How Theatre Saved My Life (And Possibly Yours)

The more I read about Jared Lee Loughner (Washington Post article) and his unhappy teen and young adult years, a chill runs down my spine because his life bears striking and eerie resemblance to mine; I could easily have gone down that same spiral, and for all I know might have snapped like he did but for fortune, a handful of choices, and the love of friends and family. Oh, and Drama Club.

I too was an only child (though not quite) of a Vietnam vet father with his own set of demons to wrestle with and a teen mother who didn't really find herself until my own teens. I had neither an especially happy nor unhappy childhood, and my family could have been described as dsyfunctional. My parents were never a good match, and I realize were it not for my pending arrival they'd never have continued to date, let alone marry. My early childhood was in a trailer park. My parents fought often. On my tenth birthday they announced they were separating, and eventually they divorced. Dad never remarried, and drifted through periodic employment. Mom got her real estate license and became very successful, and its just easier for me to refer to her long-term fiance as my stepfather.

I was quite a sheltered and solitary person as a teen. Undersized (a 90-pound freshman), scrawny and awkward, I was usually the class punching bag, I never sought out friends (the few I had initiated friendship with me), I didn't date at all, rarely socializing except for group activities (Boy Scouts, wrestling team, drama club, etc). I distinguished myself scholastically though I was rather unmotivated, half-assing my way to B's and occasional A's. With a bit more effort and/or focus I would have easily graduated top of my class (instead of 8th out of 80) and gone to a better school than the University of Maine, in which I enrolled mostly by default. I interviewed at Dartmouth, and am pretty sure I'd've gotten in, but let the application deadline pass. My lack of social skills and the intensely competitive scholastic environment would have caused me to either rise or sink, and subconsciously I believed I'd've sunk. I had enough trouble with the honors classes I did take at UMaine, though I did have a respectable GPA and graduated with High Distinction.

My work history during and after college? Pretty much just like his. McDonalds, slinging popcorn at the movies, theatre camp counselor, Applebee's, a copy center, BJ's Wholesale Club, helping my stepdad (a contractor) at his building sites, and some of Kittery Maine's finer retail outlets. Eventually in my mid-20's I realized the co-workers my age were either upper management, mentally challenged or had some severe socialization issues, and that I could do better. A big step for me was when I got a job correcting achievement tests; for once I was actually using my brain and eventually I was promoted, temporarily at least, to trainer. Then I started temping at real live office jobs, demonstrating my skills with MS Office, and even landed an actual honest-to-god permanent job at Liberty Mutual, though I quit after six months for a theatre internship. I ended a nearly four year job at a major environmental non-profit when I moved up to Boston this fall. Longest time I ever spent in one workplace.

Given that my usual routine when I didn't have rehearsal or a show was to stay home and watch TV, my romantic life was pretty much a joke. I do not recall asking anyone out in my entire life face to face. I rarely went to bars, and when I did it was with a group of friends. Hell, were it not for the internet I might still be a virgin. And when I did date, rarely did it go beyond a few encounters. I learned that six months of flowery discourse via email with someone 500 miles away is trumped by one incredibly awkward weekend face to face. I also learned that there are people out there even more socially challenged than I, and dating them for a year or so won't fix them. Now I'm in a stable relationship of over two years. Well, the most stable to date.

There have been bad days. Days that could've sent me down a bad direction. One day during college, my tendency of emulating people that I admired/fancied to the point of copying was rather tactlessly pointed out to me, in front of my best friends and the person whom I admired/fancied. My humiliation burned inside me, and as I later sat alone that night and watched a news documentary about serial killers, my mind went to some really dark places. Thankfully I didn't linger long.

It's often occurred to me that I have traits similar to people with mild cases of Asperger Syndrome.

So I'm an intelligent, artistically gifted but socially awkward loner with a history of underachievement and underemployment. I'm a prime candidate to have turned into Jared Lee Loughner. So why didn't I? My best answer, along with that I managed to steer clear of drugs, hard liquor, and The Catcher in the Rye, is that I found the performing arts.

