Maria Velazquez Hi everyone!   For me, being a Wapsi Girl means taking risks, whether through starting your own yoga studio or confronting your own inner demons. Wapsi's characters display the grace and courage of the everyday, even as they take riddle-some Sphinxes and cantankerous gods of alcohol.   In September of 2006, I decided to take a risk of my own. I moved to Washington, DC, where I didn't really know anyone, to start my first real job. I was terrified. To say anything else would be a lie. I kept trying to make friends, to really put myself out there, but I felt this great, huge fear blocking me in. I didn't know what to do! Worse, I was very, very lonely.   Then one day, as I was walking home after hanging out with some of my DC friends, I finally asked myself what, exactly, I wanted. This sadness wasn't like me. This loneliness wasn't like me. I realized I hadn't felt like me for a while now.   So&ldots; I decided to try out for a play. Specifically, the Vagina Monologues. A chunk of the proceeds was to be donated to Break the Cycle, an anti-domestic violence organization, and the performance itself was to be bilingual and priced accessibly, because plays-for-a-cause typically are plays-for-the-privileged.   I'm not an actress, I don't have a great stage presence, or anything like that. I tried out because I needed to do things to remind me of who I was when I was at my best. The Maria I knew cared about things so hard, so deeply, that she put her time and her money where her mouth was, and actually left her house to do them. She didn't set out to make friends, but because she was ecstatic with herself and her work, she made them on the way. She's a really great girl, and I deeply wanted her back.   Over the weeks of rehearsal, I felt myself changing. I didn't feel more confident, but I knew I was. I began negotiating my friendships in DC based on what I needed, not what I thought I wanted. More importantly, I began seeking out the kind of relationships that nourish the spirit, not the ones that just fill up your calendar.   I won't lie and say it's magically gotten easier. Being in a new place is still hard. Sometimes I just want to see my Boston friends or spend the night at my sister's. But each day, it gets easier... which is funny, because right when I'm just getting DC down, I'm planning a move across country to start grad school! :P     Maria Velazquez Website: