In brief:

Here's what I've been up to lately, and some stuff that's coming up.

1) Still no job, so don't ask.

2) Still no idea where I'll be living in November, so don't ask that either.

3) This week I've been stage managing an R&D process for a relatively young company that seems to be a fan of the site-specific genre. My friend Max was brought on as designer for the show by the co-director/writer Poppy, who went to Central with us. There are several other Centralites knocking about in the cast of this show as well. Overwhelmed with boredom by lack of a job/daily routine, I asked Max if I could sit in on rehearsals. He mentioned it to the director, and I was offered this job. I snatched it up, I was so desperate for a purpose.

Anyway, one of the company members works for the Lyric Hammersmith, and so they're using the studio there as rehearsal/performance space. They show for potential backers and producing bodies three times on this Friday. I say "stage managing," but at the moment I'm just an extra pair of hands. The showing has not been completed (probably today they'll have the sequence of their lines down, and the staging refined), so there isn't anything that really needs stage managing as of yet. So I've just been around, kind of listening, acting as a sounding board, and being put to task when needed. Yesterday, I painted this table top:


I also painted a door and a chair. I suspect today there will be a bit more work closer to the heading of my job, but just in case I'll be bringing the spare pants I got paint on yesterday.

4) My friend Jen is in town this week in preliminary meetings for an opera she's designing the lighting for at ENO. I don't like to name drop, but Jen is awesome and I'm super proud of her. If you're in London come June-time, 2010, go see Bizet's The Pearl Fishers! The production will be great, and the lighting will be AMAZING, I just know it.

5) I've started doing work exchange at a yoga studio. It's not a real job in that it doesn't equate to £££, but I do get free classes, which I am in dire need of right now (physically, mentally, and emotionally). It's nothing new: straighten the props, check the flyers, light the incense. I like it though: it's really humbling work, and meditative in its way. I actually always enjoyed folding the blankets at my other studio during the down time we had there. So it's nice in that way. And that wall of props was fucking *stellar* when I was done with it, no doubt.

6) Handbag returns! Yes, the performance event I took part in May is being done again at the BAC on the 19th. I'm not wearing white this time, though--no way. And frankly: I need a new handbag. Mine does not work for this season. A trip to Primark seems in order. (Though, if I do purchase one there, it shall be a wonder if it lasts till the performance. Hmmmm...)

Well, that was a noble try a best I think to throw something up here. I feel like other stuff has happened, and I've thought, "I should blog that," but I have forgotten it now. Alas. Perhaps another time.

I want to be a part of it.

Stepping off NJ transit last night, out into the flurries, out into the cold, the noise, the crisp winter air, the lights, the traffic, the tourists mucking up maneuverability on the sidewalks, the ease with which profanity left my lips when my bag would stall in a crack or someone got in my way or said something obnoxious, standing in line for a taxi and then my driver hitting on me, telling me not to let anyone else drive me up to Connecticut this weekend (I am not going to Connecticut this weekend), spending the night in some body's loft, I had to ask myself:

Why did I ever leave New York?

I went to yoga this morning (one of the perks of being home is actually subbing at my old work, which is great as I need monies and some peace of mind indeed) and someone came in right before class started and asked me to move my mat so they could fit. Instantly I was full of resentment--"Why didn't you get here earlier? Why don't you ask somebody else to move? Don't you understand the nature of New York real estate, bitch?" I'm a volatile yogini, I know. Of course I moved, but having that moment of spite for something as simple as that reiterated for me the fact that people don't change. They really don't. I'm still the same hyper-competitive, driven, incredibly susceptible to stress girl that I was when I left. I still have the same prejudices (Seriously: I hate it when people ask me to move my mat. HATE. IT.), still enjoy the same things, the same company, and still miss the same people I seem to have misplaced. You can take the girl out of New York, but...

I haven't adjusted to England yet. There are too many parts of myself that I'm not certain what to do with in terms of that city. The truth is, there I will always be an outside: an American with a different urban sensibility who talks funny. And here, well, I'm exactly what makes up this place.

