Changing Lives
Dunkirk NY – It is a steel-gray New Year’s Day morning here in the bowels of Western NY. I can’t tell if the sun has risen or not yet. Later this afternoon and into this even we expect some lake-effect snow. You have to be pretty hardy to live up in these parts. I think my hardiness is beginning to wear thin, though. I am sure I need to go outside later this morning and take a walk. Even 20 minutes outdoors can relieve the cabin fever a bit. I do not know how we ever got to the point in western civilization that determined that the first day in January, right in the first third of winter, should be the time of the season to celebrate a new year. Perhaps it continues to be a remnant of that hunger for light.
New Year’s Day brings with it that sense of things changing. I have been taken lately with this article from the NY Times Arts Blog about “Plays That Changed Your Life.” There have been some amazing comments from readers. I am not sure about this, but I think the comments get recycled somehow, because in perusing the list this morning I noted there were only 6 pages of comments, and when I first posted my own comments there were 7 pages, and mine now do not appear. So I think there have been many more than the web site would lead you to believe.
What this list attests to, I think, is something we all should continue to aspire to – creating theatre that has the power to change lives. We live now in a culture that emphasizes careerism; that is, we are more focused on how what we do in our lives advances our career. Many of us fall victim to this kind of thinking too often. We become more concerned with how our decisions and actions will affect our careers, and less concerned with how the development of our art can change lives. Continue Reading »
