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August 25, 2004
Long Time No Write
Wow. I've been busy. This is always what happens once school starts, though. So. What's been happening?
I was cast in Independence, the inaugural production of the new UI Studio Series. This is an intermediate series of productions, higher quality than the Student Theatre Organization shows, but not as "big" as the UI Mainstage shows, to be directed by graduate directors, with minimal budgets (but budgets, nonetheless) in the Kiva, which is our round space. I'm very excited about the project because it's a great script, I admire the director tremendously, and he has put together a kickass cast of 4 talented women. (And yes, I do put myself in that category.) It should be a lot of fun. (In that weird, twisted, actor way.)
I've also been prepping for and then teaching my first week's worth of speech classes. Looks like 2 good crews of students. Hard to tell at this point, but most of them seem to be trying anyway. Of course, freshmen always do their first semester. The attitude seems to set in in the spring... For some of these kids, my class was their very first college class ever. That is kind of scary, I think. I'm not sure I'd consider my self the best sort of introduction to academia.
And, of course, I've been attending classes as well. And meeting the new crop of grad students. Not many of them, but they seem to be top quality people.
My classes so far have been great. I'm loving my Movement for Actors class. Today we did this body awareness meditation which included focusing awareness on various parts of our bodies and then allowing them to move the way they wanted to, and to "speak" to us about their needs. Then, and this is the kind of cool I'm talking about here, the instructor gave us sketch paper and oil pastels and told us to draw the experience. Oh yeah. Why wouldn't I love this class? I get to play like a little kid.
And then there's Acting Studio. This semester, we are priviledged to be doing Animal Work. Our instructor is apparently one of the few who received approval to teach the form he learned from a woman who studied it with Strausberg, and some of the students who studied in her animal class went on to found Steppenwolf. Yeah.
So. It's very exciting to know that I get to spend the first half of the semester immersing myself in "tiger." Sumatran tiger, to be specific. And immersion includes a trip to the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle to study the Sumatran tiger there firsthand. But it's tremendously intimidating to know that when kill week comes, I will be evaluated by my peers on the success of my "kill," and they can, should they not think I was successful, vote me off the island, so to speak. If I don't have a successful kill, I will have to drop the class. No one moves on to the 2nd half of the semester without surviving kill week. David (the instructor) says he has no doubts about any of us moving on. But still, the possibility exists.
My Nia class is the 3rd fabulous class I have this semester. Monday was a basic roll call, here's what it's sort of about class, so today is the day we really got started. I was having so much fun that I didn't realize I'd been dancing for 40+ minutes until she had us circle up at the end. Apparently, you can't do Nia wrong. If you mess up, it's not actually a big deal (thank goodness, because my dancing contains a large portion of messing up). There's no pressure to learn routines or keep up with the instructor. If something gets too fast for your body/fitness level, you are encouraged to slow down, and if you're backwards, that's okay too. And you are expected to make adjustments to compensate for injuries. What a nice change from the Pilates woman who messed up my back last year.
And the choreography is just fun and simple. There's a lot of moving around the room doing things like "piano feet" while your arms "follow the oboe like a scarf in the wind." And serious martial art-y kind of moves, complete with "Hah!" My kind of class. It turns out I can do that. And I danced hard. I most assuredly broke a sweat. (But had no lung problems - yay! In fact, I forgot I shouldn't be able to breathe. Didn't even think about it.) It was a lovely time, and I can't wait to do it again on Friday. Hopefully I won't fall on my face at the President's reception for Graduate Students afterwards. Today, I'm really tired.
And then, because I apparently need a non-sequitir class, I'm taking the History of Jazz. Which is a 400-level Music History class. I think I'll be able to handle it. It's going to be a huge challenge for me, being not what you'd call a trained musician. So some of the stuff he talks about means NOTHING to me. But I don't have to be an expert in everything, so this is my class in humility for the semester. Hopefully he won't call on me.
The one class I haven't attended yet is Playwriting. It's Friday mornings from 8:30-11:30. But I'm looking forward to it, too.
On the home front, the egress window has been installed and Dave installed the window well himself. I think I'm going to be planting a variety of vinca minor plants along the edge so they'll trail down into the well. And the cabinets were delivered two weeks early last Thursday, the day it started raining. It hasn't stopped yet. They're all on the back porch, sitting under tarps and on top of boards, to keep them out of the water. They're to be installed a week from tomorrow. The new sink, microwave, disposal, etc. will all come tomorrow too. I'm beginning to feel a little overwhelmed.
In other parts of my life:
Last night/this morning I had a horrible dream. I dreamt Dave told me, "It's not that I don't like you, I just don't want to be married to you any more." And though I begged him to explain why, to give me a reason, some idea of how or when things went wrong, he either ignored me or said something like, "That's just how it is."
So I got a quickie divorce (from a jeweler, my friends Yolanda and Mary were also there getting quickie divorces, I don't know, dream logic) because that's what Dave wanted. But even after that, no matter how much I begged him to explain it to me, he wouldn't. He just kept turning away...
I woke up in despair. It was awful. Compounded by the fact that Dave is in New York so I couldn't even wake him up to have my worries allayed. No dream-chasing snuggles for me. And because he was in a meeting, I had to tell him about the dream over instant message. Hard to convey reassurance that way. Poor Dave.
But he sent me flowers. I don't know what they look like, because when I checked the porch for packages after getting home, I was too tired to notice the tag hanging from the front door. I didn't see it until I was talking to him and he asked if I'd checked the porch. (And when I realized he'd sent flowers, I burst into tears. Even though it was just a tag from the florist asking me to call them.) By then it was after 7pm, so I figured the florist was closed. I'll call them first thing tomorrow. I want my flowers.
All in all, it was a good day.
Posted by sally at August 25, 2004 08:43 PM
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