Still, New York doesn't feel like home anymore. Events have happened in my friends' lives that I haven't been around for, and other things (people included) have simply moved on without me. And it's not like I actually have a home here. The biggest "Huh" moment I had leaving London was looking at my empty key ring. My parents had just moved (again) and I didn't have a key to their new home, and there were of course no apartment keys resting there, having waited months for use again. I had already turned in my halls keys to the front desk when I checked out, in an effort to get reimbursed for the days I would not be staying there. So there I was, without any ties to any place. And it was strange. New York feels familiar--like some old lover we can pick up the dance right where we left off. But it's not home. And neither is England--not yet, anyway.

And where is the art in this discussion? Non-existent it seems. Except that your surroundings influence your output, and having a place to rest is the first step to being able to think clearly. And thinking clearly helps you see, and create, and all that good stuff. I left New York because I felt stifled, artistically and in life generally. In England I feel mostly lost and alone, but on the brink of something great that I can only discover by myself (for some reason, this last bit seems to be the most true thing I know), though in part aided by others. So how do you make art that is grounded in anything, when you yourself are not? And what changes that?

I guess we'll find out.

NY Event Number Twelve: Practicing yoga in Times Square.

About five years ago, the Times Square Alliance decided they would celebrate the more neglected of the two Solstices. The Winter Solstice arrives on December 21st, but is often grouped in with the celebration of various holidays, and of course Times Square's biggest yearly event, New Year's Eve. However, the Summer Solstice, particularly in Western culture, usually goes by unnoticed--presumably because its celebrants were predominately pagan and that just didn't mesh with main-stream Puritanical rule. So any rituals that went along with the day were squelched over time and/or forgotten. The idea was to commemorate the longest day of the year, and give the sun its due for helping sustain our lives. So the TSA founded an event where yoga (the physical practice of which of course includes a linked sequence of asanas called surya namaskar, or "sun salutation") would be practiced throughout the day in order to do just that. At the first year of this event literally one person showed up. This year, at the first class of the day, 8:00AM on a Saturday morning, I practiced on the island in Times Square between 44th and 43rd street, bordered by Broadway and 7th Ave. I was one of 300 people there just for that class.

I heard about the function last year from Douglass Stewart, an instructor at the studio I work at and one of the teachers I practice under whenever I get the chance. Douglass actually co-founded the event, and after I missed last year I was determined to make it--especially as I don't know when I'll be back here for the Solstice again.

It was a lot of fun. The TSA had a number of sponsors for the day, who all contributed to large yellow goody bags that were stocked with items that included a Solstice t-shirt, Snapple antioxidant water, Fiji water, Body Shop samples, and several SoyJoy bars--and none of which were the dreaded Mango bar, which I find personally disgusting. The first 500 people at the event (of which I was one) also got a free mat from Danskin, which was too slippery to practice on there, but will no doubt break-in after a light vinegar wash.


I did the first class of the day and the final class of the day, greeting the sun coming up (I actually woke up at five that morning, so yes: I literally did this thing) and saying goodbye to it in the evening. The evening class was particularly cool because we started at sunset, and by the time we were done with our meditation and svasana, the sky was lit only by the lights in the Square. (I was actually in my meditation, sensing these flashing lights beyond my closed eyes, and thought I was on the brink of discovering something--but of course it was just an ad for Inspired by The Bible Experience.)


Tranquility is hard to find, no doubt, especially in this city of over eight million people. Yoga is about balance, part of which comes with balancing the mind. Like the second sutra of Patanjali tells us, "The restraint of the modifications of the mind-stuff is Yoga," leading us to the third sutra, "Then the Seer [Self] abides in His own nature." It's a challenge to do this at anytime in the city, but like the ad above asks, "Can you find it in Times Square?" And I did. Somehow having everything else going on around me allowed me go into a deeper space of self. Aside from the occasional loss of focus (looking up in trikonasana and seeing what I can look forward to on upcoming episodes of Grey's Anatomy), it was definately one the more enjoyable practices I've had in a while.

