But I cannot choose but weep

While I am off to Washington D.C. tomorrow in hopes of digging through Fritz Loewe's letters stashed away at the Library of Congress I don't think I have the heart to think about research today.

We're back to soul searching I suppose. I found myself in tears last night. (And this was after I used quite a few onstage for my final performance of Ophelia). And it's not like I don't understand the process. In fact I was thinking about it yesterday. Theatre kids, even seasoned ones, have a difficult time closing shows, tend to hang onto the moment and the important people attached to it and I think it's because they understand deeply the emotional implication of the "life" cycle of doing a show, to put it simply. There is nothing more organic than a good creative show. The collaboration of working with people to create a process, something on a page that literally comes to life. It is born and grows. You put it in front of an audience and it breathes life. And then the day comes when it must close (and everything must close someday ,,,Phantom..take a hint). And when it does I think it's usless to ignore the mourning process. I think children, who feel things so intensly and understand the pain of loss without ignoring it, might cry when a show closes. I did when I was eight.

And then I did again last night. I won't bore you with too many gritty details but it did make me feel like a child again. And I felt slightly justified because it was really a release from the last two shows I worked on (essentially most of the same cast came straight from Arcadia into Hamlet...try that brain fucker sometime). But there are maybe little things. Like my Hamlet, who is a remarkably talented young man who knows Hamlet better than some of my professors, who proclaims he may not go on stage again (I respect spending time with God but at the cost of theatre? I'm not that kind of girl.) Or maybe it is the end of the season. Spring might bring birth but it also is rife with closure (and allergies I might add) and therefore has never been an entirly satisfying time for me. I don't like when good things end. Maybe a little bit steams from the thrill of playing Ophelia, something I most likely will never do again...and honestly after this expereience I don't know that I would want to do it again. But mostly I just feel like a child again...emotionally anyway...letting it all come out without much matter for who sees me do it, or reads this I suppose.

And it comes from this individual deaths that we experience every few months that actors begin to learn to store up their emotional strife, and bottle it for the next appearance onstage. Sometime my bottle spills I'm not gonna lie. And if it spills at the end of this beautiful season I don't mind so much. The last five months have reminded me of who I am.
So I find solace and happiness, a) in the library doing research b) writing c) being onstage d) singing really loudly. Too bad no one will pay me to do any of those things :) It's strange to be twenty-five and still figuring out who I am, but then again, I am grateful that at least I know this much. And I am grateful I have had the oppurtunity to do it all at least once really well. Thank you.

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We Know What We Are But Know Not What We May Be

Well I supose I should begin with a Trude update:

The Sound of Her Music: Musical Arranger Trude Rittmann's Life and Work, has officially been accepted by the Graduate Office at SFSU and I guess will be available in their library starting in the fall...I actually have no idea if that is true but I do know that it is currently being bound and all that. One hundred pages and I don't even feel like I've begun to do her justice. Exploring two ballets, two choral numbers and a couple of moments of underscoring doesn't even come close to expressing the sweeping talent and body of work. I'm really not joking when I talk about making it a book, but I'm also kidding myself to think that I will have the time or resources to really do it any justice any time soon. I guess it's ok to be 25 and already have a lifelong goal, something you feel you have to finish before you die...it just makes things feel more urgent already.

The reason I'm not settling in to write the book is that I would like to get a job in order to make some money in order to get off my parents payroll and therefore have some greater sense of independence (not to mention get married and have a family etc. etc.) So I'm searching for jobs...maybe not as hard as I should be. But the problem is there is nothing quite like sitting in the Performing Arts Library at Lincoln Center and doing research all day. And then talking to someone like Bruce who understood me. And then coming home and writing it all down at Peet's. I'm not at the stage in my life where anybody is going to pay me to do that. And I understand. So I'm taking the CBEST and applying for teaching jobs, and editing jobs, and anything that I can see that remotely relates to theatre.

But I have this other problem. I'm falling in love with acting again. We had a falling out. I made the decision not to pursue it as a profession, and I still stand by that. But being a part of a company that feeds my soul, and being onstage in delicious roles. It's all too much. I love it too much. And so I desperately want to find jobs that understand this and can work with this "addiction" as it were. But who knows what I will find.

At the TBA conference one speaker talked about finding your personal mission statement. Or at least that's how I interpreted it. So I jotted some notes in my journal about feeding my theatrical desire, my desire to write about theatre, and spending plenty of time with my loved ones (specifically that really patient man I share a house with).

Anyway it's all really complicated...as life should be. If it wasn't I'm pretty sure I would spontaneously combust.

Bustibility, bustibility combustibili-

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