Those actions are symptomatic of problems. They are ‘acting out’ on something deeper. If I spent my savings on the lottery then it is an act of desperation – and a signal that I have lost hope. If I get drunk before going to work then it is symbolic of my avarice towards my work place, and the need to numb myself from the people and the environment. If I take a 24 hour break from my husband, carte blanche, and had a fling then I’m probably not fulfilled in my marriage. Acting out does not make me an evil person, though I certainly would feel a deep sense of guilt and shame in going through with one of the three actions above.

Boy, I would consider myself damned lucky if I did win the lottery in a big way if I spent my savings on the lottery. Can I dodge people at work to mask the alcohol on my breath? I have to weigh the odds. There is a thought process in our choices. We do a check and balance accounting of the probability and consequences. What price am I willing to pay for my choices and actions?

I’ve been curious about the nature of evil. I was raised Catholic until I was able to break away into a practice suited to my nature. In my experience, and I say this in hindsight, that the indoctrination I got from attending a strict Catholic school ruled by nuns leaned heavily upon a “too-literal” interpretation of the scriptures. Had I not had the personal conviction to explore my own spirituality and the courage to re-think by asking questions and experimenting with my ideas, then I may not have matured spiritually. Had I remained afraid of being condemned blasphemous or I couldn’t risk the possibility that my parents would disown me then I probably wouldn’t be writing this blog.

One of the most useful books I read on the subject of the nature of evil was People of The Lie by Scott M. Peck. As a psychiatrist he untangled the complex input and output between what is normal behavior and what is evil. Prior to reading People of the Lie, I read his first book, The Road Less Travelled. I chose that book because it explored the concept of “Original Sin”. My own exploration of “Original Sin” is that it is our doubt of our inherent good nature. Why do we have this doubt? My hypothesis is when we are born, we are molded to be “good” by external entities from our parents, the church (if we are raised in a religion), schools, civil governments – the gamut of organizational institutions. That we need external bodies outside of our own good judgment to measure our sense of morality removes the responsibility of aspiring to be good from the individual. It is not a conscious decision. Life happens and we act based on our abilities and the circumstances.

When I juxtapose that argument/reasoning to the author’s description of evil:

Scott Peck says, “For adults to be the victims of evil, they must be powerless to escape. They may be powerless when a gun is held to their head…Or they may be powerless by virtue of their own failure of courage…Whenever adults not at gunpoint become victims of evil it is because they have–one way or another–bound [themselves] by chains of laziness and dependency….settling for a child’s impotence.”

What I begin to understand is I go through a painful self-examination of my nature and my existence almost daily. I have many moments of deep anguish, anxiety and anger (not all at once, though sometimes yes), and how do I release the pressure to act good in the face of evil. I halt to go further to describe my own personal religious beliefs. I do go further to say that I believe I am inherently good with a bend for fun for fun’s sake, and that what is good for the goose is also good for the gander.

The wrinkles on my hands and face are threads of living the routine between work and home, along with the news absorbed from the papers, the elevators, the internets and conversations. There are plenty of situations that play out the battle between good and evil. It’s a theme that’s been played out since the first story told about Adam and Eve in the garden, passed down to the generations thru Cain and Abel to the stories that we watch on the big screen: Captain America, Spider Man, Malficent.

I read the play The Last Train by Natacha Astuto. I’ll be interviewing her this week before the preview of her play this coming Thursday at Schkapf Obsucra. Among my questions to her will be her thoughts about the nature of evil, because her play has undercurrent of the evil nature of a psychopath. The question of good and evil is simply not light versus dark as told in the most rudimentary of storytelling. I liked how the dance of evil and good is played out in the movie The Matrix, because it portrays it as a play of lights and shadows with brushstrokes of surrealism.

Morpheus: I imagine that right now you’re feeling a bit like Alice. Tumbling down the rabbit hole?

Neo: You could say that.

Morpheus: I can see it in your eyes. You have the look of a man who accepts what he sees because he’s expecting to wake up. Ironically, this is not far from the truth. Do you believe in fate, Neo?

Neo: No.

Morpheus: Why not?

Neo: ‘Cause I don’t like the idea that I’m not in control of my life.

Morpheus: I know exactly what you mean. Let me tell you why you’re here. You’re here because you know something. What you know, you can’t explain. But you feel it. You felt it your entire life. That there’s something wrong with the world. You don’t know what it is, but it’s there. Like a splinter in your mind — driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I’m talking about?

Neo: The Matrix?

