jan jan

lame postings lately!

i am in love with the new house, new boyfriend, and new president. (not necessarily in that order.) david has been in minnesota for a few days so freda and i have been batchin' it. yesterday she was surly most of the day, staying away from me (my theory is that she was in david withdrawal) until the evening, when without warning she leapt up on the couch and achieved full cuddlage immediately. since then she's been nice to me.

i have done a few things around the house since i've had so much time alone. i've put up some pictures/paintings in the dining room. i cleaned the kitchen and unloaded the dishwasher (finally). i did some laundry. i swept the house. i guess that's it, though it felt like i did a lot more than that. 

the next play i'm going to be in is edward albee's THE GOAT. we start rehearsals at the beginning of april. last night we had auditions for the part of billy, the son. it got me excited about working on the play. it doesn't hurt that the director is very effusive about it, and his enthusiasm rubs off easily.

tomorrow is my second class at st. luke's, where i have been commissioned by a parent to put together the 5th grade play. as st. luke's is my alma mater (i went there for 4th & 5th grades), i found it difficult to refuse this job, and it doesn't hurt that the hours are minimal and the pay very good. i will meet with thirty-two fifth graders for one hour, once a week, until may. while watching TV last night, i heard the following phrase on some commercial: "kids learn by doing." i think that is very true, so i am planning to decide very soon on what we're doing and jump right in to rehearsals, teaching what i can along the way. 

president obama

i am so happy today.

the sun is shining, the air is cool, the sky is blue. i taught my first class at st. luke's this morning and it went well. and most of all, i am taking a deep clean fresh cool breath of air as i watch Barack Obama take on his role as our nation's leader.

update

on sunday i cleaned. swept. scrubbed. flushed. brushed. vacuumed.

now we're all moved in to the new house.

on monday we had a fight.

on wednesday i finally got my room set up. 

it is covered in memorabilia. it is cozy.

moved by moving

the move has gone well. there have been moments of tension, but overall the smoothness factor is not unimpressive. 

even though i have moved greater distances in my life, this feels like the biggest move i've ever made. one reason is, i've accumulated a lot more stuff these past 5 years. but i think the more significant reason is that i'm moving in with david. 

after writing that last statement i sat here looking around at the living room. there are still boxes everywhere. i can hear the new chimes ringing on the front porch (thanks fran). i'm sitting on the new couch we bought and freda is next to me. 

today we are going to my old apartment and we will clear it out completely. i have been going there the last three days and chipping away at the stuff remaining; now there's just part of the kitchen to transport, and two large shelving units that have already been emptied.

love sky, love grass, love clouds

the acting marathon is over. i call it an acting marathon because it is the first time i have done three plays back-to-back. i am grateful for the marathon. it was at turns exhilarating, excruciating, energizing, and exhausting. GLASS MENAGERIE taught me the value of a supportive and engaged director (i felt the lack thereof); BOOTH taught me the importance of broad characterization (i didn't quite achieve it, but got closer) and sheer gumption; and TRUE WEST showed me i can be completely physical onstage (my right hand ring finger is still swollen like a small sausage). of course i learned other things too...

christmas came and went unobtrusively, though it is worth noting that i enjoy it much more when i wake up and share it with a loved one. it was nice to spend my first christmas morning with david.

speaking of david, we're moving in together this week, to a 3-bedroom house, and we are so excited. at this very moment, as i type, i am also procrastinating on packing up my books and shelves, dvds and tables, clothes and kitchen. basically, everything. today (the 27th), the house is officially ours, and david is at his apartment packing his stuff as well. we hope to be all in by wednesday the 31st.

so i went for a walk this morning, because the weather is like love. 

nature walk

i saw a whole lot of cardinals on my walk today.

snuggly

getting a little sick has allowed me to stay in these past two days, do nothing, and not feel guilty about it. it's nice. yesterday i watched mike leigh's NAKED and later, some simpsons episodes. david came home with all kinds of christmas cheer and we set up a little tree in the corner of the living room and put ornaments on it. i was dismayed at how much of a curmudgeon i've become... i had to make an effort to get up and put ornaments on the branches... that used to be one of my favorite parts of christmas. luckily david's ebullience was large enough to carry the both of us until i was ready to jump in.

