Why?

When you ask "Why?" I understand your confusion.  From the start I've been laughed at, mocked. My new school Oak Heights Elementary, the talent show singing "Can't Smile Without You" by Barry Manilow. I practiced a cappella but performed accompanied in a key I could not sing in front of all my peers. Eleven years old. I run off stage, crying, refusing to return to class. But only one year later under the harsh flourescent lights of the Alderwood Mall There I, Amahl hobble on the small carpeted stage:  a  poor crippled boy. My soccer team, the Vikings, in the front on foldable metal brown chairs Make faces while I sing and clump along. And these just the seeds of my desire not yet firmly rooted. On stage I have slipped, tripped and fallen several times.  Bit lip, cheek, tongue stubbed toes, let go a monstrous fart in Timmy Howar's face Banged knees, drawn blood, and even got a splinter in my butt.  Been spat on, slapped, pushed, punched and kicked. Once dropped by a vicious testicle jab from aforementioned Mr. Howar. I have lost my voice too many times to count.  Forgotten, flubbed and butchered books of lines. Cracked, splatted, skwonked and screeched a score of notes.  Inhaled the dust mites, mold, the grit and grime From house to house to house. Sang in perfume and lingerie departments.  Sang outside in snow and rain for breakfasts, lunches, dinners, Where no one listens, but jabbers and shoves food down their gullets While we, a mere quartet, blast Handel's "Messiah" at the top of our lungs. Once, swear to God, hired as Christmas Carolers for a Jewish party. "Do not mention Christ or Christmas" she said, leading us into the elegant room of strangers. So,  "Dreidel, dreidel, dreidel I made it out of clay. . ." Then, "Light the Menora day by day. . ." And then. . .and then. . . Ah! "City sidewalks, busy sidewalks, dressed in holiday style in the air there's a feeling of  . . ."Sh**!" No! So "Dreidel, dreidel, dreidel. . ." for the next two hours Till a lovely little woman approached  "Would you sing 'Silent Night'?  I love that tune." Saved! One summer, mobbed, attempting to hand out flyers dressed as Tigger  at the Seattle Center on kids' day. "Let go Tigger's tail.  T. I. double grrr let go Tigger.  Please, little boy, let go Tigger's tail. Let Tigger's f***ing TAIL GO NOW!" I have been too fat, too young, too old, too fit, too tall, and too short. And these, my favorite quotes: "In all his songs he left you wanting more.  He never seemed to bring the songs to their full emotional level."  --Dwight Jensen, Phoenix And this, ". . .All the charisma of a resentful detention study hall proctor."  --Joe Adcock, Seattle P.I. And my personal favorite "Greg Stone plays a cypher-like Chris." What's that mean?  Flip through Webster Cypher--Zero, a person of no influence, a non entity Nice! I have missed birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, my nephew's baseball games, niece's school play And almost every holiday. And coming home one year the look on my wife's face Hollow, sad and lost. I needn't open the manila envelope stamped Clarke, Dinsdale, L.L.P. to know. So why?  Why go through the pain, loss, torture, and fear? So many different fears.  The ridicule, backstabbing, braincramming. Why drink gallons of coat tea, buckets of hot honey water and suck handfuls of Ricola's and Fisherman's Friends? No more chocolate, orange juice, milk, and cheese--those phlegm factories. Cut back the smoking and the booze and save it all for one binge filled Monday. The Actors' Weekend. Why spend all my time on buses and planes, in cars that take me to my home A Days Inn fungus petri dish in Peoria, Muncie, Ft. Wayne and Saginaw? And cram my crap in overpriced tiny sublet NY hollows with Hell's kitchen, sleepless sleeper sofa nights and days of slugging slop to working business suited prissy pricks. Why?  Why? Why stand before the shadowy dark clump of humanity and sing to the red and green exit signs? The only points of reference in the dark chasm of audience land. Exits to the light I'll never reach. And regurgitate memories of pain and loss:  Grandmothers gone, puppies in PAWS,  and abandoning wives To spark the emotional release that two thousand wait hushed in velvet coverd seats to see Only to have pagers, cell phones, cellophane wrapped candies, sneezes,  snorts, coughs, and even snores ruin the moment. Why?  Why? Just this-- To walk the cobblestones of Montreuil Sur Mer past noblemen and whores to taste the briny air of change an revolution. To adorn a broad billed cowboy hat with polished six gun on your hip and sing the sunrise of an Oklahoma morn. To know the eyes of Judas, lost, confused, and frightened, yet filled with love.  A love that will so soon betray. To dance and move with practiced precision where all the world joins in with kicks and leaps and joyful laughs and shouts. To be an awesome ass kicking fighter, master swordsman, and expert shot To kiss beautiful women, young, vibrant, women and fall in love eight times a week. To release the pent up angst within and shape it into art. To Sing.   To Sing.   To Sing. To be lost in the world of make believe.  To make thousands laugh and thousands cry. To hold a dying girl in your arms and know that she and only she's your true love for all time. To see her tears and feel her fragile breath slip away like water through your fingers. All of these and more and more. But mostly just because It is who I am And what I do.