I got the message.

Yesterday I had three improv shows (big ups to my UCB 401 class, and my teams Cats in Hardhats and Fat Computer) and one practice (The Other Pilot prepping for our debut this evening). Thanks to the support and general awesomeness of a bunch of brilliant teammates and teachers, poets and geniuses all, I got to be all of the following:

• A fortune teller
• Vladimir the evil circus owner
• A witch doctor who’d prefer to be known as an herbal specialist
• A dairy farm owner with a magical cow and a cursed well
• An unemployed typist who, due to having only 9 fingers, types 72 words a minute instead of the industry standard, 80
• An overzealous tourist who got half-eaten by a lion
• A lion
• Another lion (different set, same hunger for human flesh)
• A pregnant lady who once did heroin with Soundgarden and who now regularly follows Frances Bean's Twitter posts and receives childcare advice from the bestselling author Dr. Mallory whose second rule is “Always wash your hands before you touch your vagina.”
• A lady who would rather do heroin with Tegan and Sara than have a baby
• A priest
• A dude who doesn’t believe in marriage
• A lady who’d prefer not to be known as a husband
• A fetus
• A person who tried to cure his friend’s alcohol addiction by giving him heroin and speeding up rock-bottom
• Half a poker table
• A nurse who believes in romantic comedies a little too much
• The ghost of a talking dog that had just been eaten
• A woman who was upset about her friend tonguing a dog not so much because of the bestiality aspect as because she had not personally been French-kissed in years
• A rich lady who believes money raises the temperature of soup and people 3 degrees Fahrenheit
• Julia Roberts
• An Ice Capades dancer who wore a vomited-in costume for love
• Lucy Ricardo, finally getting to star in Ricky’s show thanks to some vomited-in bongos
• A generic macaroni and cheese brand with delusions of grandeur
• A lackluster parade waver
• A hearse
• A grieving widow
• A magical woodland creature
• A Brown University student who believes the best way to show Cornell who's boss is with glittery posters

And, of course,
• Jesus

As I write this, I'm reminded of that saying which I've heard attributed to a ton of people but mainly Thelonius Monk: "Writing about music is like dancing about architecture." Indeed... and yet I was foolhardy enough to write a book about music so such wisdom is lost on me.

I've never written about improv for realsies, outside of Twitter and Facebook posts, maybe because writing about improv is less like dancing about architecture than it is like telling your friend about that amazing dream you had and realizing half-way through that "chicken" is not a verb or that, in dreamworld, discovering the tiny closet in your tiny New York apartment contains a secret passageway to your childhood bedroom is pretty standard, really. Improv, like dreams, must be seen to be believed.

And yet, I might as well us my first craft, the one that brought me to improv in the first place, if only to dance a little love song to improv. I am head over heels for longform improv comedy, and with the people who do it and love it as much as I do.

Pretty much all my money and free time goes to improv these days. I base nearly all my purchasing decisions on improv (yes to t-shirts and Converses, no to boots with heels). I wear fewer skirts and always carry around a pair of running shorts in case an impromptu practice or show presents itself. Yesterday I blew more dough than I'd like to admit on practice spaces and coaches and cab rides to whisk me from show to show, from Brooklyn to Manhattan to Queens, and back again. It was all worth it.

A few years ago, I was dating a talented musician who, thanks to the unfortunate economics of the music biz, took a hit every time he did a show. I couldn't understand it, because if you lost money doing something you worked so hard on doing, why do it? I mean, I guess I understood it in a small way because I hadn't made any money from my writing yet and I still did it, but there was always this promise that one day I would. There's no such promise for improv--which is why I finally understand why my ex would haul his equipment from dive bar to dive bar, pay the drummer and the sax payer kindly, and leave 40 bucks short with an aching back.

I have faith that it'll pay off in other ways, I guess. I'm not lying when I say I have little desire for fame or riches; perhaps because my parents are teachers, I have always believed doing good work is more important than the compensation you get for said work. Either that or I just know mine is not a face for HD. Basically, I'd just like to write some more books, and if my improv training convinces my publisher I'm not going to freeze up if Liane Hanson or Terry Gross wants to chat sometime: Awesome. The reason I took improv classes in the first place was so that I'd feel more comfortable doing book readings and interviews.

But then a happy accident occurred, one that has nothing to do with writing or marketing or fame or anything like that. I realized that nothing, NOTHING, will every be as satisfying as being part of a team you love, as setting up a team member to be brilliant, as when a team member saves your ass. Writing a good book, hell, a good sentence, feels great, but your audience is so far away, and you're on your own. With an apology to Mick Jagger for the lame wordplay, the thing about satisfaction is that "I" can't get none of it, but together, we can get plenty.

I used to be afraid to talk about my ideas for stories and books for fear others would take them and run but improv has made me realize there are more ideas and characters than stars in the sky. There's no scientific proof of that, but improv has also made me realize you can be wrong as long as you justify your wrongness, and the statement feels true to me, so there you go.

I used to be afraid of mistakes, but now I understand that there are no mistakes, only happy accidents that take you someplace better than if you'd done things the way you were supposed to. You can be imperfect as long as you have partners to call out your mistakes and make something beautiful and strange and wonderful out of them.

I used to be afraid of people but improv has made me embrace them more and worry about my breath less. I used to be afraid of myself, of the anger and sadness and emotion I couldn't make go away no matter how feverishly I wrote or how much yoga I did. I used to believe magic only happened when you took pills with pictures of woodland creatures or lions or fortune tellers on them.

But yesterday I played all those magical peoples and creatures, sometimes more convincingly than other times, and I didn't need anything to help me become them but some friends, a stage, and a suggestion.

My friend Andrew Mendillo introduced me to improv and the Upright Citizens Brigade, and not long after he did, I wrote him a note thanking him because improv saved my life. Would I have died without it? Probably not. But when I think of the people I'd never have met and the fun I'd never have had, I realize that saving a life isn't just about keeping someone breathing, it's about enhancing the quality of each of those breaths.

I could go on and on about the dream that's been the last year and a half of my life, but I sort of blew my load with "Improv saved my life" thing--there's no way to heighten beyond salvation without bringing in ghosts, and I already do that way too much in scenes. But, on second thought, maybe there's one voice from the beyond who should have a say here. Take it away, Del Close.

"When you get the message, hang up the phone."*



*courtesy of Kim Howard Johnson's bio of Del Close, The Funniest One in The Room. Charna Halpern, who founded the iO with Del, shared this bit of wisdom at his memorial service.