I was about five years old when I organized some of the neighborhood children to put on a show in our garage on Harrison Street in Paducah, Kentucky. Many years later, I started writing for PAJ. A lot of history happened in between, personal history and world history. I have spent much of that time trying to tell myself the right story about the world and me, including thinking about how stories are told, how languages operate, and what we can call truth.
I don’t remember much about that first show, except that I took some care directing the neighborhood kids, explaining when and how to enter and exit the garage. I was keen to use the elevated storage area at the back of the garage as an alternate playing area, from which the actors daringly leapt at the end. With my frequent performances in the religious rituals of...