today i heated up david's leftover potato soup and watched BED AND BOARD, the final antoine doinel movie made by truffaut. it was just the right movie to watch for today. the little decorated and lighted tree lights the corner of the dark room. i sit on the couch under a blanket with my cat. sometimes it's nice to be a little under the weather.

funny, one thing i noticed watching NAKED yesterday and BED AND BOARD today: both of the main characters deliver speeches about how they're never bored. that is something i have said for a while now, how the only people who are bored must be very boring themselves, because there's always something to do, or think about. 

vocabulary

my mom, sister, brother-in-law and nephew came to see TRUE WEST yesterday. i had warned my mom that she wouldn't like it. there's profanity and violence and i get strangled at the end. i just didn't think it would be her cup of tea. but she came anyway. i was shocked when afterwards she called me and enthused over how much she'd enjoyed it. i asked someone to pinch me but they thought i was weird and walked away. my mom even said "i think daddy would have liked it." strange. this is a play where i pee in the sink, throw my brother on the ground and spit threats at him, and hump a chair. and she thinks daddy would have enjoyed it?

in any case, i'm glad a piece of my family came to see the play, and i'm relieved that they actually enjoyed it.

in other news... david and i saw MILK yesterday. it was sad, inspiring. good performances. 

i'm feeling sick. i've been staving it off for some time but i think it's finally encroaching upon me. 

acting notes

i like "listen to the lion" by van morrison.

so my theory on why i'm hurting myself during TRUE WEST: during my college career, several of my teachers told me i was too much in my head and not enough in my body. these criticisms have nagged at the back of my mind ever since then, and a few years ago when i saw a videotape of a production i was in (eugene o'neill's HAIRY APE), i noticed that all the other guys on stage had bodies that actually moved, whereas i looked sort of like a head on top of a plank with legs. recently, while doing GLASS MENAGERIE, the director said, casually, not knowing the total-shock effect his comment would have on me, "your body is very passive."

argh!

in approaching TRUE WEST, i was working with a very physical director who, 12 years ago, had played the same part i was playing. he talked a lot about the violence and physicality of the play, and often told me that the energy of the acting was more important than the words themselves. he pushed me to be more aggressive in almost every single moment of the play. so when the performance finally came about, i was integrated more into my body onstage than i've ever been before. i think i was so physically aware that i actually turned off some part of my brain; or maybe more aptly, i turned off some part of my brain in order to achieve that physical connection. and so i wasn't keeping an eye on myself and my actions, but was just letting myself go onstage. it's not so much that i was losing control, but i was allowing the body to take over, and this quality, coupled with a few other things (the adrenaline of performance, the wrong golf club) caused me to cut myself a few times during the first few performances. 

it's funny when you're onstage and you hurt yourself, you don't usually feel it. i had gouged a small, deep gash into my left hand pinky and it didn't hurt. i looked down and blood was pouring down my finger. not until the show was over did it actually start to smart a little.

but on sunday, i was able to pull more head awareness into my performance, to temper the violence with a little observation, so that those physical mishaps were less likely to occur. it made the show much more fun and gave me more of a framework in which to play, rather than worry about what i would be maimed by next.

i'm learning a lot about acting. there are reviews here and here.

23 songs for winter

ah, i yearn for those college days and nights... those girls and boys on chapel street were so beautiful and voluptuous and mysterious, offering you their rolling rock and whiskey... she swooned when "cold cold ground" came on... they knew all the words to "the first attack" by the proclaimers, and they sang them full-voiced around the kitchen table... also that "we are" song that leslyn wrote... you were a genius in the kitchen with a single glance... and it smelled like dirt and perfume and beer and weed and books...

dave gave me a tape i listened to non-stop on a winter break trip i took with my parents. i sat in the back seat as we drove through the oppressive south. i couldn't have cared less what was outside those windows besides green fields, cows, and sky. it was all a beautiful motion painting for me. i was stoned and wedged in among the suitcases, headphones on.

