I’m sure it won’t shock you to know that I was a very awkward teenager. High school was not my window of popularity or confidence, despite what it might look like I accomplished on paper I was a very annoying mixture of Hermione Granger, Anne of Green Gables, a little bit Patty Simcox and Sue Heck from that show “The Middle.” Always saying the wrong thing, raising my hand where I just should have probably sat there, even being the annoying voice reading the Pledge of Allegiance and the morning announcements. Or at least that's the way I look back on it. Maybe everyone feels like that a little bit.
But now, as an adult, I find…I’m pretty much equally awkward. I just mind it less. In sixth grade, I almost never mind it, because even at my most awkward, I still know that there is nothing on this green earth as awkward as a 12-year-old boy, so at least I’m still ahead of that game. And the girls are still just at the beginning of the cusp of caring what’s "cool," so most of them don’t mind me too much. And if they do, they tend to keep it to themselves. Kids are smart; I might not be perfect, but they know that spending a couple of hours a day with me is better than what they might have in another classroom, or in another school. So I do okay there.
In my high school, it’s different. I’ll be going along, directing something, staging a scene, feeling in the flow and focus of it all, and then *bam* … there it is, that awkward moment when your director just said “balls” by accident. And then snickered. Or today, when we were staging the scene that preceeds the Act One finale, and we had to have the conversation about how to “milk” the senior girl playing Milky White. I can’t ever handle things like that with coolness. I just can’t do it.
My students are kind, though, and I think generally that they all are just used to shaking their heads at me and forgiving me for being such a goofball. There is always that secret fear that someone is cell-phone-taping me, and there will someday emerge some website or facebook page or something that runs all of my ridiculous trip-overs on one of those auto-tune loops.
I’m only three weeks in, and this show has already won the prize of my Favorite Show Ever. The cast has already bonded, they are acting and sounding like an ensemble, and rehearsals feel productive, energetic, and joyful. It’s fun. AND it’s already excellent. How often does that happen? I hope everyone feels that at their job sometimes. No matter what their job might be. I hope that the surgeon sometimes feels that thrill of “I fixed him,” or that the counselor knows she’s given comfort and light, or the carpenter looks at a perfectly hung door and says, “I did that.” It feels so good to be the captain of a ship that's sailing toward Excellence. I feel both proud and humbled at the same time, just to get to be a part of it all.
I knew it would be like this, though. I absolutely knew, even a year ago, that if I did this show, right now, as my last show with this group, it would feel like this. It would turn out like this. The process, and the product. I’m doing very well at staying in the moment, and not getting myself knee deep in a well of sadness about losing them to graduation. I learned my lesson about that in my own senior year – I spent so much time worrying about the end of things that I didn’t enjoy the journey. Cinderella’s Prince has a line in response to Jack’s hysterical mother: “Worrying will do you no good.” It’s played for laughs, but honestly, I find it very poignant. Worrying will do you no good. I have a poster in my classroom that says, “Worrying does not empty tomorrow of its troubles; it empties today of its strength.” So, I am not worrying about tomorrow, or lamenting, or goodbye-ing before it’s time. I am just enjoying every day with this process, this music, these kids. I hope they are doing the same. They seem to be.
It's fun to be back to blogging. It's fun to have something to write about that inspires me as much as this does. I like having a focus, and a reason to write. Even in this long hiatus I had from blogging, I have been writing all the time. The more agitated I feel, the more I need to write. I am addicted to writing the same way some people get addicted to things like cutting themselves or, I guess, even drugs. That sounds psychopathic, but honestly, it's my therapy. If I don't journal, I get all twitchy and out of sorts. I have been hyper focused on my big Secret Project, and I am so boring, such a one-note Johnny about it all. I have to write it down so I don't bore my loved ones any more than I already do.
Despite the uncertainty of this time in my life, I can truly say that I am really happier right now than I have been in a very long time. And it seems to keep on growing. I hope that continues.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Saturday, January 21, 2012
And What Might Be in Your Basket?
People who know me roll their eyes at my not-so-secret fear of the world ending in December of 2012. I can't watch movies about Armageddon, the Apocalypse, or anything that has to do with life after people. I've been mentally preparing myself for this end of the world for a long time, and even my planner says, for December 22nd, 2012, "Faux Christmas...or the end of the world." (What better way to go than with the Faux Christmas crew?) My biggest bucket-list goal was to make sure I got back to Disneyworld one more time before the world ceased to exist, and we did that in December, so, honestly, if it happens, I’m really all set. I’ve done a lot of things in life, and I guess my biggest disappointment would really be never finding out how Ted met the Mother.
I don’t think that’s going to happen, though. More and more, I have come to feel that the end of 2012, and everything that will follow, is part of Malcom Gladwell’s Tipping Point. (This basically says that in every kind of trend or social change, there is a "moment" when it goes one way or another. Spreads like a virus. The point at which "everyone" is suddenly on Facebook, or wearing Uggs, or eating Greek yogurt. It is sometimes a slow build, but eventually *something* happens to tip it to being trend-worthy, or viral.) So much thought and energy has been focused on this big time, and I feel like the world is on the cusp of changing… for the better. I feel like 2012, and 2013, will be a giant step forward in positivity, joy, open spirituality, and a release from fear for many people. I know that I am the proverbial Cockeyed Optimist, but I can’t help but think that there are so many more people out there like me, doing their tiny things to better the world in their little spheres, and that eventually, maybe sooner than later, it’s going to have resonance for everyone. I think it has to, vibrationally speaking. And I feel like I’m a part of that. I have spent nearly 20 years in a unique position to connect with kids and encourage them to find their own best, uncharted, unique paths inspired by authenticity and a sense of responsibility for not only their own happiness and success, but others’ as well. I have learned that as a teacher and director – I’m only “good” if THEY are. Their success is the only measure of mine. And I really, really like it that way.
So, from the introduction of my new favorite book that I haven’t even read yet, (by Martha Beck) called Finding Your Way in a Wild New World: Reclaim Your True Nature to Create the Life You Want:
Find a new way. A better way. Your way. The unknown, uncharted path through this wild new world that allows you—yourself, in your uniqueness—to reclaim the full measure of your true nature.
