Friday, June 17, 2016

Anxiety, neighbors, Durango, Anxiety, 2000 words go

The last few weeks I have been writing 2000 words a day. Today I decided to post one, this is the inside of my head.


 I'm on the deck, it's 9.19 am, a little late for me to be out writing, but I did some yoga first. Now I'm in my spot until the sun blocks my screen, watching the neighbor's stories. This morning routine of 2000 words can be a challenge. There's always a stupid cat that wants out, a dog that drank all his water, anxiety, blah blah blah Across the street, beginning yesterday morning, my neighbors and all of their company---it appears they are family, grandmas and grandpas and aunts I guess--began schlepping wagons of ice and freezer type food across the street to Lin and Betty's house (next to mine, the one with the retaining wall). I thought I heard one say something about the fridge going out, but then a UHaul trailer appeared, and now it looks like they are actually moving stuff out of their garage. I feel like Gladys on Bewitched. 

I chatted with Betty the evening before last, she is adjusting to dentures and has a nasty cold she can't shake. She stepped out from behind her fence to show me she'd lost so much weight that her pants are falling off of her. She was sick a lot this winter as well. They have their yearly family reunion in Texas coming up next week, and they always drive. Every year I question how smart of a choice that is in their Buick or towncar or whatever that old boat is, but Betty says she'll never fly. "It takes just as long to get through our airport and then the one in Dallas." Fair. These neighbors are a joy. They've had a rough road, but are always kind and ask about Genoa and Harper. Their grand son Atticus has been friends with the girls since they were 3,4 and 5. Harp still hangs out with Atty.

She's at work at Starbucks right now, her third training shift. She gets to work the drive through today. When we get back from Durango and she has her schedule, she's going back to Mad Greens (she calls it Sad Greens) to work hours there as well. They'll hire her back for a few weeks, then promote her to shift lead at $13 an hour. My daughter is a money monster, and that beats $10 at Starbucks. She  labors under the delusion that she will work two jobs, but I can't imagine it working out, as she has a third job filling in as a nanny. That's an entire story unto itself, and has already been written.

Okay, everyone in my neighborhood has a dog, and they all walk them from 7 am -10 am,  bullying and taunting me because I walk my old dog only to the speed bump and back, and the other dog isn't my problem.

Writing I had hoped would alleviate some of my anxiety. I also started reading this book, One Minute Mindfulness which is somewhat helpful. Not as helpful as scrubbing every floor and floorboard in my house, but you have to try many things. Anxiety is not a joke, and at my age I cannot afford it any more, I'm going to give myself a stroke. And it's exhausting. I haven't slept well but one night this summer, and that is ridiculous. It's SUMMER. I start Willly Wonka on Monday, and I tried to get the house scrubbed before that began.

Harp and I are going down to Durango tonight, we'll spend Saturday with G and come back  Sunday morning. Jim wants to see Finding Dory for father's day, and I don't want to drive in the heat, so we'll head out around 6 I guess. Earlier if I can pour H into the car. I only love road trips in the early mornings.  I don't mind early evenings, but after the sun goes down I get  jumpy, I didn't used to, Jim and I drove to and from Houston  through the  night, and when the girls were little we drove to California. At that time my anxiety was Death Valley--valid.  Guess I have always had it, it's just really increased exponentially the last few years.

I get anxious every time we go to Durango. The first visit we didn't even make it there, I freaked out in Ouray and we came home the next morning. That was without Jim, he suddenly couldn't go on the only family trip we could make work that summer, and I agreed to take the girls. But we got there and there is something deeply wrong with Ouray, and the hotel floors were uneven and there were shadows in the mirror and nope. So it wasn't until two years later that we made it to Mesa Verde--- Jim's bucket list---and we drove around the outside of the campus, and G was  not impressed.. Then a year later we went out to visit Ft. Lewis and she met Dennis- he runs the theatre- and that was it. She was sold.  And that trip I had a full on freak out, I worry about the pass, I hate the pass, I hate being on the "wrong side" of any pass in Colorado. I do the same thing in Steamboat. I thought it was the altitude, since anxiety can be physical, high heart rate, etc---but I don't think that's it in Durango. Also that doesn't explain why I start to panic before we go.

This one started yesterday.

So my stomach hurts,and I feel dizzy, and I can't breathe and it's great. It's AWESOME.