I'd been part of some school play or other since kindergarten, though the drama bug didn't really hit me until my freshman year of high school. Joining the Drama Club was one of the first close experiences I had with other people, working as an ensemble toward a tangible goal, experiencing success as we won statewide drama festivals. Although the next three years weren't as fulfilling (the drama coach left, and I found his replacement intensely disagreeable), I majored in theatre in college. Even though my talent level and social skills relegated me largely to supporting roles, I kept at it after college. I was lucky to live in an area with a large community/semi-professional theatre scene, and I spent several years working with amazing and talented people. The most important thing I gained from this experience was a peer group. A collection of colleagues and friends that I could bond with. I grew as a person, and consequently as an artist. I wasn't that good when I graduated from school, but I kept getting better. Today I'm no DeNiro, but I know what I'm doing, I almost always have a show in the pipeline, and have made strides as a local arts advocate.

Even though I was pushing carts at BJ's (along with some scary, maladjusted individuals) or temping, I was regularly acting, producing, directing, writing reviews and articles, and was a respected member of the local artistic community. That kept me going, even through occasional bouts of depression and loneliness.

My social limitations may be partly responsible for not achieving as much as I could have by now. Or I can use as an excuse that my straddling of two worlds, my work world and my acting world, has kept me from success in one world or the other; I've given up jobs for theatre gigs, and I've often foregone auditions at larger theatres since I'd never be able to get the time off from work. I'm approaching my 40th birthday and most of my peers and colleagues are at least a decade younger than me. Sometimes this bothers me.

But then I wonder what my life would have been like if I didn't go into theatre. I might have majored in math or science, I might've flunked out, I might've drifted between menial jobs, and the life I wanted might have drifted further and further from my fingers. I wonder when, if ever, I'd've moved out of either of my parents' houses. Or somewhere along the way I'd've stayed in retail and gone into management. I'd be depressed, bored, unfulfilled and alone. I might've gotten increasingly bitter and angry. I might've gone into some of those dark places and not returned.

Of course, then again maybe not. But it worries me.

I also worry that there are thousands, even millions, of people who weren't gifted with some of the social instincts that others possess, and but for a few fortuitous choices or events might wind up snapping like he did. I don't necessarily believe in evil, but I do believe that societal outliers are much more susceptible to mental illness, and their lack of ability to form positive human connections makes them prone to a spiral of bitterness, conspiracy theories, paranoia, and schizophrenia. And given that this is America, where thanks to the Second Amendment the mentally ill can get guns a whole lot easier than treatment, there's always going to be another Jared Lee Loughner. Or George Sordini. Or Seung-Hui Cho. Or Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. Or Ted Kaszcynski. Or Mark David Chapman. Or John Hinckley. Or Charles Whitman. And so on and so on.

I won't be so naive to suggest that taking a drama class would've kept these people from becoming killers. But theatre has turned lives around. Gary Sinise would arguably be stealing cars today instead of being an Academy Award nominated actor who founded one of the best regional theatres in the country had he not been approached by a drama teacher to be in a high school production of West Side Story. Somewhere along the line these people needed to find something or someone that didn't make them feel so alone, that gave them some positive direction in their lives. A sense of purpose. Some hope. Some love. Drama Club or not, just someone to reach out to them. Their victims might still be alive today.

Or we can just do what America seems to do best: push these people to the fringe of society, let them simmer until they snap, react with sorrow and outrage, point fingers, bury their victims, execute/imprison/commit them, and wait for it all to inevitably happen again.

My life is far from perfect. But theatre keeps me afloat, and I'm forever grateful that it's in my life.

My Kleksography Story

DC's Rorschach Theatre recently solicited via Facebook a call for odd family stories that would then be used as launching pads for a series of short plays that would be written, cast, rehearsed, and produced in a pretty short period, presented under the collective banner "Kleksography: Home For The Holidays," and it ran last weekend.

My story was one that was submitted. I couldn't see it now that I'm Boston-based, but I'm honored to have been selected. Of course, the story was a launching-pad for the playwright's vision, and bore little resemblance to the actual event that inspired it.

So I'd like to share a slightly fuller version of what really happened.

In the summer of 2002, I was visiting my Dad in Kittery ME. I'd temporarily moved out of NYC to take an internship at Lost Nation Theatre in Montpelier VT, and I kept my stuff at his house while I was away (turned out to be five months, the summer internship and the fall Shakespeare show).

