Holidays Away...

Holidays away from home are tough on many levels. Part of it's the obvious missing of family members. Part of it, for a foodie like me, is the inability to cook holiday foods with the meager kitchen utensils and amenities I have in my little corporate suite.

There are also smaller problems. The reason I didn't go home for Thanksgiving this year (besides the poor factor) is that I have rehearsals on both sides of the holiday. There's a guilt that washes over me when I take a full day off while rehearsing a show. I worked all day yesterday so that I could take today - a holiday - off, but I still woke up feeling like I should work. Holiday breaks in the middle of a deadline-based gig are horrifying for the workaholic.

There's also an anti-social aspect that sometimes comes sneaking in. There's always a part of me when waking up on a holiday that wants to spend the day in my pajamas watching Christmas movies and eating takeout. I know myself enough, however, to know that if I don't go to my holiday plans I'll regret the lost connections and I'll never truly be able to relax and blow off steam.

A member of our production staff had access to an incredible home this holiday season and so he invited us all over for Thanksgiving dinner. Ten of us showed up. The table was set with real china and crystal, we toasted with champagne, we went around the table (just like my own family's tradition) and told everyone what we were thankful for, and we feasted. My, how we feasted! All of the trappings of a traditional turkey dinner plus a few little extras here and there. I brought pineapple timbale, an old family recipe that dates back to when my ancestors were whalers... It was my own contribution to the family atmosphere.

Afterwards we laughed hysterically while cleaning the kitchen, then collapsed in front of a roaring fire and talked for several hours - until the tall candles on the coffee table burned down to nubs. I sat there and looked around at everyone smiling, red-cheeked, clutching pillows, and thought about this idea of connections that I keep coming back to as I slowly try to figure out this business. We get close so fast in these little 6-week gigs. Everyone I work with is like a member of some sort of strange, dysfunctional family. We keep coming together and falling apart, but if I find these people in another city we'll be right back where we left off.

It's a comfort to know we're all in this together and I'm thankful to have so many people who share in this traveling existance wherever I go.

What else am I thankful for? I'm thankful to have a husband who is so unbeliveably supportive in this crazy career I'm carving out. I'm thankful for a family who loves me no matter how different my world is from theirs. I'm thankful that my career is still growing; that what I'm doing thus far seems to be working.

I'm thankful for life experiences and evenings like this.