Stranger 3
There was not one moment when stranger 3 felt like a stranger; so familiar in conversation and opinion that I stopped consciously listening and just enjoyed her company. Every social justice stance, every passionate protest for the radical upheaval of teaching methods, every sentimentally about missing home felt commonplace. Even her home felt like the stock image of a twenty-something share house; Typo décor, Lush soap and a futon. She asked how the project had been so far and I spoke candidly about my experience with previous strangers without fear of corrupting our experience. We spoke of commonalities – of the industry we share and the people we know. Of England and Wollongong and Shopfront and PACT. Over the course of the evening, her face changed; or, rather, the way I saw her changed. We had dinner at the pub, found dessert around the corner and returned to her house for some girly-gossip about “Hamlet boys”. I spent much time in the following days assessing my definition of a stranger, and whether stranger 3 had been alien enough. Technically, we’d not spent time together before, but the ease and comfort I felt around her was that of someone I’d known for years. Without that nervous tension, without the urgent need to understand who this new person was, or to understand a new perspective, I found stranger 3 almost too comfortable. My guard was completely let down.
I performed for stranger 3 on the 13th of April 2017 at PACT centre for emerging artists.