Can you accept this challenge? If you can’t, I hope that you’re comfortable living in your cage—and seeing it smashed by a tidal wave of escalating change. If you can, congratulations. Your future will be filled with adventures and excitement. It will also find you charting your course in a new peer group. The decision to heal your own true nature, by definition, makes you one of nature’s healers. And as it happens, healers play a unique, powerful, perhaps unprecedented role in the wild new world.
She goes on to talk about how “Healers” are really just people who are living their true natures, and just by doing that, they help/encourage/teach others to do the same. Well, I guess there’s a whole book full of how that works, which I will be reading toot sweet. She calls these people “The Team,” and essentially, if you are reading, and if you’re wondering if you are, in fact, on the Team, then you are. I didn’t have to wonder that. I totally know I am, and have been for a long time. It’s caused me to feel pressured, sometimes, but I have recognized it and taken responsibility for it. (Totally bet you are too.)
She says that members of the Team often share some qualities, among them:
• High creativity; passion for music, poetry, performance, or visual arts.
• Difficult early life, often with a history of abuse or childhood trauma.
• Intense connection to certain types of natural environments, such as the ocean, mountains, or forest.
• Resistance to orthodox religiosity, paradoxically accompanied by a strong sense of
either spiritual purpose or spiritual yearning.
• Sense of intense connection with certain cultures, languages, or geographic regions.
• Disability, often brain-centered (dyslexia, retardation, autism) in oneself or a loved one. Fascination with people who have intellectual disabilities or mental illness.
• Apparently gregarious personality contrasting with deep need for periods of solitude; a sense of being drained by social contact and withdrawing to “power up” again. (This is a major hallmark of my character.)
• Daydreams (or night dreams) about healing damaged people, creatures, or places.
So, yeah. Kind of freaky. This book can not get delivered soon enough for me to learn what to do to heal the world. I’m pretty sure it’s going to tell me that I have to start with myself, first. Maybe that’s all part of my journey through the woods. This book will certainly be in my basket.
I will venturing through this snow-covered morning to paint scenery, carefully lettering the “Storybooks” that will be part of our pre-set, opening to reveal the homes of three of the main characters. I like that sort of work, though I don’t enjoy being up on a ladder. I am not the best set-helper, keeping that in the hands of my very capable tech-designer and team-mate, Brooks, but I try to always do a little something to contribute. This is my contribution this time. Or one of them. Then rehearsal, then probably more painting. All in all, not a bad way to spend a Sunday.
I don’t think that’s going to happen, though. More and more, I have come to feel that the end of 2012, and everything that will follow, is part of Malcom Gladwell’s Tipping Point. (This basically says that in every kind of trend or social change, there is a "moment" when it goes one way or another. Spreads like a virus. The point at which "everyone" is suddenly on Facebook, or wearing Uggs, or eating Greek yogurt. It is sometimes a slow build, but eventually *something* happens to tip it to being trend-worthy, or viral.) So much thought and energy has been focused on this big time, and I feel like the world is on the cusp of changing… for the better. I feel like 2012, and 2013, will be a giant step forward in positivity, joy, open spirituality, and a release from fear for many people. I know that I am the proverbial Cockeyed Optimist, but I can’t help but think that there are so many more people out there like me, doing their tiny things to better the world in their little spheres, and that eventually, maybe sooner than later, it’s going to have resonance for everyone. I think it has to, vibrationally speaking. And I feel like I’m a part of that. I have spent nearly 20 years in a unique position to connect with kids and encourage them to find their own best, uncharted, unique paths inspired by authenticity and a sense of responsibility for not only their own happiness and success, but others’ as well. I have learned that as a teacher and director – I’m only “good” if THEY are. Their success is the only measure of mine. And I really, really like it that way.
So, from the introduction of my new favorite book that I haven’t even read yet, (by Martha Beck) called Finding Your Way in a Wild New World: Reclaim Your True Nature to Create the Life You Want:
Find a new way. A better way. Your way. The unknown, uncharted path through this wild new world that allows you—yourself, in your uniqueness—to reclaim the full measure of your true nature.
Can you accept this challenge? If you can’t, I hope that you’re comfortable living in your cage—and seeing it smashed by a tidal wave of escalating change. If you can, congratulations. Your future will be filled with adventures and excitement. It will also find you charting your course in a new peer group. The decision to heal your own true nature, by definition, makes you one of nature’s healers. And as it happens, healers play a unique, powerful, perhaps unprecedented role in the wild new world.
She goes on to talk about how “Healers” are really just people who are living their true natures, and just by doing that, they help/encourage/teach others to do the same. Well, I guess there’s a whole book full of how that works, which I will be reading toot sweet. She calls these people “The Team,” and essentially, if you are reading, and if you’re wondering if you are, in fact, on the Team, then you are. I didn’t have to wonder that. I totally know I am, and have been for a long time. It’s caused me to feel pressured, sometimes, but I have recognized it and taken responsibility for it. (Totally bet you are too.)
She says that members of the Team often share some qualities, among them:
• High creativity; passion for music, poetry, performance, or visual arts.
• Difficult early life, often with a history of abuse or childhood trauma.
• Intense connection to certain types of natural environments, such as the ocean, mountains, or forest.
• Resistance to orthodox religiosity, paradoxically accompanied by a strong sense of
either spiritual purpose or spiritual yearning.
• Sense of intense connection with certain cultures, languages, or geographic regions.
• Disability, often brain-centered (dyslexia, retardation, autism) in oneself or a loved one. Fascination with people who have intellectual disabilities or mental illness.
• Apparently gregarious personality contrasting with deep need for periods of solitude; a sense of being drained by social contact and withdrawing to “power up” again. (This is a major hallmark of my character.)
• Daydreams (or night dreams) about healing damaged people, creatures, or places.
So, yeah. Kind of freaky. This book can not get delivered soon enough for me to learn what to do to heal the world. I’m pretty sure it’s going to tell me that I have to start with myself, first. Maybe that’s all part of my journey through the woods. This book will certainly be in my basket.
