Planners

...okay - heinous admission - I keep them. I mean, if you think about it, and if you think about me, I mean...
OF COURSE I KEEP THEM.
THEY ARE INCREDIBLY MINUTE AND ACCURATE REPRESENTATIONS OF MY LIFE.
Or records of how busy I am.  You know - same difference.

Anyway, as 2011 draws to a close and I prepare to retire my shirtless-man-with-a-tattoo-on-his-chest-of-an-anatomically-correct-heart-with-a-speaker-in-it-and-some-wings planner, I found myself flipping through my old ones. Here are some gems I uncovered.

1. Found in the "Notes" section of June 2008

 Yes, this is comical because it is exactly what I am doing with  my life right now. Funny how, four years later, your life is pretty much the same.


2. Found in the back of my planner for 2009

 Yes, those are photocopier images of my hands and... well, my face.


3. Found in the front cover of my planner for 2010

I love this one for two reasons: first, I cannot believe I kept even the smallest memento from my first summer working at SSC, because I hated it so very much. I also can't believe I kept something from Claire because I barely knew her! (And now she happens to be my big sister/role model/bestie); second, I love it because my planner for 2011 has a sticky note passed between Claire and I (during SSC 2011) taped on the inside of the front cover! She's in the same spot both years, totally coincidentally!

Ricky

An Ode to Richard the Lion-breath, my favorite kitty.

Ricky has gone by many names in his life. When we adopted him as a kitten his name was "Rambo" and we soon learned that this was because the kid is bat shit cray-cray. We tried to come up with new names for him, but none of them seemed to stick (so for a while we even called him the Teflon Cat, ba dum shuuh).
We called him:
- Pablo (Pablo of the backyardigans, Pablo Cruz, Pablo Escobar or Pablo PIcasso depending on who in our family you asked...)
- Rocket
- Basil
- Mouse Feathers
- Fuck Face
- Death Wish
- Bruce (as in, the shark from "Jaws")
- The Baker/ The Baker Boy/ The Baker Street Irregular

We finally decided on Ricky because of the movie Local Hero. There is a character in the movie whose sole purpose is to ride his motorcycle at break-neck speeds down the road behind  other characters while scenes are happening. These characters then sigh and say to each other: "Ricky's on the road tonight."
Ricky, in his kitten and cat-let days, would rip and tear around our house just like Ricky in Local Hero.

Me n' mah favorite man

Many of my readers (maybe?) will remember Ricky from my last FWT, during which I lived at home and worked on my senior literature thesis. Towards the end of FWT I was continually sick with tonsil problems and one weekend my mother and father left me alone with all the pets. Ricky had an abscess burst on his face during this weekend so I, still ill, look Ricky to the vet to have it looked at.  My credit card was denied when I tried to pay the $200 to get him back from the vet, so I went down the street to the bank and paid for him in $50 bills, like a baller.
The rest of that weekend was spent reading C.B's Villette, which is maybe one of the most depressing books ever. Just me and Ricky, who had an abscess on his face.

All of this is to say, Richard is my baby beloved kitty and one of my favorite parts about coming home.

Minivan Christmas

Editor's Note: upon re-reading and finding many grammatical errors Okay, Em finds it necessary to admit that, having driven the last five hour leg of a twelve hour drive, she is a bit tired and will have funny syntax in this post.

SO: my parents and sister and dog all drove 12 hours on Thursday, northward, to come have Christmas with me in my little apartment in Portland. They wrapped all the presents, threw them into a laundry basket and came up to see me. The plan was that we would spend Christmas Day opening gifts at my apartment and hanging out, doing our traditional breakfast, ect and then all drive home together on Monday, the 26th, after spending a nice Portland Christmas together.
What happened was that on Friday, while my family was at Artists Rep seeing my show, the minivan was parked outside the theater on SW 16th and Alder and someone smashed the passenger window with a bat, unlocked the van, and stole all of the Christmas gifts from the backseat.
This event effectively killed my family's holiday spirit.
What we did instead was have a nice little blended family ChristmasEveHannukah event with Mona and Gabe last night and then woke up this morning and hit the road. That is how we came to have our first ever Minivan Christmas.
Amusement was had by all (except maybe Chrissy who was nestled in the backseat with a look that clearly said "Are we there yet?") and I have included a little photo essay of our day. Since I'm really tired and have little capacity for words.

Sisters in the backseat! 

 mmmmmmm truck stop

 Adding more M&Ms to trail mix... you know you've always wanted to....

