After the show...

I'm sitting in the dark, typing on my laptop, listening to the clickity clack of the keys being punched up and down. Though the familiar noise fills my ears, there is also a deafening silence. I performed in an improv show tonight with a group of students from American Stage in St. Pete. It was fun, tense, filled with laughs, and.....and over before it began. Its a strange thing getting on stage to make people laugh. If you've never done it before, let me tell you, it is one of the greatest adrenaline rushes of all time. The anticipation before the show is almost unbearable. I tossed and turned for hours last night and all day before the show I was pacing the room. I was stuck somewhere between exhausted and exhilarated  Then the show came. In what seemed like the blink of an eye, it was over. Now, make no mistake, I have no illusions of making it to SNL or becoming the next George Carlin. But I do love to perform. I love to do a good show for people and to hear them laugh. When it works, when the show is hot, there is no feeling on earth that can compare with that feeling. But when the show is over.....its over. And you are left by yourself wanting more when the audience has long since moved on with their lives. I imagine them all sleeping in bed, or watching tv, or doing chores. Thinking their own thoughts and dreaming their own dreams. And here I am, lying in bed, typing in the darkness. With dreams of Chicago and improv greatness. Still wishing I had dropped one more line that would have had them rolling in the aisles. I did not do a great show today. There were no home runs. If it were a baseball game, I would have had two singles, a triple, and one rbi. Not too shabby, but definitely not a home run. Oh well, sleepy time.....