Carolyn's Legacy

Even when I was a young man, I always wondered what I might be remembered for when I’m gone.  In the five years before I turned fifty, I spent many hours with my creative palette, sharing the ideas and inspirations I’d dreamed up, writing and performing at every opportunity.  Is it possible that one role I took on inspired a youngster to take up acting? I pondered.  Could some set of words I’d written become a mantra for a lost generation?  Could it change a single life?  Could one of my punchlines become a private joke that never gets tired between two people?

Ultimately, of course, it’s not for me to decide.  It appears that you don’t get to choose your legacy, your legacy chooses you.  Hilariously, I’m recognized four times more often for playing Mark Twain on a web series called Soggy Jim than I am for playing Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman.  The play that has paid the most bills for me, Night of the Livid Dad, was written when I was nineteen.  It was about being a husband and father, two things I had not done at that point in my life.  So much for “Write what you know.”

I had a chance to see a person’s legacy reveal itself this past week when my mother had a stroke.  It was, thankfully, a mild one (an easy thing to say when it wasn’t me with difficulty walking and a crushing headache).  When she had stabilized and was ready to share with the world her excellent prognosis, I dictated a statement and took it home to place on social media.

I should explain at this point that my mother’s life was not always an easy one.  A third child, adored by her father and resented by her mother, she could rarely do anything to please the one who had given birth to her, as a youngster or as an adult.  Discouraged from reaching for the stars, browbeaten for having dreams, she coped, doing what she could to become her own person and still seeking the approval of one who was so stingy with it.  I won’t go into my late grandmother’s psychiatric problems…all of her life, she attempted to make every story center around her and today I will deny her that victory.

Mom had to fly by the seat of her pants, trying to be a wife and a mother when she’d been given a piss-poor example of same.  Giving birth to two sons, she had to learn, being the only woman in the house, how to be one of the boys.  To this day, she can still feign interest in wrestling, boxing and baseball when she would rather be watching a Fred Astaire musical.

She told my brother and me we could do anything we put our mind to.  While that wasn’t exactly true, it didn’t stop us from trying.  She was always there to cheer us on, exalting in our triumphs occasionally and certain that the fates would be different if we tried again at something we had failed.  When we were grown, we left the nest without backward glances, eager to try our new wings, positive that we would always have a place to land if the weather turned nasty.

If you’re as lucky as I am, there are those people you’ve known since high school (or before) that you check in with on occasion.  Social media has become a place where I see the disappearing hairlines and just-appearing grandchildren of people I’ve known for over thirty years.  Most all of them have been to the house I grew up in, many finding a safe haven from the chaos in their own adolescent homes.  Mom didn’t approve of many of the activities we were up to and was hardly shy about expressing it.  She also knew that we were better off in her basement, under her watchful eye, than out on the street.  She seemed to know when to pat us on the head or kick us in the ass and seemed to be aware of which ones needed it the most.

When I shared the news of my mother’s stroke, comments poured in, some from people I hadn’t heard from in years.  One guy, who rarely used the ‘L’ word with his first wife (and only occasionally afforded it to the Green Bay Packers) wrote, “I love that woman.”  When I looked at the posts and allowed my mind to go back to the old, smoke-filled basement, I saw it.  Carolyn’s legacy.

There were people who found the courage to walk away from abusive relationships.  A few that decided that they didn’t have to be wired on drugs to be funny.  There were those that decided to speak their mind, although it was going to make people angry.  Some applied themselves to school because of her counsel, while others decided they loved themselves, even though they were heavier than society thought they should be.  At least one decided to find their satisfaction in the Bible instead of the bottle.

And so, we see a life’s work unfold before us, a grain of sand at a time instead of a shovelful of dirt all at once.  It’s possible my legacy is sharing this story with you.  Perhaps yours, Dear Reader, is in sharing your story as well.  She didn’t set out to change the world, but she changed lives.  One heart at a time, she’s made the world a better place.  I aspire to her greatness.

In Memory of Dirty John

There are always a lot of water main breaks this time of year.  Seeing the men working in holes dug in the road always makes me think of my old boss, Dirty John.

When I was in college, I worked full-time for the university’s physical plant as a “student plumber.”  For the princely sum of $3.75 an hour, I, and my co-worker Abdul, sometimes found ourselves up to our knees in the frigid, muddy water, digging around the burst pipes so the union plumbers could be called in to complete the job.  Dirty John was making good wages of course, but he was right there with us, cursing the cold, working as hard as we did.  He was about fifteen years older than I was and had a bad back.  He never complained.

