All the World's a Stage

“All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players.”

The line of Shakespeare from her high school English class likes to haunt her, taunting with its undeniable truth. Everyone has a role to play, shoes to fill so to speak. And everyone spends time trying to out-play others, keep them ever so slightly off balance. If she wasn’t where she was now, she thinks she could almost be an actress. She spends her days on a stage of sorts, playing the role of intelligent woman, justice seeker, logic driven and unerringly independent. Moments of clarity beyond this costume are few and far between, so good is she at her chosen part. For a true player never lets go until the curtain falls. Even her friends, the one who think they know her best are fooled by the care she has taken into crafting her character. They see the woman who doesn’t need the ephemeral, transitory nature of love, when really, her heart cries out constantly for the possibility that maybe, maybe there’s someone out there for her.

She plays her role so completely no one ventures to second guess this guise. It is only when she’s alone, in the frightening stillness of home and in the dark recesses of her mind, that she escapes the careful façade she spends her life constructing. Only then does her Oscar-worthy act fall to pieces on the floor.