Jennifer Carroll is a 21 year old actor and writer. She first began writing for the Uxbridge Cosmos in 2007 when she had the opportunity to share her experiences as a Canadian ambassador for an international conference for women in Dubai. At the beginning of 2008, she moved to Ireland to pursue a career in theatre and film. Far From Home is her monthly account on living and working in Dublin.
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The truth and learning in things
A lot of people don't believe in regrets. I do. I certainly believe that a person's actions can leave them with a weight on their shoulders that they will never unburden, a reminder that will follow their shadow forever. I believe in consequence. I also believe that regret festers in ignorance. Knowledge is a powerful thing, and learning from an experience, from wherever you are in life, is your greatest armour against regret.
…I sit here with a few words on the page in front of me, and I'm finding it hard to type. I came back to Canada from a tiny little island that housed me, engulfed me, and which I love more than I ever imagined I could. I traveled back with a script in my sights and a company with their eyes locked on the same prize. I came back scared, unsure, excited, trembling, and it was six months I wouldn't trade for anything. Through preproduction, auditions, casting and the tedious tasks in between, The Organic Theatre Collective's first baby started to take form.
Then came the jumping point. You can't make any splash dipping your toes in the pool, so at the very start of March we closed our eyes and grabbed our knees to form a cannon ball.
And it was exhilarating. Those first days in rehearsal, fully immersed with waves splashing around us, I reveled in the sensation of running rehearsals, of arriving to work every morning to create, to learn, to discover more about a story I nurtured for two years. The fire in my gut smoldered with pride over watching my actors, my director and my crew work tangibly on a project we've held in abstraction for so long. But then it all just started to…unravel. Quickly, nearly before I could notice, small hiccups turned into speed bumps and potholes, and then suddenly… we stopped moving altogether. I don't know how it happened, but four weeks into what was meant to be the greatest adventure of my life, I was holding the remains of a production in my hands, mere shrapnel. I looked down and everything I had left to hold onto was in bits, and it was over. We never made it to stage. We didn't even come close.
I was left in a vacuum in the few days after. My ears rang in the absence of scripted dialogue, my body aching to move to the blocking and choreography. I had nothing but my own image and the reflection of mistakes to stare at, and as I peered at those faults I could see the dangerous crevice I was tipping over: regret.
So I stepped back from the edge and took a breath. And I looked at what there was to learn. It's a nasty thing to stare in the face, your mistakes. They can be ugly, and they don't hide their warts and gashes. You don't have anything to mask the truth, you just have to raise your eyes and stare at it. And if you have the courage to look straight ahead into the eyes of your mistakes, you may find tiny nuggets of knowledge protected behind the warts and gashes. I looked deep and I looked long. And after a few painstaking days examining everything I did wrong, I saw small flecks shining in the depths of my disappointment. So I polished them, I looked harder at them and started to rub away the dirty, grimy film. And they started to sparkle.
I lean on that knowledge as I humbly work my way back from disappointment and heartbreak. And the harder I lean, the further I stand away from regret. I've learned so much in the last few weeks. I know more about the art I want to make, but more importantly the art I don't want to make. I know more about the artists I want to work with and the artist I want to be. But more than anything, I know truly where I belong right now. And it's an ocean away. I miss Ireland, the people, the theatre community. I miss the green and the Guinness. So in an effort to learn from myself, I'm turning my eyes back to Eire, and I'm going home.
As I steer forward, I hope I don't forget about how I got here, the things I did right and the mistakes I made. Because as I learn, I feel myself getting stronger, and my bitter friend, regret, is left standing atop the last hill abandoned and alone. I just don't need its company.
