Midnight on a Friday and I'm staring into a tiny ceramic dish in the kitchen holding three bobbypins, two quarters, a nickel, some incidental coffee grounds and a screw. I'm sure everyone has a vessel like this, and I can't remember the last time I wore the bobbypins. To my left is a letter that's not addressed to me, the magnetic pull is strong. My focus on the dish is belittled by my side eye on the letter, but to be honest I've already read it.
How exhilarating it is to be a validated fly on the wall. Being mute but also unasked, all the while knowing the ending to the chapter or story in your bones. If I was a better writer I could've taken a close compositional guess at this letter years ago, but instead it's been lurking in the back of my brain, every now and then drifting into the present for contemplation. The time hadn't been right.
I'm building a new duet where my primary twosome maintains gripping communication with each other while they are surrounded by observing bodies that don't get to engage, and I'm fairly sure this would be a moment akin to one of my silent observers. I've been struggling with the presence and tasks of the observers as their task is just to be present, making a sort of internal captain's log of their experience. This is the most difficult part as a creator of performance: importing enough sensation, cause and effect from this exact point in time into the work so that maybe my performers can find it, and maybe just maybe the audience members can pick up on the magic that's happening live. It's impossible to bottle experience, but perhaps possible to rediscover.
In other thoughts, how great would it be to be a professional fly on the wall?