Chrissy in her backseat nest. Tessie tried to teach her the 

command "nest" so that she would not crawl into our laps...

We watched LOTR III for most of the ride and were, unfortunately, 

at the part when Denethor is screaming to all of Minas Tirith that they will all die 

when we stopped for gas/directions/lunch. This is unfortunate because everytime

 the car is turned on, the DVD immediately begins which means there is some gas station 

in Ashland going to bed tonight wondering why there was a screaming man in the trunk 

of that silver minivan that passed through today...

 We stop for lunch

 Mona doesn't like to have her picture taken

 ...but I keep taking pictures anyway....

 ... and this impromptu photoshoot makes my father mutter "So gay..."

 under breath as he put on his jacket to leave and when we ask "What?"  

he just vaguely waved in our direction and said "This."

Car outside the restaurant

Goodbye for now, Oregon

Chrissy stepped in the yogurt cup

 Oee driving, Daddy DJing

 Home again: kitties on my bed!

Goodnight, Moon

... goodnight, bowl of mush ...goodnight, old woman whispering "Hush."

Before I say goodnight, here are a few things I've been thinking about lately:

Country Music

Specifically: how I would listen a lot more consistently if there were less (to borrow a vocab word from Mary Chapin Carpenter) jingoistic and violently prejudice/ignorant/religious lyrics.

[Editor's Note: this is not to say that violence, prejudice, ignorance and religion are all the same thing, but that this media links them with alarming regularity.]

The Outlander Series

Specifically: how I can't wait to talk to my mother about the theories of time travel/one's ability to alter history that are presented in these books.

Being An Adult

Specifically: how to make scary and seemingly-life-altering decisions without giving yourself an ulcer. 

More specifically: how to decide how you want to make those decisions; emotions or logic?

Bennington 

In the snow. 

Specifically: kicking up snow while crossing commons lawn on nights when the cold makes a ring around the moon.

Relationships

Specifically: those of the people around me.

I think about when you know what you want and how you go about getting it. I think about body language and missed signals and devotion. I think about devotion a lot and about how it can make some people foolish and some endearing. 

Air mattresses and brown paper packages tied up with string. 

Air mattresses and vegan cookies and wire rings.

More specifically: mine

What do I want now? I've recently spent time with two men and learned what I don't want: emotional unavailability, continual inconsistency and games NOR someone who can't spark my interest, bad diction and nothing in common. 

But these men have also let me see a bit of what I do want: immediate ease/comfort, intimacy and joy in each other AND generosity, clear/direct expression of thought (albeit hampered by bad diction) and desire.

I'm left with an Ikea mattress and no one in it but me.

Candles

Specifically: how the red-ish pink-y ones from Ikea smell great. Or how I want another rose scented candle but I think Bi-Mart won't restock them until after the holidays.

Oliver! The Musical

Specifically:  how I've been singing bits of songs from Oliver! backstage. Not during the show but before or after, as I set up or clean up. 

This invariably makes me think of Maria or the security guard I was in lust with from Dalton. I wish I hadn't been such a baby then, but I was and didn't know what to do about him. I don't even remember his name.

The Bug

Specifically: how I need to get it washed before my sister sees it tomorrow and stabs me for never cleaning off all the dust from my September trip up I-5.

My Grandfather

Every time I wear his old Carolina sweater, which is a lot.

Closing Weekend

Specifically: how am I going to navigate closing parties/drinking outings and have my family here?!

More specifically: how am I going to live without seeing Ruth, Lauren, Gary, Matt, Nate or Vana everyday?!?

Zo

Specifically: wondering how she's liking the snow east coast.

More specifically: wondering if two year olds miss people.

Going Home

Specifically: how I'm thrilled. And nervous. But mostly thrilled.

Tech Bits

Lauren made me and Tozzi t-shirts to commemorate our little nicknames for each other.
UMMMM, TOTALLY IN LOVE WITH MINE.

Me: "Nice Tech Bit"
Tozzi: "Tech Bitch"
Lauren: "Naught Tech Bit"

The picture is supposed to be of us all playing our role.

Spaces

Yes, it's shameless marketing for my school BUT: I love this video because it attempts to capture something that is so fundamental and essential to a Bennington education, which is the student's interaction with their space.
Lester Martin will always be my home, no matter how old I am.

