I made it.  I’m still alive. I honestly don’t know how I arrived here, besides the logical retracing of my steps, but how I didn’t kill myself or a house pet along the way, drink too much & fall, get someone pregnant, contract a fatal STD, loose all my money, all my respect, and all my friends and family I do not know, but I am grateful to be here and to be alive.  The kind of grateful that can’t be explained in a simple way, and might not translate to those untouched by addiction.  Relief. An arrival at empathy. Fear of loss. Acceptance. Remorse, Guilt, Sadness, Anger, Passion, Love, and Joy.  It overtakes me and I am grateful.

The biggest mystery to me is how I didn’t loose my wife along the way, and although I have a mind & belly full of the painful knowledge that she has lost parts of herself because of me, because of my choices & how they effected her, I am grateful she is still here, lying next to me, learning to trust me again, and caring for me when I need it, partnering with me in our future, and allowing me to care for her. I am painfully sad because in that future she will never be the same, but not for some concept of how people change over time, rather it is more of a price she has paid for the truth, mine, ours, and it is a truth she can choose freely now. She is no longer a victim from this point on, however victimized she was by me.

However, we do have a future now, one I can see beginning to take shape as my eyes focus on reality after my long sleep, and the adjustment to the new light, the look of the real world verses the dream scape I was shut in, begins to allow for new awareness & insight.  I still don’t trust myself fully, and I am still so afraid & anxious.  When people ask the question “how did I cope?”, perhaps in reference to a tough spot in their lives, I imagine they are in denial, they’ve blocked that mechanism from their memories.  I know full well how I coped, if I try, if I want to torture myself, I can close my eyes and see every method of how I coped with life, with fear, anxiety, with what I was dealt, and it wasn’t healthy or acceptable, but it kept me alive, from killing myself and turning myself to complete stone. I did abuse myself, those around me, and my wife, but I am feeling my guilt, my shame, and this transforming pain.

I once thought that guilt, shame, and my remorse should be as painful as the hurt I inflicted on others with my behavior & choices.  If there is a God, then I believe this to be true. I believe this pain is a gift I receive when I find true remorse and I can learn exactly what I’ve done, what my choices have done, and it is a bliss, it is a fire that changes me and reconnects me to humanity, perhaps to the person I hurt, and if I can accept it, receive it, and understand it I can change forever.

I am so thankful I played Tony on this tour.  I did not appreciate it at the time, as I was in a dark place, but I’m thankful I have this video, this memory, and the ability to make it happen again.  My voice is stronger than ever, actually better than this recording, and I am grateful, hopeful, and excited at the prospect of revisiting this role again in the future.  I guess I’m also grateful that genetics has me looking as young as I do for my age!!! Yeah genes!

Truthfully, I don’t believe I have anything worth sharing that’s inside of me, but my wife would say I never shut up.  I often hide behind a wall of words or make a brilliant and dazzling attempt at distracting from honesty and vulnerability with humor or in my most unfortunate states sex or rage.  Slowly and painfully I am changing the reality I had come to accept by not making a choice at all for the past 38 years.  I know I’ve hurt so many, abused so many friends and partners along the way, as well as myself, by not being present, mindful, and realizing the healthy choices have been there all along.  I am an addict and this is who I am.

Well, today, I am just going to breath, accept, and take action, even move in the tiniest way towards what I feel I want.  I’m still very much moving through a dark and unfamiliar room in this chapter of my life, but I am experiencing my emotions again, after what seems like too long.  Lyrics from songs have meaning again, words in books speak to me, I am finding a healthy intimacy with friends, with like minded strangers in the rooms, and I am hungry for more health, peace, and serenity.  I am no longer someone with two or three lives, compartments that function as well appointed parts, but I am discovering that I can and I am willing to relate to the world from a state of wholeness.  I am excited, scared out of my mind, but it is a sober mind.

One of the most joyful byproducts is that I am singing again, and my voice is painting a map, lighting my path, and it is leading me to one conclusion.  I am not done.  I’m not done singing, and I know I have something inside me worth sharing with the world.  I’m so scared to take Me and this true expression out into that world, because in all my years of performing I don’t think there’s a single instance of my voice conveying Me to an audience or to those casting.  I make myself feel a tremendous amount of fear because of this realization.  Fear of acceptance, rejection, and I am experiencing it all.  My most functional response to this is “fuck yeah”, because it is the human connection I was lacking for so long.  I don’t want to disconnect ever again.  Will I?  I’m sure, as disconnecting or checking out was how I coped for so many years, coping with all my fear and pain, and all the fear and pain I took on because of my lack of boundaries.  Now, with boundaries developing, awareness intact, and options flourishing, I am ready to respond to the world and connect.

My greatest gift today, is today, this 24 hours.  Another gift is my fellowship and what I take away from connecting with others in a healthy and intimate way.  Even as I type “intimate” I still have so much shame and sadness around that word.  I’m grateful that I am changing and finding health in openness and vulnerability.  Mike M. told me about his Transcendental Meditation program and how it is simply expanding his mind, awareness, and opening him up.  I’m excited to find out more, to possibly use techniques like TM, and become aware of my limitless options.  In my addiction I made myself, yes, made myself feel like I was hanging from a branch on the edge of a cliff.  No options, or extremely limited ones.  Hold on or let go and die.  I held onto my ways, and it has destroyed almost everything good that came into my life.  I’m grateful to be aware of my choices, my reality, and that I can see beyond my addiction.  I know I will grow, change, and become more of what I have always longed to be.  It is not easy, I am so afraid, feel so overwhelmed and make myself feel like no single person would want to connect with me because of what I am or what I’ve become.  There’s no explanation, there’s no solid answer to the “why” of my addiction, and I just have to accept that, accept it all, and keep moving, one step at a time, towards a higher plane.  I really want this, I desire this more than anything else, and I want to find a place to inhabit where I can say to the world, “this is who I am.  I’m not perfect.  I am making progress, and I am willing to accept the world on the world’s terms.”