I will venturing through this snow-covered morning to paint scenery, carefully lettering the “Storybooks” that will be part of our pre-set, opening to reveal the homes of three of the main characters. I like that sort of work, though I don’t enjoy being up on a ladder. I am not the best set-helper, keeping that in the hands of my very capable tech-designer and team-mate, Brooks, but I try to always do a little something to contribute. This is my contribution this time. Or one of them. Then rehearsal, then probably more painting. All in all, not a bad way to spend a Sunday.
Each Time You Go
A snowy Saturday, with no where I have to go, nothing I have to do. I am brimming with gratitude for that. On this most ordinary of winter days, I am snuggled in yoga pants and a ratty old school sweatshirt that I found abandoned at the bottom of the props closet I cleaned out when I first started at this high school. It’s my most comforting article of clothing, one of only two things I have with the name of the school on it, and I have realized recently how very often I snuggle when I want to feel most relaxed and cozy and myself. It’s a battered, grubby (and technically, I suppose, stolen) symbol of belonging to a place I love, and I really give it more value than I should, I guess.
I’ve spent much of this afternoon focused on my stirring my potion, doing some research and writing that will help me move forward in my goals. I have also been flipping through my underlined passages in some books I’ve already read and found inspiring: The Power of Intention by Wayne Dyer, A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle, Ask and It Is Given by Jerry and Esther Hicks, and my most recent favorite, Steering by Starlight by Martha Beck. I’ve just discovered that I love her, (thank you, Andrea!) and that her words and life-coaching instructions are very resonant for me right now. (I just read an excerpt from her new book, Finding Your Way in a New Wild World, and I'm in love with it already. I just ordered it on Amazon.) I chuckle at the term “life coach,” because really, what that means is that someone listens to a client as they talk themselves into what they already know to be their soul’s purpose. I have done that very well, thank you, with years of obsessive journaling and actually listening to my own heart….as well as reading and heeding the words of the Master Teachers that click with me.
Since I have now chosen to focus this blog on my journey as a director in an attempt to get me to actually stick to it, here is an email I sent to my cast today to announce a change in rehearsal time for tomorrow. I find it funny that football is interfering with play practice, because back in "my day," the two were about as connected as watercolor painting and taxidermy. Disconnected fields. Not in my new world, which, really, is one of my most favorite things about it. Anyhow, the email:
Hi Everyone!
Well, because of some sort of "game" going on tomorrow, due to popular request, we are going to move our rehearsal from 12:00-3:00 instead. I know that this impacts some people in terms of church, so if you can't get there till 1:00, I understand...but please do let me know, as we are starting with "Ever After" and will need to know how to best cover for missing parts. (Getting how critically important each of you are to this process? Friendly reminder. You are needed and beloved!)
On another note...I know I haven't talked too much to all of you about this yet, but trust me, it's coming...This show, as we move through it, will soon become a metaphor for all of us. We are all journeying into the woods together as a team as we journey "Into the Woods," but the reason that I chose this show is because every single one of us is also journeying on our own, for our own purposes. For some of you, the experience of this show is a journey to friendship and connection and to becoming more deeply aware of your high school persona. For others, it's the beginning of your transition away from the safety net of your high school world to your life beyond, where the path is not straight. Regardless of where you are on your journey, I challenge all of you to begin to be mindful of where you are now, when we have just begun this process, and to pay attention to where you go, and who you become, as you grow through it.
I won't require it, of course, but I would suggest that each of you begin keeping a performance journal of this process. You do not need to share it with anyone, though if you want an audience and/or feedback, I am more than willing and happy to provide that. Either way, think about how you felt as you prepared for your auditions, how you felt about the casting (good, bad and ugly) and how the rehearsals are feeling for you so far. Then just write about it. I think you will find that as we go, more and more lines and lyrics and moments of connection will begin to resonate with you and prove to be instructive and inspiring for your journey, both now and in the future. At the very least, your journal can become a keepsake of a special time in your life, one that will have as much meaning to you as you allow. The more open your spirit to this kind of journey, the more powerful the journey will be.
Just a thought. I welcome your ideas and feedback on the topic!
Anyhoo...I'll see you tomorrow at noon. Please stay safe today...way better to stay in and study your lines than drive anywhere!
I wonder if they’ll do it. I hope they do. I walk a fine line with my high school kids…I want to be their teacher, but really, I’m not. I’m just the lady that comes a few afternoons a week and tells them when to cross down-stage-left. I know that I set the tone for the drama club, so there’s that, but there is just so much more I want to do, and can’t from this strange part-time, one-foot-in-the-door position. In this show, however, I am hoping to "teach" more, especially because there are so many seniors leaving me, and so many things I feel like I haven’t told them yet. I feel like Molly Weasley shouting her last instructions as the Hogwarts express pulls away from the station… “Wear your sweater when it gets chilly! Mind your manners! Eat your vegetables! Oh, and make sure you journal your experiences because you’re not going to believe how much you’ll change…” Never enough time to teach them all that I wish I could.
I think what I have most discovered, though, about high school kids is that while I don’t necessarily teach them quadratic equations or the finer principles of the Stanislavsky method, I can, at least, leave them with a living example of a passionate, creative life, enthusiastically and mindfully lived.
This show, Into the Woods, has been a metaphor for me for twenty years. If I were to write my memoirs, I could title every chapter of my whole life with lines from this show. And here I am, at this very pivotal crossroads, back in the woods again and realizing, more than ever, that each time you go, there’s more to learn of what you know. I didn’t chose this show for me; I chose it for them, in the hopes that they will find such connection to their own lives. But every project I have ever done in theater is most successful when I put my heart and soul into it as well, and so I am this time, listening hard to what this show has to teach me this time. Life-Coaching with Sondheim 101.
Ready for the journey.
Here are some views from my cozy corner of the world, snuggled up in the Athenaeum:
My snowy window to the world.
Sweet Ginger snuggled at my feet.
My year-round tree, and my current vision board.
