[3] Tournelle du Soleil: Driving to Montréal (Patreon)

[ MAY 14th ]

The occasional deep blue flash of water glitters up on the right hand side of the car as I pass through the valley that Kingston, Ontario sits in. I’m halfway to Montréal and I want a second cup of weak Tim Horton’s coffee. I replay the voice notes I received from the director at Cirque through the car’s speaker system:

APRIL 25th [voice note]: So it sounds like the 15th is the week that it’ll be ready. I’m still hoping, like I mentioned before, that we give you the first two days to work on your own. Time to explore it, just listen to the music, see what feels good, see what works. And then we would have three days to work together, and to just explore how you want. That sounds like it’s going to be the simplest solution, in terms of logistics, and then we ship it down to New York. So – yeah. It sounds like just the five days if you’re still free that whole week of the 15th, those days are open for you. And then we’ll have the three days before the show, in New York. So – yup. I know that’s not a lot of time, but I’m sure it’s going to be fine. We’re going to be able to make something beautiful. And I talked to Tyler, the fabricator, a bit more about the logistics of bringing in fog to the tower – so they’re working on that, and it’ll be all set. The 15th isn’t that far away so – yes, should be a fun week in Montreal, thanks for your flexibility and positive attitude, and I’ll see you then.

Five days.

I'd been hoping for two weeks.

Alas.

My eyes scan the huge green roadside signs, looking for the next rest stop. I run my plan for tomorrow through my mind:

Wake up at 7:30am. Get back in this car. Inch through morning rush-hour traffic from Verdun up to the Cirque du Soleil HQ. And … go inside and start my first contract with Cirque du Soleil.

I gulp at my own knee jerk internal-monologue phrasing.

First? sneers the Cynic. Bit presumptuous, isn't it?

Automatically the thought-audit begins.

Overconfidence. Hubris. Arrogance!  the Cynic continues.

Wait – do I actually believe that?

I don’t know, says the Pragmatist.

The Idealist chimes in: Confidence is good. Fake it ‘til you make it, baby!

Pragmatist: Just not too much, though.

Because what if you SUCK?  says the Cynic.

Do you think you suck though? asks the Pragmatist.

Compared to what? asks the Idealist.

Okay forget it.

Cynic: Look, it’ll be embarrassing if you think too much of yourself, right?

Right.

So ... find just … the right … magical amount … of easygoing, humble, accurate, but not-too-thought-out …. confidence?  tries the Idealist.

I physically give my head a tiny shake. My shoulder scrunch up to my ears and I grip the steering wheel firmly enough that the leather gives a small squeak of complaint.  The thoughts quiet down.

I crack the windows. There’s a sour note of self-inflicted confusion left over in my mind that I want to drown out. The white noise roar of the rushing air rolls over me and takes up some of the space in my brain that the thoughts are trying to crowd back in on. 

Deep breath in. 

Deep breath out.

Relax.

I try to release the death-grip I've taken on the steering wheel. Roll my shoulder blades back down my ribcage. Soften the way I start to clamp my arms to my sides.

What are you doing tomorrow. Go back to that. 

I’ll step into the new tower for the first time tomorrow afternoon.

Four hours in it tomorrow.

Three hours in it Tuesday.

Six hours in it with the director on Wednesday, morning and afternoon combined.

Three hours in it with the director on Thursday.

And two-and-a-half hours in it with the director on Friday.

Then they’ll pack it up and ship it off to NYC. I’ll pack myself up and ship myself back to Toronto.

I'll craft a blanket-fort of mats in the rough dimensions of the tower back at the Toronto studio and run the act choreography we create at Cirque HQ inside of it. Makeshift practice conditions until I fly out. Then it'll be NYC on May 28th to begin on-location rehearsals.

Makeup tests, makeup practice, intake processes, physio evaluations, and many, many costume fittings would be fit in between all the creation and rehearsal.

AH! Finally – I spot the ON Route rest stop and hit my right signal to ease off the highway. A welcome distraction. 

I pull up through the drive-through, dissociating pleasantly until the tinned voice of the worker comes through the metal stand next to my window and makes me jump a little.

"Small coffee, one cream please," I say.

"That'll be all?"

"Yes please."

"Drive on through."

I get another couple minutes of pleasant nothingness until the glass window slides open, a hand offers me my coffee and I place some coins in it in exchange. The hand recedes. The window slides shut. I pull away slowly. 

The cardboard cup is reassuringly hot against the palm of my hand. I crack the small white tab on the lid and the aroma fills the car. I take a sip, breathing softly through my nose and slurping at the cup in case it's hot enough to scald my tongue. A cup of weak, shitty, perfect Tim Hortons' coffee. Ahhh.

Restored, I pull back out onto the highway. It's not long before a new yipping pack of fears and doubts catches up to me, chasing me down the highway from Toronto Montreal. I can't even tell which voice is which, now. It's just a chorus of discontents, banging around the inside of my skull.

It doesn't matter if they say that it's fine, they’re still going to be disappointed you’re not more flexible.

What if the dimensions of this new apparatus don’t work for your current mobility because it’s a rigid material instead of a stretchy one? 

You’re going to do this job and they’re going to be so underwhelmed that you’ll never get called back to work for them again. 

You’re going to be one-and-done. 

Under other circumstances, maybe I would have had time to hash it out with friendly ears; let a flow of words carry the anxieties and doubts out of my mind and across my tongue out into the open air where that spring sunshine could have burned it all off in the bright light of day. But that’s not what’s happened, and I’m left trying to reassure myself – something I’m not the best at. 

What I’m left with is the sterile, cool rationale of:

Okay, so what, then? What's the worst-case scenario. Play it out.

If you fuck up and they don’t hire you again – well, then you don’t work for Cirque du Soleil again. You go off and do something else. You go off and make more of your own work. You go off and do the things you’d be doing otherwise anyways.

Because you sure as hell didn’t have ‘Work for Cirque du Soleil’ on your 2023 Bingo card to begin with. Or ever, really.

I try to tap into whatever shredded scraps of sport-psychology know-how are left in my brain from my Muay Thai career a decade ago.

You are what you think.

Find the right words.

Keep them to yourself.

Build your confidence.

No one else needs to know what you’re telling yourself in order to make the most of this experience, in order to get the best performance out of yourself.

It’s your job to do it.

My breathing settles a little. My shoulders drop. I fix my gaze as far down the highway as I can send it. I find other reflections, less melodramatic and less emotionally-loaded, waiting in the wings.

 'Why doesn’t it feel better?';  'I thought these moments would feel bigger when they arrived'; 'Why do I always feel like I'm just surviving these opportunities instead of enjoying them.'  

But they'll have to wait for later in the week, or the week after, or perhaps even the week after that. Because tomorrow, I’m going to wake up bright and early tomorrow in my little Verdun sublet. I’m going to wash my face. Brush my teeth. Get in the car and drive up there nice and early so I can sit in the car and focus on the day for a second. And then I’m going to go in that building and get my Cirque du Soleil badge with my name and photo on it and do my fucking best.

That's all there is to do.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Stay tuned for your next instalment of Tournelle du Soleil.  It'll be landing in your inboxes tomorrow at 7am EST / 1pm CEST. Until then, stay strange and wonderful – XO, ess