In Defense of the Arts or Why I Sometimes Can't Sleep

     This isn't the first time I've wrestled with this.  And I'm certain it won't be the last. But, naturally, being face to face with the more noteworthy causes under whose shadow my guilt-laden feet creep in the opposite direction, the age-old question has been aggravated this fall. How do we reconcile the pursuit of the arts in a world of so much suffering? Is it possible for an artist, in her heart of hearts, to feel justified? Will I ever silence that little voice that whispers it isn't enough? Especially now, with what I've seen and heard and tasted this semester...
      I try to remember how I got here, when I decided that theatre was the best way to leave my mark on the world. But nothing stands out. I never had the debates of my friends in high school about what to pursue, what they wanted to be. Never had the "aha!" moment in a lab or with a mentor when it all became clear what it was I did best. Mine was as organic a process as the one I observe now outside my window; a small trickle of rain down the side of the building joining a larger stream at its base.
     So when it came time to begin the college search and declare a major, there was really nothing to declare. I would continue doing what I had always done.
     But along with education comes awareness, and with that consciousness, self-examination in light of new information. As the global problems became larger and more lucid, the hours spent learning how to breathe on the floor of a dark classroom seemed more and more irrelevant.  And I started to wonder if I really wanted to spend my one and only life on stage.
      Today, I ask the same question. But over the past few months I've had time to really ask it, removed, as I am, from the fast track treadmill I was on where I could only doubt while I was still moving. I decided that this was the time to truly hold my passion for theatre loosely, and be open to whatever leadings I  might experience during this brief sabbatical. So I have tried to delicately surrender my gifts, fearful of what I might find.  But, to my great surprise and joy, here is what I've discovered:
     In the third world, amidst a level of suffering most of us cannot fathom, I have found countless living testaments to the power of the arts unlike any I have seen before. Isn't it amazing that art persists around the world and throughout time? In this place, where everything operates differently- from authority to family to education to time.... In this place, surrounded by extreme poverty, disillusionment, unemployment....still, people dance. They sing. There are stories.
     I have been reminded that we were created for an experience beyond the basics of survival. It is in our nature to seek after knowledge and beauty, whatever state we're in. A favorite professor has influenced a great deal of my perception of this issue; reminding me that culture will remain, no matter what. That has certainly proved true over time. We remember various eras or decades or places for the clothes they wear, the music they love and the movies they make, as much as we remember their leaders or the laws that were passed. It would seem then that culture, this expression of what we care about, is an inevitable out-pouring of the heartbeat of a people in a given place at a given time. Therefore, it must be intricately connected to the arenas of life my little voice would deem more "noble"- politics, foreign affairs, education, humanitarian causes. Culture is our means of response.
     And if culture will persist, then we can either desert it to darken while we all run off to be more useful, or infuse it with some sort of light. Because just as we inform these stories, they too impact us. I have really noticed a difference in the words that come out of my mouth and the things I dwell on now that I have been removed from so long from mainstream music, movies and TV. I'm not advocating for their absence, but it has made me recognize their influence. The stories I surround myself with not only reflect my own experience but begin to narrate it, so that it becomes difficult to tell what is scripted and by whom.
     Still, the relationship to the stories we grow up with is so difficult to define, intertwined as it is with our own narratives. I struggle to articulate the significance. There are people who are called to fields with a more quantifiable margin of change. How I envy the obvious and inherent significance of the work they do. I envy the peace which I mistakenly ascribe to teachers' or social workers' souls as they lay down at night and know that they're helping. I envy the admiration in the eyes of the stranger at the party who's just asked what they do for a living or what they're studying in school. And I envy their being suited for such noble professions. It's sick, but I do. I recognize it's not that easy. I'm sure they too second-guess, how do we not give ample thought to the cause to which we devote our one and only life? And is this really about helping or my own search for significance?
     The same professor pointed me to C.S. Lewis' essay, "Learning in Wartime" which deals with this question. He offers an image of a soldier reading in his tent while battle rages on around him. How? Why? This semester I have witnessed moments and pictures that might be displayed in the same gallery. I was pulled away from building water purifiers to dance alongside the citizens of the village with dirty water. I met Kiriku who paints though he has little to eat and few customers. He paints on the back of old packaging paper and news articles. The kids at Beacon House look forward to drawing pictures in chalk of a world they've hardly seen. They giggle and fight over the pretty colors whether or not there was enough for snack time that day. And I found solace, in the darkest night of my own journey, in a movie theatre that let me escape for a bit and brought me home, just for a few hours. So, in this place, where art and suffering co-exist, it seems impossible to imagine one without the other.
     I grew up in a house where my parents both worked hard. Their lives were never centered around what they did, but both were clearly passionate about their work.  My mom, for the greater part of my childhood, oversaw the arts ministry at our church. And my dad, alongside his commodities trading, led the global compassion and justice efforts of the same organization. Never, for a moment, did one's work seem more important than the other. Never did I catch even a hint of scorn as we shared the details of our days around the dinner table. It is only now that I am starting to realize and appreciate the example they set; that we are all wired differently, and such molding is not an excuse to be ignorant nor to feel superior. My mom has taken many trips to visit global partners with my dad and gone to great lengths to raise us with a spirit of gratitude while my dad has never missed a show and often offers the best and most serious critique and encouragement, recognizing the potential impact of what's happening on stage.
      So. How do the arts stand up to the realities of suffering in our world? I think they stand right next to them, just alongside war and poverty and unemployment and unequal education and racism and injustice. As these issues become bigger and smaller over time, quieting so they can resurface 10 years later, the arts will remain. To reflect, to distract, to inform, to inspire, to challenge, and even to anticipate the changing tide. And if the stories of our culture so intimately run alongside our own, and that culture will remain whether we deem it a worthwhile investment or not, a call to contribute to the aesthetic of our society should not be ignored. It should not be deemed irrelevant or inferior or insignificant or any of the other -ir's, -im's or -in's that make me feel less than. Artists have an opportunity to influence the waves of sharp notes, feather steps, images and words that suggest what we ought to care about.  I know I will not drift into the kind of contribution I'm talking about. But, if I continue to stay informed, to give thanks and to be mindful of those who have less.... if I strive everyday to let go of the comparison game, the competition, the self-obsession that comes with the field... if I stay open, stay selective and only get behind stories that deserve to be told.... surely, the arts are as worthy a cause as any. Or at least, I can quiet that little voice. And fall asleep knowing I'm trying.