I’ve spent much of this afternoon focused on my stirring my potion, doing some research and writing that will help me move forward in my goals. I have also been flipping through my underlined passages in some books I’ve already read and found inspiring: The Power of Intention by Wayne Dyer, A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle, Ask and It Is Given by Jerry and Esther Hicks, and my most recent favorite, Steering by Starlight by Martha Beck. I’ve just discovered that I love her, (thank you, Andrea!) and that her words and life-coaching instructions are very resonant for me right now. (I just read an excerpt from her new book, Finding Your Way in a New Wild World, and I'm in love with it already. I just ordered it on Amazon.) I chuckle at the term “life coach,” because really, what that means is that someone listens to a client as they talk themselves into what they already know to be their soul’s purpose. I have done that very well, thank you, with years of obsessive journaling and actually listening to my own heart….as well as reading and heeding the words of the Master Teachers that click with me.
Since I have now chosen to focus this blog on my journey as a director in an attempt to get me to actually stick to it, here is an email I sent to my cast today to announce a change in rehearsal time for tomorrow. I find it funny that football is interfering with play practice, because back in "my day," the two were about as connected as watercolor painting and taxidermy. Disconnected fields. Not in my new world, which, really, is one of my most favorite things about it. Anyhow, the email:
Hi Everyone!
Well, because of some sort of "game" going on tomorrow, due to popular request, we are going to move our rehearsal from 12:00-3:00 instead. I know that this impacts some people in terms of church, so if you can't get there till 1:00, I understand...but please do let me know, as we are starting with "Ever After" and will need to know how to best cover for missing parts. (Getting how critically important each of you are to this process? Friendly reminder. You are needed and beloved!)
On another note...I know I haven't talked too much to all of you about this yet, but trust me, it's coming...This show, as we move through it, will soon become a metaphor for all of us. We are all journeying into the woods together as a team as we journey "Into the Woods," but the reason that I chose this show is because every single one of us is also journeying on our own, for our own purposes. For some of you, the experience of this show is a journey to friendship and connection and to becoming more deeply aware of your high school persona. For others, it's the beginning of your transition away from the safety net of your high school world to your life beyond, where the path is not straight. Regardless of where you are on your journey, I challenge all of you to begin to be mindful of where you are now, when we have just begun this process, and to pay attention to where you go, and who you become, as you grow through it.
I won't require it, of course, but I would suggest that each of you begin keeping a performance journal of this process. You do not need to share it with anyone, though if you want an audience and/or feedback, I am more than willing and happy to provide that. Either way, think about how you felt as you prepared for your auditions, how you felt about the casting (good, bad and ugly) and how the rehearsals are feeling for you so far. Then just write about it. I think you will find that as we go, more and more lines and lyrics and moments of connection will begin to resonate with you and prove to be instructive and inspiring for your journey, both now and in the future. At the very least, your journal can become a keepsake of a special time in your life, one that will have as much meaning to you as you allow. The more open your spirit to this kind of journey, the more powerful the journey will be.
Just a thought. I welcome your ideas and feedback on the topic!
Anyhoo...I'll see you tomorrow at noon. Please stay safe today...way better to stay in and study your lines than drive anywhere!
I wonder if they’ll do it. I hope they do. I walk a fine line with my high school kids…I want to be their teacher, but really, I’m not. I’m just the lady that comes a few afternoons a week and tells them when to cross down-stage-left. I know that I set the tone for the drama club, so there’s that, but there is just so much more I want to do, and can’t from this strange part-time, one-foot-in-the-door position. In this show, however, I am hoping to "teach" more, especially because there are so many seniors leaving me, and so many things I feel like I haven’t told them yet. I feel like Molly Weasley shouting her last instructions as the Hogwarts express pulls away from the station… “Wear your sweater when it gets chilly! Mind your manners! Eat your vegetables! Oh, and make sure you journal your experiences because you’re not going to believe how much you’ll change…” Never enough time to teach them all that I wish I could.
I think what I have most discovered, though, about high school kids is that while I don’t necessarily teach them quadratic equations or the finer principles of the Stanislavsky method, I can, at least, leave them with a living example of a passionate, creative life, enthusiastically and mindfully lived.
This show, Into the Woods, has been a metaphor for me for twenty years. If I were to write my memoirs, I could title every chapter of my whole life with lines from this show. And here I am, at this very pivotal crossroads, back in the woods again and realizing, more than ever, that each time you go, there’s more to learn of what you know. I didn’t chose this show for me; I chose it for them, in the hopes that they will find such connection to their own lives. But every project I have ever done in theater is most successful when I put my heart and soul into it as well, and so I am this time, listening hard to what this show has to teach me this time. Life-Coaching with Sondheim 101.
Ready for the journey.
Here are some views from my cozy corner of the world, snuggled up in the Athenaeum:
My snowy window to the world.
Sweet Ginger snuggled at my feet.
My year-round tree, and my current vision board.
Friday, January 20, 2012
I Must Begin My Journey
One of my various bosses said to me a few years ago, “Aren’t all theater people just naturally full of drama?” I bristled so over that, and it still bothers me now. I, myself, like things calm and tidy and happy, and when drama happens in my little theater families, there is never a part of me that looks on from the sidelines, excited for the adventure of solving the problem or reveling in the action. (Not to say that I don’t enjoy a bit of theater gossip about other people…I totally do. But I am always glad when it’s not at all affecting me.)
This show started out calmly enough, quite drama-free, with a very exciting audition workshop that was full of enthusiasm and positive energy. Auditions went great, even though everyone who walked through the door knew that half of them would not be cast. (We are doing this one true to the script – no ensemble or anything. I did cast a person as Milky White, but more on that later.) At auditions, there were some standouts, particularly the girl who was cast as the Witch, a junior, who had the single best high school audition I have ever seen for anything, anywhere. It was thrilling to watch her rise and conquer with such apparent ease, and every single person there knew, when they left, that she would get the part. Oh, how I love when it’s that easy. The guys were much harder to cast, and it took some long discussion on the casting board to weigh the pros and cons of each person in each role. We finished, though, and I left feeling glad that most of my seniors were going to be happy, and that there wasn’t anyone that I would truly devastate.
I’m generally quick in my casting, instinctive and decisive, and I very nearly always do it in one day, and email the list that night. There is the time between making the decisions with the team, to then getting home, getting into my pajama pants, pouring the chardonnay, composing the thank you all for coming I wish I could cast you all blah blah blah email, and hitting send. That part of the drama I like, actually. That breathless moment just before, when everyone still feels like anything can happen and they still have a chance. Then I hit send, and the destinies for a major important piece of each kid’s year are determined. By me. And then I duck and cover. It used to be that I was friends with the high school kids on Facebook, so I could immediately eavesdrop on the buzz, the proclamations, the bitching, but I am not allowed to be “friends” with them now until they graduate. Which, believe me, is really just as well.
