Alexandra Ficken
@alexandraficken trying to decide if she should smile or not. I told her not to. Hope that was the right choice.
-Theatre-
I had been trying to talk to Allie since I started this project last spring. We just could not get our schedules together which is crazy since neither of us was doing “anything.”
We met outside her condo on her patio set on a morning that became progressively warmer. She is open about her struggle with self-care and mental health on social media and it always helps me take a deep breath and get out of the toxic positivity that tends to flood a good southern girl’s Instagram feed. Our similar upbringing helps give us a shorthand that makes me feel like my struggles aren’t superfluous.
We made plans for me to come inside her condo when we can be together without masks. Let’s hope that is sooner rather than later.
Interviewed 2.27.21
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Allie: Hello. Hello!
Casey: First and foremost, how are you?
Allie: Well, I'm better now that you're here, so that's my answer. I'm good. I'm taking it one day at a time.
Casey: Good. How have you been over the last year?
Allie: I bet you love asking that to everyone. Because (there are) so many answers right? I have been better. I have been OK, and also I have not been great at all.
I was pretty good at the beginning. I was kind of wanting and craving a little bit of time to settle into my new place, which I got just a few months before (the pandemic started). … So it was kind of nice to be able to be like, “This is my new home, cool, all right.” But then, I started thinking about jobs and money and realizing, “Oh, this isn't going anywhere. This is going to be way longer than a few months, a few weeks.” Then I started to kind of panic. My anxiety went up.
Casey: Buying a house right before Covid sounds like a scary thing.
Allie: I was like, "What the fuck have I done?" Because I was settling in. It was super exciting. And then, when I knew this wasn't going anywhere, I was like, “Why did I just buy my own place?” Which has been on my bucket list for the past, you know...
Casey: Forever.
Allie: Yeah. Honestly, I've always wanted to buy. … It was such a big step for me. So exciting. Everything kind of worked out. It fell into place perfectly. And then it was like, well, you have this mortgage now, and the world is shut down. How does that work? So that's when the anxiety really started to hit, which I've always struggled with.
I really started to panic when I thought maybe I wouldn't qualify for unemployment. It wasn’t until May when the unemployment went through, which was a huge pressure off. That lifted my spirits a little bit just knowing that something's helping. But then it was the stress of not getting sick. … And it hasn't ended. I mean, the uncertainty alone will keep you up at night.
Casey: Sure. This is insanity. How is your family? How are your parents? You're living with your sister.
Allie: Yes. That helped a ton. It did. I mean, she's almost eight years younger than me, so she's kind of going through her own post-college, "What's happening?" And then this. … It's so stressful, and I definitely sympathize. I empathize with that.
I think we're a good team because we have lived together our whole lives. But we both were like, "What's happening?" You know, "What are we going to do? How are we going to do this? How are we going to see our parents?" I hugged my parents for the first time over Thanksgiving and I just sobbed because I hadn't hugged anyone, really. We were outside, still, and I was like, “Please give me a hug.” And I just lost it. But they're great, they're healthy.
Casey: What have you been doing to stay sane?
Allie: So, at the beginning, it was hardly anything. I binged so much television and movies. That's something that I've always done but especially in times of depression or anxiety or stress — which is why I got into acting in the first place.
I've been watching a lot of documentaries. Show after show after show, movie after movie. We tend to have a movie on in the background, usually, instead of music. It's usually a movie that we've seen, like, 50 billion times, just to hear it. I like hearing the music or hearing the voices.
When the weather got nice, I was out here all day. I hadn't explored this new neighborhood, so I was checking everything out. There's all these parks and all these really cool houses, and some were for sale. I'd go creeping in them and look at them. But unfortunately, a lot of the little, fun stuff was closed down. It sounds so strange, but I was literally watching these flowers grow every day in the spring because I was always walking.
Then one of the main things I did that I wasn't doing before was I started dancing in the living room. I found my old pointe shoes and I just put them on again.
Casey: How did that help?
Allie: It just is something that I have known for so long, even before acting. … It's so precise. Ballet is so strict with the way that everything is, the way that you do it. And for some reason, I needed that, or I needed to remember that I knew how to do it and that I was kind of good at it.
Casey: Especially when what you were doing and what you were good at was taken away from you.
Allie: Yeah, absolutely. It was an opportunity to be like, "Oh yeah, I remember I used to do this all the time! This was a part of my life. I was pretty good at it." And, "Let's see what happens when I do it, god, 12 years later." You know, because I didn't pursue it as my career. I wanted to at some point and then I got more into acting.