Ak mak Ak mak Ak mak

I re-read Circle Mirror Transformation yesterday as I put together a scene breakdown. I feel incredibly grateful to be working on this project and I still cannot actually believe that I get to. The last time I touched this play was at Bennington, junior year, and I was on the fringe of the production. I had just finished Mahagonny (a project that  sucked the life right out of me and left me filled with Jean-Randich-light instead) and I agreed to tech Jean's Directing I class because, at that point, I would have washed her stinky laundry for her if she'd asked me to. In re-reading it, I was surprised by how utterly heart breaking it is.
My memories of it are all light and happy but I'm thinking now those are memories of how I felt to be working with those people and not of the actual piece. Circle Mirror is, in fact, terribly sad. It's moving and it's real and it's magical and it's funny and it's sweet and it's very very sad. I finished it and I felt kind of hollow inside, like I often feel after I've cried for a long time.
Circle Mirror is about how people hurt each other without meaning to, and about how those hurts can last. There is a scene where two characters are doing a theater exercise and are speaking repeated gibberish words at each other: "goulash goulash" and "ak mak ak mak". Slowly, just by repeating these sounds, James and Theresa come to understand one another. They share a moment when the absurd realization dawns on them both that, somehow, they've managed to communicate through this gibberish, and all the while Theresa's spurned love interest watches them. When I re-read it yesterday I felt the beauty of the ak mak goulash game, but I also felt Schultz's sadness as he sat apart, watching them. Theresa didn't mean to hurt Schultz by finding someone to connect with in James, but she did. They all hurt each other, over and over again in this play.
Tonight, Andrew told me that one of Annie Baker's major influences as a playwright is Chekhov and that she is writing an Uncle Vanya adaption. This only makes a ton of sense to me. I'm interested in what she's doing now but I'm going to wait to dig any further on that particular piece - I have a feeling this one will be breaking me a bit for just a while yet.

When You Are Old

When You Are Old: One of my all time favorite poems, by W.B. Yeats. 

I pulled it up the other day and just haven't deleted the tab. I find myself reading it over and over and I think it's because, right now, all I really want is someone to love the pilgrim soul in me.
You slay me, old boy.

 When You Are Old

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

Distinctions

Keeping Pace

My fellow bloggers (Maria @ http://mdifabbio.wordpress.com/ and Kinch @ http://silkinthediningroom.blogspot.com/) have been writing about our six month graduation anniversary, so I thought I'd keep pace.

I'm writing from the Slaughter's living room while Zo is napping upstairs and then, when Amy comes home, I am going to the theater for the 23rd performance of "Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Christmas Carol." I live with my best friend and I am trying to make some new ones. I miss Bennington nearly every day but, like Maria said, I know that what I miss most isn't there for me anymore.

I miss living only a street away from my favorite people, I miss VAPA at night, I miss VAPA during the day. I miss turning the corner to Annabel's office and letting out the breath I'd been holding all day, knowing she could solve whatever was wrong. I miss collapsing on to the couches in Booth, I miss curling up by Booth's fireplace. I miss rm 12 and rm 4. I miss getting excited about pasta night, about Wednesday mornings and eggs benedict. I miss Vermont mornings and the nights when the moon seemed to sit on Canfield's roof.  I miss hearing Jean laugh from two hallways away. I miss going to Rob and feeling better immediately.  And though the moon is probably still there and Jean and Annabel and Rob are still there, my place isn't. I don't have work in VAPA or a room in Booth. I don't have papers and books to discuss or class to prepare for. If I was there I would just be tracing the life I lived and not living it again. Maria said it and I think she's right - I miss my college years and not my college.

Instead I'm trying new things. I'm lying in bed and letting a two year old count my freckles (she got to eight). I'm  running dry ice in a new backstage. I'm learning new street names, I'm navigating new social scenes. I'm running auditions and copying sides and I'm taking everything from Bennington and translating it.

Yes, graduation was hard for me. Yes, it kills me that the people I love are so far away. But also: yes, I'm fine. I'm more than fine. I'm excited and I'm trying to make my Life Work Term a real life and one that I'll love living.

MUMFORD AND SONS

I opened this blog post to describe the concert, but now I don't even want to. It was pure joy and endlessly lovely. What fine gentlemen. I think I'll just stick to their words for a bit.

Winter Winds 
As the winter winds litter London with lonely hearts
Oh the warmth in your eyes swept me into your arms
Was it love or fear of the cold that led us through the night?
(Winter Winds was my summertime driving song, ironically enough)

Little Lion Man
Well it was not your fault but mine
And it was your heart on the line
I really fucked it up this time
Didn't I my dear?
(I wish I knew a man who could apologize this well)

White Blank Page
Can you lie next to her
And give her your heart, your heart
As well as your body?