Then, often kids will email me back with a thank you or a hooray or a what-did-I-do-wrong, which I answer appropriately, and then I trudge wearily to sleep, still wound and worried. Excited and scared. The next day, when the parent emails and phone calls come, as they inevitably do, I try to handle them with grace and compassion. Sometimes I am better at that than others. This particular show, because of the intensity of the kids’ enthusiasm for it, and because of the fact that the fall musical cast was so large and so many kids wanted to come back, I had more of those interactions than usual. It was draining, and in one case made me very sad, but it’s part of the job.
One mom, however, of a freshman girl who was not cast, wrote to me about how her child had so enjoyed the audition experience, and tried out despite major conflicts just for the learning, and how the group of seniors that are our leaders are so inspiring and kind and supportive, and congratulated me for building a group that everyone wants to be a part of. It turned out that this freshman girl was actually very spectacular, and had she not had conflicts, she very well might have gotten the part of Little Red Ridinghood over the sophomore who ultimately earned the role. And not because her Mommy was nice to me, either.
Rehearsals began, and immediately exceeded expectations. The kids so far are very serious, totally committed, and seem to understand how very ambitious it is for all of us to expect that we can pull of a very complicated Sondheim musical in less than two months. But they’re all in it, a little more than ankle deep in the journey so far.
In the dramatic way that dramatic things happen in drama clubs, several days ago, the girl who is playing Little Red discovered an immovable conflict for the second night of the show. Due to the nature of “theater people,” as my former boss had explained, by all rights I should have been doing some serious freaking out. But I didn’t. Because generally speaking, I don’t. I talked it over with my Zen Master Musical Director (more on the wonders of this lovely man another time), calmly called my supervisor (the nice one), and worked out a plan. No crying, gnashing of teeth, flipping of any kind. I let the girl we cast keep the role for Friday night, and the girl with the lovely mother, and the fabulous audition, will play it on Saturday. Win win. I love a win win.
That’s some of the background on where we are at so far in this production.
In other related news, my potion-making, magic-seeking project hit a snag yesterday. Might be the end-game, but might also be just a road-block. The hair was pulled from a maiden in a tower instead of the ear of corn, that sort of thing. (Look, if you’ve never seen Into the Woods, this blog is going to get very freaking boring very fast. Might be there already.) I am holding fast to my faith in the fact that things happen for a reason. If something doesn’t go the way you want it to, it’s always because there is something better around the bend in the road. Some higher purpose or destiny that you are supposed to inherit. I’m always on the lookout for that. I’m not giving up my dream, though, without a fight. To mix my theatrical metaphors, I’m going to the mattresses. When you know what you need then you go and you find it and you get it.
Journeying on.
This show started out calmly enough, quite drama-free, with a very exciting audition workshop that was full of enthusiasm and positive energy. Auditions went great, even though everyone who walked through the door knew that half of them would not be cast. (We are doing this one true to the script – no ensemble or anything. I did cast a person as Milky White, but more on that later.) At auditions, there were some standouts, particularly the girl who was cast as the Witch, a junior, who had the single best high school audition I have ever seen for anything, anywhere. It was thrilling to watch her rise and conquer with such apparent ease, and every single person there knew, when they left, that she would get the part. Oh, how I love when it’s that easy. The guys were much harder to cast, and it took some long discussion on the casting board to weigh the pros and cons of each person in each role. We finished, though, and I left feeling glad that most of my seniors were going to be happy, and that there wasn’t anyone that I would truly devastate.
I’m generally quick in my casting, instinctive and decisive, and I very nearly always do it in one day, and email the list that night. There is the time between making the decisions with the team, to then getting home, getting into my pajama pants, pouring the chardonnay, composing the thank you all for coming I wish I could cast you all blah blah blah email, and hitting send. That part of the drama I like, actually. That breathless moment just before, when everyone still feels like anything can happen and they still have a chance. Then I hit send, and the destinies for a major important piece of each kid’s year are determined. By me. And then I duck and cover. It used to be that I was friends with the high school kids on Facebook, so I could immediately eavesdrop on the buzz, the proclamations, the bitching, but I am not allowed to be “friends” with them now until they graduate. Which, believe me, is really just as well.
Then, often kids will email me back with a thank you or a hooray or a what-did-I-do-wrong, which I answer appropriately, and then I trudge wearily to sleep, still wound and worried. Excited and scared. The next day, when the parent emails and phone calls come, as they inevitably do, I try to handle them with grace and compassion. Sometimes I am better at that than others. This particular show, because of the intensity of the kids’ enthusiasm for it, and because of the fact that the fall musical cast was so large and so many kids wanted to come back, I had more of those interactions than usual. It was draining, and in one case made me very sad, but it’s part of the job.
One mom, however, of a freshman girl who was not cast, wrote to me about how her child had so enjoyed the audition experience, and tried out despite major conflicts just for the learning, and how the group of seniors that are our leaders are so inspiring and kind and supportive, and congratulated me for building a group that everyone wants to be a part of. It turned out that this freshman girl was actually very spectacular, and had she not had conflicts, she very well might have gotten the part of Little Red Ridinghood over the sophomore who ultimately earned the role. And not because her Mommy was nice to me, either.
Rehearsals began, and immediately exceeded expectations. The kids so far are very serious, totally committed, and seem to understand how very ambitious it is for all of us to expect that we can pull of a very complicated Sondheim musical in less than two months. But they’re all in it, a little more than ankle deep in the journey so far.
In the dramatic way that dramatic things happen in drama clubs, several days ago, the girl who is playing Little Red discovered an immovable conflict for the second night of the show. Due to the nature of “theater people,” as my former boss had explained, by all rights I should have been doing some serious freaking out. But I didn’t. Because generally speaking, I don’t. I talked it over with my Zen Master Musical Director (more on the wonders of this lovely man another time), calmly called my supervisor (the nice one), and worked out a plan. No crying, gnashing of teeth, flipping of any kind. I let the girl we cast keep the role for Friday night, and the girl with the lovely mother, and the fabulous audition, will play it on Saturday. Win win. I love a win win.
