Moving on with life
This is a cathartic moment for me. I am not a young inexperienced woman, but a mature fairly confident artist (classical singer). But my experiences over the last few years have left me, shall we say, hesitant to spread my wings and test the waters both personally and professionally. Hesitant is the wrong word. Eager but apprehensive is probably more appropriate.
I have been a widow for 3 ½ years now. The length of my husband’s illness and my devotion to him and his caregiving were such that I missed many of my most productive years as a singer. Not that I stopped singing, but that I stopped really pursuing anything beyond the places I could get to in less than an hour by car. Before his illness, the responsibilities of being a mom had done something of the same to me, although I did travel to Italy to sing for 6 weeks when my son was 5. I do not blame my family for my actions. I love them, loved them, and would have done whatever needed doing to keep them safe and happy and, in my husband’s case, to return him to health. In his case, that was not to be. And so, grief took over my life, ruled its confines and wrapped me in a fog so thick that it took a major illness of my own to blow a hole through.
So here I am. Alone and looking for a second chance at life. I have survived my own health battles, thank you very much, and can reasonably expect to be around for several more years. Now what? And why? When so many around me have succumbed to their grief or to their illness, why am I still here? And what do I do with it?
Interesting possibilities…. I started small, well, small for me. I continued to sing throughout all this, scored several performances in large and difficult works that demonstrated that “I was back”! But they didn’t feel nor did I want them to be the destination. I want and need to do more with this, to explore the possibility of stretching my limits as far as I can.
It will be no surprise to anyone living that the world revolves around and worships youth and beauty. The opera world is no different. Singers are consistently cast on appearance more than on sound and youth is a huge plus for those singers. So what does a mature, saftig woman with a voice that makes the earth move do to counter this trend? Well, I am striking my first blow for the mature artist next month in San Francisco.
I have applied to audition for cash prizes and for the opportunity to sing for several opera companies at a convention put on by a magazine for, purportedly, all classical singers. It started as a whim, an annoyance that, once again, all the materials and classifications as to professional level focused on “young artists” or “just graduated”, instead of only on how much work you do and where. So, since the first round was by audio recording, resume and picture, after much hand-wringing, second-guessing and some sleepless nights, I applied. I have sweated the last 6 weeks, wondering if they would guess from my resume (even though I removed the oldest stuff) that I was WAY over the usual age for these things and would reject me out of hand. But the recording I sent, though not professionally done, was good and, thanks to a young, edgy woman photographer, my headshot did not look like an “old lady” (see my home page). And last Friday, I got the word….I’M GOING!!!
Wow…now what? Well, I intend to sing like a goddess! Why go if I’m not going to give it my all? And one part of me is determined that I win! But the realistic side of me has a backup plan or rather, a “where does this fit in the scheme of things” opinion. I have won a competition before. It is not a destination goal; it doesn’t pay bills or guarantee future employment. But what the experience does for me is another thing. It is a step in the right direction, a step toward life, a step taken on my terms, for me, for MY life and my future. As an event, it probably doesn’t have any great significance, although I will still pursue a win here, make no mistake about that. But believing that life is not over, that I am still a capable, valuable artist who just happens to be over the age of “maturity” is of much greater importance. And the first step in convincing the rest of the world!
Now, if I could just do the same thing for my love life….sigh…. Another story, another day. It is part and parcel of this same journey and I have made steps in the right direction. But I have lots of work left to do there before I can declare myself whole. If one can ever say that with complete conviction….
No Comments »
No comments yet.
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URI
Leave a comment
Line and paragraph breaks automatic, e-mail address never displayed, HTML allowed: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <code> <em> <i> <strike> <strong>