I saw a lot of people I knew at the event--teachers, clients, and friends, (and this super model--I am NOT kidding {Boys: do more yoga. You will meet women.}) and I feel blessed to have been able to be a part of this NY yoga community for my time. These individuals have taught me a lot about life and myself, and I hope I can honor those lessons in the time to come, no matter what side of the pond I'm on. Namaste, my friends.

(NOTE: All photos, except for the Solstice ad itself, were taken by Cathy Lilly.)

Yoga Certification Progress: Anatomy Done! (Maybe.)

(ABOVE: Diagram of Jason Brown, labeled with anatomy; BELOW AT LEFT: A doodle)

Well, probably. Most of it, at least. I must admit, I went a little crazy trying to make up hours of the anatomy intensive that I missed the last time around--I had a table reading of Much Ado one day, and rehearsal for The Accommodation the other, cutting both of my six hour days short by about three each day. So I went Saturday, determined to get through the whole weekend with and open mind and excitement about the human body.

I failed.

By the four hour mark of the first day, I was falling asleep, and bailed to go home and take a cat nap before seeing my friend Melissa's dance show. Today I couldn't bare it almost at all, and after two hours headed out.

Part of it is the heat--NY is especially oppressive lately, and even an early morning jog feels like moving through butter. Part of it is the repetitiveness--having done part of this before, there was a bit of information I was already familiar with some of what Jason (anatomy & yoga teacher extraordinarie!) was discussing, so it was easy to zone out. And another part is being back in the classroom after so long, I've yet to build up the tolerance for these kind of situations. I also have a habit I developed my senior year in college of walking out of classes I don't find interesting, wandering around for about a half and hour, maybe getting a snack, maybe checking my e-mail, and then meandering back in at some later time. And anatomy, to me, is only so fascinating, unless it involves the use of this book, which is awesome.

But in any regard, it's over now (I think--there may be a stray hour I need to account for), so I'm a touch closer to having my yoga diploma.

Suzuki: Day One

(WARNING: These entries will end up being more personal. Unavoidable.)

Got into the space and felt Old. So OLD. And that seems silly at twenty-three years and almost-but-not-quite eight months. All these undergrad students, most it looked like hadn't gotten past twenty yet, all friends, all these familiar greetings ("There she is!") that I remember when I took the intensive with my friends three years earlier. The sense of solitude hints at my feelings about grad school a little too well. I'm the only one from that session to return, and know no one, save the instructors, who I was flattered to discover actually remembered me--one teacher came over and greeted me, and it made me feel much more at home in what is now a foreign environment.

The work was the same, but getting my body used to moving that way again is just as difficult as it was three years ago, though I like to think the yoga experience has actually helped in at least understanding balance a little more, specifically the work the whole body is doing in order to maintain it. But my habits are still my habits, and I'm still working on them: letting go of the tension in my jaw, working but not WORKING!!!, maintaining a far focus (which I find harder as time goes by and the nearsightedness gets worse {still no glasses or contacts}), and ceasing judgment of myself and others (fucking judgmental mind...).

Last night we did a warm up, kind of a dancey-yoga, and then worked on marching as a whole, and then split into three separate groups. My group gathered in an upstairs rehearsal space that is separate from the large hall where we start the evening, and worked on extending ki, weight on the underside, and relaxation. Let me try to explain for those not familiar, and for the sake of myself:

