Madness and Manifesto.

I have a rather strong memory regarding a Year 2 assignment on road safety. We had to create a cardboard poster, displaying our understanding of the topic at hand. The task details are not so vivid. What is vivid, however, was my audacious interpretation of this simple cut and paste type of deal. A basic cardboard poster was not enough for this precocious 8 year old. Mine came complete with a three minute song and dance routine, that was to be presented to the class (you can imagine their surprise) come assignment day. I, with a little help from my mother, who has a lot to answer for come to think of it, got all Suzi Quatro like, and rewrote the lyrics to 'Devil Gate Drive', aptly substituted with 'Wear you helmet when you ride'. I'll leave the costume assumptions to your imagination. I want to cower into my neck with embarrassment when I think about it now, but my God, was I well chuffed with my efforts then!


What the hell happened to this fearlessness?


As this seems to be the canvas for confession, I'll admit that the first half of these past few weeks (yes, it's been that long since I've fondled the keys), was not the greatest. The perceived doom of my 27th birthday was banging away at my mind like monkeys cymbals, every clang a reminder of what I've 'failed' to do with my colossal 27 years on the planet. Ah, the invisible march of time can be so suffocating for something that is really nothing but a self imposed sentence? I began to develop, well more like indulged in the existing, anxiety pertaining to all of my shoulda, coulda, woulda, didn'ts. All the bad guys came out to play (worry, fear, self-doubt..blah blah crappy blah), and adding salt to the wound was a rejection letter from my old mates at 'Insert name of bank here'. My consolidation loan was denied, the letter reading something along the lines of;

Dear Ms. Ryan.


Suck balls. You will never get your financial shit together. We, of every single bank in the world, will see to that.


Yours, with not an ounce of remorse,


Team Arsewipe. (hahahhahahahsuckedinhahhahhaeatshitahahahahahloserhaahahahahhaha)

Add to this a small but shitful car accident, where by I side-scraped the left side of my car with another, to avoid the douche who was approaching too close on my right. Cut to wide shot and I'm left footing the bill. A bit hard to bury that one in the denial pile when the treat who's car I scratched (who feels the need to intercept every second word she says with 'basically' ARRRGGGHHH) calls me incessantly with the latest updates. It was somewhere around this point that I titled me head back and screamed 'Why Gods of karma? Why?!?!'

But then something happened. I'm not sure what (anti-climax), but somehow, somewhere in the latter half of this time that has lapsed since my last post, all this USELESS fear and regret dissolved into a peaceful calm. Not only an acceptance, but a celebration of where I'm at. Yes, it's helped that I have been working hard, in jobs that I like, and that I am slowly but surely making a dint on my debts. But I think the key was, that in the same way I laid out all of my dirty little secrets in a bid to come clean, so too have I laid out all of my hopes, dreams and aspirations in a bid to have them realised.

Positive thinking/ visualisation and I go way back. Ever since my parents bid adieu to one another some 17 years ago, my Mum, in post-divorce haste, had my brother and I closing our eyes, taking deep breaths and leaving our worries at the worry tree. Bless. Hell, if I did that now there would be a worry forest and I'd be armed with a chainsaw! Anyhow, point is, I really am well equipped to handle my demons with some sort of positive guard.

So, I took heed. First came the vision board, totes Opes style (ahem Oprah...duh). It was a lovely Sunday night, glass of creative juice (aka Vino) in tow, sitting on the floor in a cathartic ocean of magazines, photo's, travel guides and newspapers, cutting and pasting a representation of all that I aspire to. And it was fun! What I noticed however, was that despite the gamut of imagery depicting how I want to be...STRONG! EMPOWERED! (don't cringe, it's hard enough admitting this) and the romantic ideals of where I want to go..EUROPE! NEW YORK!... there was a distinct absence of what I want to do, particularly on the career front.


It was at that point that I realised....I'm not entirely sure of what I want to do? I've spent a lot of time thinking about what I don't want to be doing, one needs only to scroll through the this blog to see that. But as for what I want to do? Exactly? Hmmmmmmm. Yeah, yeah, I know I've always had grand aspirations of marking my mark as an 'actress'. But the truth is, when I really think about it, I want to do a hell of a lot more. And now that I have really thought about it, there's a lot more that I can offer.

Some famous bird by the name of Madonna once said ' A lot of people are afraid to say what they want. That's why they don't get what they want.' Well, thanks for the hot tip Mads, because just as I cyber-divulged all of my dirty ways earlier, so shall I, in the spirit of my audacious, fearless 8 year old self, cyber-proclaim what I actual want. May I add, that this is not easy to do. And for that reason, I do so in bold red. 

I want to explore and present life, people and their complexities, places, diversity, culture, arts and of course, humour. I want to do this through the mediums of TV, documentary, radio and the written word. The greater goal being to educate, inform and inspire. I want to do radio show, write a column in a magazine and even a book or two. I want to perform multiple cabaret shows (the art form where for me, music, theatre and life meet), perhaps in several countries. And I want to continue to foster my passion for performance, doing the odd musical, and meh, the odd film. And I want to fly to the moon.

Wow, that was scary. And freakin hard! But it had to be done. My manifesto, if you will. Even though I've only got around to publishing it now, it's been brewing for the past few weeks. And, call it a coincidence, but since I've put it out there, things are coming to fruition. Perhaps that's why I haven't had as much time to write, because I've been busy doing!

There's no point letting our dreams lie dormant, with captain fear snarling at them like a guard dog, forbidding them to be released into reality. Heck, I'm in my late twenties now!! It's time to take action. And buy the look of things, I have a hell of a lot to do.

So I best get cracking! Wish me luck.