10.23
So I got bullied into walking the dogs. It's already hot, and they're black so we only went to the water tank. We were behind an elderly couple who seem to be part of the across the street gathering, he has one of those one armed/crutch/metal things and he was moving uphill at a lovely pace. At the water tank, Sundown broke away--to the extent that he can "break away", more like "hobbled"---and their dog became a bit aggressive. They were kind, he has gap teeth and both are definitely Aussie. I swear the dad does not have an accent, but last year on the fourth they had friends over, and the guy I chatted with had an aussie accent. They are loading up, this is a caravan of some kind. I'm having Walking Dead anxiety, do they know something I do not. There is a truck with a UHaul trailer pulled behind it, a minivan and a  hatchback car loaded up with coolers. How many people and how far are they going? I'll ask Allison, she lives next door and I think she went to college with the mom. She knows everything in the neighborhood....DANG, she's in Chicago.I'm left to my own snooping.

Well, the good news is the walk has quelled my anxiety attack.

I'm just too old any more, I don't want to leave home but I'm grumpy because we never get to take a real vacation and leave home.  Ok, last year we went to Florida, that was great.  But it was only a week, I don't know if we've ever taken a vacation longer than a week. What's that like? Leave your house for two weeks? OH, I had an anxiety attack in St. Augustine as well, so....not related to higher elevations. Science. I'm all about it.

We went to NASA while in Fla, of course, why wouldn't you, and I cried the whole time. It was like visiting a gravesite, a monument to Things We Used To Do That Were Cool.  The Atlantis, the production values, the old guy sitting on his folding chair with a sign that said "Engineer" and which missions he worked. I wanted to talk to him but I don't speak engineer, so I just shook his hand and thanked him. The visit made Genoa think she wanted to change majors---she investigated, discovered math, then decided she could design the next phase of space suit. Harp was duly impressed and expressed interest in learning more about space stuff, but has no interest in the math necessary for space travel. Also, we don't do it any more here in America, so there's that.

When G chose Ft. Lewis I was already in the throes of College Panic Attack, as she had been accepted into OCU and the costumer had started calling to confirm that she was coming so she could assign her shows. The cost--even with the scholarships---was giving me heart palpitations, even though loans are a thing and more scholarship $ was coming. Then she met Dennis and it was over, even though Ft. Lewis is not a "theatre" school, she didn't care. She liked Dennis, she felt comfortable in their tiny theatre and wanted to get a minor in biology. Which she dropped when it was between bio and a trip to Dublin, so there you have that. But it worked out, even though she is declared as a Design and Tech major, she was nominated for the Irene Ryan for her acting in The Little Prince. And she's going to Dublin and London in July---originally they were doing Barcelona as well, I hope they do. It's a collaborative performance class, so they've created a piece to perform at universities over there. I feel like it's a sort of college Fringe Festival.  Between now and her departure I get to worry about getting her a credit card, a cell phone plan, her losing her passport or getting her money stolen...she's Genoa, there is much to worry about. But I don't know why, she's doing great. She got an apartment for the summer, works two jobs--- well, until last night when she quit Pizza Hut for sexual harassment. But she'll get another second job and she'll be fine. She doesn't really need me to worry, but what else am I going to do? I have two gifts: theatre and worrying.

And one of those has been cut off for next year, since I'm not directing at LHS. That's another source of delightful anxiety.

The younger "aunt" and her young daughter have taken off, cooler secured in the front seat. The elderly couple are loading the mini van. I love road trips, I really do miss them. This looks awesome, how come we don't do this any more? Harp and I are going to Durango to see G for one day, that's not very road trippy. It'll be fun to get out, and I wish Jim was coming, but it's not like this event I'm watching. Allison drives to Chicago every summer. Our old neighbor drove to Florida for the summer. We just don't have anywhere to drive  to I guess. The dad is checking the brake lights on the trailer, I don't know where the two girls who live there have gone to. They were in the front yard in their jammies a minute ago. I see only adults in the truck and minivan.  I think mom is taking them in the family car? She just asked an empty front yard if anyone had to go to the bathroom. Wow. This is impressive. Of course in Colorado I'm used to RV's and trucks and SUV's with Thule rocket boxes and bike racks. We used to be those people.

Back when we rented our cars, we had a Tahoe I loved, and then a Suburban that I did not. But that Suburban had a Thule on top, a bike rack on the back, and occasionally pulled a pop up camper. That was us, headed to Turquoise Lake and the Molly Brown Campground---where you have to reserve your spot a year ahead of time. Well, then it was a year, that was 10-12 years ago before everybody bloody moved here, now I bet it's impossible to get a spot two years ahead. I loved that lake.