SIDE A: ELEVEN SONGS FOR WINTER

1. PLAINSONG by The Cure

2. LOOKS LIKE MONA LISA by Michelle Shocked

3. CLOSER TO FINE by Indigo Girls

4. HEY JONI by Sonic Youth

5. MUST I PAINT YOU A PICTURE? by Billy Bragg

6. THIS IS THE DAY by The The

7. DOUBLE-DECKER BED by Phranc

8. TEMPTATION by Tom Waits

9. LIL' KING OF EVERYTHING by Los Lobos

10. TROUBLE ME by 10,000 Maniacs

11. THE PAN WITHIN by The Waterboys

SIDE B: TWELVE MORE

1. I FEEL POSSESSED by Crowded House

2. YOUNG NED OF THE HILL by The Pogues

3. SOUNDS GREAT WHEN YOU'RE DEAD by Robyn Hitchcock

4. WE CAN WORK IT OUT by The Beatles

5. GOD'S COMIC by Elvis Costello

6. KISSABILITY by Sonic Youth

7. WELL I WONDER by The Smiths

8. SIDE OF THE ROAD by Lucinda Williams

9. A PAIR OF BROWN EYES by The Pogues

10. BABY PLAYS AROUND by Elvis Costello

11. THE SPANGLE MAKER by Cocteau Twins

12. EVERY LITTLE COUNTS by New Order

(HIDDEN TRACK: PROVIDENCE by Sonic Youth)

 it was such a beautiful collection of music, each song leaving you perfectly prepared for the next, especially the transition from "sounds great when you're dead" to "we can work it out." 

i think part of the beauty of this tape must have been its tacit expression of my relationship with dave at the time, which was full of possibilities and love, and a certain degree of angst.

in my classic nostalgic manner, i am recompiling this tape on my ipod so that i can remember that wonderful period of my life.

refurbishing

yesterday was my first full day off since september 28. i'm not counting thanksgiving because that was a very busy day. since sunday september 28 i have had something going on, some rehearsal, class, or performance every single day. wow!

so, yesterday i worked on re-loading the new iPod. david took my broken one back to costco and because it was still in the 90-day guarantee period, they exchanged it for a new one. it was a pretty fun thing to do all day. i had saved almost everything on an external hard drive so i don't think i lost much. now today i get to go through it and find graphics for all the albums that don't have them. 

what's particularly fun is finding graphics for the cds people made for me. if i can't find a picture of the person online (facebook is handy for this), i'll find some other picture that seems to suggest that person, or to suggest the nature of the music they put on the cd. my goal for today is to find an image for every single album on that iPod. i'm into keeping it simple this week.

TRUE WEST opened on thursday and is going well. i have theories about why i have been hurting myself during it, which i'll share in the next post... stay tuned.

life imitating art

...but today i just feel kinda sweaty and old. tired, achy, withdrawn. 

our set for TRUE WEST is really life-like. it's quite beautifully done. we even have running water in the sink. the sink is hooked up to a spigot in the costume shop, which is just adjacent to the theatre. apparently, last night, the spigot in the costume shop wasn't securely turned off, and so the costume shop flooded somewhat. i got a politely infuriated email from the university head of costumes, explaining that many of the feet pedals on the sewing machines had been resting in pools of water when she arrived this morning, which means there may be lots of dollars worth of damage. 

though i feel some marginal sense of responsibility for this (probably more than i should), i have never touched the hoses, spigots, or anything else in the costume shop. i have this deep urge to write to the head of costumes and apologize, but i never pretended to have any relationship with that aspect of this show. my job is as an actor, and that's where i draw the line. i think it's good to know what your job is, to contribute without over-extending, so that's what i've done. i'm sure that this inadvertent (maybe irresponsible?) flooding problem will damage the relationship between AtticRep and the university, but with any luck it will make us more aware of our actions and responsibilities to be aware of how we treat others' property.

it's funny that it's happened with this show, though, because onstage we destroy property like hell, and mom returns and admonishes us. 

twelve-one-oh-eight

welcome december!

my iPod's imminent demise has inspired me to blow the dust off my old iPod Shuffle. it's one of the old ones, about 1"x3" and white. to load it and charge it you plug it directly into the port on the computer. it was given to me by nic huang a couple years ago and i remember being amazed by it (and even writing about it on my blog) before i upgraded to all the other fancy iPods i ended up getting...