I had intended to drive to Montpelier that day, but my car (kept in his driveway for the year or so that I'd been in NYC) was acting up. So while it was in the shop, we made the best of the extra day and had a taco night. Old El Paso taco kit, just like the old days, with our regular filling: shredded cheese, lettuce, pickles, olives, tomatoes and taco sauce. We had sat down for our first round when the phone rang. He sighed heavily, thinking it was likely a telemarketer.

He wound up being on the phone for over an hour, as his tacos grew cold on the plate across from me. I could only hear half of the conversation, and couldn't piece together what was being discussed from context, but I could tell that it was definitely a significant conversation.

For Dad to be on the phone for more than fifteen minutes with me was a rarity - most of our phone conversations when I was in college, or while he was living with Grampa in Florida during his final years, or when I'd left for New York were of the "checking in" variety. Everything OK? Yup. Car running? Yup. How's New York? Fine. Got enough money? Mostly. Okay, don't wanna run up the bill, so I'll letcha go. Love ya, Kiddo. We didn't have really deep conversations.

At the time there was a lot that I was keeping from him; I wasn't out about my sexuality at the time, so we sorta kept to the tip of the iceburg. I was also aware that there was a lot that he kept from me. He almost never talked about his time in Vietnam, his divorce from Mom, etc. We never went deep. So there's a lot about my dad that I didn't know.

So after an hour or so, he sat down across from me again. Sighed heavily. Obviously he was quite emotionally moved. Then he said...

"So, John, did I ever tell you about your big sister?"

(a pregnant pause...)

"Um, nnnnnnno...."

A long explanation followed.

Once upon a time in 1968, there lived the son of a prominent city official. After graduating high school, he tooled around aimlessly in his Corvette, worked some construction jobs, and had a girlfriend. The girlfriend was still in high school, aged 16 or so. One day, girlfriend got pregnant. Parents on both sides raged. Decisions were made. In the days before Roe v Wade, it was decided that the child would be carried to term; it was a girl, and after a week was then put up for adoption. Babydaddy appears to have been given a Hobson's Choice of Vietnam or jail, so he sold his Corvette and enlisted in the army. Babymomma eventually married someone else. Babydaddy served honorably as an MP in the First Division, survived Tet, earned a Purple Heart, and came home. Shortly after, he met and married my mom, and thus begat yours truly.

A few weeks before the phone conversation, Dad attended the funeral of Babymomma's father, seeing her for the first time in years. The subject of their daughter came up. Any news, perchance, of what became of her?

Turns out that it was Babymomma on the phone. And over the course of the hour she informed him that their daughter, who was adopted by a loving family and had a pretty happy life, had nonetheless wanted to know who her biological parents were and had managed to track her down. She lived in Massachusetts on the north shore, had three children, etc.

I had no knowledge whatsoever of her existence. I knew that Dad had a girlfriend named Donna before Vietnam, but never knew about my half-sister. I'd been raised as an only child , although it turns out my mom knew about her too.

Long story short, while I was off in Vermont she contacted my Dad, they met, and once I came back I met her too. She's a sweetheart, and I'm glad to have her in my life. I've met the younger of her three kids (all are mid/late teenagers now), and the oldest is serving alongside his own father in Afghanistan.

It explained a lot about my Dad. I never knew what a burden he carried, but I could appreciate how finding her and establishing a relationship with her gave him a lot of inner peace. And were it not for a worn brakepad, I wouldn't have been present for the revelation.

More Civil War Ancestors - C. W. Gray

Out of the four Gray brothers (Robert H, Clarendon W, Augustus L and Madison J) of Stockton, Maine, who enlisted in the Union cause in the Civil War, only Clarendon returned, having seen every major battle from Bull Run to Appomattox. After the war, he served as a Boston police officer. This article, in a September 1897 issue of the Boston Evening Record (a precursor to the Boston Herald), features his Civil War service and his being awarded the Kearny Cross.

BOSTON EVENING [RECORD]
[Septe]mber 18, 1897
LATEST RECORD EXTRA
4:05
HIS PRIZE.
Patrolman Gray Has Kearney Cross.