Most days, we were finished with work early, free to play euchre while we fielded emergency calls from the school buildings and family housing units.  We laughed a lot, playing as hard as we worked, occasionally cashing in all the abandoned soda bottles to pay for for a feast from Domino’s Pizza.  Sometimes, I think it was the best part of the years I spent in college.  I was nineteen, being treated like a man because I could be counted on to work like one.

Abdul was in a frat, which we visited occasionally, on the clock and off.  One night we attended a bachelor party for Abdul’s brother, an evening I can’t forget no matter how hard I try.  When the beer ran out before the entertainment had arrived, our spirits were kept high by passing around fifths of liquor, of various types, taking a pull from the bottle and passing it on to the next guy.  I won’t discuss the strippers…and you can’t make me…but the last thing I remember that night was losing my lunch while leaning over the porch railing.  Dirty John whispered into my ear between heaves, “Don’t puke on my bike, Sport.”  He meant it.  As I was not beaten to a bloody pulp, I can only assume that I missed his Harley with my bazooka barfs.

That is one story that we all shared.  But we shared a lot of stories from our own lives, trusting each other with information no one else knew.  To my knowledge, no one ever betrayed a confidence.  I intend to betray Dirty John’s today.

With no children of his own, Dirty John was fatherly, in his way, towards his young charges.  He didn’t give advice or hugs.  He didn’t loan us money when we’d blown all of ours on a girl we’d met in a bar the night before.  He was just there, a constant presence, someone who knew me well enough to walk up beside me when something went wrong and say, “You fucked up, Sport.”  It wasn’t a condemnation.  It was a question, as in, “What are you going to do about it?” 

One thing he didn’t like was being called “Crazy John”.  It would be imperceptible to most, but to those of us that spent a lot of time with him, we saw the pain in his eyes when he heard the words.  He would blink and recover, responding with a smile, “That’s right, and I got papers to prove it.”  And he did.  He showed them to me.

John had served in Vietnam.  He once told me, “Those were the greatest two years of my life, because I got paid to shoot people.”  He described some of the horrors he had seen, adding, “I had pictures, but the doctors took ‘em away from me.”  He was just another West Virginia boy who chose picking up a rifle over picking up a coal shovel.  I don’t know which would have been better for him.

There were times when the stories where so sensational that you had to doubt their veracity.  And then there were other times, like the day Abdul committed a minor infraction in a card game, when John whipped out his buck knife and slashed him across the hand, cutting him nearly to the bone along the lifeline, where the thumb met the palm.  It took twelve stitches to close the wound.  If Abdul had said a word, John would have been fired the next day, but it didn’t happen.  John’s contrition was immediate, though the damage had been done.

Abdul graduated not long after the incident and I flunked out a short time later.  After leaving school, I never saw John again.  It was shocking to hear, a mere seven years later, that John had died of a heart attack at the age of forty-two.  I’d never made the fifteen-mile trip to visit him and recall the times we’d spent in a hole dug in the road, the water pouring into the rubber boots that were supposed to insulate us.  I was told, second-hand, that he had found love with a second wife and had two daughters that he doted on.  I hope that is true, and that the years that followed our brief association were blissful.

I tell you all of that to tell you this…there is an election coming up in a few days.  There are a lot of candidates telling you to “Support the Troops” that don’t support them with their votes in Congress.  We have to remember that these soldiers, men and women, have put their lives on the line and have scars we can’t see even after their physical wounds have healed.

Dirty John, wherever you are, I’m sorry I told some of your secrets.  Just know I did it with the best of intentions.  I miss you, for the man that you were.  I love you, for the man you wanted to be.  May every returning soldier receive the care to which he or she is entitled.

We, as a country, may be stuck in a muddy hole right now.  But we can still climb out.

"It's Only Community Theatre, But..."

I’m a professional writer.  In addition to this blog, I’ve written for newspapers, radio and the stage with varying amounts of success.  I aspire to being a novelist, a challenge that has me “on perk” from the moment I get up some days.  It’s a passionate pursuit.

Less well known about me is my time as a performer on stage, a vocation I once looked at in a much different way.  I was fortunate to participate in a very well written piece this past weekend and was flattered by the praise that was offered, sometimes by complete strangers.  “You should be a professional actor,” some said, compliments I sincerely appreciated.  I responded with thank-yous, but a more appropriate answer would have been “Thanks, but no thanks.”

