The Constellation Learning Newsletter
July 2009

First things first: My son Michael is fully recovered. When he returned for new chest x-rays the mass size showed a 98% reduction in size. The doctors were flabbergasted. He’s now ensconced on Hill Island looking toward the future.

Ah, pursuing your dreams…never an easy task when it involves bumping up against the top of your comfort zone…

Cynthia Barlow

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~ Monthly Message ~

“Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear.”

-- Ambrose Redmoon --

I’ve been scaling the ladder up a very steep learning curve the past month. Regular readers will recognize this is a result of the June launch of a new radio show on BlogTalk Radio, as well as the production of Earth-Bound Angel, an eighty minute one-woman show that opened at the Toronto Fringe Festival July 2nd that I wrote specifically for Valerie Michaels.

If my learning curve has been steep, Val’s has been perpendicular.

Valerie attended the Trust Program years ago. Badly wounded in childhood, like an injured bird, she flew, shall we say, erratically. Over the years she put a splint on, went to physiotherapy (metaphorically speaking) and learned at least to fly in a straight line. Taken by her story (it’s powerful) I offered to help her tell it. I had thought it would be a book, but for the material to come alive it became apparent that Val needed to tell it herself with her voice. The show emerged from that intention. Someone suggested applying to the Fringe Festival, we got in, and now Earth Bound Angel has taken flight although, like Val, sort of erratically.

Opening night was July 2nd. Val forgot half the lines she was so nervous. The audience didn’t know that, but I did. Oh, did I mention that in addition to playwright I am also Director, Stage Manager, Sound gal and all round doer of everything that isn’t Val’s territory? Val’s territory is to learn the script, be herself, and have fun. She sort of forgot all three on opening night.

That’s what fear’ll do to ‘ya.

The next performance—there are seven in all—she got the second act down perfectly. The third performance she nailed act three but sort of forgot to get off the chair and move. It was like watching a hawk circling at an altitude of fifteen feet—something’s not right. She was flying at half mast. That night she wanted to chuck it all—cut and run. It was too hard, too scary.

After each performance I’ve given some input and ways she can improve, most of which come down to “know your lines—cold!” all of which is underscored by the larger issue of putting her life story, and herself, way out there. To her credit, each performance she has integrated my input.

Last night I watched it all come together. Once again in the sound booth calling lighting cues (oh, and I’m Lighting Manager, too) I witnessed a transformation. I sat slack-jawed, in awe, as she didn’t miss a word. She stuck the landing. It was a flawless performance. She knew her lines, she was herself, and she had fun.

And I, at the end of scene one in my little box above, after a challenging day personally with perceived petty little problems, could barely see the sound board or my notes through teary eyes nor could I call a lighting cue as my throat constricted: I had just witnessed an act of courage that was no less significant than any soldier’s landing at Normandy, any cancer patient’s valiant fight or any mother’s unselfish act of advocacy on behalf of her child. The audience didn’t know that, but I did. I felt inspired by her determination, no matter the cost. I don’t know if I’ve ever felt so proud of anyone ever in my life. I had forgotten the power of courage in action—our own or others—to decimate perceived challenges.

She’ll tell you that she’s waited all her life for this chance, that she hopes her story will inspire and perhaps help others. That’s been her “why” and it outweighed her fear. I’ll tell you that I’ve seen her transformation over the past seven years probably more intimately than anyone else in her life and I’m the only one who’s seen her remarkable evolution in four short performances. Valerie will tell you her mind just works in a way that allows for massive memorization. I’ll tell you that she was scared, but she didn’t let that stop her. She simply took “scared” and rearranged it to become “sacred.”

The running start, the falls, the start-over’s, mean less in the long-term than the single leap off the ledge in the short-term. For only then does one really get to test one’s wings.

Never try, never fail; the motto of a safe life.

It doesn’t matter what comes from this endeavor—something has been set in motion and the universe has it handled—for the bird is on the wing now soaring high above.

Ask Val, or any Hawk and she’ll tell you: “Ah, but the view was worth the leap.”

“Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point.”

-- C.S. Lewis --

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