This upcoming academic year still harbors an assortment of questions for me. I am not sure what to expect, nor what is expected of me. I wonder about big questions like: “what will my major be?” and mundane questions like: “how many times can I have dinning hall waffles as a meal before it stops being socially acceptable?”- both are equally as stressful.

Now that I have divulged my deepest and darkest uncertainties, introductions are in order. My name is Seana Bruff and I am from Miami. I have been in conservatory training for acting the majority of my life. I have always been involved in the political world. It always intrigued me how the political process allows regular people to make a huge difference in the world. I like to surround myself with art, weird little poems and books. I firmly believe life is about approaching everything with a good sense of humor.

To properly portray a character, it’s necessary to identify the background, or narrative, of each person. I learned how to do this by studying acting.  What intrigues me most when reading about others’ life narratives is how their background, or upbringing, shaped them into the person they are today. It’s the small details that pique my curiosity most. Seemingly meaningless past experiences can have a huge influence on who we become as adults. I want to know what drives a person to take a certain action.

No one is more intriguing to me than Patti Smith when it comes to examining others’ motivations. Smith is the original rock and roll queen. My infatuation with Smith began when I was assigned a monologue from a play she co-wrote with Sam Shepard, Cowboy Mouth. The play was written in the course of two nights by passing a type writer between Smith and Shepard in a dingy room in the Chelsea Hotel in New York city around 1971. Cowboy Mouth was a product of a passionate affair between the two, an affair that ended with the first performance of the show. Shepard freaked out because the material was too close to his reality. Shepard deserted both Patti and the production. I happened upon a review of the performance that I found absolutely riveting. The review sheds light on the circumstances around the play and the reasons for the actions taken by both parties. The actor inside of me was hooked, I started looking into anything that could give me a clue as to why this scandal occurred. I found Patti Smith’s memoir “Just kids” and scavenged the pages for clues on her psyche, upbringing, personality and how she spoke about the affair in the book. Through all the information read, I only had one question in mind: how did Smith get to where she is?

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