Morpheus: Do you want to know what it is? (Neo nods his head.) Morpheus: The Matrix is everywhere, it is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window, or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work, or when go to church or when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.

Neo: What truth?

Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else, you were born into bondage, born inside a prison that you cannot smell, taste, or touch. A prison for your mind. (long pause, sighs) Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself. This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. (In his left hand, Morpheus shows a blue pill.)

Morpheus: You take the blue pill and the story ends. You wake in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. (a red pill is shown in his other hand) You take the red pill and you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes. (Long pause; Neo begins to reach for the red pill) Remember — all I am offering is the truth, nothing more. (Neo takes the red pill and swallows it with a glass of water)

Credit to “The Matrix” written by Andy Wachowski & Larry Wachowski)

A quote from another book for consideration:

Erich Fromm, The Heart of Man: Its Genius for Good and Evil:

The longer we continue to make the wrong decisions, the more our heart hardens; the more often we make the right decisions, the more our heart softens–or better perhaps, comes alive…Most people fail at the art of living not because they are inherently bad or so without will that they cannot lead a better life; they fail because they do not wake up and see when they stand at a fork in the road and have to decide. They are not aware when life asks them a question, and when they still have alternative answers. Then with each step along the wrong road it becomes increasingly difficult for them to admit that they are on the wrong road.

There is something in the ether that I picked up on and I confirmed it with a search in google using the words “was jesus a pow”.  It was a shot that came up with possibilities that fit.  Pow for pow-wow and pow for pow’r.  Another one was a youtube video from a band Pow woW , with a song “Jesus”.

I chose the link for Angelina Jolie directing a movie based on the life of POW survivor Louis Zamparini.  It’s basd on a book “Unbroken”, by Lauren Hillenbrand.  From what I gleaned of the history available on the internet about him, he started out as a troubled kid (smoker at 5 years old, school bully by elementary and menace to society by high-school.)  His saving grace was his talent for running which qualified him to be invited to train for the 1936 Olympics.  When WWII broke out he fought in the war and ended up as a POW when his plane crashed in the Pacific Ocean and he and his two other crews were taken by the Japanese soldiers.

What initially motivated my search was my curiosity for characteristics of survivors of prison camps.  There has been so many war movies made and that continue to be made for many reasons including, “we” as a race continue to make war.  I read the book “Man’s Search For Meaning” by Viktor Frankl of his account as a prisoner in the concentration camps during WWII.  As a psychiatrist his perspective was important to me, because I wonder myself what I would be capable of doing to survive severe conditions in cramped and limited conditions; and equally curious to me, is what are others capable of doing to save their own skin.  What is the common thread of like people?  (Also, I’m curious about group dynamics in stressful conditions.)  On a day to day basis, there are personalities with whom I have an affinity for, while there are those I prefer to avoid.  My resistance to the latter makes me more curious about me.  What makes me feel that way?  What can I change to improve the situation?

Racing towards the sunset at middle age I do ponder more seriously and frequently the meaning of it all.  What is in “Original Sin” that I want to explore through a play?  Our origins, our path, our destiny, and how do we get there?  As companions in life we have our choices of with whom we want to travel with.  Stressful conditions bring out the best and worst in people.  I want to see what stuff, people I work and hang-with, are made of.  To me, the answer is not as simple as “Survival of the Fittest”.  There are people who’ve gone down, sacrificing themselves for the better of humanity.  Just think of the saints and martyrs (who didn’t think of themselves as such, but the outcome of history has earned them that title):  MLK Jr.,  Gandhi. Mother Theresa.

Specific to Frankl and Zamparini, their separate stories, with its similar conditions, show forbearance with meaning.  They are survivors of the worst conditions we can imagine in our comfortable lives, but beyond survival what did they get from the experience?  What did they give back during those years of suffering and/or afterwards?

For Frankl, the experience untombed this perspective,

That brought thoughts of my own wife to mind. And as we stumbled on for miles, slipping on icy spots, supporting each other time and again, dragging one another up and onward, nothing was said, but we both knew: each of us was thinking of his wife. Occasionally I looked at the sky, where the stars were fading and the pink light of the morning was beginning to spread behind a dark bank of clouds. But my mind clung to my wife’s image, imagining it with an uncanny acuteness. I heard her answering me, saw her smile, her frank and encouraging look. Real or not, her look was then more luminous than the sun which was beginning to rise.

A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth — that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way — an honorable way — in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. For the first time in my life I was able to understand the meaning of the words, “The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory.”

