This is my G'Town transfer essay, responding to the following prompt:
The Admissions Committee would like to know more about you in your own words. Please submit a brief essay, either personal or creative, which you feel best describes you.
One minute until the curtain comes up, and the switch is on. Bodies. Voices. Emotions. All pile into the blender that is the stage and are violently mixed. The products are finely chopped nerves, lightly seasoned by the deafening murmurs of the audience in the house, a tantalizing meal of anticipation.
I remain still, though my heart bangs on the walls of my chest. It wants to get out already. It can't wait the forty-eight seconds that are left. "Wait," I say, smiling. It can come out to play soon enough.
These are some of the feelings that I get when on a stage. The circumstances can be different. The walls, black or white, the floors, plush or gritty, the audience, vast or small. We, the cast, could be performing Ibsen or Next to Normal. Those sorts of things change. The throbbing clock, the sweat, the giddy anxiety? Never, and I love that it doesn't.
Georgetown? A challenge, a new audience. One that I want to prove myself to. I follow my routines, and do what my inner actor does. The operative words in my memorized lines are underlined to make them matter. The questions about my character arise, of who he is internally and on the outside, and who he should become. I recite the script, over and
over again in front of the mirror, until I get it right. Vocal exercises, withdrawal from caffeine, and physical movement ensue. The process is humming along.
Yet something feels funny. The outer layer seems fine, but it is as if I have missed something. My grinning heart tells me to look again, and I do, poring over any orifice or opening that I can find. I look deeper, burrowing into previously undiscovered boundaries, and then, I realize. This unique calling named Georgetown desires and provides more than whatever is on the bare floors and walls. It plumbs the depths of emotion, of character, of the feelings I get before uttering my first line, and infusing the first traces of meaning into them. I cannot prove myself to it if I do not unfold each layer, one by one, and carefully see what they can mean, and what they desire. More than the words. More than the movements. I must go under them, not over them.
So, I re-examine everything. Each and every syllable of every emphasized word. What the character desires, and what is desired of him. The sounds of the lines spoken by the chambers of my heart. The intentions and the reasons of the movements. Everything is in its right place, and it knows why now.
I stand on the stage tonight an inspired actor. One who has found meaning in what should be meaningful. One who longs for the challenge of Georgetown. One who performs for it. And I am not afraid. I am ready.
The curtain goes up. The lights are on.
Cue scene.
Please be honest. Any feedback is greatly appreciated.
The Admissions Committee would like to know more about you in your own words. Please submit a brief essay, either personal or creative, which you feel best describes you.
One minute until the curtain comes up, and the switch is on. Bodies. Voices. Emotions. All pile into the blender that is the stage and are violently mixed. The products are finely chopped nerves, lightly seasoned by the deafening murmurs of the audience in the house, a tantalizing meal of anticipation.
I remain still, though my heart bangs on the walls of my chest. It wants to get out already. It can't wait the forty-eight seconds that are left. "Wait," I say, smiling. It can come out to play soon enough.
These are some of the feelings that I get when on a stage. The circumstances can be different. The walls, black or white, the floors, plush or gritty, the audience, vast or small. We, the cast, could be performing Ibsen or Next to Normal. Those sorts of things change. The throbbing clock, the sweat, the giddy anxiety? Never, and I love that it doesn't.
Georgetown? A challenge, a new audience. One that I want to prove myself to. I follow my routines, and do what my inner actor does. The operative words in my memorized lines are underlined to make them matter. The questions about my character arise, of who he is internally and on the outside, and who he should become. I recite the script, over and
over again in front of the mirror, until I get it right. Vocal exercises, withdrawal from caffeine, and physical movement ensue. The process is humming along.
Yet something feels funny. The outer layer seems fine, but it is as if I have missed something. My grinning heart tells me to look again, and I do, poring over any orifice or opening that I can find. I look deeper, burrowing into previously undiscovered boundaries, and then, I realize. This unique calling named Georgetown desires and provides more than whatever is on the bare floors and walls. It plumbs the depths of emotion, of character, of the feelings I get before uttering my first line, and infusing the first traces of meaning into them. I cannot prove myself to it if I do not unfold each layer, one by one, and carefully see what they can mean, and what they desire. More than the words. More than the movements. I must go under them, not over them.
So, I re-examine everything. Each and every syllable of every emphasized word. What the character desires, and what is desired of him. The sounds of the lines spoken by the chambers of my heart. The intentions and the reasons of the movements. Everything is in its right place, and it knows why now.
I stand on the stage tonight an inspired actor. One who has found meaning in what should be meaningful. One who longs for the challenge of Georgetown. One who performs for it. And I am not afraid. I am ready.
The curtain goes up. The lights are on.
Cue scene.
Please be honest. Any feedback is greatly appreciated.
