Thought Residencies

My name is Alan Dilworth, this is thought number four.

This curtain is the curtain that I sit in front of every morning. This morning it struck me how much an object, like this curtain, can sum up part of this experience of staying at home. We are spending so much time confined in our spaces. We are encountering the same objects over and over again. This morning sitting in front of the curtain, I was struck by the curtain's curtainness. It moves in a gentle, lazy way when blown by a breeze, it diffuses and softens sunlight, and the fabric is textured but soft. And for a moment I am completely insignificant to myself. What a relief! Just this curtain. Extraordinary ordinary. And then off I go.

My name is Alan Dilworth, this is thought number three.

This is my daughter two days ago riding one of two bikes that she was regifted. This bike was given to her almost three years ago. It's too small for her, but she is riding it anyways because she is motivated to master this bike thing, and anyways the other bike was not yet in Toronto. This image is her rocking it during homeschool recess. She was buzzing up and down our street wowing me with her new going-downhill-pedal-break-technique. A middle aged man walked by us, smiled, and said. "Riding a bike... it's great... it makes the young feel old and the old feel young." Ten minutes later, a young couple driving by rolled down the window -yelled "Yay!", and applauded her fresh success. Exhilarating. Time to get out my Masi Uno and pump up the tires.

My name is Alan Dilworth, this is thought number two.

I am thinking about the rhythm and experience of change today, about being raw, the knife's edge, glowing coals stepping out from behind what is the known into the... unknown. I am thinking about uncertainty, about texts and words and ideas and experiences that rob one of the ground under one's feet. I am thinking about Erin Shields and Jose Saramago and Edward Bond and Spike Lee. I am thinking about writers and directors and choreographers and actors and designers and artistic directors. I am thinking about art. That's today.

My name is Alan Dilworth, and this is thought number one.

I'm in the process of translating something I created called The Stillness Room to a live digital platform. The Stillness Room is the coming together in a room, most often with a group of theater-makers, to experience silence and stillness but with a simple but clear container. The Stillness Room has been about making time and space, literally and figuratively, through stillness and silence and buildings where people are making theater, with unique challenges, pressures, and rhythms that we might recognize as of the theater. Those rhythms have been disrupted. What is The Stillness Room now? As I wrestle with translation from room to digital room, I am reminded of how centrally people who work in theater have figured into the vision of the whole thing. What does it mean to be a theater worker in this moment? I'm curious about what will be lost and what will be gained in translation.

I'm Jessica Watkin and this is my fourteenth and final thought.

Here's The Compassion Project Part 2. I've had a hard time making art without a deadline, without someone to make it for, without a gallery exhibit coming up, without an opening night looming, without a holiday to exchange gifts. But today I started my first piece of art that is only for me. New rug, new project. I want to stand on this rug and feel my own intentions through the bottoms of my flat feet. How can we use our own art in our lives?

So to end my thought residency during these chaotic lockdown times, I invite you to create art, to make, but do it for you. Thank you for listening. That's the end of my final thought.

I'm Jessica Watkin and this is my thirteenth thought, and this is part one of The Compassion Project.

I am too hard on myself. I am everyone else's hype person, and I struggle to be there for me. I work so hard on so many projects and still feel I'm never doing enough. I crash and burn often, my eye crashes every Thursday from overuse and fatigue. I'm exhausted.

So I decided to start saying it out loud, the gratitude, the things I wish I could feel the truth of: Thank you for trying. Thank you for feeling your feelings. You are doing great things. And I write them down. And I'm searching for a way to feel this truth.

I'm Jessica Watkin and this is my twelfth thought.

And I'm gonna be honest for a second about online performances and how I don't think its interesting or engaging or useful for performance creators and performers right now to be trying to recreate the experience of in-person theatre online.

I think that, yes, we are given a computer screen which is a square and very proscenium but there's no way to engage with an audience in the same way, there's no way to connect as performers in the same way.

And so I think we've actually been given an opportunity to find Virtual Performance. To find methods that are unpolished and sticky and fun and rely on disconnection of wifi internets and dropped words because that is what it has to be right now. And that's exciting.

I'm Jessica Watkin and this is my eleventh thought and I'm going to tell a story today about fear. The last time I was in London, England, I was at a show at the National Theatre and when it finished it was so dark outside, like super dark, like too dark for a Blind person to be out alone in, and I got completely turned around. I had my cane but there was no one around me, and I found myself randomly on the south bank in some sort of parking lot and I was freaking out, I had no idea what to do, who to call, how to get home... And then I looked up and I saw the lights of Big Ben. And I saw the moon shining, and I couldn't see the buildings, and I couldn't see where I was, but I could see them reflecting in the Thames, and I knew that that was the way I needed to go, that was Westminister station, and I found my way.

I'm Jessica Watkin and this is my tenth thought, and I am telling you the story today of being a blind person and going for a walk during the pandemic! So I'm out with my cane because I cannot see if I'm six feet away from people. (sound of cane and wind) (Jessica sniffles) And so the cane helps folks stay away from me! (sound of cane, a car, and Jessica breathing)

I'm Jessica Watkin and this is my ninth thought and this week I'm going to tell some stories.

At the Republic of Inclusion in 2017, we ended the summit with a cocreation of space. We were prompted to do anything to make us feel comfortable and have ease in engaging with the music provided. Everyone around me found chairs, mats, blankets, sunglasses, stickers, fidget toys, temperature and light changes, vibrating vests. I found some sparkly stickers and asked someone to guide me to everyone I had met and cared for, gave them each a sticker, and ensured they were safe and okay. Then I curled up with a friend. I desire safety and closeness with those I care for.