Mama Murphy Advice

My mother has always told me: "when people show you who they really are, believe them."
I've always thought that was pretty obvious and didn't need any kind of iteration, you know? As a woman who holds a few grudges and can be (at times) fairly vindictive, I've never had trouble translating douche-y behavior into a sure knowledge that that person is a douche. (I'm sure this surprises no one.)
Now I'm starting to realize it's not about that because when it's easy to write someone off as douche it means that, on some level, you've always kind of known they're a douche. It's about when you get blindsided and immediately start to rationalize it away, change it, dissect it into something you can actually swallow. You try to make it smaller, neater or nicer than it ever actually was. What she was trying to tell me was not to. To avoid falling into the same ditches and to keep learning, keep protecting yourself, keep listening to those around you and to do yourself a favor in the process.
SO: as much as this may suck, I'm going to start believing. Because if I don't, I'll be at the mercy of my own feelings and someone else's indifference.
And for a vindictive bitch like me, that just aint an option. :)

Dry Ice Days

Apparently this is what we do after two-show Sundays.

22 mo old bff

My 22 mo old bff is a smarty pants.

She can: spell her name
             count to ten
             correctly identify each letter of the alphabet
             and sometimes pee in the potty.
Guys: she is not even two yet. This all a pretty big deal.

But with great genius comes, well, a lot of other things. Like sneakiness.
Today I notices that my darling-est little-est baby bunny of joy has developed certain sneaky behaviors. Primarily, she has a sneaky walk and a sneaky talk.

Sneaky Walk
This is not so hard to picture. Imagine a child deciding that each step must land as lightly as possible. Imagine a child trying to accomplish that quickly. Now remember that this is a very small child, who is still learning how to step in general.
Basically, Zo creeps about on her tip toes, with her back a little hunched over like in how people creep around on tip toes in old cartoons.
(I do a pretty good impression.)

Sneaky Talk
When Zo has lighted on a plan of action that she knows I will not like/try and stop her from doing, she has started to try to distract me. It's a very simple procedure.
1. Zo sees forbidden object (example: my cell phone)
2. A look crosses Zo's face as she realizes she wants the forbidden object. (I usually see this look cross her face.)
3. Zo looks at me to assess if I will stop her from having the forbidden object. (Yes, I will.)
4. Zo looks back at the object.
5. Zo looks at me.
6. Zo looks back at the object.
7. Zo smiles and waves at me, cheerily saying "byee byee!"
She then, presumably, expects me to say "bye bye" back, wave and walk away to leave her to the glory of her prize. (It doesn't ever happen that way.)

Little Miss Sneaky McSneakerson may be cute, but give her some time and she'll come up with actually sneaky things to do, I know it.

Quick Changes

Disclaimer: I'm writing this post here because I can't anything about this on facebook because my actors might see it and be made uncomfortable. This also might make my father, mother or younger sister uncomfortable. Sorry.

SO: Quick changes.

This is really the first show I've had to do serious amount of quick changes in. We have a team of dressers at SSC and at Bennington, well, I was in the booth 90% of the time, so I never hands-on managed anything messy.
We have A LOT of quick changes in Sherlock. Our shortest one is about 40 seconds (1910s English aristocrat --> WWI trench soldier) and I believe there are 10 in total, all in the second act.

This means I spend a lot of the second act ripping clothes off other people.

Basically, what I'm wondering (looking at you here, Kinch): does everybody think about sex while they quick change people, or is it just me? It's not all the time and it's not every time but recently I've come to realize that a big part of my job right now is getting men's pants off as quickly as possible and it just makes my mind wander a little.

Now, this should be said:
I do not want to have sex with anyone in my cast.
I do not want to go further down their clothing layers than I already do.
but I feel like it pops into my head a lot when I'm backstage frantically unbuckling a belt. Because when else do people put such energy into getting clothes off NOW?

Knowing my luck, someone at work will see this and I'll get fired and probably sued for sexual harassment and then thrown in jail and I'll rot away until I look like Otto from Sons of Anarchy even though I never said or did anything, just thought it and then wrote it down in my blog.
Actually - I'm going to go remove my blog link from my facebook right now, just until a few more posts have  shown up to cover this one.


No one really reads this anyway but Maria...right? Of course right.
I won't get sued...
right?

TO REITERATE: I DO NOT WANT TO HAVE SEX WITH ANYONE IN MY CAST.
(Kelly, please don't fire me.)