One of the possessors of the coveted “Kearney Cross,” awarded for especial and conspicuous bravery at the battle of Fair Oaks or Seven Pines, as it is sometimes called is Patrolman C. W. Gray of station 3.

It is a simple maltese cross, dangling at the end of a strip of red, white and blue ribbon, with the words “Kearney Cross,” engraved upon its face, but it is rich in signification, and its value to Mr. Gray cannot be estimated in terms of this world’s riches.

Mr. Gray comes from a family of men who were foremost in answering the call for the defence of the Union. Three brothers, with him entered in the army at the first summons of President Lincoln.

Three of the four brothers left their lives upon southern fields. Mr. Gray alone returned home after the bloody conflict.

And strangest of all the father of these four gallant men was a staunch democrat, bitterly opposed to the war and all that it signified.

It was a bitter irony that three of his sons should have given their lives for the cause to which he was so entirely hostile.

Mr. Gray was but 18 years of age when he entered, and two of his brothers were one and two years younger, respectively. Patrolman Gray is still a young man, and few people who see him on his daily beat would deem it possible that a man so youthful in appearance should have undergone such hardships and attained so great a proof of gallantry as the Kearney Cross.

When I questioned at the station house about the cross and the circumstances under which he gained it he was extremely loath to talk of the matter, preferring, as he said, to leave the relation of the facts to others.

He invited me, however, to come to his home, and see the trophy, and finally I obtained a recital of the circumstances from his own lips.

OF GOOD MAINE STOCK.
Mr. Gray and his brothers were of good old Maine stock, and they enlisted in the Third Maine volunteers. Their first experience under arms was at the first battle of Bull Run, in which engagement Mr. Gray was wounded in the thigh.

His corps was commanded by the gallant Gen. Howard. Mr. Gray fought in all the battles in which his regiment took part, but it was at Fair Oaks that he received the cross for his notable gallantry.

It was after a fierce engagement when the troops were resting after the heavy labor of the day. Mr. Gray, then a sergeant, with two other men of his regiment named Roper and Millano started out to do a bit of independent reconnoitering.

They went far beyond their own lines, and had almost reached the lines of the enemy when they noticed, under a tree a group of Confederate soldiers, who afterwards proved to be a Georgia colonel who was wounded, with five of his men as a body guard.

Their weapons were stacked against a tree nearby, and the men were reclining about apparently with feelings of great security.

“We slowly circled about them,” said Mr. Gray, “through the woods, and suddenly, when we were as near as we could safely get, we leaped out with a great shout and commanded to surrender.

“They were absolutely dazed, and almost before they knew what we were or what they were about, we had them ‘yarded up’ and on the way to our lines.

“But when that Georgia colonel came to his senses, and especially his sense of speech, the language he used was almost as focible as a charge of musketry.

PICTURESQUE SWEARING.
“It was the most picturesque swearing I ever heard, and if profanity could have availed we would have left our captives then and there and fled in terror to our lines.

“We were proof against his wordy assaults, however, and marched him and his men straight to camp, where, as you may imagine, we were received with great ovations.

“This was on May 3, 1863, and May 16 Gen. Braney, who commanded the Third Army Corps, issues a general order commending the splendid gallantry of our corps.

“At the same time the Kearney crosses were presented to the favored few. We were drawn up in line of battle, and Gen. Sedgwick, our division commander, passed along and pinned the crosses on the breast of our coats.

“We were told to wear them continually, and to keep them free from disgrace. We did not have to be told that, and my cross was never removed until the day Lee surrendered at Appomattox.”

THERE ARE TWO OTHERS.
So far as Mr. Gray knows, there are but two other men in this city who have the Kearney cross. They are George Woods, a baggage master at the B. & M. depot, and George Flynn, the janitor of the Lexington School at East Boston.

Both the other men who assisted in the capture of the Georgia colonel and his men were killed in later engagements. Millano was a wealthy Spaniard who left Spain for some political reason. He was killed one month before the expiration of his term of service.

Mr. Gray has, besides the Kearney cross, other tokens of his fighting days, which he values only less highly. Among these are the adjutant general’s report of the records of his three brothers.

HIS BROTHERS’ RECORDS.
R. H. Gray, major of the Fourth Maine, was killed in the battle of the Wilderness. The youngest of the brothers was killed at Fredericksburg, and Mr. Gray buried him with his own hands. The third brother was also killed at Fredericksburg.

