As if We Never Said Goodbye

About a month ago, one of my teachers at PCPA passed away after a long and arduous battle with cancer.

Before I begin, I should clarify: I have lost a number of people in my life. Death is a part of this life, and I was never shielded from that, even when I was young. I have an established process for dealing with these difficult situations, which usually follows an approximate pattern:

Crying
Talking
Proactivity
Logic
Surprise Breakdown #1
Lethargy
Logic
Funeral/Memorial Service Breakdown
Logic
Life
Surprise breakdown #2

I acknowledge this process, and it usually serves me well. At no time, excepting a blurb on Twitter or Facebook, do I feel that my words serve me, so they are not part of the process. The initial Talking stage is only in place to get my thoughts out of my brain in order to push me out of Emotionland and launch me into Proactivity and Logic.

I do not write about people who have died. It becomes impossible for words to do justice to my feelings and memories, so I don't even try. I reflect internally, and I'm comfortable with that.

This time is different. I'm not sure why, but I'm going with it.

Patricia Troxel was my faculty advisor, and I was thoroughly intimidated by her. As a first year student, I had little exposure to her; she did not teach any of our classes, and I was not cast in the show she directed that school year. I did myself a massive disservice by using this lack of acquaintance as an excuse to generally steer clear of the fiercely knowledgeable Troxicon (or P-Trox, as our class affectionately called her). It wasn't until I was an understudy for her production of Distracted the following fall that I gave myself the opportunity to get to know her, and began to take advantage of her presence in my academic and professional life.

At the end of the first year, Patricia and Peter Hadres, another valued teacher, sat down with our entire class to start a year-long discussion about life after PCPA. They encouraged us to consider all options, including furthering our education, and to please connect with either of them if we wanted any assistance or advice in determining What Comes Next. When I was on the hunt for monologues to use in audition class during second year, I, at long last, turned to Patricia for help. Over the course of our first half-hour tutorial, Patricia gave me a three-page list of plays and playwrights, both classical and contemporary, that I should look at - for starters. With some of the Shakespearean plays she recommended, she specified individual monologues for my consideration, and coached me on them when I had made my selections.

The floodgates were opened.

To indicate that I sufficiently utilized the grand resource that was Patricia would be a bold-faced lie. However, I met with her on several occasions upon deciding that I wanted to seek further education, something which I had never anticipated and for which I was therefore ill-prepared at best. She advised me on BA and BFA programs to research, and when I got the crazy idea in my head that I might be able to get an MFA without completing my undergrad, she advised me on which programs were likely to consider such nonsense. She was honest about the challenges I would face on either path, but she never harped on them; she never said anything remotely discouraging. Any discovery I needed to make was mine for the making, she simply got me moving. The direction itself was mine to find.

Patricia directed me in my final production as a PCPA student - the Conservatory Showcase production of The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood. This project, the culmination of two years of blood, sweat, tears, sore muscles, broken bones, self discovery, ensemble-building, and presentness, is impossible to compare to any other experience in my artistic life, and I will cherish it always.

After graduating from the program, Patricia and I would see each other occasionally, usually in the lobby after a show, but would scarcely find a chance to say hello - she was in high demand in those moments at the theatre, and I didn't want to get in the way.

The last time I spoke to Patricia was, I'm sorry to say, nearly two years ago, on the opening night of Caroline, or Change. I was able to congratulate her on the beautiful production she had helmed, and she suggested that I email her so that we could find time to get together. I agreed, and surrendered her to the adoring masses.

I never sent that email.

After someone is gone, these are the moments that plague me, the moments that sneak up on me and push me to Surprise Breakdown #2, or #3, or #4. I often struggle with mourning, feeling that my grief is somehow unjustified. I did not know Patricia well, nor did I expend any significant energy in an attempt to get to know her separate from being my teacher, advisor, and director. So many people have so much more right to feel her loss so acutely. Who am I to take ownership of someone so separate from myself? Who am I?

But, then, who am I to question my feelings, my instincts, my process? I know better than that.

As I embark on my next educational endeavor, I refuse to feel regretful for the time we did not spend together, and instead, be grateful for the time we did spend, the life lessons I have learned, and the artistic journeys I have taken because of Patricia. I hope to someday be even half the educator and artist that she has been, and will forever ask myself, just before looking it all up in a book -

"What Would Patricia Do?"