Snipping Off the Loose Ends, Continued (Patreon)

I never thought about trying to return to the Cirque de Demain. 

In the community mythologies built up around this prestigious festival, it was always positioned as something one did once, and then after that your career was gloriously launched and you never looked back.

And – I mean – there was a launch, with Troy, after we performed our duo act there: the year of 2019 was one of nearly constant travel and nonstop performance (and nonstop stress). 

But it's quiet now – like it is for a lot of circus artists still, admittedly – and Troy is off in film-land being a creature-feature-movie-monster-mega-star. 

The momentum is gone, and the act that was being carried by that momentum is gone, too. No one can do what Troy did. And – if I'm being honest – it would take a LOT for me to willingly enter a duo dynamic again. Too many variables ride on the wants and needs of another person. Heartbreak is imminent in duos (artistically, as it happened in our case; romantically, in the case of practically every hand-to-hand duo that has ever seemed to exist. I don't make the rules),

(********Oh, and – for my newer patrons, or for my patrons here that are not in the circus world – to just casually say, "Hm, maybe I'll go back to Cirque de Demain" is sort of like saying "Hmm, maybe I'll go back to the Olympics." Mild hyperbole? Perhaps, yes. But ... only mild.********)

I didn’t know that the Festival allows artists to take part a second time, as long as they perform in another discipline. I hopped onto the Festival website, clicking through to the Applications page.

 It still seems like there’s some grey area (or translation errors) in the matter:

While the website says “Artists who have already taken part in the Festival may apply for a second time, provided that they perform in another discipline”, Jean-Pierre had written to me, “it will be better with another discipline than the one you performed the first one” [my emphasis].

It will be better if ...

* * * * * 

The want of it tugged at me.

I knew that it was my ego searching for a back-up to what felt like the reality of Zurich slowly slipping away, but it was hard to resist. 

And so, dear patrons, I’d be lying to you if I didn’t seriously consider it for the briefest of moments before mentally slapping myself upside the head and reminding myself to not engage with impossible ideas: 

You just finished doing that, I chastised myself. Look how that’s going for you, now. 

Finally, I shook my head:

There is absolutely zero chance, no freaking way, that that could work, I reminded myself. 

I needed higher level technique, more consistent time in the air and on an apparatus, time to develop and research and explore and adapt. No, the best I might be able to do would be to apply for some funding to try to expand the work in that direction over the next year; the least I could do would be to take a year or two on my own and struggle towards something that I thought might stand a chance in the application pool for the Festival.  

No, Ess, I told myself again.

And then, still trying to run from the wall of feelings I didn't want to feel about this project, I turned my attention back towards who I could harass next.

I wasn't ready to give up. I had to keep asking.

Who can I write to next ...  

* * * * * [ to be continued ]