The Art Festival that Wasn’t

A few days ago I wrote about Healing Through Creativity, an art festival that I had been looking forward to for quite some time. So me and my boyfriend made what ended up being a seven hour trip from our home in Vandling, Pennsylvania to our hotel room in Uniontown, Pennsylvania and then the hour trip from our hotel and into West Virginia for the art festival.

The trip from our house to the hotel was fine and the trip from the hotel to West Virginia University was fine, but once we got there, all went to hell, to say the least. Who knew that West Virginia University had not one, but two campuses? Not only that, but who knew that West Virginia University was approximately 200 miles long? I surely did not. Okay, now I may be exaggerating the 200 miles long thing because in all honesty, I wouldn’t know how many miles West Virginia University encompasses because I was too busy fearing for my life as we drove around the university looking for the building in which the festival was being held. Fearing for my life? Why yes, because who knew that this university was located on a hill where it is virtually impossible to see where you are going because of the cars driving in the opposite direction as you on several hundreds of dips and twists in the road. For all of you people thinking of even driving near West Virginia at night–Don’t, because the people of West Virginia do not know how to drive and apparently they think nothing of driving you off the road while trying to get wherever it is they are going with absolutely no respect towards you, the miscreant who decided to get in their way by driving on the same road as them.

So to sum up the art festival, I have to say that it was the art festival that wasn’t; at least for me. We ended up driving around the university for an hour and a half, missing the showing of the film I went there to see in the first place, and at that point I was so frazzled, terrified and anxiety-ridden, I thought that it was ironic, to say the least, that I was going to an art festival all about healing while one of my main anxiety issues is getting lost driving at night on a busy road that I am not familiar with. While some may find it odd that while I do not drive and have never even had a driver’s license I can get to the point of having a panic attack while someone else is driving, I guess you would really have to know me. I’m a control freak and always have been, which is a common personal trait in survivors; so while I have had panic attacks behind the wheel of a car while learning to drive, making driving virtually impossible for me (at least for now) my mind still believes that I need to possess control over the driving situations; so if someone who is driving the car I am riding as the passenger in, my mind tells me that I am lost, on my own, in the dark in an unfamiliar place and I need to make sure that I can get back to where I am comfortable again. When someone is driving and gets lost, I immediately think “Oh no, I’m going to be stranded here forever. Do something!” And what do I do? Why badger the person driving about our whereabouts, approximately how many miles it will take until they know where we are again and approximately how long it will take to drive that many miles. I usually repeat this around 48 times.

So in the midst of being on the verge of a panic attack and wanting to choke the students of West Virginia University for not knowing directions around the campus they spend most of their time at or what building the art festival was being held at, after an hour and a half of driving I was spent. I wanted to get back to the hotel so I one, knew where I was again and two, could sleep the rest of the weekend because there was no way I was making the trip back to the largest university known to man where the students didn’t even know where they were; and so we went back to the hotel and my trip to the art festival to bask in the glory of my art turned into a two day vacation I apparently needed.

Me and the boyfriend spent the next day and night eating at Eat n’ Park, a Denny’s-like restaurant I had never heard of before and Sonic, a drive through food place that we get commercials for here, but are lacking the actual restaurant. We also drove around looking for something to do and low and behold, we found out that there is absolutely nothing to do in Uniontown, Pennsylvania. After seeing a commercial for a Dave and Buster’s arcade, which is being marketed as an arcade for adults equipped with a bar. A bar and an arcade is one fabulous combination–Get drunk, play games, how can you go wrong? Well, apparently you can, since after driving an hour there we found out that it is merely a place for adults to sit and get drunk while their kids play arcade games approximately ten to fifteen years old; not fun.

While this weekend was supposed to be a weekend all about healing, I did do something very new and very great for myself this weekend, despite going to the art festival. For the first time in eight years, I went swimming; not only that, I went swimming in a pool that was also being occupied by other people. I forgot how much I love swimming; I really, really love swimming and now have the urge to get a membership at the local YMCA so I can go swimming as much as I want to. So while I didn’t make it to the art festival, I did do something that has had a great healing effect on me and loved every second of it.

Healing Through Creativity: The Night Before

My next few blogs will be about an art festival that I have been looking forward to for a little over a month now–Healing Through Creativity.

Healing Through Creativity is an art festival for survivors of abuse and trauma and supporters of survivors. I have known about this festival for a few years, but never thought of going–That is, until a short film that I wrote a segment of was showing there and since this is the furthest a piece of my writing has gone, other than a book put together by my high school creative writing class and a few high school poetry contests and readings that I won, me and my boyfriend are traveling about six hours to West Virginia to see my writing and the film it was put in shown to I don’t even know how many people.

Excitement is just one feeling coursing itself through my being right now, we also have anxiety and of course, fear. What are the next three days going to be like? Who am I going to meet? What do I say to anyone who starts talking to me? What do I do with my hands when I’m talking to people? Yes, sadly, these are the questions I ask myself and more often than not, “What do I do with my hands?” is a very prominent question. I guess that’s why I’ve always been a writer; a behind the scenes type of person because I can never decide what to say or what my hands and arms should be doing when I’m saying it.

I’m supposed to read some of my poetry while there for an open mic and also for the filmmaker who made the film with my poetry. He is asking for one hour of reading to put the footage in another short film so while my poetry was in the first film, I will actually be in the next. I think that has a lot to do with the fear I feel. I used to do poetry readings once a week for a few years but I stopped going and soon became a recluse. I am not used to being around a lot of people or having to actually read my writing to a group of people and even when I did it years ago, I could feel and slightly hear my voice shaking, which is something I had meant to work on but instead opted to just stop doing it.

Frankly, the bottom line is that I want to go to this art festival and I want to have a great time. I want to read my writing and hopefully meet some fabulous people and take fabulous pictures and what my anxiety and fear comes down to is that I have a hard time giving myself what I want. I moved out of my father’s house when I was 17 years old and I have worked since that moment forward to give myself my own life and what ends up happening with me is that I work and work and work and very infrequently do I indulge myself with something or with doing something that I want. So here is a lesson for all of you people out there with goals and dreams that you have been working so hard towards–Working is great, but sometimes you need a little breather time and you need to give yourself something that you want and in this case, I am going to the Healing Through Creativity art festival, fear and all, and I am going to read my writing, fear and all and who cares if my voice shakes or if I feel like I am going to throw up? I want to do it and so I am going to. Wish me luck.

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