Harbinger: A Journal of Art & Literature | 2018-2019

BREATHE IT ALL IN: A MEMOIR
Madelyn Gunnels
All is dark, the drop of a pin would easily echo as loud as a boom of thunder. Silence
takes center stage in place of sweaty hands, beating hearts, and the multitude of butterflies
in respective stomachs. Then, light. It graces the stage in a spectacle of surprise and
built up anticipation. Deep breath, eyes forward, game face on. Hours upon hours of
blood, sweat, and tears have led up to this moment, now is not the time for anxiousness
and stage fright, now is the time for magic, fun, and wonder. Take a breath, break a leg,
and let the show begin.
The art of theatre has existed within the world as early as 8500 B.C. in the forms of
ceremonial dances and rituals and has continued through history as being a driving
source of entertainment and storytelling for as long as we can remember. My experiences
and personal story with theatre is and will be merely a single drop in the vast ocean of
this art, in the entirety of this story, yet I believe my small contributions to it will allow
the art to continue on for years to come. While this so far will mainly seem like a piece
of historical writing, that’s not the case. In truth, while there will be some sprinklings
of history, this is the story of a girl and how she didn’t discover theatre, but how theatre
discovered her.
The history of theatre and great amounts of contribution to its production and preservation
by great minds such as those of the Ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Saint Augustine,
Miguel de Cervantes, Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde, and even Rosie O’Donnell had existed
long before my theatre story ever began. However, one thing that I do have in common
with these individuals is that my influence to go into theatre wasn’t simply out of my
own will to do so, it was from a single individual. In truth, I can’t put the main influence
of my story of theatre on one single person like those listed above. It wasn’t one of
the great minds such as these, it wasn’t an actor I saw on TV, and it wasn’t a teacher or
mentor, because my influence was, what I discovered later, my greatest restraint. It was
my mother.
My mother and I had a shared story of theatre for some time of my short life. She has
always said that I came into this world singing, and that doing so was as easy as breathing
when I was a child. She would always take time on our trips down memory lane to stop
and constantly remind me how she always placed dingy, Walkman headphones on her
swollen belly and play songs from famous Broadway musicals that I could only now
dream of being a part of, and how she somehow always knew that I “was destined to be
on the stage”, and of course, with childish ambition, I had always believed her. When I
walked through the studio doors on my way to my first ever theatre class, she was always
right behind me, cheering me on and pushing to my limits to ultimately do the best I
possibly could at that age. Whether it was through practicing my lines to singing show
tunes together in the car on the way to school, to being the first person I saw whenever I
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