OH, Shuffly Boy with the German Shepard is walking late today. Dude, it's hot. He walks the dog twice day and I have no idea where he lives. Maybe behind us. But he's a kid, so he shuffles, he doesn't pick up his feet, so you can hear him coming. He's really late, it's 11. HA, I hear Nathan Lane's voice "Gotta run, it's almost eleven!"

WC 2040,
Not bad, although I did break for a walk. Weds I did a 640 word character analysis as part of my routine,. Yesterday I edited and beefed up the "After School Theatre" outline for the guy they hired. I didn't do a word count, though, but it counts, there were words.

The UHaul and truck have left, mom is moving the smaller car into the driveway, and I guess the children are loaded into the mini van? I didn't ser them, but she's talking to someone. I think Grandma and Grandpa are in there too. Big mini van.

I promised myself I'd cross something off the list today, I should probs go in. I need to buy paint to finish the spare room, and I'm saving my pennies for Durango. I'll do that after Willy Wonka, or next weekend. Today I have to dig out CD's for the trip, Jim's Honda is so old we can't listen to the iphone. OOOOH, CD's! Harp has some sort of small speaker arrangement that we can kinda use, I think.



Saturday, June 4, 2016

SECOND AUDITION: THE HELL AGAIN?

 10 am
 Uta Hagen has a book An Actor Prepares. I have a blog An Actor Neurotics. I read the script again, first time in thirty years.  Watched the movie again. Again, was grumpy at how different the two are. There are no men in the play except to be discussed and alluded to.    I have never loved this script, I feel like the women are stereotypes and they speak in platitudes. It was written by a man, and I don't like any man's female characters except Edward Albee. His women I understand. Steel Magnolias seems to be an extended stereotype intended to make women cry for monetary gain (ticket sales). It works, don't get me wrong, but it's transparent. And I'm judgy. 
  The men in the play are referred to as couch potatoes and neanderthals. Largely useless, beer drinking entities who do not help out at all. But when they made the movie they cast Tom Skerritt and Sam Shepard and well....they aren't going to play that now, are they? So the movie skews away from the man bashing in the original script quite a bit, allowing these sympathetic, and hard working husbands to emerge---albeit quietly. They aren't given a lot of lines. And that softens the  blow a bit, and frankly gives the story a bit  more balance.
   Just my opinion.
   The stereotype, however, is part of what makes it fun. Ouiser is a bitter old southern woman, the end. No need to dig too deeply. Truvy  is pretty. Clairee is dignified. M'lynn is a mom. Shelby is an ornery child trying to live her own life but is ultimately a moron. Annelle is a "survivor", pulling herself up after the criminal husband leaves her. And Scene. They all hang out in a beauty shop and gossip about the town. Because that's what women do, apparently. It's really a play about drag queens, let's be honest. I volunteer to direct that version!
    I used to feel the same way about Crimes of the Heart, until recently. I looped it into my Acting 1 class and got some really nice work out of the girls. Turns out there's more there than meets the eye when you work on it. Maybe that's my problem with Steel Magnolias, I just don't understand it.
   I don't need to understand it or even like it to want to be in it. I can't explain why, it'd just be fun to act again.
    So I had to drag out a monologue. Everything I have no longer works for anyone over 30, except for Aunt Maddy which is 10 minutes long. Not an audition monologue. So I pulled an old one from Soap Dish, as it can work with a southern dialect and it's short, and "ageless".  It'll be fine.
    I looked up the map, the theatre is 28 minutes from my house. Armed with this information I will still arrive 30 minutes early and end up sitting in the parking lot, texting Eric.
    If  callbacks are tomorrow or Monday,  I can't go, I have auditions for Willy Wonka. There is no callback time listed on the audition notice. 
    I had a terrible nightmare last night, in it the person they hired to replace me as director took over my entire office and let choir kids hang out all the time. It was awful. So I didn't get a great night of sleep, which is good. I look older.
    My lower back/hip has been seizing for a week, I overdid it last Saturday at the gym, so I walk with one hand on my back. I also tore up my pinkie toe breaking in shoes, so I limp. Again: good for age. :)
    I look down at my hands. I have 4 remaining  long fake nails from my last manicure adventure with Harper, three weeks ago. The other 6 have been broken off and hacked at. Another mess that is so me. So I clip two of the nails down and leave the longer thumb nails for balance. If they notice my nails, I've failed anyway, dunno why I bother. It's something to do I suppose.
    I have nothing to wear. I coach "Don't dress for a role, dress nicely. Not prom nice, just church nice." I stand in my closet looking at the hodge podge of hand me downs and funky pants and maxi skirts and realize I don't have "church clothes". So do I go for it as me, since I already am Ouiser, or try to find neutral pieces to cobble together, that may look worse than just committing to poor taste. Or Nathan Lane? I can do Nathan Lane pretty easily. Dear God I cannot even dress myself.
    Just messaged Eric, he recommends the heart ruffle shirt my mother in law gave me. I always get compliments from older women when I wear it, good call.
    Jim made breakfast, I guess I'll go shower?
_______________________________________________
In the shower I realize it's a rant, not a monologue. I can alter my Carrie Fischer Postcards From the Edge in a way that it still works. I'll do that.
__________________________________________________
I arrive 30 minutes early. I text Eric about the tattooed young lady having a cigarette outside the theatre--which is in a strip mall that  also contains other businesses. We decide she's the stage manager. An orange mini arrives, and a disheveled man carrying a pile of papers (clearly scripts), a brown to go bag, what looks like mike stands and his car keys in his mouth, stumbles to the theatre. He returns moments later, moves his car around the block, returns and parks in the same spot, emerges with more papers. He returns to his car a third time to retrieve something I cannot identify before it's time for me to go in.
    I have identified the director!
    The young lady, however, turns out to be an employee at another shop in the strip mall. 
___________________________________________________________