1. Extending ki is essentially taking the focus off one's self and extending energy outward. Steve, one of the teachers, said this great thing: "Seeing in successful looking." We experiment with this by standing, just standing, and having some one push us slightly. Usually a person just standing will waiver. But the next step is to take a focus, look across the room, see some small detail--the dust on or shape of a pipe, whatever. Some one tries to push you again, and suddenly you barely move. Because your focus is off yourself, you're more actively engaged, and instantly you're grounded. This is obviously something you need as an actor, and as Steve reminded us in class, the other person in the scene is usually the most important. We do the same exercise by holding one arm palm up, extended straight out and having someone try to bend it, or palm facing the ground with a person trying to push it down. Your focus is usually coming from a sense of center, and sending energy up from that place, passing through the arm, extending to the point you are seeing. Here we often experimented by having the subject (arm-holder-upper) focus on a person standing across from them. See a specific detail about their neck, and you can keep your arm straight. See how they're noticing your hair, and suddenly with the focus back on yourself, your arm bends. It just happens. (Unless you're really good: There's actually one student older than me, Heath, probably in his late thirties, early forties, who has actually taught Suzuki. We are in the same group and he was my partner {the two fogeys}, and he was good even when he was supposed to be bad. In those instances, he would work to stand "STRONGLY," and that effort usually worked to unground him enough that he would waiver.)
2. Weight on the underside works on grounding and balance. Have some one focus their weight on their heels, push them, and they'll start to fall over. Have them readjust their focus to distributing their weight to the center of the foot closer to the ball, and they'll be steady. With the same idea, have some one sit on the ground, have them focus on the tops of their legs, and when you push them they'll move. Have them stay in that same position, but think about the place where their thigh touches the ground, and they're steady. Same thing works on a chair, or in variations from moving from standing to sitting, or sitting to standing. This is actually the place where the yoga has helped me the most, as we often have to move one part of the body while keeping another part stationary, maintaining a wide, steady balance the whole time, making that action possible. So being aware of where your weight is in order to do that helps in this exercise.
3. Relaxation is not about releasing entirely, but maintaining energy that isn't taxing or restrained. If you release entirely, that's just flaccidity, and nobody ever seems to want that. Steve's example: "Relaxing entirely on stage is essentially this (falls on floor in jumbled heap)." You can't act like that. But it's important to know where you're holding tension in your body so you can release it and make yourself more available to act/produce an action. It also frees up your body to do character work--there are only so many physical choices and shapes you can make with your shoulders up to your ears, or pushed down as far as they can go, for that matter. And of course, a relaxed body makes breath more available.

The three ideas are linked, in that if one works they all will: if you extend ki, you'll relax and have your weight where it needs to go, and so on. So if you can just do one, you're still doing a lot.

Aside from watching myself work last night and marveling how far I've come and not come, I mostly found myself noticing the kids, and laughing at what I saw--not in mockery, but in familiarity. There's this one girl who was decked out in Lululemon. I didn't notice her really speaking to other people, and in all of her work, you could tell she was trying Real Hard. She reminded me of myself in a way, and it made me both smile and feel a little sad. "Let up a little!" I wanted to say. "Find friends here!" Another girl was obviously there more concerned about how she looked, moving with intended body language, but I couldn't figure out who she was putting on the show for. This girl bothered me--"Don't focus on that! It's not important and it doesn't last, and here is not the place!"

And then there's this third kid, Jake. Jake is not the same as my friend Jake who did the GPS play with me, but one of the many MMC undergrads at this function. He seems like a pretty cool kid. We're in the same sub-group, and had a chance to work together. Every time something clicked for him, his entire face just lit up, like it was the coolest thing he'd ever experienced. You could see him gaining the confidence and the wonder all at once. And it was totally infectious. No wonder older people are often attracted to younger ones: watching their discoveries is wonderful and reminds you just what is happening around you and how lucky you are to be a part of it. It's like really seeing again, instead of just looking. And there's something about the lack of fear and self-censorship about Jake having that reaction--I'm totally guilty of always trying to come off professional and end up having very cerebral reactions to what happens to me in art and discovery (this blog could make that argument all on its own). But here is some one who can just celebrate the really amazing change you experience in discovering this work, and really enjoy it. I miss that--just letting myself enjoy something, not having to qualify it by examining WHY I like it. That's what my therapist is for, anyway.