In front of me a man stumbled and those following him fell on top of him. The guard rushed over and used his whip on them all. Thus my thoughts were interrupted for a few minutes. But soon my soul found its way back from the prisoner’s existence to another world, and I resumed talk with my loved one: I asked her questions, and she answered; she questioned me in return, and I answered.

As a summary, he expressed in the preface to the 1992 edition of the book:

 ‘I had wanted simply to convey to the reader by way of a concrete example that life holds a potential meaning under any conditions, even the most miserable ones… I therefore felt responsible for writing down what I had gone through, for I thought it might be helpful to people who are prone to despair” – Preface by the author to “Man’s Search for Meaning”, by Viktor Frankl.

As for Zamparini, upon his rescue from the camp, he was showered with the accolades of a hero.  He ran with the torch for the Olympics in Los Angeles (1984), Atlanta (1996) and Nagano (1998).   At Nagano, the route passed many of the concentration camps where he had been imprisoned.

A Houston Chronicler sports writer called it “the very best thing I saw on sports television, period, in 1998.” The press universally praised the 35-minute piece, which later won an Emmy – Source USC News by Elizabeth Segal

The transformative experience of the imprisonment was not immediate for Zamparini.  He suffered from the effects of what is now commonly called Posttraumatic stress disorder.  He became an alcoholic and was at the point when his wife threatened with divorce before the cycle of his experience started to turn to complete the circle.  It was his wife who initiated the conversion after her own conversion to Christianity.

Instead of divorce, his wife turned the other cheek and found solace in the sermons of a preacher named Billy Graham. She tried to get her husband to convert too. At first, he was resistant. “I hated all that holy roller stuff,” he says disdainfully. When Zamperini finally went to a meeting, he was surprised to find Graham “so handsome and clean-cut, not one of those wheezer types.”

During that sermon, Zamperini had an epiphany. “I momentarily flashed to the life raft in the Pacific, the moment when I prayed to God that if He spared my life, that I’d dedicate it to service and prayer – you know all those promises you make when you’re in a jam,” Zamperini says. “I realized then that I’d turned my back on my promises and on God. And when I got off my knees that day in the tent, I knew I would be through with drinking, smoking and revenge fantasies. I haven’t had a nightmare since.”

Inspired by Graham and the Bible, Zamperini toured as a public speaker, channeling his energies into messages of forgiveness. He revisited Japan in 1950, and before large forums of Japanese civilians (as well as the Tokyo Trojan Club), he spread the gospel. – Source USC News by Elizabeth Segal

What I’m learning from absorbing these two stories is there is a closure to their experience.  It was not just a matter of getting through it, it was to put a meaning to it and they felt it was worthy to share their own epiphanies with the rest of us.  They are teaching us how to survive, not just under extreme conditions, but in our day-to-day struggles with our own selves; that conscience that leads us to know what to do and what to say in situations that challenge us to put up our guards rather than open our hearts.

I feel I haven’t lived enough to be worthy of telling everything I want to show in a play.

Sometimes I just tell myself – Oh heck, just get on with it.  Get on with life and forget about your conscience.  (I jest!)

by Analyn Revilla

A friend told me he’s having a hard time finishing his first book.  My comment was, “because your life is not yet finished.”  He paused.  He neither agreed nor disagreed.  He explained he didn’t want the story to end yet, because he wants to have a few sequels after the first.  I started to wonder why my first play is not yet finished done, after the multiple drafts I’ve written.  I’ve actually stopped writing for six months now; but I’m always doing research.  (And I’m laughing at myself, because research can go on for a very long time, and it’s a bad excuse.)  Today as I ponder seriously as to why the play is not done, I came up with an apt analogy.  It is not that my life is not over, it is  that “The End” is like the endless carousel of thoughts going through my mind.  The possibilities of the ending is infinite, because like a chess game each move introduces a new set of permutations.

Eventually however, probabilities will limit the possibilities.  After the players of the game have made their choices for each move, the ending does become inevitable, and its ending is also predictable.  So in writing, the only way to get to the end is to write.  As a writer makes choices as to what the characters say and what actions they do, the story unfolds.  Figuratively and literally the miracle of creation unfolds and the story writes itself – if only the writer allows the characters to act out and speak out.  I haven’t been letting my characters play at all, and so my play is not finished.  I’m in the throes of the second act which in chess is the middle game.  The middle game is my weakness.  There’s a lot of tension and I’m horrible dealing with tensions.  I like things to be neat and orderly – because it’s easier that way, but this is not life, and this is not story.  Life Story is messy messy messy.