That’s some of the background on where we are at so far in this production.
In other related news, my potion-making, magic-seeking project hit a snag yesterday. Might be the end-game, but might also be just a road-block. The hair was pulled from a maiden in a tower instead of the ear of corn, that sort of thing. (Look, if you’ve never seen Into the Woods, this blog is going to get very freaking boring very fast. Might be there already.) I am holding fast to my faith in the fact that things happen for a reason. If something doesn’t go the way you want it to, it’s always because there is something better around the bend in the road. Some higher purpose or destiny that you are supposed to inherit. I’m always on the lookout for that. I’m not giving up my dream, though, without a fight. To mix my theatrical metaphors, I’m going to the mattresses. When you know what you need then you go and you find it and you get it.
Journeying on.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Into the Woods
I know. You’ve forgotten my name. Removed my bookmark or tab or what ever little corner of your web that I wove in. I’m attempting a come-back.
I made recently made a list of goals for 2012, as I have made for every year that I can remember. Some of my goals for 2012 are simple: Wear a dress at least twice to a week to remember that I’m still a girl. Paint the sunporch. Read the Game of Thrones series. Finally learn yoga, dammit. A return to blogging is on that list, so I am trying to figure out how best to go about that.
I am dwelling in a very intense time right now. My brain is intensely awhirl, even more than usual. I am directing a play, one of my very favorite shows, “Into the Woods,” and it is, without compare, the most excited and inspired I have ever felt as a director. Even more than when I wrote a play. I have had this special group for four years, and I want to truly enjoy the rest of the time we have together. I want to guide them to make something special, for the audience, but way way more importantly, for themselves. I want them to make a journey. I want them to learn something about their own spirits, and about love, about choice and consequence, about the ways in which you hold and release people, and how to let them stay a part of you even when you let them go. No one is alone. So, there’s that. And I think I really want to write about that, about what happens to some of them. I have to protect everyone’s privacy, of course, but I can write some things.
In this process, however, I am making a journey, too. I have hit a very definite crossroads in my life, a fork in the road, and I need to make a choice about which way to go. Or rather, I need to wait for some other people to make the choices that will illuminate my path and allow me to follow it. My path is not straight, and not certain. I know what I wish, and I have done all that I can to make my wish come true, collected my ingredients, made the potion. Now I just need to wait for the “witch” to grant my wish. In the meantime, I am watching everything around me with eyes wide open, trying to make sure that I don’t exchange a cow for magic beans. That is…well, whatever the term for “vaguebooking” is in blogging terms. It’s a thing that I really want to talk about, but can’t yet. I have journaled about very little else for several months now, so I can retroactively share that part of the journey when the time is right. Stay tuned.
The part I can do, while I wait, is to very seriously cast some magic spells of my own, like I did when I was trying to get my house. I am sitting in that very house now, just as I had envisioned, by the light of my Christmas tree, which is still up, and lit. Don’t judge me. The point is, my house is a very concrete example of the fact that I am a little bit magical when I put my mind to it.
So, along with my Big Wish, I am putting my mind to this show, and I think I would really like to share that journey, if you’re interested.
I made recently made a list of goals for 2012, as I have made for every year that I can remember. Some of my goals for 2012 are simple: Wear a dress at least twice to a week to remember that I’m still a girl. Paint the sunporch. Read the Game of Thrones series. Finally learn yoga, dammit. A return to blogging is on that list, so I am trying to figure out how best to go about that.
I am dwelling in a very intense time right now. My brain is intensely awhirl, even more than usual. I am directing a play, one of my very favorite shows, “Into the Woods,” and it is, without compare, the most excited and inspired I have ever felt as a director. Even more than when I wrote a play. I have had this special group for four years, and I want to truly enjoy the rest of the time we have together. I want to guide them to make something special, for the audience, but way way more importantly, for themselves. I want them to make a journey. I want them to learn something about their own spirits, and about love, about choice and consequence, about the ways in which you hold and release people, and how to let them stay a part of you even when you let them go. No one is alone. So, there’s that. And I think I really want to write about that, about what happens to some of them. I have to protect everyone’s privacy, of course, but I can write some things.
In this process, however, I am making a journey, too. I have hit a very definite crossroads in my life, a fork in the road, and I need to make a choice about which way to go. Or rather, I need to wait for some other people to make the choices that will illuminate my path and allow me to follow it. My path is not straight, and not certain. I know what I wish, and I have done all that I can to make my wish come true, collected my ingredients, made the potion. Now I just need to wait for the “witch” to grant my wish. In the meantime, I am watching everything around me with eyes wide open, trying to make sure that I don’t exchange a cow for magic beans. That is…well, whatever the term for “vaguebooking” is in blogging terms. It’s a thing that I really want to talk about, but can’t yet. I have journaled about very little else for several months now, so I can retroactively share that part of the journey when the time is right. Stay tuned.
The part I can do, while I wait, is to very seriously cast some magic spells of my own, like I did when I was trying to get my house. I am sitting in that very house now, just as I had envisioned, by the light of my Christmas tree, which is still up, and lit. Don’t judge me. The point is, my house is a very concrete example of the fact that I am a little bit magical when I put my mind to it.
So, along with my Big Wish, I am putting my mind to this show, and I think I would really like to share that journey, if you’re interested.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
A Flight of Fancy
It’s a whirlwind, and then comes a moment when my students are off at gym class, and I sit with my cup of Starbucks instant coffee, and the sun streaming in on the stack of Tuck Everlasting comprehension questions I’m trying to correct, and one of my favorite songs comes on my Pandora radio station. (“It Might Be You,” the love theme from Tootsie, “Rocky Mountain High” by John Denver, or “Muskrat Love” by the Captain and Tennille…it’s a Carpenters-based 1970’s soft-rock Pandora station, and I have lovingly honed it over the past two years to eliminate all traces of Neil Diamond. That radio station is on my list of Favorite Things in Life.) Anyway, I take my little ten minute vacation, look out my classroom window at the wilting sunflowers in the school’s organic garden outside my window (of which I have the best view in the school) and try to release my shoulders, breathe, and not think about my to-do list taped to my planner, sitting on top of my rehearsal binder, on top of another stack of papers I still need to correct.