Being around these kids (I keep calling them that, but it's really because I feel SO OLD, not because of any pretension {at least not conscious pretension...}) makes me also think about how I had wanted to teach at one point, and think I still do...someday. There is something, though, the responsibility that comes with teaching that I'm afraid of. What if I get it wrong? What if my students hate me? What if I become one of those teachers I hated, who got into it only to hear themselves talk, not because they wanted to help minds develop? How to be sure? I guess you never can be. But I might risk it for a student like Jake. Maybe.

He also complimented my mis-matched socks, which gives him another point in my book.

"I am tied to the stake, and I must stand the course."

(That title is not only appropriate, but a nod back to the fact that I forgot to post yesterday celebrating Shakespeare's Birthday. Happy Belated, my dear, darling, dead author.)

After a ridiculous chain of events that are far too boring and ludicrous to recount here, I finally had the check (British spelling: cheque) drawn up yesterday for my initial deposit to reserve my place in next year's MAATP program at Central (the acronym stands for: Master of Arts in Advanced Theatre Practices). It's to be made out for one thousand pounds (there's no way to make that symbol on an American key board in Blogger, it seems) and because it's an international draft, or some such thing, it takes two business days to make. I'm not certain why this is, but it is so, and so it is.

Anyway, after the whole transaction happened, I left the bank feeling badly. The mood lasted the rest of the day, this kind of nervous fear. My roommate (who should be making her cheque out today, incidentally) thinks that it has to do with a few things:

1) Spending that much money all at once can cause excessive nausea.
2) It's a LOT of money.
3) This is something that we are investing a lot in, and somewhat blindly.

I can attest for the nausea, no doubt--I have it right now, as I'm writing this post. And it's not just "I ate too much" nausea, it's "Why is everything spinning?", sea-sickness nausea. Somebody please bring me some Transderm Scop.

And it is a LOT of money. With the recession going on and the general weakness of the dollar (Remember that great sketch with Topher Grace on SNL? I do, but can't find a link to it to put here.), the check/cheque came out to $2,119.20.

YES.

Now, this may not seem like a lot of money to some, but it's quite a bit to me. And given the fact that exchange rates fluctuate daily, if I'd had the check/cheque made out on Sunday, or today, even, it would have only totaled a little over $1,970. This kind of fickle behavior of dollar-to-pound value fills my heart with bitterness. And it also makes the idea of living and existing in England all the more daunting, because I am a poor artist-student, and London is fucking expensive.

But, as I like to say, there are always ways of getting money. And bemoaning my poverty is much more appropriate in person, over high-priced drinks. So let's cut this one off right here.

The third reason is really the resonant one. Going over means a lot of things for a variety of reasons, but I suppose one of the chief ones is the hope that this experience will provide some answers, some clue as to what the fuck I should do for the rest of my life. Now, experience and yoga tells me that no such thing is possible. Nothing will ever give you a set answer because there is no "one answer" and if there was you probably already know it and are either not conscious of it, or you're just flat out ignoring it. But a clue would be nice. I'll even take a suggestion. Even a kick in the ass--not too hard, though please. I'm not really into that. Furthermore, taking this first step in really getting the gears moving in terms of getting myself over there makes everything suddenly overwhelming.

I should explain how I got this far: In November, I came home from somewhere, slightly drunk, with some kind of fire in my brain, logged onto the Internet, looked up Central, and after cruising around the site for a bit, I found the page that talked about US auditions. I registered to reserve a slot, but didn't give anymore real thought to it until sometime in December when I received a reminder e-mail from the school asking me to send in an application. A month later, I finally contacted my references and asked them to send their letters in, while I still hadn't filled out a single application. Cut to the last week of February, I finally finish my applications and Fed Ex them to England. They get there on Friday at noon. My auditions are Saturday and Sunday morning. My audition piece for the program I got into I finalized the day before, after figuring it out two days before the audition. The lag in this process followed me stil to sending the money off--I've had it for about a month, but now, with it due next Friday, I'm finally getting it there just barely in time to make this deadline.

