Tuesday, November 21, 2017

November 2017 Writing Challenge - #21 - Sickness

Everyone, I woke up so sick this morning. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t move.

While that’s a personal problem, how does it transfer to stage? How can you make the audience feel sick? 
I’ve seen some Eastern European Theater where the purpose seems not to tell the American Dream of an underdog fighting harder and winning it all… but of someone who has done wrong and is doing everything they can do lower and dirty themselves – trying to get that wrongness out of them.

Is that the same thing? I don’t know! 
But invert your aesthetic. Winning is covered in mud, naked in a wheelbarrow being spat upon by someone you love… because they “get” you… all of you. The ugly you. The sinful you. The violent you.

If you must, show us why this person thinks they deserve it.

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Given my "skin of my teeth" brand of timing and luck the last 6 hours or so, I'm not taking any chances and I'm gonna post this early while I have a window of internet access I can count on.

It ain't pretty, but it's decent enough as a rough outline from which I can push to build a scene with a little more forward motion in it.  Next draft -

Another Sarah - Auggie scene (I am once again heavily indebted to Eli Effinger-Weintraub's Very Rough Guide to Neo-Paganisms.  Thanks, Eli!)

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                          AUGGIE
Tell me about your holidays.

                          SARAH
There are eight.  A lot of people call it The Wheel of the Year.  It's all keyed off of the solstices and equinoxes, the lengthening and shortening of the days and nights.

                          AUGGIE
The light and dark, the warm and cold.

                          SARAH
I like to start with All Hallows, or Samhain*, partly because it falls around Halloween for everybody else.  It's the midpoint between the Autumnal Equinox and the Winter Solstice.  It's the New Year for us.  A time of new beginnings, as well as a celebration of the dead.  The veil between our world and the world of the dead is very thin at this time.

*(pronounced SOW-en)

                          AUGGIE
Then you get to the Winter Solstice.

                          SARAH
Yule.  The longest night of the year and the shortest day.

                          AUGGIE
Quiet time.

                          SARAH
Sometimes I stay up all night, communing with the dark and celebrating the return of the light at sunrise, the lengthening of the days going forward.

                          AUGGIE
Then halfway between the Winter Solstice and the Vernal Equinox -

                          SARAH
Is Candlemas, or Imbolc, or Brigid.

                          AUGGIE
Like the name?

                          SARAH
Yes, a Celtic goddess of beekeeping and artisans.  The lengthening of the days starts to be more obvious.  More new beginnings and initiations.  Farm animals tend to be pregnant or giving birth.  Time to break out the cheese and honey.

                          AUGGIE
And art.

                          SARAH
And art.

                          AUGGIE
Then the Vernal Equinox.

                          SARAH
Ostara - perfect balance between light and darkness with daylight on the rise.  A pause just before spring is truly sprung and all living things go a little crazy.

                          AUGGIE
Then midway between Vernal Equinox and Summer Solstice -

                          SARAH
May Day, or Beltane - focused heavily on the fertility of the sexual union of the Goddess and God.

                          AUGGIE
Oh really?

                          SARAH
Yes, really.  Though fertility can be intellectual and emotional as well as seuxal.

                          AUGGIE
Creativity.

                          SARAH
A lot of crossover between you and me, yes.  Also, it's International Workers Day, so activism.

                          AUGGIE
The rights of workers and all people to have a decent way of life.  On to the Summer Solstice -

                          SARAH
Midsummer, the longest day of the year, and the shortest night.

                          AUGGIE
So you can party all night and still not overdo it.

                          SARAH
One last chance to harness the full power of the sun before the days start getting shorter again.

                          AUGGIE
Halfway between Summer Solstice and Autumnal Equinox -

                          SARAH
First Harvest, or Lammas, or Lughnassah* - celebration of the first harvest, generally grains.  Another time for everyone to gather -

* (pronounced LOO-na-SAH)

                          AUGGIE
- since everyone would normally congregate at harvest time anyway.

                          SARAH
Exactly.  This is more of a bread holiday.  I know bread is considered the enemy of physical fitness and the waist line these days.

                          AUGGIE
It is a special occasion.  For you, I shall eat bread.

                          SARAH
Why thank you, sir.

                          AUGGIE
Autumnal Equinox?

                          SARAH
Mabon - perfect balance again between daylight and nighttime, this time with darkness on the rise.  A pause to gather your resources before things die or go into hibernation during the dark months.

                          AUGGIE
And then we're back around to All Hallows and the Halloween/New Year.



(to be continued)

 

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