Since 2012, I have taken a moment at the end of the year, and posted a sort of year-end-update here on the website. This serves as a kind of archive for me as well as away to celebrate the year that was.
2025 was a year of stabilization, which was a positive change considering last year. 2024 saw some big highs (winning Outstanding Production at a big theatre conference) and deep lows (being unemployed for the last nine months of the year). So, here's a glance back at 2025...
The year got off to a decent start after the slog of the previous year. I had a college class to teach twice a week, though it was ass-early in the morning at a high school. I was grateful for it. That meant I could at least cover my part of rent and fill my gas tank up (once) each month.
In mid March, I also had a directing gig at the college I worked at. It was the same production that had been cancelled the previous semester due to low audition turn-out. It was a goddamn slog of a rehearsal process. I had to remove a cast member due to lack of enthusiasm and missing a substantial number of rehearsals. Another cast member was as unenthusiastic and downright surly as I have ever encountered. There was barely enough backstage crew to run the show (myself and the faculty ended up helping backstage during the run). One of the musical numbers was so difficult that I wrote myself into the show to alleviate the pressure on the young lady who had to do it (who stepped in to cover the original girl who was removed).
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| I Angered A Great God at TCC-SE |
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| I Angered a Great God at TCC-SE |
The play was called I Have Angered a Great God. It was my own full-length adaptation of a one-act I had directed back in 2010 for Austin's Frontera Fest and the Out of the Loop Fest in Addison. It had musical numbers and was a language-dense comedy. Since it was an old piece of mine (that I had somewhat grown past) and the premise was so silly (a woman angers a Great Tiki God. She retraces her steps over the past few days to see where things went so horribly, horribly wrong. This task might be easier if she weren’t constantly, obliviously, on her phone). It proved to be difficult for the skeletal student cast and crew. The final result wasn't embarrassing, but a lot was "left on the field" so to speak.
Anyway, it was not a fun experience. It was something to get to the end of. When the end of the semester arrived and I was told I would not be considered for directing the next school year, I finally decided it was time to move on from that college adjunct job that had been worsening for years (certainly since the pandemic). Perhaps the decade and half chapter of my life spent as an college adjunct instructor was coming to an end...
Another opportunity popped up. My friend Jeff approached me about stepping in to replace him at an institute he had been working at since the previous autumn. He was a Performing Arts Instructor at a place that taught vocational and life skills to young adults with autism. Though I had one foot out of education I decided to interview for the gig. the position was adjacent to a lot of skills I had. Jeff moved on to his next adventure in mid-May. I jumped in.
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| Admittedly, it is nice to have an actual office for a change... |
My co-workers all seemed cool. The students (called "crew") were okay. As is the case with many of the places I have worked, there were folks who were as unpleasant as the high schoolers I had been teaching (just in completely different ways), but also like every other place I've taught, I encountered some really good students (and people). It has been a learning curve dealing with several consistently challenging, high-bandwidth types. Though I had prior experience in the past instructing various special needs students, this was the first time I was at an institute that was exclusively tailored to individuals with autism. It has been an education on my part getting familiar with folks up and down the spectrum.
I had to revamp Jeff's curriculum. Though very experienced with performing and with teaching youth drama, he has no experience in formal academic education. Nearly everything he had created had to be fixed/ altered. To my surprise, I found that I actually enjoyed the challenge of creating curriculum. It proved, however, to be a massive amount of work - and continues to be - and therefore a huge expenditure of energy and focus. The aim was crafting instructional materials somewhere below full college-level, but high enough to touch on a lot of the basics of performing and the accompanying soft skills such as active listening, collaboration, emotive responses and so on. And to give it a practical, vocational bent, veering away from a lot of history and theory.
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| This was "tropical shirt day" which happened to fall on my birthday |
After nearly twenty five years I was once again working a consistent full-time 9 to 5 desk job. Weird to think my many jobs over the years have mostly had non-traditional hours. The salary allowed me to refill the coffers I had depleted from my savings in 2024. At the time of this writing, I am going to stick with the job and see where it goes.
The trade-off has been the amount of time and energy this new gig has siphoned from me. Almost all of my creative pursuits ground to a halt. Turns out that spending the entire day doing difficult things five days a week is not good for artistic achievement. Not much concentration and creativity left in the tank by the end of the day. My goal moving forward will be working on a better work/life balance. Or maybe, better said, work/creativity balance.
Throughout the summer, I did fulfill obligations I had set up in the spring. I performed my solo show Robert's Eternal Goldfish for senior care facilities. My friend and colleague Holly Bagwell set up the gigs for me. It was a new experience. People slipping in and out of sleep but then praising the show afterwards.
I also took that solo show to the St. Louis Fringe and the Theatre Crude Fringe in Oklahoma City. I did not really make an impact in Missouri or Oklahoma. I still enjoyed performing the show and I had some lovely feedback in both places, but something felt like it was missing. These trips seemed a pale reflection of the old days of drive, seeking out fellow artists, seeing a bunch of other shows and making the whole thing into a grand adventure. I saw a handful of other shows at each fringe, but the interesting stuff seemed few and far between. Nothing really blew my hair back.
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| Performing Robert's Eternal Goldfish at 2025 Theatre Crude Fringe |
I fear that the chapter of my life that has me performing my solo shows at venues and festivals all over North America is gradually closing. I generally think change is good. And these things never really have a hard stop, but overlap and slowly phase out. I feel writing and/or drawing will be the next stage of artistic output for me in the coming years.
I also had a few interactions with other artists. In May I was the interview subject of the Playwright's Spotlight Podcast. There are a few bon mots, but the questions were kind of all over the map. You can watch it on YouTube... HERE.
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| Reading from Shaun Hamill's book Dissonance at Cake & Prose |
In mid-October I also was invited to be a reader in one of the Writer's Garret Cake & Prose evenings. I read an excerpt of Shaun Hamill's kids-on-bikes horror fantasy Dissonance. It was fun to get to know a great local author.
Throughout the year I still created J. Herbin comics, though I got a bit behind towards the end of the year. I also released a few Cultivated Playwrights podcasts. I made preliminary progress on several bigger projects, but my current work schedule has stymied the deep work I need to do to really get into the projects.
It feels like things are going to be on the up and up next year. I still have the goal of removing myself from dependence on income outside of my own control. This should be easier without debt and with the savings accounts restocked. I am cautiously optimistic of what the next year will bring. I aim to make my life a wonderful adventure. I expect ups and downs, but I want to be able to look back and say that the time was well-spent. I want to have something to show for the effort, you know.
Thanks for reading this far, if you have. That's a wrap on 2025. I have tentative plans (when I make solid plans, the universe usually laughs in my face) and I expect to complete a few big things. I want to resurrect my new YouTube channel. Maybe launch an Etsy page. We'll see. Time and energy will be the big deciding factors. Onward and upward.
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