Earlier this month, I saw the Mylie Cyrus movie,
The Last Song, with my friend Grace.
It was marginally entertaining, shamelessly clichéd
and should have been completely forgettable.
And would have been, if it weren’t for my noticing
that I was strongly identifying with
Mylie’s character throughout the movie.
(I didn’t identify at all with the age- and intellect-appropriate
Kelly Preston mom character)
I saw myself as that tough-and-too-often-
misunderstood 15-year-old girl,
taking on the world,
in love, at last, with the right boy.
It felt familiar and thrilling.
Last month, I saw Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind,
a popular Chicago theater experience
that performs 30 plays in 60 minutes.
The show’s creator, now in his 40s, has been performing
in Too Much Light for more than 20 years.
In one of the more poignant two-minute plays,
he talks about what it feels like to be treated differently
because he looks old on the outside,
but has all the dreams and desires
of his 20-year-old self on the inside.
It’s all still in there—
regardless of the body you carry it in.
The 15-year-old girl.
The 20-year-old boy.
And your chance for a do-over.