Goodbye Jillene. And thank you.
Mar. 1st, 2005 08:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fictionalI just got a phone call telling me that Jillene is dead.
I last saw her last summer. She had recently been diagnosed with breast cancer, but by the time I saw her, chemo had kicked it into remission. Her bright red hair had fallen out and grown back in black. She said, "I guess we were sisters under the skin after all". Then she laughed and held me very close, all six feet of her dwarfing me as usual. Thinner, but not shrunken in the slightest. We stood there, in the dark, on the porch of the Chalfonte, and she ordered me to keep in better touch. She cried when she first saw me that night, it had been so long. I promised I would write. I promised I would try and get down to see her new show. I didn't. School was starting. A new life. I thought there'd be time. I thought I'd see her this summer. A promise broken.
She was such a giving person, in every sense of the word. She gave me my first paying gig in the theatre. Her father taught me to design a show, lights, sound, everything. She taught me so much else, in the best way possible, by example. To always stand tall, and be proud of my accomplishments. To always show up to work with a smile because you know that no matter what is going on in your life, as long as you have that stage, that audience, your talent, that magic, somehow everything else will be okay. To demand perfection. To be generous with your laughter. To be brilliantly professional and yet always sincere. To be kind to others, even when your profession demands that your attention be directed towards yourself. To sing with your whole heart, to always be present, never shortchange an audience. That the best performances make little families. That beauty comes in all shapes and sizes, and to recognize it in yourself and others. To love your characters because if you don't, who else will? To use your insecurities like a hook and a knife straight into the heart of your audience. To always make your own fun, and enjoy it with zest. To always make time to give encouragement. That art is inescapable, and that if it's inside you, and if you work hard, and delve deep, it will always be there to come back to, no matter the age, or time, or place. That it is all art, if you know how to look: writing, singing, acting, talking, cooking, eating, sex, laughing. That any food is always improved by the application of heavy cream. She always seemed uncontained by any room, too funny, too brilliant, too vibrant, too buxom, too colorful, too much.
Her fiance left her when she was first diagnosed with breast cancer, a month before their wedding. She went through chemo, and then went right on performing, singing, acting, writing. Then the cancer came back, and this time it had metasized into her brain. She died yesterday.
The last show we did together, she asked me what song she should sing for her encore, as my special goodbye. I picked Edith Piaf's Non, je ne regrette rien. I wish I could say that now. I wish I could have told her all these things when she was here to listen to them. Now I can only hope that somehow, she knew what she meant to me anyway.
I'm sorry, Jillene. I really wanted to have said "I love you" one last time.
Rest in peace.
I last saw her last summer. She had recently been diagnosed with breast cancer, but by the time I saw her, chemo had kicked it into remission. Her bright red hair had fallen out and grown back in black. She said, "I guess we were sisters under the skin after all". Then she laughed and held me very close, all six feet of her dwarfing me as usual. Thinner, but not shrunken in the slightest. We stood there, in the dark, on the porch of the Chalfonte, and she ordered me to keep in better touch. She cried when she first saw me that night, it had been so long. I promised I would write. I promised I would try and get down to see her new show. I didn't. School was starting. A new life. I thought there'd be time. I thought I'd see her this summer. A promise broken.
She was such a giving person, in every sense of the word. She gave me my first paying gig in the theatre. Her father taught me to design a show, lights, sound, everything. She taught me so much else, in the best way possible, by example. To always stand tall, and be proud of my accomplishments. To always show up to work with a smile because you know that no matter what is going on in your life, as long as you have that stage, that audience, your talent, that magic, somehow everything else will be okay. To demand perfection. To be generous with your laughter. To be brilliantly professional and yet always sincere. To be kind to others, even when your profession demands that your attention be directed towards yourself. To sing with your whole heart, to always be present, never shortchange an audience. That the best performances make little families. That beauty comes in all shapes and sizes, and to recognize it in yourself and others. To love your characters because if you don't, who else will? To use your insecurities like a hook and a knife straight into the heart of your audience. To always make your own fun, and enjoy it with zest. To always make time to give encouragement. That art is inescapable, and that if it's inside you, and if you work hard, and delve deep, it will always be there to come back to, no matter the age, or time, or place. That it is all art, if you know how to look: writing, singing, acting, talking, cooking, eating, sex, laughing. That any food is always improved by the application of heavy cream. She always seemed uncontained by any room, too funny, too brilliant, too vibrant, too buxom, too colorful, too much.
Her fiance left her when she was first diagnosed with breast cancer, a month before their wedding. She went through chemo, and then went right on performing, singing, acting, writing. Then the cancer came back, and this time it had metasized into her brain. She died yesterday.
The last show we did together, she asked me what song she should sing for her encore, as my special goodbye. I picked Edith Piaf's Non, je ne regrette rien. I wish I could say that now. I wish I could have told her all these things when she was here to listen to them. Now I can only hope that somehow, she knew what she meant to me anyway.
I'm sorry, Jillene. I really wanted to have said "I love you" one last time.
Rest in peace.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2005-03-02 02:33 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-03-02 05:18 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-03-02 04:12 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-03-02 08:09 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-03-02 08:19 pm (UTC)I'm glad you had a lovely vacation anyway!
Love you.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-03-02 08:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-03-03 03:44 am (UTC)She knew, kali. Anyone blessed enough to call you friend knows how much you love them. I mean it.