Extra Credit #1: Karen Anzoategui's "Catholic School Daze"

It wasn’t my first time seeing Karen Anzoategui’s “Catholic School Daze,” I had had the privilege of seeing it earlier this year but, with my higher level of consciousness, I was able to see the pain, struggles, and borders that Anzoategui endures and overcomes throughout the play. Being an autobiographical piece, it began with Karen, a self-righteous, hardcore Jesus/Catholic fanatic whose mission in life is to help others, and complete the two hundred plus hours of community service. Karen’s worked so hard in life: she’s an at-best mediocre student, does what her mother asks her to do, and prays to Jesus, what more can Karen ask for? Eventually, a rumor begins at Karen’s school, a Catholic school, where, supposedly, she was seen kissing Amanda Rodriguez. To Karen’s dismay, she is appalled and shocked that this rumor manifested, even more surprised because she doesn’t even know an Amanda. Karen gets expelled from Catholic school for her immoral and sinful ways and is eventually sent to another school where she meets a new female friend. After spending time with each other, Karen receives a call from her new female friend who tells Karen

that she lost her virginity to her boyfriend. Karen, dazed and confused, enters a spiraling descent from innocence and begins to cut herself to feel pain. The scars on her arm and chest reflect the pain, struggles, and borders in her life, her religion, and now, on her body.

Anzoategui’s performance demonstrates how conflicts in our lives create borders, leaving us halfway stuck on a fence, not knowing which side we should fall on. Being a devout Catholic, Karen now struggles with her newly discovered sexual orientation, which stemmed from her body like the blood from her skin. Karen’s able to understand how the two conflict one another, that by being a lesbian is sinful and very much against being a “good” Catholic. Afterwards, Anzoategui begins, casually, to discuss her life where “Catholic School Daze” leaves off. She discusses her conflict and how she decided to leave the church behind so that she can remove the stress and pressure in which she carried. She was able to “ pick” a side of the fence she hung on to, the side that didn’t fill her mind with being “immoral” or “sinful”—a side that she would be able to be herself, freely. By removing herself from the Catholic Church, she was able to shed the pain she felt, and even the physical scars she inflicted onto herself. I admire the way that Anzoategui is able to openly discuss her horrors and trauma in a way that is light yet heartfelt. She definitely knows what it’s like to have borders in her life and, gratefully, she made the journey over and she is in a much better place.

Here’s a picture of myself, along with Aces and Diana, with Karen Anzoategui.