In those moments, I want to write.
I’ve been thinking lately about how often I write things like, “I’m in transition.” Or, “I feel like something is coming around the bend in the road.” I’ve been saying that, seasonally, for like thirty years. I’m pretty sure it’s time now to just accept that nothing is permanent, and we are always in transition. There is not one thing you can totally count on staying permanent except change itself. Nothing is for sure but death and taxes, isn’t that the old saying? Except death, in my mind, is really its own kind of change, so I guess that just leaves taxes.
Yes, I am in transition. I am in a state of Permanent Transition, a lifetime long. And how I love that. I have grown so certain that my life is exactly what I make of it, every single day. I suppose that soon I will ceased to be surprised at how very powerfully the things I dream of and plan for come to be. But I’m not there yet. I’m still shocked and delighted that the Universe does, in fact, take care of all of the “hows” if I only believe strongly enough in the end game. I can’t know the roads I’ll follow to get to where I want to be, but I know that if I believe in it, I’ll get there.
So, maybe my biggest transition right now is to decide what I want to do next. I talk about being a “writer,” but the thing is…if writing a book were really that important to me, the thing that sets my soul aflame…I would be doing it. It’s out there, a thing that I vaguely aspire to, like learning yoga. But its time hasn’t come yet. I’m spending my creativity on putting on high school plays and journaling and trying to raise daughters with a sense of whimsy and celebration. I’m so present in those tasks – too present, sometimes, I know – and I am not currently making room for anything else.
In the past several years, I have been totally, utterly okay with that. Or, at least, I have been until very recently, when I’ve begun to ask myself, “What next?” I have done the blogging thing. I have written plays. I have gotten my darling house. I am about to receive a gift of the most epic proportions, which I can’t tell you yet for three more weeks, but trust me, it’s been WAY UP on my list of Big Dreams that I had no idea how I could possibly make come true, and it’s coming true with no effort whatsoever on my part except the wanting.
What to dream now?
At the end of this school year, I will graduate a group of seniors who, along with three that graduated last year, will be the students that I have known and loved very much. They were the class that loved and lost Matt, who experienced that unique heartache and found solace in the community I helped to build. One student, in particular, will be my hardest ever goodbye. Ever. There’s something about this coming event that is hitting me hard, and making me feel like it’s time to make some big changes. (Though my choice of their final show will be exactly the right thing to honor their journey.) This is my 7th year at that High School. Is it the seven year itch? Next year both girls will be in Middle School. Do I still want to be in middle school? I don’t know. I just don’t know. But I’m finding myself starting to ask some new questions.
Stay tuned, if you’d like, and be forgiving, if you would, of my lack of consistency in blogging. I often aspire to do it more often, but when it becomes another thing on the to-do list, I feel like I have nothing worth saying. I have to just do it when the fancy strikes, I guess.
So…thanks.
In those moments, I want to write.
I’ve been thinking lately about how often I write things like, “I’m in transition.” Or, “I feel like something is coming around the bend in the road.” I’ve been saying that, seasonally, for like thirty years. I’m pretty sure it’s time now to just accept that nothing is permanent, and we are always in transition. There is not one thing you can totally count on staying permanent except change itself. Nothing is for sure but death and taxes, isn’t that the old saying? Except death, in my mind, is really its own kind of change, so I guess that just leaves taxes.
Yes, I am in transition. I am in a state of Permanent Transition, a lifetime long. And how I love that. I have grown so certain that my life is exactly what I make of it, every single day. I suppose that soon I will ceased to be surprised at how very powerfully the things I dream of and plan for come to be. But I’m not there yet. I’m still shocked and delighted that the Universe does, in fact, take care of all of the “hows” if I only believe strongly enough in the end game. I can’t know the roads I’ll follow to get to where I want to be, but I know that if I believe in it, I’ll get there.
So, maybe my biggest transition right now is to decide what I want to do next. I talk about being a “writer,” but the thing is…if writing a book were really that important to me, the thing that sets my soul aflame…I would be doing it. It’s out there, a thing that I vaguely aspire to, like learning yoga. But its time hasn’t come yet. I’m spending my creativity on putting on high school plays and journaling and trying to raise daughters with a sense of whimsy and celebration. I’m so present in those tasks – too present, sometimes, I know – and I am not currently making room for anything else.
In the past several years, I have been totally, utterly okay with that. Or, at least, I have been until very recently, when I’ve begun to ask myself, “What next?” I have done the blogging thing. I have written plays. I have gotten my darling house. I am about to receive a gift of the most epic proportions, which I can’t tell you yet for three more weeks, but trust me, it’s been WAY UP on my list of Big Dreams that I had no idea how I could possibly make come true, and it’s coming true with no effort whatsoever on my part except the wanting.
What to dream now?
At the end of this school year, I will graduate a group of seniors who, along with three that graduated last year, will be the students that I have known and loved very much. They were the class that loved and lost Matt, who experienced that unique heartache and found solace in the community I helped to build. One student, in particular, will be my hardest ever goodbye. Ever. There’s something about this coming event that is hitting me hard, and making me feel like it’s time to make some big changes. (Though my choice of their final show will be exactly the right thing to honor their journey.) This is my 7th year at that High School. Is it the seven year itch? Next year both girls will be in Middle School. Do I still want to be in middle school? I don’t know. I just don’t know. But I’m finding myself starting to ask some new questions.
Stay tuned, if you’d like, and be forgiving, if you would, of my lack of consistency in blogging. I often aspire to do it more often, but when it becomes another thing on the to-do list, I feel like I have nothing worth saying. I have to just do it when the fancy strikes, I guess.
So…thanks.
Monday, September 12, 2011
There and Back Again
Back to school is an intense time in my household. There’s the shopping for binders and folders with kitties or the cast of Victorious printed on them, the “right” pencils and notebooks, shoes and socks and new clothes and underwear. When I was a child, I remember that even when we were at our poorest, back-to-school was still new clothes and new shoes, and a new start, even though it might have meant a long Bradlees layaway and stressful figuring on my mom’s part. (My mom who, this year, bought Amelia practically her whole middle school wardrobe. I never, ever lose perspective on how different my children’s childhood is from mine.)