There was a time many years ago when I wanted to make my living as an actor, but the person I was then, before I acquired this thin, unruly head of white hair (that made me a “Q-Tip”) was a different man.  Young Marc Holland was not an ideal cast-mate, sometimes incapable or unwilling to take instruction.  Headstrong and cocksure, I must have had some talent or I wouldn’t have worked at all. 

Awarded at times with scholarships and trophies, I took them almost as my birthright.  I returned the favors I had been given with quarrelsome behavior in rehearsals and unswerving opinions about how the show, and more specifically my performance, should be presented.  It is a generous assessment to say I had a lot to learn about life and about acting, if only I had shut up for a goddamned moment and listened.

You see, I had friends and acquaintances that were out there working professionally and making their own way in show business.  I never doubted that I was as good, if not better, than those courageous individuals.  I wondered why it wasn’t happening for me, and when that wonder turned to spite, I spared no one around me from my disappointment and, for those lucky few actors that were making it, my scorn. 

Part of it was my youth, of course, still believing the platitude that if you want something bad enough and are willing to work for it, it’s yours.  But as I have said before, when you turn thirty, you ought to know better.  Yet some of us are slow learners.  I burned for the recognition I felt I deserved and took it personally when others didn’t share my world view.

After I had married and had children, I kept my hand in the acting stream by taking part in what was then the vogue, dinner theatre murder mysteries.  From there, I co-wrote, produced and directed short radio dramas that failed to produce waves anywhere but in the air.  Feeling stifled, angry and somewhat humiliated, one night I unloaded on my wife, Miss Kitty, about the perceived slights I had suffered during a particular day.  She nodded at the appropriate points and waited until I had finished to ask me the salient question.

“Okay.  Now can I tell you the results of my cancer screening?”  I don’t know what the great actor’s face looked like at that moment.  I wasn’t a good enough actor to mask that I was horrified, truly horrified, at what I, in my self-importance, had forgotten. Fortunately, the test results were negative.  If she had had cancer, I doubt I would be telling you this tale right now.  In my shame, I probably would have taken this story to my grave.

I knew at that moment some thing had to change immediately, and that thing was me.  I had to stop being that guy that feels the need to fill up every silence with the sound of his own voice, or half-listens to someone else’s story, all the while searching his memory for one to top it.  I was also aware that if I ever went back to the theatre, it would have to be a different experience.

I did go back, and it was different.  As my children became teenagers and barely had time to look up from their homework when I came home, my wife and I decided that it was time for me to go back on stage and see if I still loved it, as well as if I still “had it”.  I have auditioned for one show a year since I turned forty-five and have been fortunate to get a part in each of those shows, even getting a couple of lead roles.

Let me make one digression in this story: I have always hated it when I hear someone (usually an actor inviting a friend to a local show) say, “It’s only community theatre, but…” If you have never been to an amateur theatre production in your community, you should go.  Some of your neighbors are fine actors.  They almost always offer a very good evening’s entertainment at a fair price.  The commitment of an amateur actor is the same as that of a professional, in fact, it is probably greater.  Most toil for eight hours at a day job before gobbling a quick dinner and then spend three hours in the evening working at a rehearsal and/or a performance.  Make no mistake, acting is work.

The older, wiser Marc Holland listened to his director and did as he was told, knowing that their vision of the production as a whole was the most important view.  I learned that there is always time to give a word of encouragement to a cast member that is tackling a demanding part, or to throw your arm around someone who had a tough night.  Even the auditions were different.  Where once I had approached a cold reading (a couple of pages of dialogue you’ve never seen before) as something that would confer upon me a sense of my self-worth, I now felt like a kid in a playroom filled with shiny, new toys.

The weekend just past was a challenging one for myself and Miss Kitty.  I had an Opening Night on Thursday with performances on the two subsequent evenings.  On Friday afternoon, my daughter graduated from college.  Saturday night, my son attended his senior prom.  Come Sunday, my wife and I were both exhausted.  We spent the Sabbath in each other’s arms, kissing and watching movies, talking about the drama, both real and imagined, we had experienced over the preceding three days.  I shared with her a story about my Friday performance, a story I feel certain I will tell many more times.