i dropped david off at work and did a few loads of laundry at the laundromat. on my way home i stopped and got a soy chai latte. it goes well with the crisp weather of today. 

during last night's rehearsal i cut my right-hand middle finger on an aluminum can. i'm surprised it's the only injury i've sustained on that show so far-- we tend to get pretty violent. i guess most of the violence is perpetrated on the objects. we've destroyed two typewriters (one on purpose and one inadvertently); i mutilated a few typewriter ribbon cartridges (remember those?); the other night i jumped sideways and landed on a plastic mug which shattered; i broke a plate and a picture frame. for me it's kind of fun to practice this kind of violent recklessness, which i really don't allow in my everyday life. but i do sustain some regret for the broken objects-- especially that typewriter, which i pounded upon with a 9-iron. (it wasn't my idea-- it's in the script!) with any luck, all this violence will pay off and the audience will get some visceral thrill from our antics. 

the chill in the air makes me want to write, draw, create something. i like that.

attachment

yesterday was really beautiful here in San An. there was a blue sky with scattered multi-shaped clouds. as i embarked on my walk, a few drops of rain fell. i stopped and thought about turning back and waiting, but it seemed the rain was light, so i continued. 

across the street from my apartments there is an old road which was destroyed by flooding years ago. the road has been closed for a long time, which has made it a good place to walk. yesterday i saw that the road has been changed into a greenway path, a sort of walking/jogging trail complete with mileage markers, paved roads and signs describing the wildlife of the area. it's very nice, and one no longer feels sketchy about walking there. though there are more people on the path, and therefore less privacy or sense of knowing about something no one else knows about, it seems safer and is actually quite beautiful.

i had set my iPod to shuffle on the beatles. when i reached a point in the path where i was ready to turn around, the music stopped. i looked at the screen and it appeared that the next song was about to start... but it never did. i tried several methods of revival, did everything short of giving it mouth-to-mouth, and now it shows me a big red X when i try to start it. 

i am fully aware that we must not become attached to objects in this life, but music is different... isn't it? is it impossibly perverse that i gain so much pleasure from having my entire music collection in my pocket, so perverse that i must be struck down and tuneless due to a faulty piece of equipment?

never fear, i'm being histrionic on purpose. i am going to have to figure something out, though. i'm thinking i'll take it to the apple store tomorrow and see what they say.

in other news... i'm in another play. TRUE WEST opens this thursday. today's our tech day. things are going well enough, though i am at that predictable place of panic which always occurs several days before opening. if you live in san antonio, well, SEE it! 

a lot of thanks to be had

happy thanksgiving.

i am well. the play called booth was relatively well-received, i worked hard on it and even though there were some criticisms of the script itself (mostly that it was too long), i got a lot of postive feedback and felt that i learned quite a lot along the way.

as i throw a piece of wadded raffia for my cat to catch mid-air and bring back to me, i am most thankful for my own unique family-- freda (the cat), and my newly 32 year-old hubby with whom i have been together for six months as of the 29th of this month. i am very thankful indeed.

now i'm working on sam shepard's play called true west. it is at least as intense as booth was, perhaps more intense, and has been a lot of fun. tonight siggi was there and he took photos of us. not sure where they'll be posted, but check back here.

double bagging

today the checker at walgreens forced me to take TWO plastic bags for my "merchandise."

she was an older woman, probably in her mid to late seventies. her hair was swoopy and curled and i had observed her helping others ahead of me in line.

"the handles just broke on that bag!" she said, referring to a bag of "merchandise" she had prepared for a customer. then she said, "scary!"

so when i arrived to the front of the line, with a box of Dots, a stack of blank cds, and a bottle of shampoo and conditioner (all held comfortably in two hands), she double-bagged me!

"one bag is fine," i said.

and she proceeded to take a second plastic bag and place it inside the first one.

"i don't need two bags," i emphasized, thinking for a moment she was hard-of-hearing.

