i am but a liar,
my Lover.
i promise to stay,
but you know i
will often forsake You.
i swear to friends and family
that i will bid them “farewell”,
but i will steal my way back to you
in silence, My Beloved …
like a thief in the night.
(from “Jisei”, 2013).
One of my favourite recordings is one of Edith Piaf singing “Non, Je ne regrette rien”:
At sixty years of age — now looking back, I feel confident in regard to my life learning … but in another sense, I am still curious about how different my life might have been would it not have been for the many “missed opportunities”. In other words, I am — in a sense — “but a liar”.
I have — true enough — embraced many life challenges and learned much … often at formidable costs. However, there have been many life opportunities that I have both turned down and missed; and I sometimes still wonder how my life had been now, had I managed to include them in my “life portfolio”.
Some were too outrageous for me at the time, as for example an offer to tour Europe with a famous drag ballet troupe or to assume a leading position playing cello with a symphony orchestra in Central America (under the auspices of the Peace Corps). Others were opportunities that I competed to achieve but where I did not measure up, including auditioning for Meredith Monk in NYC for a worldwide tour as a choir vocalist and dancer. There I managed to reach the top 20, only to fall out in the final round. All credit to Ms. Monk who sincerely told all of us that did not make the final cut what our strengths were, and why we individually and specifically did not work together with the determined final grouping, and who then personally invited us to audition for her productions in the future. Never before has “losing” felt so much like a “win”!
Manhattan was simply amazing in those years! Thank you, Meredith! You gave me a sense of confidence and self-worth that has served me quite well over the years.
Oso Para Vos 