Stop Everything and Watch This Right Now

2 comments

June 18, 2014 - 6:10 pm Sharpeggio

I remember going to Duke TIP for one year; I was a first year Third year, a relatively rare breed of TiPsters who come in with potentially one extra year of attending. A “lollipop” moment came around only a few months ago, relative to my, I thought, shy participation in Duke TiP. Looking back at it now, I consider myself a very shy person back then. I had horrible conversational abilities, I got flustered a lot more than I do now around girls, and all in all, not very good at sustaining a conversation.
But I just finished my first or second year in theatre, and I wanted to do more. The only outlet in Athens, GA? Improv extra curriculars at night, once every week.
At this point, I still hadn’t really gotten a good grasp at my personal philosophy about theatre. I also still sucked at acting. I was still new to it, only having at most two shows under my belt. I’ve also never done improvisation before. So, justifiably I was nervous about acting silly around a bunch of people in improv.
I don’t really understand why or how, but I remember that when I got to that small little room and the cold, black floor, I just sort of did it. The first time I did it, I didn’t really care, and maybe off an adrenaline rush, I had a lot of fun with it.
I made a couple of friends that night, one being this African american guy named Dartanyan Ball. Sort of skinny, lightly dark skinned, and extremely goofy and geeky like I am. I can only very vaguely remember when I did a scene with him, and only very vaguely remember talking to him afterwards about what little theatre I’d known and did.
And just like that, Duke TiP finished. A lot of friends I had made lasted for a brief while, but after two or three years, maybe only about five or six stayed on my facebook page that I still enjoy looking at.
Dart never really used facebook, but we did have eachother’s Steam usernames.
Even so, however, I slowly stopped talking to him. Maybe in a year. And I essentially forgot that he existed.
Something magical happened again, though. Many years later, I had swapped out my pictures and profile name on steam, I was an upside down pokemon (Goomy), and my name was Sharpeggio. But he sent me a message: “Is this Kevin?”
I replied I was, and more than anything, was pleasantly surprised he had contacted me. I was pretty happy, in fact, that someone I hadn’t talked to started talking to me again. But then he dropped the real deal.
Dart wanted to thank me for inspiring him.
For what, exactly, I asked him.
For loving theatre so much, he replied. Dart had said that his life had been very difficult, and when difficult times had reached their peak, he had turned to theatre because he had seen how much I’d loved it.
And he told me it changed his life.
He told me that it “saved him.”
He was now heavily involved in plays in his school, being casted as a main antagonist in his school’s production.
It took me awhile to really understand what I had done.
I agree a lot with this video. Even though we think of ourselves as so small, and perhaps unable to affect the world, that’s not true at all. I barely remember interacting with him, yet Dartanyan remembers this clearly. I think a lot of it also has to do with really reaching out, and doing something you aren’t comfortable with doing. The things I did for myself, to make me happy, ended up potentially saving someone’s life. And to realize you have that ability…Something so short, that you don’t remember. That can change someone’s life. We all inevitably play a role in another person’s universe, a drop of water in a massive pond causes huge waves and disturbances for hundreds of meters, never really dying out. Everything we do, what we say, has a massive effect on everyone around you. And the moments you make, even though you might forget them, will definitely be remembered.