"the handles on these bags have been breaking!" she said. "i have evidence of that right here behind the counter."

so i took the double bag and left.

refuge from harsh reality

my car is stretched out on the couch next to me

its exhaust having exhausted it

present joys lighting the forest

which still and always 

carry their candles out the sliding glass door

carefully, with fur

and bullets.

various

it upsets me a little when people don't like obama.

more specifically, it upsets me when my niece posts something like this on her facebook:

"Obama is in "over his head". Looking at the photos of him and his family watching the returns come in Tues. night was very telling. He looked uncommonly nervous, ringing his hands before and after the networks called the election. No celebratory response, not even a smile. He' a novice and he knows it. BO was created by his party and they own him completely. He'll do what he's told, like the poster boy that he is. As for how it affects us as believers, it is clear that God is pulverizing His church into submission with one political disappointment after another. Watching the pagans put our dear Constitution through the shedder is hard, but politics is not our Savior. We serve King Jesus and Him only."

there is so much that is so wrong with this, it's almost impossible to react at all. i almost didn't post it, but by posting it i feel a little bit better about having seen it. it shouldn't bother me, but somehow it does. and you know, we pagans really should stop putting the constitution through the 'shedder.'

in other news, strangely related, i went back to churchill high school to see a production of arthur miller's THE CRUCIBLE on saturday night. though it is overdone to death, it is still a great play, easily applicable to many periods of history, because of people's unfortunate proclivity to demonize each other. besides all that, the students did it well. 

we had a six-hour tech day for BOOTH yesterday. i enjoyed it. we got to see some of the sets and lights, and based on what i saw, it will be a pretty show. tonight we are dealing with costumes for the first time. i am playing a harsh, egocentric, delusional tyrant with a heart of pyrite. though i have some things in common with the character, it is an extremely challenging role for me... but i am having fun with it, and looking forward to performances.

when i'm in my car and i turn on my left turn signal, it doesn't turn off. this is a recent development.

my cat is stretched out on the couch next to me.

i bought a pizza last night. it was half pepperoni and half jalapeno/mushroom. it was pretty good, but what made it delicious was some hot sauce david made. we ate it while watching iron chef.

president obama

the election of barack obama as our 44th president is the most wonderful and exciting political event i have ever witnessed.

when i first saw obama speak, somewhere on TV, i was riveted. by the end of his speech my spirits had lifted. i felt like what he was giving was a very necessary medicine for our people. we are so cynical about politicians, so jaded about the deception and corruption that has seemed to be taking over. it has become so easy to feel downtrodden about our country's affairs at home and abroad. but when i listened to obama, i felt a little glimmer of empowerment-- i felt like i didn't need to give up or feel hopeless about our situation. 

last night when i got out of rehearsal at 11:15 he had already won. i got these texts from various friends on my phone:

"Times square is a huge party!"

"Woooooo! Fucking awesome!"

"Sarah Palin is wearing BLUE!"

"Yay :-)"

"This here is what we call an election ass whoopin'"

i'm so happy that barack obama won the election, and i'm so excited to see how things change during his presidency.

sunny, happy, chirpy

GLASS MENAGERIE had its last 4 performances in gonzales, texas this past weekend. we performed at the historic crystal theatre. the town looked like the town in 'waiting for guffman.' in fact we wondered if any of it was filmed there. the theatre had a nice feel to it and in my opinion our performances were a lot more relaxed and interesting than they had been at the venue in san antonio. and... WE MAY BE GOIN' TO BUH-ROADWAY! ...not really.

the other great thing about the weekend was that we stayed in a cool old house in the country, with cows and horses and strange burrowing rodents. i sat on a porch staring at a field, took a walk on a country road, and felt myself relax a little. now that i'm entering into the final two weeks before BOOTH opens, i needed that small respite.

i think i'm starting to develop an actual relationship with the idea of my own mortality. i had a sort of death-like experience after smoking salvia a couple of months ago and it really freaked me out. as i have reflected on it since then, that freak-out feeling has begun to change into some semblance of maybe beginning to understand mortality outside the life-after-death paradigm. i guess what i'm trying to say is, i'm coming to terms with the idea that i won't exist anymore.

ps. jo jo d, thanks for your comments. i put your blog in my list of blogs to check daily, so i expect to see some action young man.