I wonder as I sit comfortably in my safest place on earth: Have I perhaps made myself a little TOO safe?
Editor's Note: Joey Parsons is co-host of the thebigda Podcast, where she and Dan Abbate explore authenticity, creativity, personal growth, and the often messy journey of becoming who we're meant to be.
Coming Back to the House I Love
I’m sitting on the front porch of the family home in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
I come twice a year for a few weeks, once in the summer and again around Christmastime to visit my godmother in the home I love so much.
My grandparents bought this house for $12,000 in 1952. It’s where my mother and her four siblings grew up. My godmother nursed both of my grandparents through the ends of their lives here. And, since my mother died eight years ago, it’s where I stay when I come to visit.
It’s filled with knickknacks and keepsakes and nostalgia galore. Olde tyme lamps bought with coupons from Montgomery Ward. The Last Supper hangs sentinel over the kitchen table. I was never allowed in the separate dining room as a child. Or the living room. My rambunctious family had been well trained: too many breakables in those rooms. Just march straight through to the den, all wood paneled and carpet soft, where we could scrap to our hearts’ content. To this day, as a grown-ass adult, I feel a little funny lounging in the living room, filled with delicate filigree things and lacy curtains filtering floods of sunlight — though it is now the room where I cozy up, draped in crocheted afghans, and wind away afternoons reading library books as the sunlight dies out.
Here it smells of comfort food, fried and spicy. Clean laundry. In the summer, songbirds wake me at 5 a.m. In the winter, it’s the crows.
During monsoon season, it rains hard, leaving the world clean and fresh and brimming with possibility. In the winter, snow blankets the streets in a bright, clear quiet. I stare out the window, and feel there’s nowhere more perfect.
When I dream of my childhood, I dream of this house.
I pine for these trips. Today is my last day here.
The Anxiety Dreams That Never Change
For the last five mornings, my godmother has asked me how I slept, and I’m chagrined to report I’ve slept poorly each night. This is not new.
You can set your watch to my anxiety dreams bubbling up anytime I travel. I’m missing connections and carrying tons of baggage. I’ve forgotten where I live, I can never get the internet to work, and I’m always running late. Last night, I accidentally stole Lisa Kudrow’s phone from an airport lounge, and later, police pulled over the shuttle bus I was on to retrieve it and possibly arrest me.
Is My Comfort Zone Becoming My Cage?
I’m almost 52, and still scared. What am I returning to?
Kelly sends me a photo every day from a book of inspirational quotes, and coincidentally enough, today’s was about comfort zones. “Do not allow your comfort zone to become your cage.” Oof. I wonder as I sit comfortably in my safest place on earth: Have I perhaps made myself a little TOO safe?
My last Off-Broadway show closed a year and a half ago. Back in New York City, I’ll wake in the morning and journal. If it’s not too hot, I’ll do a spot of yoga. I’ll eat around noon. Maybe meet a friend for coffee, or help a colleague with a self-tape. Calls to dispute insurance charges, or track a package. I’ll try to write, but Instagram or MeowDoku may time suck. The latest memoir on tape while I put together some dinner. God willing, some audition prep. Read. Netflix. The usual crusade for sleep.
Nothing in Particular Is Happening (And That's the Problem)
Nothing in particular is happening. But also… NOTHING IN PARTICULAR IS HAPPENING.
A few nights ago I sat on this porch, admiring the zillions of hummingbirds crowding several feeders I hung when I first arrived. It’s a simple, few weeks-out-of-the-year joy I savor. My mind meandered back to college at UNM.
I costumed all my classroom scene work with finds from ThriftTown. I based characters on exotic animals I observed at the zoo. I developed an entire one-woman show after taking a class in performance art. My senior year one-act was probably some of the best work I’ve ever done.
The Class I've Always Avoided
The one class I actively avoided was improv.
I flipped open my laptop. Something told me to revisit the website for The Magnet — the improv school our guest Jonathan Pitts recommended to me a while back. I peeked through fingers caged over my eyes as if watching a slasher film.
Improvisation terrifies me more than just about anything else.
More than heights. More than quicksand. (Why did that seem like it was going to be a bigger adult problem when I was eight years old? Thanks, Gilligan’s Island.)
But I’m besotted by improvisers. The coolest kids in school formed a troupe, and I perched on the very edge of my seat for every single black box performance, aching to join, but too petrified to ask.
I once watched the famous TJ & Dave create an entire marching band, teeming with backstories and conflicts — all performed by only two extraordinarily talented men.
In the early 2000s, I played a famous “airy spirit” in a beloved upstate Shakespeare festival. I was tasked with performing the entire show with my arms corseted to my sides. What in the orthopedic nightmare was this torture? How could I be asked to be in constant movement when costume constricted me so terribly? I persevered, and discovered ways my body moved I’d not known before. I felt like I could fly.
Am I Brave Enough to Bomb?
Where are my parameters now?
This fall, do I take my first improv class? I’m brave, but am I THAT brave? Do I have the courage to jump into a basic level class with a bunch of young, exhausting hopefuls? Am I too grumpy for this now? Or… am I just scared? Am I brave enough to bomb?
What if there’s no net?
What if I took the leap, anyway…?
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At Clotine, we're fascinated by people who choose authenticity over approval, curiosity over convention, and growth over comfort.
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