I am 5 years old and sitting in a sandbox. My brothers are playing on the tiny swing set in our backyard while my dog Muffin runs around freaking out all the squirrels. I'm building a sandcastle.
Suddenly a voice pipes up in my head. "My job is to play," it says.
I pause.
"My job is to play," I repeat back.
(Side note: I was a weird kid who wasn't at all freaked out by voices.)
I think about my dad in his suit going off to work every day. I think about my mom inside clipping coupons and cooking our dinner, and it occurs to me how lucky I am to be doing the exact thing I'm doing this very moment. Digging in the sand takes on a new urgency. After all, if "my job is to play," I better play like I mean it. I construct my castle in a matter of minutes, and when I join my brothers on the swings, I pump my legs much harder and happier than I did before.
Cut to the present. It's 20-something years later. I'm smiling. I'm in a profession where my job really is to play. There are challenges. Lots of them. But I love them all. I love being cooped up in a tiny booth for three-hour stretches while recording an audiobook. I love curling up with a new play on my lap even when -- and perhaps especially when -- I have no clue how to approach it. But most of all, I love when I look at an actor across from me onstage, and I spot that familiar spark in his eye: His job is to play too.
Here are upcoming projects in which I'll get to play:
"The Cliché Plays" on April 22 at 4:30 p.m. at the Brooklyn Winery. See what happens when six writers and 12 actors resuscitate the most overused sayings of all time by turning them into theater.
"Branched: A Comedy With Consequences" on April 30 at 4 p.m. at the Harold Clurman Theater, Manhattan. My full-length play is being read with a fantastic cast, thanks to the great people at American National Theatre.
"Nectar" on May 8 at 7 p.m. at the Red Room Theater, Manhattan. I am performing in a funny and whimsical play by Katie Baldwin Eng with Direct Arts' "Take Two" series.
