You May Ask Yourself, Well, How Did I Get Here?

Here's some backstory, in case you missed it.

In the summer of 2007, I took a very long trip around America.

I made a list of all the places I had ever wanted to see, but hadn’t, and all the places I thought I’d have to make a special trip to see if I was ever going to go, and I pulled out a map, and I found each of those places, and, just for kicks, I traced a route that would take me to all of them.

Then, as is often my way, I did some math. I figured out how long it would take to drive this route. I figured out how much gas it would take. I figured out where I had friends I could stay with along the way, and where I could camp, and where I would have to stay in a hotel and how much all of it could possibly cost.

You know, just for kicks.

And it dawned on me that, since I had some time between acting jobs, it would actually be cheaper to take this trip, and see America’s greatest hits, than it would be to rent an apartment in New York City for the same amount of time.

The idea was crazy and delicious. And probably, it would make a really good story when it was over. Plus, it scared me a little.

The rule for me is, if something seems scary, ridiculous, uncomfortable and nearly impossible, it’s probably the thing I should do.

So I drove off, not totally sure where I was going, or what I was doing, or how it was going to happen, but pretty sure that I would be fine and that I’d figure it out along the way. Lot of things happened – big things and small things, and things that were funny and sad and personal and universal, and I wrote about some of them in a series of e-mails to a list of people who I thought might be interested in where I was and what I was doing. And the response I got from those e-mails was all like, “Elizabeth, these are good stories, and I like reading them, but sometimes, you know, they are a little too long for an e-mail.”

So, when I came back from the trip, I started thinking about writing a book. Or a book of essays. Or something for the radio. Or something. But the problem was, I didn’t know how to do any of those things. So, I just wrote up all the stories and let them sit. I had a giant crush on America now, and I didn’t know what to do with it. So I went to work on the Obama campaign. That’s a different story all together, but suffice it to say, my crush on America became enormous and unbearable.

And then, other things happened, and then more things happened, and I still had all these stories, and it seemed sad to just let them languish. So, I kicked myself in the pants, and I took some of the stories, and made it into a…something. I added music, and pictures, and made, like, a whole thing.

I feel weird about calling it a one woman show. But it’s ok with me if you do.

I performed it/read it at the Fortnight Festival Works in Progress Series, in front of about 100 people, over two nights. It was terrifying and horrible, and I thought that surely I would die. I did not, and I was shocked how much people liked it. It turns out, we all have a lot more in common than I thought, but just as much as I’d hoped.

I thought it was too strange and personal and specific to mean anything to anyone else, and that it might be, at best, boring, and at worst, totally self-indulgent. To be honest (because what else is the internet for, right?), I'm still a little (very, super, extra, doubleplus) worried about these things.

Please reference the beginning of this post about my feelings on doing things that are scary and uncomfortable. Point taken.

So here we go, all over again.

Oh, hell.