Shiff Says

Often, I have said that working with Our Time is the best thing I do.  And, unlike much of what I often say, I mean it every single time.

Our Time is a theater company that works with young people who stutter, ages 8-18. 

I made my way towards Our Time through a series of touching coincidences, all of which began when I was maybe 6, or 7, or 8 years old, growing up in D.C.  Thank you, Dad.

I could say more, and more, and more and more and more about how much Our Time means to me, personally, but frankly, what I get out of working with these kids is besides the point.  I have seen, over the course of 4 years, the impact that being in the company has on the kids.  I want to share an anecdote that has always stood to me as a living testament to what this company is and does:

I started working with Our Time as a costume designer.  The following moment occured during the second set of shows I designed for them.

I was sitting in the audience - making notes on my costumes - during the final dress rehearsal of the Teens’ play, a collaborative work written and performed by all the members of the Teen Company, together.  The play they’d written this year was about high school cliques.  There was the preppy clique, the gangsta clique, and the sporty clique.  The kids write the play themselves,  and they also cast themselves as whoever/whatever they want to play.  As such, there were three kids in the gangsta clique.:   K, N, and A.  K and A had been in the company 4 and  3 years respectively that year, and I believe it was N’s first year.  they were all 17 or so years old.  K and A were old buddies - even though they didn’t go to school together, they hung out outside of Our Time, had similar interests, came from similar neighborhoods, etc.  N was different.  N was skinny as all get-out, with big thick glasses…and some sort of notable learning/developmental difference.  All three kids stuttered like woah.

N, a shy, quiet guy in real life, wrote himself a scene where he picks a fight with one of the sporty kids, over a girl he was trying to hit on.  In this scene, he’s shouting across the room at the sporty kid, while K’s character stands next to him as back-up.  Now, N is notoriously hard on himself.  He knows what he’s capable of, and he doesn’t accept any less.  He wants to nail every single moment.  Alas, during this final dress rehearsal, he had lost his line, the big, bold, shouting line that marked his stake in the scene.  Anyone could see he was frustrated, sad, angry.  And it wasn’t that he was having a block.  (A block is the term for what happens when a person stutters through a word, a sentence, or a syllable. )   Having a block onstage would have been no biggie- after all, everyone on stage around him were people who stuttered.  The entire cast stuttered throughout the play, having blocks left and right.  Forgetting his line: that’s what killed him.

As my eyes scanned the company on stage, looking for fraying hems, ill-fitting pants, I landed on K and N, standing next to each other.  K put his hand on N’s shoulder as he struggled to find the big-shabam line.  He pat him on the back, and nodded his head - all without ever breaking character himself.  Just to let him know, “hey man, I know you got this.”  N eventually did remember his line, and they all kept rehearsing.

I almost cried, my heart was so full.

This wasn’t just any demonstration of comradely support between cast members.  Because these aren’t just any kids.  These two teen-aged boys could not look more different standing next to each other.  If they were not both company members in Our Time, they would have never met - and they probably would have never met any one even resembling the other.   But these two were tight.  They loved each other - they still do.  And it was the atmosphere of love, total, un-compromised acceptance of Our Time that gave them to each other in this way.

All of this is to say:  Our Time does things for young people that I have never seen any other non-profit come even close to accomplishing.  Forget the fact that it creates a safe space for often-isolated stuttering youth to forge a community with one another.  I swear to god, this theater company plays a vital role in turning good, cool kids into great, A-MAZING kids. 

Please support the work of Our Time by bidding in their Silent Auction online.  It’s part of their annual benefit Gala, coming up this April 19th. 

Below are two links to auction items that I am donating/co-donating.  If you like what you see, awesome, bid on me!  if not, check out the other items.  there’s some super cool stuff.

peace love and hope,

Shiff

http://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/Item.action?id=107824525

http://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/Item.action?id=107831901