In a production filled with talented writers and actors, I played a man haunted by the kidnapping of a child, trying to come to grips with what he feels he failed to do to prevent the disappearance.  We were performing in a small theatre just miles from my house, with the crowd so close you could look into each audience member’s face if you wanted to, and I wanted to.

Two-thirds of the way through my monologue, my eyes came to rest on a young man sitting at stage right, a twenty-something with a thin beard.  His return gaze registered something just shy of fear.  I spoke directly to him as I delivered an impassioned rationalization, saying, “I just didn’t make the connection at the time.  I just didn’t connect the dots.  Well…I mean…why would I?”  His eyes narrowed and he nodded at me, as if to say, Yeah, I feel ya, brother.

I had made a connection with another human being, a total stranger.  Hopefully, I also gave him a theatre memory he wouldn’t soon forget.  I, along with tens of thousands of other Americans, am a community theatre actor.

That’s what we do.

Small Intimacies

My wife and I have kicked around the idea of writing a book about relationships for a long time.  It’s not that we’ve run out of other things to write about, God knows, but as many things as we are passionate about, our marriage is number one.  If our relationship is in good shape, there’s an excellent chance that the rest of our lives are running in greased grooves, too.

“Small Intimacies” would be the title of the anticipated volume.  Going on twenty-three years together, we learned that a successful life partnership depended less on the grand gestures (the trips, the jewelry on major birthdays or anniversaries, the lovemaking marathons) than on the day-to-day small intimacies. 

The list of those intimacies will not excite anyone who is thinking about tying the knot.  For Miss Kitty and I, they include such mundane tasks as her carrying the laundry down the stairs because of my battered knees.  When she comes back up to the ground floor, I have probably prepared her sack lunch for work the next day.  She handles the mechanics and negotiates price for car repairs while I do the grocery shopping. 

I could go on endlessly about the things we do for each other, but then we wouldn’t have anything to write in the damn book.  This is also one of those rare instances where I am not the focus of the story.  Revel in it, it can’t last long.

Recently, I had a chance to talk to a couple of friends of mine, let’s call them Bob and Mary.  I don’t call them by these names because they would like to remain anonymous.  I call them that because their names are Bob and Mary.

They volunteer at the library that pays my salary. Bob had endured a stroke during a week when I was on vacation and it was another couple of weeks before I saw them again.  My concern about their well-being mounted with each day that passed, with the rumor mill curiously idle.  When they reappeared, I couldn’t wait to hear about a path that led from the precipice of death back to their altruistic duties.

Bob was just a tad shaky, but unquestionably himself, eager to give an account of his medical adventure.  Most of the facts he shared with me are none of your business, and frankly, weren’t any of mine, either.  What I will share was that he was minutes from a deep-brain bleed and the loss of an intellect that ranges from the sublime to the ridiculous, an intelligence that could offer, at any time, a profound statement or a chucklehead anecdote.

What made the situation even more poignant was knowing that Mary had just come through a battle with cancer, including chemotherapy. I’d watched Bob keep a very close eye on Mary when she came back to the library, no doubt worrying that she was tiring, or not feeling well, or both.  As Bob showed me the livid scar on his scalp, from the operation that had saved his life, I could see Mary watching him the same way.

They are both fascinating conversationalists, easy to know and even easier to talk to.  For a few minutes, I had the chance to hear Bob tell me not only how close he had come to departing the mortal coil, but also how hearing those things from his doctors hadn’t scared him nearly as bad as waking up after surgery to see that his sons had traveled thousands of miles to sit in his hospital room and watch him sleep.  “Then I knew it was serious,” Bob recalled.  He occasionally got the details wrong, and he would look to Mary for clarification, which she happily gave.  “Mary and I talked about this a couple of days ago,” he said.  “In the space of one year, we both shaved the other’s head.”

I fought a lump in my throat as he continued.  “They don’t mention this in the wedding vows, you know?  Love, honor, cherish, shave each other’s heads…”  He looked at Mary and the two shared a smile that only comes from a lifetime partnership and a love that has only grown through the decades, years that follow the days of youthful exuberance and thick, unruly hair.

I went back to my office as soon as I could exit the conversation, afraid that the tears in my eyes would be read as pity, because it most assuredly was not.  Oncology is a wonder of science and neurosurgery makes strides everyday, but they haven’t created a treatment yet that is as powerful as the love between two people.

Love, honor, cherish, shave each other’s heads…maybe the small intimacies aren’t so small after all.