When I have a situation that is full of possibilities because there’s a lot of tension then I have a tendency to finish the scene prematurely.  In chess terms, I make a stupid move and suddenly I’m in check mate or needing to dig myself out of a hole.  Writing about this now, I can understand how experienced writers have advised me put the play out there – have a reading.  As seasoned writers, they’ve played this game many times before, and they see my dilemma.  They know the burden of carrying the decision of when it is done.  It just takes practice to let go, perhaps.  (That was conjecture on my part.)  I’m perhaps afraid to let go because of the “unknown”.   Will others think it’s boring, stupid, or crap?  Oh well, I won’t know unless I try.  For one thing… don’t give up.

In chess games a game clock is used.  It has two face clocks with buttons to stop one while starting the other.  This enables the players to move in turn without delaying the game.  Perhaps if I used a clock like this in writing I can keep the dialogue and action going.  It’d be a fun exercise to try, and see what writing comes out of it.  Game on.  Write already!

by Analyn Revilla

There are those days when the only motivation I can muster is to reach for the pint of Haagen-Daz ice cream, then spoonful after spoonful give my spirit some reprieve and consolation.  Each mouthful is a salve of sugar and fat in cold creaminess.  It’s a tangible fantasy that yields measurable value compared to buying a lotto ticket.  These two questions form the yin-yang in my mind:  Am I going to win the lottery tonight? Is there a God?

I’m down to the last half pint of the vanilla flavored ice cream, and yet I’m not feeling any better.  Short of psychedelic medication, I’ve tried meditating, but my mind constantly drifts to the ice cream.  I “look” at the third eye, the midpoint between my eyebrows and an inch above the midpoint.  I feel cross-eyed and a mild dizziness breaks out.  The anxiety is worse than waiting at the doctor’s office for the appointment schedule 45 minutes ago, and you got there early to find cheap parking.  The ice cream beckons.  I’m coming my friend.

(This is a rant!  It’s not fair of me to hold you up, like this, you my unsuspecting audience.  But didn’t my ice cream dreams give you a hint.  Duck!  Hide!  A baleful of self-flagellation is coming your way!)

Whoa Nelly…

You’ve been taking life too damn seriously.  When that happens then everything grinds to a halt beginning with the joie de vivre taking the backdoor exit; the cat gives me that look – like she couldn’t give a fig about my mopin’ around; and I have to work and write a blog too.

It’s a tightrope act to balance between the ennui of the abundant modern industrial life and giving meaning to life.  I’ve lately been obsessed with songs that have the word “Hole” in the title.  Here’s my list:

• Police – “Hole in My Life”
• Alice in Chains – “Down in a Hole”
• Beatles – “Fixing a Hole”
• Soundgarden –  “Black Hole Sun”
• Black Sabbath – “Hole in the Sky”

I think all these songs allude to that thing amiss in our lives.  The hole is real.  But I’ve been trying too hard to get in and out through to the other side.  Will there be a revelation (– something/anything) after the show?

I dive back into my books, a collection of metaphysical, philosophies and practices by some of the great thinkers and doers:  Paramahansa Yogananda, Edgar Cayce, Rilke, Krishnamurti, Gandhi, Martin Luther King. Jr., and a collection of skits/shows by Bill Hicks “Love All The People”.  This search for truth and meaning is not an easy path.  But we go on.  And once in a while we do hit rock bottom, like I’m down to a thin film of creamy vanilla.  I pass the carton for the dog to lick clean.  Pets.  They can take you or leave you regardless of your mood, because they know instinctively that you have unconditional love for them.

Love is not a theory.  It is a practice and an experience.  I can repeat the words love and forgiveness till I’m blue in the face, but until I actually feel it then it means nothing.  Love is like butter.  It makes everything taste better, even the bitter pill of life we swallow everyday. This poem about work from “The Prophet” by Kahlil Gibran expresses best what I’m feeling.

 And what is it to work with love?
It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart,
even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth.
It is to build a house with affection,
even as if your beloved were to dwell in that house.
It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy,
even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit.
It is to charge all things you fashion with a breath of your own spirit,
And to know that all the blessed dead
are standing about you and watching.

Stanza 6

Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distils a poison in the wine.
And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man’s ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.

Stanza 8

So how does it end?  Is the character transformed?  Does every story have to have a transformation? Or do we just recycle our energy into the universe and hope, perhaps for a reincarnation in a better life.  If karma rules then grace trumps it.  We all have it – the capacity for grace.  At every turn there’s a choice to be one or to be separate.  (I can’t help but think of the lyrics and melody of “A Day in the Life” by the Beatles.)

