Today my partners and I brought our TMI Project monologue workshop to an awesome LBGTQ teen conference. Julie started things off with “Football Princess,” her touching and hilarious monologue about her gender identity. Then she did some improv exercises with the kids, and I was amazed at how they just jumped right in - so different from the adults we work with, who tend to be so timid about doing improv games. From there, we gave them some prompts I came up with, and they wrote for just ten minutes. I am amazed at what they produced in that short time. There were pieces about coming out, being raped, abortion, being bullied and called names, being rejected by parents and peers, being self-conscious about dancing in public, wanting a different body… The stories were moving and sweet and some of them were hilariously funny. We were so moved, and hope we get to work with teens more often.