    I have been the wrong age my entire career.
    In  my 20's I read older, and rarely was considered because actors who were actually 30 were better than me. Then I took a decade plus off to be a mom and a teacher. Landing me here, a young looking 50, and still the wrong age.
    The callback went well. Again, Nice People! And I nailed reading for both Ouiser and Clairee. He has a definite type in mind for the other roles that I do not fit, and that's fine. I would have liked to read for M'lynn but it was clear he had a specific type in mind.
     It was a joy to sit there as an actor and watch the proceedings without my judgey director hat.
     I had the best time! I got to be an old southern grumpy and he read enough scenes for me to be funny physically, create a character, nail the meter in the text,and cry! I got to CRY I never get to cry! He was auditioning M'lynn's, you know "My daughter can't run to Texas....why is she dead..." and all I had to do was control my crying until Clairree shoved me down front "Hit her!"
IT WAS THE BEST ABSOLUTELY THE BEST MOMENT!!!
'cause I was actually crying, so I had to say "are you high" through tears and anger and surprise and WHO EVER GETS TO DO THAT?
   Dang I MISS ACTING!
   They have more auditions tomorrow, and I'm confident that I am too young to get cast. But I had such a great time, I'm going to look up more auditions tonight and go to another one. 

 I get it now!  20 years too late but still, I GET IT!



Friday, June 3, 2016

3 June, 2016: The First Bunny Victim is Found

Gatos Diablos 16.

  As I have posted previously, I am quite aware that I am not using Spanish correctly. I just find it funnier this way.  I like the timber and syntax, and I can hear Martin Buchanan's "Monster Truck" voice when I write it. "Gatos Diablos".
   The Devil Cats are back.
   The first victim was stumbled upon at 8.35 am, MST, on the back patio.  Its head was gone and its internal organs had also been removed, and were displayed next to the body. The head was not in sight. The victim, a medium sized Green Mountain bunny, looked like the other thousand bunnies running around. S/he had no notable markings other than the missing head. The murderer was curled up at the edge of the Tarantino scene, calmly awaiting her reward for saving our home from this fuzzy menace. 
   What she received, instead, was my yearly impression of a Jersey bodgea owner washing the blood off of the cement with the garden hose. With the added suburban element of keeping the dogs away from eating the intestines.
    What do they do with the heads?
     Every year I ask this question.
    This year, the coyotes have returned--huzzzAH! And there have been fox sightings--also huzzah! Due to mange, we haven't had fox up here in a few years, hence the bunny menace and the morning power wash. The cats were simply stepping in where the fox and coyote left off. I thought, that since the natural predators had seemed to return, that the cats would have less interest, or competition, or less prey.

     A few years ago, it was birds and mice and large rats. We had a family of fox living next door, and the cats would bring their prey to our porch, and drop it. The next morning, or later in the day, the dead had been removed. I realized that, with a family of baby fox next door, my cats should be disappearing. But they weren't, and we figured out that they had an arrangement with the fox family. The cats caught birds and mice, left them at our door, and under cover of darkness the baby foxes (foxes, is that right? Plural? That looks wrong) would retrieve their dinner.
   AH-HA! The cats are smart! They were feeding the fox family and saving their own hides! Very clever, gatos!