Mastery of procrastination is one of my leading characteristics, it must be said. But I think part of the fueling of this procrastination is some denial of reality--the reality of the work that will be involved in just getting to England (flights, living space, setting up a bank account while over there, living costs), the reality of the work that I'll encounter (my program focuses on forms of theatrical production that I mostly know nothing about and have no substantial prior experience with, save the idea of development within an ensemble), and just the damned reality that the way of life as I've known it for the immediate past 5 years or so is going to change so drastically.

When it comes to the unknown, surely a certain amount of apprehension is to be expected. But I'm the kind of person who doesn't even deal with the immediate reality of change until about three months after the change has occurred: I float along, and then one day, BAM, the flood gates hit and everything flows through, taking out every large and small city in its path. I've been trying to think of this time I have left in NY as a kind of preparation, so that I'm not back-logging so much. But instead of acting I've just been dragging my feet more. (Go ahead and ask me if I've filled out my FASA. Go on. I dare you.) I fear taking responsibility for myself. I fear adulthood, and whatever sense of loss and hardship comes with it. The whole thing just seems so daunting, so why even bother, just stay here and have another drink, and do it tomorrow.

"Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow..."

So I'm freaked out, but not entirely willing to admit it (in my waking life, away from this forum, apparently), and while I know this is the right choice in the end, I hope to God I feel it at some point. And soon would be nice. Even if it was fleeting assurance.

And till then, I better get to work, because the recession is only getting worse, and I'll be lucky if a pound comes out to $3 by the time I get over there. Please forgive the introspective nature of this entry. Money does this to me.

OD #1: Next question, please?

OPEN DISCUSSION...PRETTY MUCH

(This one's for the actors, or those who have studied it in their time, or those who use such technique at some point.
Or for liars.)

Okay, guys: I think periodically I will ask a question here and look to all of you answer it, because I think a strength of a good blog is to engage in or introduce a discussion. Hopefully this will work. This is something that came up during my interview for the Classical course at Central. I was posed this question during my interview:

"What do you do when you act?"

For the actors, you'll be thinking, "I'm focusing, I'm saying lines, I'm listening to my partner, I'm putting myself into the circumstances of the character," etc. Well, you're wrong. Every answer I gave of that ilk garnered the response, "Yes, but what are you Doing?" An example of the interaction:

"Well, I'm staying present."
"Yes, but how do you Do that?"
"With my body, with my breath, with my voice...?"

I had no idea. I was exasperated and so was my auditor, who assured me, perhaps in an attempt to cut off the conversation, that there were loads of answers. I just didn't have one. He wanted something beyond Stanislavsky, and I could only really call out technique. I just didn't have an answer.

I thought about it a long time after--the rest of the day the question followed me: backstage at my performance of Much Ado About Nothing, and later into the audience of Conversations in Tusculum, which is where, while watching Aidan Quinn stand against a column, an answer occurred to me.

Here's what I came up with. I think the answer is that you breathe. According to my yogiraj, breath is one of the three things that make up life (the other two being light and love). Breath has been known to control our rate of thinking, the pace of our dialogue, our action. It keeps us present, calms us down, speeds us up, and is the thing we live on. All of these things are happening when we act and affecting how we act, what's going on in the moment, so I think that's my answer.

My roommate, Heidi, another Central acceptee this year for dramaturgy, who I had repeated the question to later, came home with an answer to days later. She had seen a documentary made about mounting Mother Courage at the Public in 2006, where Meryl Streep was basically asked the same question. She said something to the affect of being a translator; that she was both Brecht and herself, both 1939 and 2006, embodying this story and making it coherent for an audience of today, singing the songs of old so they not be forgot.

So Meryl Streep translates, and I breathe. What is it you do?

Lying, lying liars: feel free to comment as well.