that is no trinket you carry...

my mother told me as i was growing up that the only person i can rely on is myself - that i shouldn't learn to trust anybody. so needless to say, i have trust issues.

i recently came out a maddening depression. i remember my boyfriend one night sitting on the bed next to me, asking, "what IS it? what IS wrong?" there was no way to explain what was going on, so i cried instead. for about three weeks.

when you're lost, you tend to look in the oddest places for answers.


one of my favorite stories comes from a friend who lives and works in new york as an actress. during a production of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat", she tripped on an errant cable and fell down a small flight of stairs right before she was to go back on stage.

although she was able to aim the fleshy, meaty parts of her body to take the blow of the fall, it still hurt like hell - the kind of pain that immediately brings tears to your eyes. she lay on the ground, stunned and breathless, while the music played on - signifying the beginning of the second act.

at that point there was no turning back without stopping the show completely. her mind raceed while trying to figure out what to do. if she couldn't get up, her understudy would have to go on ("but she had no costume and couldn't sing it - and she wasn't memorized at all").

she closed her eyes and that's when aragorn appeared in her mind. he was also lying face down but was outside in a muddy pool of water. he raised his face out of the water, dripping, and said, "you know what you have to do. and you don't want to miss me tonight, do you?"

my friend, being the movie nerd that she is, had 10:30 tickets for the opening of "return of the king".

my friend thought about everything aragorn had done up until then - and not just for frodo and the fellowship, but for the people of rohan as well. and she knew there were many more sacrifices that he was willing to make for the greater good.

after a cursory examination of her body parts, she realized nothing was broken or sprained. she thought about what she had do physically in the second act. except for a series of conga lines and some ponying, which was going to be a little painful, it was nothing like what aragorn put himself thru at helm's deep.

she limped to center stage, the curtains opened, she smiled brightly, and began to sing...


because i look very, very highly upon people who live hand to mouth, audition 10 times a week, and SING in front of people, i found myself reanimating that story in my mind one day when i was feeling a tad overwhelmed.

however, the voice in my head wasn't my friend's - it was aragorn's. he had one again found the strength to selflessly channel himself to transmit his message of self-reliance: that we all know what it is we have to do.


"It is said to be the age of the first person singular." - Ralph Waldo Emerson