Thank you for the opportunity to share with you.

by Analyn Revilla

The first big choice to make today was either to go to practice yoga or do “other things” before I go to work.  The “other things” is a list of activities that aren’t part of my weekday routine.  These are “other” fun things that feed my soul:  read, write, play music, bake a pie, meditate and take the dog for a long walk.  I skipped the yoga class.  Later, when I was wiping away the flour dust and blueberry stains from the kitchen counter I smiled, because I recognized that I made the right choice.

 That feeling of knowing is intuition.  I can habitually and easily destroy this gift of intuition when I’m way too much in my head calculating the minutes and hours of the day, dividing the day with allocations of how much time I can spend on the to do list.  I’ve recognized that it can be a form obsessive compulsive disease to always be on top of my to-do list (checking it and checking it twice and checking it some more not just to put check marks and cross marks, but ensuring I’ve got everything in the list.) 

This is not my natural way, by the way.  I’m not a list person, nor am I the person to print the directions from Mapquest.  I’m more the person to get an overview of the direction and area that I’m supposed to be at, then I’ll use my nose to find the spot.  Indeed, I’m hardly on time, and exact in getting to my destination, because I end up discovering different roads and stopping to ask people for directions before I find my spot.  If you’re not that kind of a traveler then you wouldn’t want to be travelling with me.

 I know I can be more balanced if I was more organized and orderly, but I like the practice of using my sense of direction and intuition to guide me.  I attribute many of my wonderful experiences in life to my “adventurous” and devil-may-care approach to certain things.  It’s not uncommon that the “unlikely” and “illogical” choice is the right choice on many occasions in my life so far.

 But I agonize over making decisions and choices.  When I went for my computer science degree there was a point when I had to specialize.  I would guess that 60% of the class chose the option that would guarantee the best probability of getting employed upon graduation; the other 35% chose their area that was best suited for their interest and aptitude while the remaining 5% (which I’m part of) did not really choose an option.  But I did make a logical choice this way.  My option was “Decision Systems”.  It was about linear programming, and I thought “Ok, this is the one for me, because this will give the tools I need to make better decisions in life.”  The last laugh was on me, because the curriculum was heavy on statistics and linear programming and calculations, which is opposite to my nature.  

But it was possibly what I needed, because my computer programming career provided me with the means to have shelter and food, plus other amenities.  But having “blueberry pie” moments is equally necessary to fulfill my soulful needs, and gave me the sustenance to hope and dream as we all do during the festive holiday season with its lights, decorations, music and all-around cheer.  

Most of the year and throughout the days I live in the practical  world to survive; and rarely heed the small voice that asks to be heard.  As I read in one of my treasure trove books, “what good is a voice if no one is listening to it?”  It is only during this season that I relax a little more to restore a balance of slowing down and listening.  So now I’m open to giving more consideration to that little voice that pipes up, “Hey, let’s make blueberry pie, and forget about rushing off to the studio and feeling great after a good sweat.”

 Being in the midst of the end-of-the-year holidays, it is the period of observing traditions of rites and rituals that convey significances of the passing of time.  The observance of these rituals can be a mixture of being automatic and heart-felt, or one or the other.  As a child, my memories of Christmas were the rites of getting a tree, decorating it, and afterwards watching with wonder the flicker of lights in different colors.  It was this precious wonder that I want to preserve for all my Christmases.  The wonder is a knowing that All Is Good.  It is the intuitive knowing hope lives.  And choosing to be open to possibilities rather than calculating probabilities, which is the more expansive experience that deepens our soulfulness.

 by Analyn Revilla

I think a lot of stories reflect the subtext of the hero’s need to belong. It begins as a want for something outside of herself that she believes would make her be acceptable, loveable and eligible to belong to a group/family.  A simple idea of a shampoo commercial that depicts a pretty woman with gorgeous hair, and how suddenly this product makes her attractive to the world around her and now she belongs to the ideal of beautiful. 

I didn’t know until I read the analyses by Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes of the fairytale “The Ugly Duckling” (written by Hans Christian Andersen) that this story holds deeply textured meanings in terms of Jungian psychoanalysis. The chapter “Finding One’s Pack:  Belonging as Blessing” in her book, “Women Who Run With the Wolves”, is devoted to describing the movement of characters through the different archetypes of:  the Innocent; the Orphan, the Martyr; the Wanderer, the Warrior and the Magician.  (She does not specifically use the terminology listed, but the concept is there.) 

