The Sound of Silence Part III

There is something very awful about having to extend your number when you've already been on stage for two-and-half minutes. It's like telling a sprinter at the finish line to run another 400 feet. It's like finishing school and then coming back for summer classes. There is an endless, monotonous, sinking quality about dragging your body through more of what you didn't expect. Seconds stand still, minutes turn into hours. Time really is relative.

I go through the motions, and complete my choreography. The music signals that I have another two minutes to kill on stage, with not a shred of planned routine left in me. That's when I go into "artist overdrive" which is to say my autonomic nervous system takes over and I spontaneously begin to flail in all sorts of interesting shapes. This is improvising without a clue of what to do.

I run forward, arms wide open. I wave, spin, jump. The audience is watching every move. Sixty seconds left - what else to do? I throw a flip, another one. Fifty seconds. I smile a knowing smile without knowing that I am about to throw my most dangerous move.

In an astonishing burst of speed, I sprint towards the pole and begin climbing. My forearms burn with thick lava coursing through burgeoned arteries. I am tired. I am dizzy. But I keep climbing.

At the top I pause long enough to ask myself, "what the hell am I doing here?" and then my awareness snaps back to the building crescendo of the music. Almost over! I knew that I had to deliver - this was the punch, the climax, the grand celebration of my marathon number, and I still had an audience to impress. I had one last move in my bag of tricks and this was the moment to scour my weary body for its last ounce of courage.

It was a move that I had only done in practice - once. I do a shoulder plank at the top of the pole, throw myself into a 3/4 back flip, freefall twenty feet down, and squeeze the pole with my legs and arms to stop at the very last minute. It worked - once.

I ready myself and extend my body into the plank, arms shaking, shoulder aching, muscles screaming. But I am in a zen moment. A funny state takes me over, the kind of calmness and confidence that rises from deep within when you know something big is on the line. There is no audience, there is no music, there is no you. There is only the action at hand, and your total immersion within the moment.

I cast myself backwards, feeling the pull of gravity already tugging me with her tentacles, sucking me rapidly to the hard stage. The music is on its last notes. I am moments from hitting the bottom. Legs tighten, arms straighten, muscles engage. Three feet, two feet, one foot. I stop with six inches between me and the floor. The final note bursts out of the loudspeakers with climactic flair. I am done. I made it. I survived.

I learn two things that day. One: never restart your music from the beginning. And two: I have deeper resources within than I ever thought possible.

- Alvin.