"It's Possible!"

Sunday, August 9, 2009
7:52 pm I have show tunes stuck in my head...

The past few days have been nothing short of inspiring. That's really the only word I can use to describe how I feel right now. I feel like I'm buzzing with inspiration. Like anything's possible. Like everything's going to work out. And it's all thanks to my little sister, Cinderella.

For the past four nights, I have watched Kaitlyn play Cinderella in this year's summer show, Rodgers & Hammerstein's "Cinderella." First of all, she was amazing. And I'm not just saying that because she's my sister and I have to. She was seriously AMAZING. Like, after I heard her sing her first song I was covered in goosebumps and my mouth was hanging open and I temporarily lost the ability to blink because I HAD NO IDEA SHE COULD SING LIKE THAT. And then I looked around and saw that the entire audience had the same expression on their faces, and when Kaitlyn stopped singing we all looked at each other like HOLY CRAP THAT WAS THE NICEST SOUND I'VE EVER HEARD I WISH SHE HADN'T STOPPED.

That happened for four straight nights. She rocked it every single night and somehow managed to do better and better with each performance.

But as I watched her on stage each night, it was so hard for me to accept that it was her up there. How was it that the little sister I had watched tv with until noon that very morning (still in our pajamas) was now on stage singing like a rock star and losing glass slippers and kissing a prince??? It didn't seem possible. But there she was: 17 years old and killing it as the lead in the town play. She had a dream, and she made it come true. How cool is that???

Now, as you know, I get emotional over McDonald's commercials, so you can imagine how emotional I was actually watching a play. I laughed, I teared up (though I didn't cry!), I cheered, and I lost my voice a little by screaming like a mad woman when Kaitlyn took her bow each night. And as I watched the play, some of the lines really spoke to me. Like, when Cinderella tells the Fairy Godmother right before the ball, "But nothing in my life has prepared me for a night like this!" and the Fairy Godmother says to her, "And yet everything in your life has led you to this moment," I gasped. Audibly. I mean, leave it to me to relate to a fairy tale but THOSE LINES ARE MY LIFE RIGHT NOW.

I've been telling people I'm planning on having a panic attack at the end of August. I'm not planning on it because I want it to happen... I just feel like it's going to happen. The end of August will come and students will return to their colleges and I will realize I'm not a student anymore and that I can't go back to Boston anymore and that I'm not employed either and I will have a mental breakdown for approximately 48 hours. Maybe more. It's hard to say. But seeing Kaitlyn as Cinderella made me feel better. Like maybe I won't break down. Like maybe I'll want to and that's okay and everything, but sometimes things do work out. And sometimes people get what they've been working toward. And maybe it will take a while, but eventually I'll get there.

After all, Cinderella had to survive like, 20 years with a wicked stepmother and stepsisters, but then one day she walked out and found her prince and lived happily ever after. It happens!

This is sounding a little too much like a 13-year-old girl's diary entry, so I'm going to stop now, but not before I throw in a Grey's Anatomy quote that is JUST SO RELEVANT RIGHT NOW:

"The early bird catches the worm. A stitch in time saves nine. He who hesitates is lost. We can't pretend we haven't been told. We've all heard the proverbs, heard the philosophers, heard our grandparents warning us about wasted time, heard the damn poets urging us to ‘seize the day.' Still, sometimes we have to see for ourselves. We have to make our own mistakes. We have to learn our own lessons. We have to sweep today's possibility under tomorrow's rug until we can't anymore, until we finally understand for ourselves what Benjamin Franklin meant: That knowing is better than wondering. That waking is better than sleeping. And that even the biggest failure, even the worst, most intractable mistake, beats the hell out of never trying."

Love,
Tara