 A common thread that runs through each stage of the journey as the Ugly Duckling shifts from one stage to the next stage is his desire to belong and his never-ending search for this sense of belonging (which is essentially home.)   Dr. Estes awakens the reader to the significance of the Ugly Duckling’s movement from the river’s nest to the marsh, the farm, and finally the lake.  In each locale he meets with groups with which he tries to fit in; or who tries to make him fit in; but inevitably he needs to continue his quest because the “shoes never quite fit in” for the hero.  This need to never give up is attributable to the call of the wild.

 “The duckling of the story is symbolic of the wild nature, which, when pressed into circumstances of little nurture, instinctively strives to continue no matter what.  The wild nature instinctively holds on and holds outs, sometimes with style, other times with little grace, but nevertheless.  And thank goodness for that.  For the wildish woman, duration is one of her greatest strengths.” – from “Women Who Run With the Wolves” by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

I work in a corporate environment where, as any large body of people, change is slow to happen; and communication, though stressed to be of high importance, can be challenging because of the large mix of individuals needing to work together for a common purpose.  One method of communication within our group are forms.  There are specific templates for something that needs to communicate something specific.

 There is a new form called “Project Commitment Form” that needs to be filled out and reviewed to get it to a stage of getting approval for funding of projects.  This form begins with a statement that defines the “Business Problem”.  When I met with the first reviewer, she started with “you did a marvelous job, but…”  Then she continued to say, “I’ve never had to fill out one of these forms, but…”  At the end of the meeting I absorbed the suggestions and incorporated most of the changes, but hung on, at least, to my version of the “Business Problem”.

After the meeting and sending out polite emails I went home, but something didn’t sit right in my belly.  What am I hanging on to that does not belong to me anymore I asked myself.  To say the mantra “Let it go” repeatedly was pointless unless I meant it.  At the end of the day, I said to myself, I’m just trying to conform, and get the job done with some personal integrity left.  That was the kicker for me – I was attached to the final result.  I now see that the document shows responsibility and accountability for approving a project for funding in a language and format that is understood from their perspective and not mine.  I’m writing for the audience and not me.  The sense of belonging is defined in terms of what they need, and not my own.

 I began to unwind the tight ball of confusion by reading “The Ugly Duckling”, and the wisdom unbound by Dr. Estes analyses brought the light to eyes.  I had been trying to “fit in” so hard at work to the best that I can; and even then there’s always room for improvement as is often conveyed through the annual performance review.  Isn’t there just a point in time, during your employment years with a company where you just fit in? or does the criteria change with each change of leadership, or change in what’s new and trendy for “process” and “methodology”, including (even) vocabulary?

 “The other important aspect of the story is that when an individual’s particular kind of soulfulness, which is both an instinctual and spiritual identity, is surrounded by psychic acknowledgment and acceptance, that person feel life and power as never before.  Ascertaining one’s own psychic family brings a person vitality and belongingness.”  –  from “Women Who Run With the Wolves” by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

 After reading her analysis of the fairytale using Jungian psychoanalysis I felt enlightened and this gave me so much joy.

 The next day I IM’ed a friend at work, “I’m so happy this morning I don’t know why.”  The response was, “Do you need a why?”

 I did know the source of the joyful feeling.  It was that I truly let go of the result, and it came about by my internal inquiry combined with a serendipitous opening to a page in the book about The Ugly Duckling.  (I found the book in a thrift store at Lake Elsinore during the weekend.  The previous owner had written the word “= Grace” after “Contacting the Power of the Wild Woman.”)

I can define my belongingness in my own terms as acknowledging my boundaries.  There is a real and imaginary line between what I take home with me and what I leave at work.  The integrity asked of me and what I ask of myself has been fulfilled in that I created something that I share with a community; and it does not belong to me anymore.  At the end of the day I go home to my family, and when the family retires to bed, and turns out the light then the dog is sure to follow.  She imposes her weight against me like a falling sack of potatoes, telling me “I belong here with you.”  It is a wonder to behold the irony of the extraordinary in the most ordinary of our daily routine – to lie down and rest and accept one’s truth.

I can’t put it more eloquently than Estes:

“So that is the final work of the exile who finds her own:  to not only accepts one’s own individuality, one’s specific identity as a certain kind of person, but also to accept one’s beauty… the shape of one’s soul and the fact that living close to that wild creature transforms us and all that it touches.” – from “Women Who Run With the Wolves”.