Other mementoes are Mr. Gray’s corp badge, a diamond of red cloth which was worn on the cap, and a badge which was given him by his comrades when he was made lieutenant.

Mr. Gray is of the opinion, and it can hardly be disproved, that the record of his family cannot be duplicated among the soldiers of the United States who fought in the Civil War.

At the close of the war his corps was commanded by Gen. Miles, and thus, beginning with Howard, one of the most gallant of the surviving generals, he ended with Miles, no less gallant, who commands the army of today.

My Great-Great-Great Grandfather at Bull Run

I spent the afternoon at the Houghton Library with my uncle Bob, transcribing documents from the MOLLUS Civil War archives. While he worked on our ancestor Major Robert Henry Gray's 1863 war diary, I transcribed two newspaper clippings. What follows below is then-Lieutenant Gray's first-hand account of his experience at First Bull Run, originally printed in the Rockland (Maine) Gazette sometime in 1862, and re-printed in an unknown newspaper some time later (source unknown).

Statements of Lieut. R. H. Gray
[From the Rockland Gazette]

EDITOR GAZETTE: – Agreeably to my promise, I make some remarks concerning the affair at Bull Run.

Of the general features of the battle you have probably before this been well informed. Our brigade commenced moving at about 2 o’clock P.M. We were kept waiting for other troops, who fell in so slowly that at sunrise we had not advanced one mile from our camp. This was a fault. – Had we advanced promptly, we should have taken the northern batteries, as the enemy were not expecting an attack in that quarter. But as our column was some 5 or 6 hours in marching a distance we might easily have gone in two, the enemy, who watched our movements, and saw where the blow was to fall, had time to throw reinforcements into those batteries from Manassas, only three miles distant.

The force detailed to storm the batteries was insufficient. The army generally halted a little short of the battle field, and the battle was fought by detachments from the main body, and marching from one to three miles on a “double quick.” These detachments, after fighting as only brave men will fight, and performing, in many instances, deeds of valor which will never be written were compelled, by being outflanked by superior numbers, and for want of support, to fall back, and abandon the advantages they had gained.

The most glaring fault on the field that day was that, with a few exceptions, our attacking columns were not supported. I make no comments; I am not allowed to censure the conduct of a General, but men will think.

On arriving at a point about one mile from the centre, and about two and a half miles from the right of the enemy’s line, we halted in a wood. While there Major Nickerson was ordered forward to reconnoitre, I got a horse and went with him. Major N. advanced to where Ayer’s battery (formerly Sherman’s) was playing into a [w]ood, where were stationed a body of the enemy’s riflemen and cavalry. They were finally driven out. I passed through this wood later in the day. The havoc was fearful. The trees were splintered and limbs cut off, the ground plowed up, and horses and men dead and dying, lay thickly scattered about. Major N. having finished his reconnaissance, gave me permission to remain a little longer, and returned. – Hitching my horse I climbed a tree and saw Hunter’s brigade engage the enemy. They were about a mile distant, in an open field inclining toward me. I had a fair view. – They had an equal number, no outflanking, and the fight was with musketry alone. – They advanced until the lines were very near, and for about fifteen minutes the roll of musketry was unceasing. The lines of the rebels then began to waver and break, and finally they rallied in four or five confused masses. The rebels were between me and our men. In a moment more the glistening bayonets of our troops came bursting through the smoke-cloud, and rushing on the confused rebel masses. The slaughter for a moment or two was great. The rebels ran to the wood; where they were reinforced and advanced again, and again, after a smart fight, were driven by the bayonet to the wood.

Mr. Russell, the correspondent of the London Times, who pretends to have been an eye-witness of the Battle of Bull Run says there were no bayonet charges on that day. This writer prefers sarcasm to truth, and states what is false.

Thinking I had staid too long, I hastened to join my regiment which was marching by a circuitous route, over to attack the enemy’s left. Before getting into position, […] to [peer? pass?] some distance over a hill.

