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Ever wonder why Old People (TM) make such a big deal about Christmas cards or birthday cards, or calling on the holidays? Or acknowledging each other in the grocery store or gas station? I used to think it was because these were the things you did when your life slowed down and you had time to kibbitz around, talking about nothing. But more and more, I’m noticing that it’s not boredom, lackadasiality, or lack of other motivation that’s pushing these little connections. It’s the connections themselves. And it’s certainly not something happening in the lazy-river end of Life’s Ride.

These little connections are more of a high-five between two furiously churning entities, who are worrying, thinking, focused on, and collating the Big Shit. And they are far from meaningless. They are the interactions of electrons engaged in the Mad Business of Life. They happen at atomic speeds. We reach out to each other long enough for a nod, a smile, a, “how’s the kids” because that’s all we have to spare, but spare it we will, because it’s not the information in the packet that’s important, it’s the photon created by the connection that keeps the bonds permeable, malleable, open.

Little things have more meaning in Act Two. Maybe it’s because there’s more life behind them. The simple pleasure of meeting a friend for coffee means more, because I care more. And honestly, I’ve had enough of empty interaction to want to savor a simple experience of connection.

As a writer, the scenes I write that involve what we call “sittin’n’thinkin’” (or “sittin’n’drinkin’,” as the case may be, are often the Kiss of Death (and first to be up on the chopping block). Nothing happens in those scenes, which is true–there’s little action, and even sparkling dialogue needs to exist outside of a vacuum. But in discovery drafting, those scenes are often where I find the most meaning, the most significance, the most important and inspiring parts of the story, because the characters are connecting.

Act Two is where the Playwright litters the scenes with symbolism and thematic cues. Act Two is where you Get Your Shit Together after stumbling around some in Act One. Act Two is where your connections form your web, so that when you look back (or fall back), you have a life to support you.

Life, Act Two requires the good method-actor to shift into a different mindset. It’s not just a matter of learning new lines or stage direction. It’s about recognizing inside the actor’s studio of your mind that you are still the lead role in your Act Two. And it’s about understanding your character.

The Lead in Act Two is not the Lead from Act One. Remember all those mistakes you made as a teenager and young adult? Remember the reactions and interactions of those around you? They were all predicated on your status as the Ingenue, the Babe in the Woods, the Precocious little youngster out to break hearts and learn lessons.

But by Act Two, you need to have learned those lessons. Reactions and interactions with You, Act Two, are going to be different.

I’ve been thinking long and hard about my Act Two. I watch my peers as they go through the most obvious transitional shifts like divorce, which forces us to re-evaluate ourselves as mates and partners to other people, our desirability, our femininity or masculinity.

We all struggle with our aging, the evolution of our relationships. I’m fortunate enough to not have the divorce in my cards, but even without that enforced re-evaluation of myself as a partner to someone else, I still sense an evolving in my femininity and my concept of femininity. My concept of attractiveness.

I watch us struggle with our kids getting older, and realize that for many of us, there’s at least a decade’s worth (if not more) of years that have literally gone by in an exhausted blur as we did, in fact, step back or even off-stage while we assumed a role not as leading lady, but as Director, Costumer, Stage Hand, and sometimes Chief Antagonist to the stories of our children, while our own audience enjoyed a tasteful intermezzo of sherbet and instrumentals and perhaps a bit of see-and-be-seen engagement with a nod to the Society pages.

Those who didn’t have the children may have seen their story shift in favor of a sub-plot involving the introduction of secondary characters assuming the roles they once played, or finding themselves in a story that takes a different focus and direction towards a career, where the antagonists of economy, or of other life players failing their walk-on cues (or they themselves failing to cue their cast for one reason or another) and the scenery of professionalism conspire to confuse their stage direction until they find their footing just in time for the curtain to fall on the first act.

The curtain rises on Act Two and we are, first and foremost, its Casting Director. What role do you think you have to play? What role do you want to play?

This is Life, Act Two. For most of human history, it wasn’t a given to get an Act Two. In fact, it’s still not. But it is worth recognizing. Because it needs to be recognized and acknowledged, otherwise it’s a whole bunch of stage time that gets wasted while the audience fidgets.

People don’t talk or think about Act Two much because it’s not really in our nature when we’re living Act One. And honestly, most people just stop at Act One. For most of history, most people haven’t lived long enough to see their roles in the Great Stage Play of Life shift past that first curtain call–first through lack of longevity, and then through lack of societal role. Sure, you see maidens go to motherhood, and mothers step into the role of crone, but that’s in relation to someone else’s Act One. You see warriors move to statesmen and then to elders because they’re there as supporting roles to the next cast of Act One-ers. So it’s understandable that we face the curtain’s rise in Act Two and blink in the blinding brightness of the spots and want to take a step back.

Unless you glance to the wings, where the directors wait. Where you realize that, as part of the opening tableau, the direction of the play is actually up to you. You can cue the upcoming cast, as many people do. You can fade into the background, take up a supporting role as a new Act One plays out, until you find yourself an extra, and then part of the stationary scenery.

Or you can step forward and keep the lead role in your own story.