I left and nobody* noticed: middle-aged female playwriter enjoys (mostly) exile

After 2015, I quit writing plays because Theatre had finally broken my writer-heart five-too many times. I had already let go of writing screenplays after a little success and some gratifying near-miss opportunities. I had abandoned the first draft of my novel because [insert various reasonable excuses here, then mentally replace all of them with “distracted by the Internet.”].

And yet, there is this spark, this desire to create, and sometimes it says, quite clearly, “Write.” I mostly answer “No,” but it leaks out in poems, and posts, and floods out of my soul in a journal that nobody’s allowed to read.

In 2018, I was invited to write a little play for Joanie Schultz, then-artistic director at Watertower Theatre, a process and a story that came to mean a lot to me. A few weeks later, Austin ScriptWorks threw a reunion for its playwrights, and I had the thrill of seeing my words work beautifully on stage and featured in a published volume.

Then, last summer, I was invited to join a spiritual writing retreat. In the remote safety of that place, I wrote a first draft of a big play. I haven’t touched it since I returned to real life. I think about it, occasionally, but I don’t feel drawn to it. Theatre and playwright me are irreparably broken, I suspect.

I am surrounded by books today, thrilling in words, a grateful listener.

But still – that spark. “Write.” I am listening. And while I don’t yet know what form it’s taking, I sense that Eastertide is near.

*I lied. My sisters noticed. So did my closest friends. And my mother-in-law, Jean Daves, who urged me to get back to writing so she could come see my next play. Jean passed away in 2018. This post is dedicated to her, with a desperate wish that she’d be here to read it and hold me accountable, and to the female theater producers in Dallas and beyond who ask me “What are you working on?” This, at last, is my straight answer.

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Image of Victorian dancing girl courtesy of The Graphics Fairy ©2007 (thegraphicsfairy.com)