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I’ve posted the first scene of my show as a page. (click here or above)
The beginning of the show hasn’t changed much in the five years since I wrote it. The rest of the show has changed a lot, but this foundation remains the best introduction to the play. The whole story is there, in a way, in that first scene.
Today at work (at a cool downtown Tulsa restaurant) I was making my way through the place, making sure things were fine, when I heard my name. I turned and there was a woman a few years older than I am looking at me.
She said, “Justin, I don’t know if you remember me, but I’ve seen your show twice.”
I said thanks, and once she said that I did remember we’d talked after one of my shows.
She turned to her friends there and told them how profound my show was, how powerful, and asked me when I was doing it again. She kept saying such good things about it.
It made me smile, you know?
Every time I do my show I have a pre-show ritual where I sit backstage and wonder why the hell anyone would want to see my show, why I’d expect them to sit through it, why they would not ask for thier money back.
Then I do the show. The audience – every single time – comes to me after and tell me how touched, moved, encouraged, empowered and uplifted they were by my performance. Sometimes months after. And then the best part comes.
Then they tell me their stories.
And I am humbled. And I am in awe, not of my skills, which, I’m not gonna lie, are formidable, but rather the power of the art form itself.
Turns out, we’re family, all of us, and we often don’t realize it. Stories help us to see.
Stories are the most powerful force in the world. They are the vehicle through which all other things pass. Love. Hate. Joy. Compassion. Fear. Wonder. All of it must travel through some kind of story to get to our hearts. Maybe it’s a made-up story or maybe it’s our own.
I’m so glad, so happy, so very very thrilled that I get to share my stories with others. I’m glad, amazed and excited that they contribute positively to the world.
And hey, the show is funny, man.
So take a gander. And if you can get to Shawnee, Oklahoma on 25 October, come to the Ritz Theater and see the whole thing.
Booking info is here.
Talk to you later.
Why atheism? Because this:
is more mysterious, interesting and uplifting than this:
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Life is so much more interesting out here in the real world. It gets more interesting all the time.
There is an unprovable assertion derived from bronze and iron age ideas about how the world works. It is that this universe is the only one, that it was made by a god, and that this god cares where you are on Sunday morning, who you slept with the night before, whether the “F”word ever escapes your lips, and cares about any number of other things that are uncannily similar to the personal behavior preferences of the religious humans in your area. This god was so sure you’d screw up that two thousand years before you were born he committed suicide and killed his own son at the same time to make up for your mistakes. (Or he didn’t. Insert your favorite religious mythology here.)
There is also an unprovable assertion derived from 21st century ideas about how the world works. It is that the universe is one of many, a bubble in a foam of universes. That each of these universes is different in fundamental ways than this one. That these other universes themselves might be a mere millimeter away or closer, traveling in the correct dimension. That there may be life in these other places and so we might have someone new to meet! That there may exist great, ultra thin membranes of articulated mathematics upon which we and all other denizens of this multiverse reside.
Why would I want to buy into the god idea? It’s founded on ideas which are thousands of years out of date, which aren’t even wrong, by todays standards, and which serve only one purpose. That purpose is to enable those who buy into the idea to look down on those who do not.
That last statement’s not entirely fair, and I’ll tell you why in a later post this week.
Ideas based in real, modern science are so much more mysterious, interesting and empowering than the ancient ideas, which are virtually useless most of the time.
What do you think?
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Born Again Yesterday is a comedy about being raised fundamentalist.
You can find out more here.
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Two items today.
First, an atheist serving in our military has sued the government for denying him a promotion because, he claims, of his atheism. Observe:
Hall alleges he was denied his constitutional right to hold a meeting to discuss atheism while he was deployed in Iraq with his military police unit. He says in the new complaint that his promotion was blocked after the commander of the 1st Infantry Division and Fort Riley sent an e-mail post-wide saying Hall had sued.
In other news, I simply found this amusing and wanted to share.
Good day, all!
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