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From the Editor: The bohemian life

From the Editor: The bohemian life

Holly Hatch

I once thought I was destined for a life of acting. During my high school and early college years, I’d often don wigs, silly Cleopatra eyeliner and stage makeup complete with fuchsia lipstick that seemed impossible to keep inside the lines – just to go to class.

I got to enact my dreams for the big screen on a local scale – playing in Colorado theatre house productions when I was 15 to 21, creating an identity through on-stage success, with dreams – the lofty goal – of one day taking it to the silver screen.

“Where are you wanting to apply for college?” my dad asked me one morning while we were sitting around the breakfast table. Forking my baked beans – a Hatch family breakfast staple – inside a piece of turkey bacon, I replied, “I’m not going to college, Dad. I’m going to Hollywood to be an actress.”

Coming from a family in which intellectual and philosophical development were deemed far more important to a balanced life than the flashy pop-culture world of TV, Hollywood and celebrity tabloids, it didn’t go over well. Over the next month I was reluctantly persuaded; I could go to Hollywood, but only after I had a degree.

The type of degree I got, though, was still completely my choice. I started college as a broadcast production major, and after hauling an oversized studio camera around campus for a while, grew out of my dream of performance.  After a few other stabs at majors – physical anthropology, journalism and hesitant flirtation with sociology – I found the romantic realm of creative writing.

Poetry became my new passion. The words were my script, and I got to create them in whichever order I pleased. There was no need to read my poems out loud; seeing the words on paper was a satisfying-enough self-expression, and allowed me to be me: a femme lesbian who could find the beauty inside the dark voids and fill the caverns of my desires up to the communion of human experience, writing prose and alliterative beats that became my refuge; a place I could go, unashamed, to be myself.

When we’re young we all try on different careers, relationships and ideas for life, like costume changes between scenes. When we’re grown we keep evolving: each stage of our development brings a new “role” we learn to play – child, student, rebel, traveler, worker, negotiator, manager, parent, leader – adding a layer toward a completed future self we hope to someday, though maybe never with finality, discover. We all try to “act the part,” often with insecurities, to the best of our abilities whether through political engagement and community organizing, fulfilling a job title, finding satisfying social or family lives or coming off as strong in a corporate world where it is easy to get lost or feel insignificant.

We are all required to be performers – actors and actresses playing out our lives and finding chances to express our individuality through daily work or extra-curricular activities. As we work to increase the connectivity of our community, this issue is our homage to the arts.

This issue’s cover story is a glimpse at our local LGBT performers and their motivations. For some like stage actor Owen Niland, on the cover, it’s an after-work activity that comes as second nature to his intrinsically-expressive personality; for others such as improv teacher and actress Sarah Kirwin, performance is a full-time trade and career. While we did our best to reach out as a staff exploring theatre houses, local bands and venues to get a snapshot of every kind of LGBT entertainer, the performance art world here in Denver is so expansive and rich, and LGBT people are such a substantial part of it, that we’d have to make it the topic of every cover story year-round to capture it fully.

As LGBT folks, we are connoisseurs of aesthetics and sensory experience. We revel in grand productions, touching performances, thumping beats, soulful lyrics, evocative art, titillating photography and stylish clothing that accentuates our unique looks.

We are constantly creating, growing, and making a sometimes-ugly world more beautiful, reflective, rich and striking through our roles in the arts, whether on-stage, in a supportive audience, or sculptors of our everyday lives.

I will always think fondly on my days of stage performing: What it felt like to sing “Beauty School Drop-out” as “Frenchie” in Longmont Jester’s Dinner Theater production of Grease. I sometimes still pretend I’m that fiery 1950’s redhead woman, defying her time’s expected woman’s role, when I’m looking to lift my mood or confidence.

Our work, as LGBT folks and as humans, is to make our experience one of beauty, truth, self-reflection, and compassion into a place where opportunity is not limited to a select few.

Sounds a bit Bohemian, right? But our individualities and historic circumstances make that an inevitable part of who we are. Through our manifestations of artistry and character, we’ll find the strength to continue depicting a perfect, ideal world – where good people live happily-ever-after and everybody gets what they deserve, where crowds of passers-by spontaneously break into song, and every person, and every thing, looks fabulous – for those inside our community and beyond.

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