Casey: Acting's easier.
Allie: Yeah, it's way easier. I had kind of paused on the whole dance world and ballet, that track of going towards a conservatory and going for company member. I remember taking drama in school and I thought, “Wait, this is so much better than dancing because I get to actually talk.” Whereas, in dance, I had to talk with my body. I thought, "This is way cooler!" So that's what kind of led me to the acting world. I started dancing again and I really want to take a class around here and get back into it.
Casey: Like you said earlier, it's been a challenge for a lot of us. It sounds like you've found some things that have inadvertently helped you cope, which is great. What do you want to take out of this, when we go back to work? Because I think we're all on the same page that normal isn't coming back.
Allie: No.
Casey: But there will be a time when we're in theaters again. What will you take out of this year of self-reflection that you'll keep at the forefront of your mind as you start going back?
Allie: I think one of the main things is not taking any of it for granted, even the mundane and the annoying. If it's having to wake up super early to get across town to do this one thing, I mean, I’ll still get annoyed, but...
Casey: No one's gonna be pissed to be in a rehearsal room again, I hope.
Allie: Right, right. Obviously, we knew why we were doing it. We loved it. But life was so fast, and it was so go, go, go. I think I've been able to cope through some of this because I'd had those moments in life where the things I wanted weren’t happening. I've always struggled with that. Because I want it to be going, going, going, going, but life wasn't happening. All my friends were getting married and having kids and buying houses, and I was not. Or this person was getting this job and this job and then booking this and then getting, you know, famous. And I was like, "Well, I'm not." You know, it was so easy then to compare myself (to others).
Casey: By “going, going,” do you mean success?
Allie: Yes. Success and prosperity and money and life successes, like children, husbands — so much of what society has is ingrained in us, especially in the South for women. I've always struggled with that, and when everything stopped, I stopped comparing myself. Because nothing was happening. I didn't have a lot to compare myself to.
But it was kind of a nice thing to be like, "Alright, I can. I can stop.” I can reflect on why I do that. Why do I compare myself when life is just going to be life, and it's going to be uncertain, no matter who you are, where you are in life, and what has happened to you? No one knows. Also, I don't think anyone really knows what they're doing.
Casey: Those arbitrary life goals don't always happen to people at the same time.
Allie: Exactly! So when we do go back into the world, I really want to take that with me. I want to be able to take not comparing myself to other people, with social media and these life decisions that people are making. I want to be thankful for where I am and not have to worry that I'm doing something wrong or that I'm not doing enough. I just want to enjoy the ride. Like I said, I don't want to take it for granted, even the annoying things.
The last thing I'll say is that I just want to be around people that want to be around other people, if that makes sense? I want to spend my time and energy with people who want that connection of a relationship because that's what I've always felt is the most important thing in life. But we get just sucked into the busy go, go, go, and we don't appreciate what's around us, the people that are around us.
Casey: Is it hard to try to boil down your thoughts on this whole fucking year?
Allie: Yeah, it's very hard.
Casey: Surprisingly, right?
Allie: Yeah, it's surprisingly hard to talk about this. Which is another thing... I recently found a therapist. I've been on the search for years. But also, in March or April, it will be two years that I've been on my medicine consistently, and I don't know how I would have done this without my meds.
I have been off of it before. I've gone off it thinking, "Oh, I'm fine. I've done the work and I can handle it from here." And then, like, a year goes by and I'm not in a good place again, and then I would get back on and feel OK. And I've done that a couple of times, but it's now been two years straight of taking my medicine. I think I want to talk about it with people more, about my mental health.
I'm sure everyone's talking a lot about their mental health right now. But ever since high school, it's been something that I haven't really been able to articulate, until now. I don't know if it’s because of this whole year or what, but I want to get involved in mental health in some way. I'm reading all this stuff and researching a lot. I'm listening to a lot of podcasts about certain mental health issues. I just think I really want to do something involved in that. That's something totally new that’s come out of this for me. I don't know why, I don't know how, but I want to explore that world and helping people.
Casey: It sounds like your priorities are starting to become realigned.
Allie: Oh, for sure. I just think it's so important. Some people can talk about it, some people can't. But I think as a country, as the world, as the human race, we need to start talking more about our mental health, and I think this whole experience has really brought that out in some people, including me.