This is a sampling of the view we experienced every day strolling the grounds of the Elbow Beach Resort in Bermuda.  Lisa and I spend 7 days exploring the archipelago and finally taking our honeymoon, which was very sweet indeed.

This is Sophie Blackwell-Boag, our rescued and adopted cat from the streets of Harlem.  She has several idiosyncrasies from spending some of her life on the streets of New York, and I think she slept for a week when we first brought her into our space.  She is not your typical cat, and I’m very thankful she’s being well taken care of by my in-laws near Buffalo, NY

There’s an actual sun setting in 20 minutes, red, plump, beautiful, West Coast Sun, but I’m watching one on TV.  Am I missing something?  Am I not participating in my human experience?  The cinema sun I’m watching was captured less than 10 years ago, in Italy, and is surrounded by a collection of Europe’s most beautiful actors at the time, made more beautiful by the Mediterranean sun.  I’ve seen some of them out of that water, on the streets of NYC, in their homes eating mac & cheese and tofu dogs, and they look like fish out of water, awkward, human, far less pretty, but actually more beautiful, more human, and as the sun sets I realize I’d rather watch the real one.  I’m sad because I missed it, but happy for the realization.

Yesterday, Lisa and I went to Disneyland to have the magic kingdom veil lifted as we had a “backstage tour.”  No, not a tour of one of the many park show theater’s backstage areas, but a true peak at what happens beyond the signs that read “cast members only.”  Now that the aerospace above Disneyland is open, anyone with a cessna can buzz over the park & destroy the illusion, but we were given a guided tour, a peak behind the curtain in a very personal way.  Yes, it’s the place where Goofy gets beheaded, and Buzz Lightyear disassembles.  Somehow, while we gawked and gazed at the guts of the theme park, never once did we see those mysterious acts, however, we did see the costume crew doing wrist rolls, warming up for their day of stitching & sewing, post having a rainbow cone from a specialty food truck.  Still, No 1/2 costume Costume Characters, no one frowning, wiping a brow, or going to the bathroom.  Just happy people, going about their business, enjoying their incentives, health insurance, and the knowledge that the only way they would loose their jobs is if happiness itself were to cease to exist.  When something like that is your product it is kind of amazing, and at 37, I was still very impressed both front and back “stage” at their collective efforts.  We toured the warehouses that store the parade floats, an area where they launch their “pryo” or fireworks from, their rehearsal studios, for what our guide informed us was the largest division of the park (Entertainment), and caught site of a clean and well ordered theme park “closet” storing items from derelict Space Mountain roller coaster wagons, to retired signage for shows & characters long past.  Can you say “sword in the stone?”  My favorite moment was having a monorail pass over top of us while on a open air tram on our way to the Hyperion Theater and a live stage show of Aladdin, where we enjoyed the best seats in the house.

Lisa and I had adulty fun, and truly generated a type of happiness we have not both felt in a while.  Lisa was screaming & dancing all day, inspiring me to laugh, play, cry, and I was not ashamed to hop on her wagon all day long as she soaked up Disney for all that it was worth.

This morning, with coffee in hand, looking cute, but still a little California Screamed-Out, she departed for the Segerstrom Performing Arts Center to teach some of the entertainers from Disney the choreography to Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, which I hope will continue the new and unique relationship, between two divisions of the Godzilla sized monster-mouse that is Disney.  Disney Theatricals, which produces Mary Poppins along with other stage shows globally, and the theme park entertainment division in Burbank, CA.  Two huge division, but with only a small filament of connection at this “teaching” & “sharing” point, where the education of the theme park entertainers and possible future “cast members” joins with the actors in a touring or sit down production near the Parks.  It is a great and unique opportunity for Lisa, and as I shared, we enjoyed the fruits of her labor yesterday before she even stepped into the studio today.

I thanked her and gave a her a big kiss as she departed to “Koh-teach” the class along with another cast member, making sure she knew how much I appreciated the VIP extras and seeing into a unique world that only about 22,000 people see annually as they punch the time clock, and sometimes scan the barcode on their underware (for the entertainers only), on their way to & from work.

This is a moment in my life with Lisa that I will never forget.  Mornings in Venice, at our Novocento boutique hotel.  We were so fortunate to have a week off from my West Side Story tour, and the finances, to explore Venice.  Lisa’s morning well being is linked to caffeine still, but in 2006 she rejoices in her Latte Experience and I was merely an observer.

Kitten therapy for Lisa.  We strolled past a window with kittens in it and to my surprise Lisa didn’t see them first.  More of a surprise was the fact that she missed the sign that said “come in and pet our cats.”  It may be due to the fact that the place/shelter/pet food store was called Dogstar.  Dogstar is a community store that houses animals, rescues animals & puts them up for adoption, and gives a lot back to the area in downtown Portland, OR. dogstardaycare.com

My wife & I enjoyed Multnomah Falls just outside of Portland, OR.  Connecting with nature, hiking in some of the best Oregon has to offer, while running our fingers along the surface of romance and play.  Each day like this that we spend together seems to strengthen our connection, and bring us closer to the healing, but one of my fears, rational or not, is that it separates us from the social world around us as well as Lisa tour family on MP.  First things first maybe?