[column break; two columns of newsprint have been cut and pasted together, and some text is lost here]

[…] missed me, but [reeling? feeling?] so badly, I was some-what indifferent as to the result. I had almost reached my friends, when I was cut off by rebel cavalry, who came charging back, cutting down stragglers. I turned, went into a house used by our troops for a hospital, and lay among the wounded. – The cavalry came up, shot two men who were unwounded, rushed in and took all the guns, pistols, knives and watches they could get, and left. A guard was soon placed over us, which prevented personal violence, but not wordy abuse, for which the rebels have a particular gift. The officers were gentlemanly, but the questions of most of the soldiers showed them to be extremely ignorant. One said to me, “I spose ye are all starvin’ up North, now you don’t git our cotton.” “We do not eat cotton, sir.” “Well, ye wont git any corn up there, neither.” Another, the poorest specimen of humanity I ever observed, ragged, dirty, and ignorant, said to me, “What are you down here for, meddlin’ with out instooshuns?” Our “instooshuns!” I pitied him. The poor class of whites at the South ignorantly worship the Juggernaut “institution,” whose wheels crush them into the mire of society.

A certain rebel colonel belonging in Richmond, after making himself agreeable, as he thought, tried his hand at pumping. – He asked me how many men we had in the fight? I replied, “We had 60,000. How many did you have?” He told me “they had 45,000 at 1 o’clock P.M., besides a reserve,” the number of which he did not inform me, “and at 4 P.M., Johnson arrived with 15,000” I then told him we really had only 32,000 including the reserve, He said I “knew nothing about it, the Yankees had 80,000.” The loss of the enemy must have been severe. An Alabamian remarked with a deep sigh, “If this is war, by —— I want to go home, for our regiment was almost wiped out!” On of their orderlies told me that his company consisted of between ninety and a hundred in the morning, and only forty came out of the fight unhurt.

We received no bad treatment. The good woman of the house made us some goose broth. The good soul was fearful that a bit of the meat would hurt us, and so she kept it for herself and family, giving us only the broth. Whether it was gratis, or the paid her in “Virginia scrip,” I do not know. The dish was without much salt, and being strongly flavored with goose grease, we could not appreciate her kind gift.

The arms of the rebels are generally good, but most of their clothes are cotton, and their shoes are thin and unserviceable. If they stay in Virginia they will suffer much this winter. They have a numerous cavalry and but little of the hay in that State was cut.

I was with the rebels seven days. My condition, to me, was intolerable, and I determined to escape or die in the attempt. I made what little preparation I could, taking some biscuit, (which got wet and I threw away,) and some bandages and salve to dress my wounds, and also a secession blanket. I was thirty-four hours in reaching Georgetown, during twenty-four of which I was saturated with water. I crossed the Potomac by wading and swimming, using a rail to compensate for my arm. I had a slight fever when I started. I was seen several times by soldiers and others, but my blanket deceived them. For the first fourteen hours I repeatedly saw their pickets and sentinels, but they did not see me. – However, I escaped, assisted by a chain of fortuitous circumstances, and a little of that peculiar wit with which Nature kindly furnishes a Yankee.

R. H. GRAY

UPDATE: An 1899 book about Maine Major General Hiram G Berry by Edward K Gould, published by the Rockland Courier-Gazette, contains an account of Lt Gray's escapades at Bull Run that appear to be drawn directly from the above article. It includes information about his wounding that is ostensibly drawn from the missing section:

"Lieutenant Robert H. Gray [...] was wounded and taken prisoner at Bull Run. He received his wound just before the order came to retreat. On his way to the rear Lieutenant Burgin of the Searsport company found him and bound up his wounded arm, and afterwards sent some men to conduct him to a place of safety. They did not find him, however, as his wound commenced bleeding soon after the lieutenant left him, and he started for a stream near by for water. Before he reached it he fainted from loss of blood, and on reviving, saw the retreating column of the Union army nearly a mile away. Replenishing his canteen at the brook, he attempted to rejoin his comrades by a short cut, but soon came in view of rebel troops who began firing on him, but he escaped further injury. His wound was so painful that he was indifferent to the danger he run, and continued steadily on his course until he had nearly reached his friends, when he beheld rebel cavalry rapidly approaching. Hastily entering a house which had been converted into a hospital by the Union forces, he lay down among the wounded, and had just made himself comfortable, when the cavalry dashed up, shooting two unwounded men."