After the requisite fashion show in the living room, narrated by Abby (“Now here’s a perfect look for those crisp fall days in the city…”) there’s getting back to the routines of homework, after-school activities and schedules, rehearsals, and the general pace of my family’s life in the fall.
It’s never easy, especially after a mellow, peaceful summer of reading novels in the swing under the oak trees and swimming at the secret beach.
September feels very different for me this year than it has in a long while. For one thing, my oldest has started middle school, in the very grade that I teach, and thinking of my curly-haired baby in this sitting amidst the pressures and mysterious social catacombs of 6th grades kind of freaks me out, to tell the truth. I mean, I know we’ve prepared her; she’s smart and confident and enthusiastic, but still…my baby. Abby, on the other hand, now in 5th grade, is loving the sense of independence from being the Oldest in the School, and having her sister…elsewhere.
There is a shift in the energy of my household from Patrick’s focus on his novel. Head’s down, past-the-middle serious writing, and I can feel that in the walls, even. It’s very exciting and having him so energized and happy has made a huge difference in this fall.
For me? Well, auditions for my high school show were this weekend, and instead of the normal sense of anxiety and even dread that I feel when I have to launch into this (for a lot of reasons), this year I am really looking forward to it. It’s a show I’ve never done and really like, and the last time I directed a musical I’ve never done before, it was so dance-centric that I felt like I couldn’t really totally get a handle on all of it. Plus, there were several people in that cast who annoyed me really, really badly, and it did not make for the most pleasant time. Other than that, the past five years have just had me in a musical recycling mode, and it bored me. This year, some of my most adored kids ever are seniors, the cast turned out to be spectacular, and I think it’s just going to be such fun. It’s such a silly, sassy show, very stylized and lively. That, along with the fact that I saw it on Broadway with Harry Potter in the lead on my very 40th birthday during my favorite weekend of my whole year, and it’s just a great big happy combo of good good good.
Here in 6th grade, I’ve already started in earnest on a very intense writing program, and it’s been great for the kids and good for me, too. (Hence, I think, my ability to even contemplate a return to this blog. In a room full of writing, it’s hard to resist the call.) I like my kids this year, mostly, even though a few of them are…well, really weird. You might remember Sam, who I wrote about last year, and who we kept back, in our class for 6th grade again this year. He missed the first day because of the hurricane. He came the second day…and then did not come back again. For several days, he did not come back. I called to talk to him, and he slammed the door. He could not deal with the other kids knowing he’d been kept back. It took some doing on the part of a lot of people, but we got him back. We had a talk, again, about the man he wants to be, and how he chooses right now to become that, or risk becoming like the kids and adults he left behind in Roxbury, on drugs, on the System, on the street. I’m trying to help him know his intuition, listen to the voice that’s the best of himself, because I can hear it already. We all could, all of us here, right from day one. He can too, when he tries. I hope he’ll keep trying.
So, here in September, I’ve dusted off my sense of purpose, renewed my addiction to toasted almond coffee, and set out again to do a little something in my corner of the world.
After the requisite fashion show in the living room, narrated by Abby (“Now here’s a perfect look for those crisp fall days in the city…”) there’s getting back to the routines of homework, after-school activities and schedules, rehearsals, and the general pace of my family’s life in the fall.
It’s never easy, especially after a mellow, peaceful summer of reading novels in the swing under the oak trees and swimming at the secret beach.
September feels very different for me this year than it has in a long while. For one thing, my oldest has started middle school, in the very grade that I teach, and thinking of my curly-haired baby in this sitting amidst the pressures and mysterious social catacombs of 6th grades kind of freaks me out, to tell the truth. I mean, I know we’ve prepared her; she’s smart and confident and enthusiastic, but still…my baby. Abby, on the other hand, now in 5th grade, is loving the sense of independence from being the Oldest in the School, and having her sister…elsewhere.
There is a shift in the energy of my household from Patrick’s focus on his novel. Head’s down, past-the-middle serious writing, and I can feel that in the walls, even. It’s very exciting and having him so energized and happy has made a huge difference in this fall.
For me? Well, auditions for my high school show were this weekend, and instead of the normal sense of anxiety and even dread that I feel when I have to launch into this (for a lot of reasons), this year I am really looking forward to it. It’s a show I’ve never done and really like, and the last time I directed a musical I’ve never done before, it was so dance-centric that I felt like I couldn’t really totally get a handle on all of it. Plus, there were several people in that cast who annoyed me really, really badly, and it did not make for the most pleasant time. Other than that, the past five years have just had me in a musical recycling mode, and it bored me. This year, some of my most adored kids ever are seniors, the cast turned out to be spectacular, and I think it’s just going to be such fun. It’s such a silly, sassy show, very stylized and lively. That, along with the fact that I saw it on Broadway with Harry Potter in the lead on my very 40th birthday during my favorite weekend of my whole year, and it’s just a great big happy combo of good good good.
Here in 6th grade, I’ve already started in earnest on a very intense writing program, and it’s been great for the kids and good for me, too. (Hence, I think, my ability to even contemplate a return to this blog. In a room full of writing, it’s hard to resist the call.) I like my kids this year, mostly, even though a few of them are…well, really weird. You might remember Sam, who I wrote about last year, and who we kept back, in our class for 6th grade again this year. He missed the first day because of the hurricane. He came the second day…and then did not come back again. For several days, he did not come back. I called to talk to him, and he slammed the door. He could not deal with the other kids knowing he’d been kept back. It took some doing on the part of a lot of people, but we got him back. We had a talk, again, about the man he wants to be, and how he chooses right now to become that, or risk becoming like the kids and adults he left behind in Roxbury, on drugs, on the System, on the street. I’m trying to help him know his intuition, listen to the voice that’s the best of himself, because I can hear it already. We all could, all of us here, right from day one. He can too, when he tries. I hope he’ll keep trying.
So, here in September, I’ve dusted off my sense of purpose, renewed my addiction to toasted almond coffee, and set out again to do a little something in my corner of the world.
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