Orion Bradshaw
Bio
(M.A.T. / AEA) I am a Teacher & a student of Life. I am a Storyteller every single day & a Facilitator of Equity Justice principles. Constantly curious, ever seeking, attempting to lean into my fears. May the Learning never cease...
Stories (20/0)
A Lonesome Snow Walk
This past holiday season, my job as a professional actor took me to the picturesque Sun Valley, Idaho. I was to appear in a stage play, a production of the recently published holiday hit, Miss Bennett: Christmas at Pemberley. You know, the old Austen-ian story of high-class British folks running around a mansion - being in love, falling in love, and fighting off love. Feminist-forward, family-friendly fare. A perfect holiday story for this small, yet affluent mountain town. Though the process of building and performing this play was a fun one, it forced me to travel many hours from my home - away from my family, my people, my comforts. Additionally: on a "snow day" I couldn't travel more than a half-mile from my lodging, it was 12 degrees or below most nights, and I was housed in the childhood home of the famous(ly antisemitic) poet, Ezra Pound, which is currently inhabited by at least one ghost (who visited me my third night there, glowing and screaming at me at the foot of the bed, like a menacing and luminescent banshee). All these factors combined made for a bittersweet gumbo of isolation and cabin fever at times. Drinking to calm the nerves was a must most nights, if I'm being real honest.
By Orion Bradshaw4 years ago in Wander
Community:
COMMUNITY. What does that word mean to You, individually? Ask yourself... Now think about it just a bit longer... And now: “You’re welcome.” It’s high time to reclaim these two words within our vernacular, to transform them from cliché to genuine invitation.
By Orion Bradshaw4 years ago in Journal
Further musings on my 2nd viewing of 'BLACKkKLANSMAN'...
Further musings on my 2nd viewing of BLACKkKLANSMAN: In this film, Members of the Black Student Union and other black/ African-American activists state, on more than one occasion, “All power to ALL the people”... at the core of my heart, I love this mantra & appreciate its presence in this film, it being a period piece of sorts.
By Orion Bradshaw4 years ago in Geeks
Goodbye, Summer...
I used to mourn the passing of the summer. I’m just naturally more of a hot weather person. But this year, I am embracing the coming of the fall; looking forward to it even. If nothing else, I am relishing, awestruck, the announcing of its arrival… As I behold herds of Abundant clouds, filled to a beautiful bursting, rolling with a sublime and sloth-like grace over hills of new green. The air is noticeably thicker, no, heavier—especially in the evening and night time. I think there is a poetry and a message in that… An invitation to regroup and re-ground, as the days’ work hours expire. Flights of fancy that the summertime would tempt us to transforming into a newfound focus. An open doorway to a more mature awareness. To putting your money where your mouth is—even though your savings account is still a depleted one. To collect all the things you’ve learned in the past year or so, harness them, and do something truly exciting with them. And not a vacation type of excitement (I don’t always travel well anyway) or even a “staycation” type of excitement… But a ‘who the fuck am I about to be?’ type of excitement, just as full of fear as pure potentiality. There is a part of me who wants to keep turning this passage into a poem, letting a loose rhyme scheme or alliterative device do the talking for me. But no. Even at this very moment, I am learning how to let my prose be enough. Metaphor. Why must everything always rhyme anyway? Rhetorical question. To spend all that time, money and effort on being a better Educator... just to turn back around and perform in a couple of plays. Those two lines don’t rhyme, do they? I guess, at this moment, ABABABeeee... is lost on Me. And there it is: one last rhyme, dedicated to the summer, summer, summertime.
By Orion Bradshaw5 years ago in Poets