   But then there were no more fox families, no fox adults, nothing. And that was when the bunny corpses began to arrive.
    Without a food chain-self preservation arrangement, I am at a loss as to why the cats A) escalated to bunnies and B) still leave them on the patio. That is when I formulated the gang theory. They are leaving the headless bunnies as a warning. But to who I still do not know.
      One morning last summer---it's in a blog somewhere---I came out to what appeared to be two disemboweled bunnies on the patio and two more on the deck! That was a true Tarantino, you gotta get the body count up there.  As usual they were headless, heads nowhere to be found. I stopped coming out on the deck in the morning to write as the stench was overpowering.  See, I'll power wash  the patio and deck, but that's it. If the dogs don't eat the remains, or at least move them, they just stay in my yard.  A Big Bunny Burial Ground, except for the burying. It's just a body dump. My back yard is the Colorado version of the East River.
   
    But today, there are fox sightings, and I hear coyotes. And I see thousands of bunnies daily, hopping everywhere, twitching their noses and flashing their tails. I feel like Anya "What's with all the carrots, why do they need such good eyesight for anyway?" They are kind of a scourge.  Maybe the cats are doing a public service.

   We'll see. This was only one victim.

    Here is the murderous devil hiding behind the deck. Or awaiting her next prey....YES! She jumped on the dog as he passed! And returned to her spot and....YES! She lept upon  a fellow Diablo who just wanted to pass through.          

Image may contain: cat
WANTED 
"STRUMPH"
RUNS WITH THE GANG "GATOS DIABLOS"
 Do not be fooled by her small size or pretty face. She is the most lethal of the three.

Wednesday, June 1, 2016

Another Audition? the HELL IS GOING ON?

    So...I really enjoyed auditioning again. When you don't really want the part and you know you aren't right for the show, there is real freedom in just going to play.
    So Immma do it again.
    I'm going to audition in Conifer on Saturday for Steel Magnolias.  My friend Toddie and I used to re enact the bench scene with Ouiser and Clairee with much joy. I have always wanted to be Ouiser, and admittedly I am not old enough BUT, Shirley Maclaine was 55 when she made the movie. I can look and act much older than  50! Unfortunately, for me, I'm a young looking 50. But still it'll be fun! I had to dig out a monologue and do a southern accent. Which  I love, I only get to pull it out once a year when we do Tennessee Williams, I may not be able to maintain it for a full monologue.  But I'm kinda excited to try!
    It'd be more fun if I didn't want the role, I know I'm too young for Ouiser but dammit, I am Ouiser and have been for twenty years! I'm  too old for M'lynn or Truvvy,so I have it set up to be OK if I don't get cast. I can always hide behind the age issue. Go me.  Control Freak: Party of One!
   I teach and preach "YOU CANNOT CONTROL CASTING", but I do not practice what I preach. Why should I? I'm not an actor any more.
   I have a vague recollection of auditioning for this show when I was in my late 20's. I was wwaaaaaaay too young for any of the parts I wanted, and a bit too old for the younger roles. They read me for Annelle, and I was fine. But another actor who wanted the role more and was right for the part won. I haven't thought about that in years. I knew at the callback whose part it was. For someone who spends her life teaching acting, I sure don't recall a lot of my own experiences.  I figure the kids don't need to hear about how I'm a failure, they already know that: "Those who can't do, teach."

WHICH BY THE WAY I SAW A BILLBOARD DOWNTOWN THIS WEEKEND, THERE IS A SHOW ABOUT LOSER TEACHERS AND I DON'T KNOW HOW TO FEEL ABOUT IT.  I think it's called Those Who Can't, and the billboard has adults in a bathroom drinking brown liquor.

I do not drink at school.

ANYWAY, that's all I can say about that. 

   So I will keep a fun journal of the audition Saturday. Eric is in Vegas, so I guess I can't  text him. Well, I can, but why would he reply: he's in Vegas. But I will Find the Funny and joy in auditioning for the pure love of theatre. The business sucks, and can make many perspective actors exit stage "SCREW THIS IMMMA GET  A LIFE". But it only sucks if you let it. I teach my kids the difference between love of the craft and the necessity of the business. Just go to auditions and tell a story. Have fun. You are in love with the craft, not the business. Eventually you will be right for a role, and you will be able to have your cake and eat it to. Until then, take classes, enjoy, explore, HAVE FUN. The day it isn't fun is the day you retire.

And become a teacher.