The Younger You

In high school, I was voted Most Likely to Win an Oscar. But the prize could’ve just as easily gone to Jessica, who instead won Most Likely to Become a Professional Athlete.

The two of us stole the stage in our high school a few times. Looking back I wonder if it was as simple as Jessica got the blond parts and I scored the brunette roles? In any case, she was a dead ringer for Ellie May Calmpett our sophomore year and Beauty in Beauty and the Beast and Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz fell to me.

That said, I don’t think our senior class really expected each other to achieve the titles we were voted. We didn’t think Jess was going to actually join the WNBA or that I was going to literally move to Hollywood or that another friend, Most-Likely-To-Publish-a-Book-Tracy, was going to write a New York Times Best Seller.

After all, we were all from a town so small you couldn’t find it on most state maps. And we knew, even then, that most people’s teenage dreams get swallowed whole by the demands of suburban monotony.

But Jessica perhaps proves low expectations wrong. She has not only stayed true to the actress in her, but she’s found a way to use theater to express the meaning she finds in everyday life.

After working for the Hallmark Channel for a stint and producing the documentary Laffey Men, Jessica joined forces with a friend to bring ordinary life to the stage in the hit ongoing play Expressing Motherhood.

The play, which has been featured by media outlets like That Morning Show and the Huffington Post, put fifteen moms in the spotlight to share the highs, lows and laughs of motherhood. After four shows in L.A. and one in New York, Jessica’s effort was called “one of those theatrical experiences that seems so sincere that it is not hard to relate to it” by Examiner.Com.

All of the stories about Expressing Motherhood have one thing in common: the reviewers and audience members were impacted by the personal-ness of the stories shared by the cast.

And reading that, you know what strikes me? That the person responsible for that touch to people’s lives was a fifteen year old blond with curly hair who didn’t let life beat the dreamer out of her.

Can you remember when you were that young–young enough that you still took the time to dream? What did you want back then? And what part of that younger you survives in your life and work today?