Feu

So I come home from New York and all of Southern California goes up in smoke. It seems to happen that every time I come home from traveling somewhere the weather changes for the worst here. When I came home from Cooperstown we were dealing with record highs and record humidity. The first week I was home was pure misery. Now I come home from the City and the weather is beautiful. John and I travel to San Francisco and have a gorgeous time. On the way back we drive down the coast and hit some pretty smoky air around Los Angeles County. Unbeknownst to us we were driving straight through the beginnings of the Malibu fire. I'm in town for one more week before I go to Dallas Opera and we are dealing with fallout from the Witch and Harris fires. Unbelievable.

Not nearly as unbelievable, I'm sure, as all of this is to the thousands and thousands of people who have been displaced in San Diego County alone. Despite my bitching I am one of the lucky ones. The city has not yet been threatened and we are only suffering from the bad air, hot weather and lack of services due to businesses being closed while everyone figures out where they are going, what they are doing and whether or not they still have a home.

I feel helpless somewhat and can't help thinking in the back of my head that this is all my fault. Why do these things happen only when I come home? Dallas was a last minute gig and I was actually not really looking forward to it since I have been away from home so long. It doesn't look so bad right now as I see the mild temperatures on their weather forcast. Just to get away from the campfire air will be a blessing. I only wish I could bring John and the cats with me.

The picture is of the setting sun from our front porch. It's beautiful and horrifying all at the same time. Interested in helping out? Please follow this link to the San Diego chapter of the American Red Cross and this link to the San Diego chapter of the Humane Society. Many, many displaced horses and other furry creatures : (

It's Been a While...

So it's been over a week...I know

I got home last Monday and have been decompressing for the past week.

I went to a beach party, saw "Nozze Di Figaro" at San Diego Opera, walked to Twiggs for coffee with John several times (and once to "Mystic Mocha"), ate at Brian's American Eatery and Mandarin Dynasty (after trying to eat at P.F.Changs only to be told we would have to wait for an hour and a half).

I cleaned house, put away my stuff, did my laundry and went grocery shopping.

I got "The Portable Dorothy Parker" as an early birthday present, planned a dinner party, emailed a thousand people, planned a trip to L.A. and laid around with my cats. A lot.

I sorted out all of my books and uploaded a thousand and one pictures to Flickr.

I went to the dentist and found out that there's absolutely nothing wrong with my teeth that a good cleaning won't take care of. I spent hours and hours translating Gluck's "Orfee et Eurydice," and I'm still not done.

I made a hair appointment.

I finally saw "Blood Diamond" and liked it very much. I forgot that Leo DiCaprio is actually a good actor, and I forgot that Djimon Hounsou blows everyone around him out of the water every time.

I watched a backlog of John's "San Diego Opera Spotlights," and wished very much that I'd been around to see "Wozzeck."

I've been basking in being home. In being with John and the cats. Three more weeks and then off to Cooperstown.

I'll be writing more. I'm replenished now.

Living With My Husband...

Days got much better this week. Rehearsals started like a moving train, slow for a few seconds then quickly jumping up to speed. We're into Act II right now and we started on Wednesday. I think this whole show is going to be a hurricane (hopefully not IN a hurricane, however. I already did that).

Our biggest issue is actually the size difference between our theater space in Broward County and our space down here at the Carnival Center for Performing Arts. The set fits beautifully into CCPA (as most sets would...in fact, many would seem swallowed up by its cavernous space), but Broward is going to be a tight, tight fit and will require some very specific choreography backstage to get all of the large groups of people out of giant traffic jams. We had our first chorus rehearsal tonight and the group didn't look as large as I thought, but when we get principals and supers into the mix, we're going to feel quite cramped quickly.

News was very very good today. I got a job that will have me working in San Diego for five straight months, which means I'll actually get to come home and spend time with my husband after each work day. I know that's normal to most people, but I've spent exactly 3 months with my husband since September, and will only have another 2 months before Christmas. 5 months in 16 is pretty sparse.

I'm not complaining. This is the career I chose. I love what I do...will love it even more when I'm directing my own shows, but when the opportunity arises to work in the same place my family lives, I'm going to jump on it. And so I did.

It'll be good to see the cats too, and to walk to the Farmer's Market on Sundays and lay on my own couch and do free laundry and get to use my orange Kitchen Aid mixer and be able to research stuff out of my library of books and do my taxes without having to have package after package sent to me...so many things get missed out of when you live out of a suitcase.

I'm sure the wanderlust will grab at me again once I've been home for a bit. I don't think it will ever go away entirely.

Forward . . . In Time

So I'm looking ahead to this upcoming concert. It's funny how things seem so very far away on Thursday, and then a certain Monday rolls around and you can see the avalanche barreling towards you. My calendar doesn't look full but I feel it in my veins, that adrenalin rush around the corner as I start to prepare for December.

Brecht closed this weekend. It was a joyous occasion for all and I was especially joyous to finish up there and walk away for a while. The final performance was sheer perfection after a rough matinee that afternoon. It's so terrific to see a group of teenagers in rare form - they were nervous but cool, wandering off on their own, going over lines, breathing together in a circle before filing downstairs to the theater. Several days ago, on opening night, I introduced them to a theater tradition passed on to me by Mary Rotella. We played the hokey-pokey before stepping onstage. I don't know what it is about that ridiculous song that brings a cast together, but it works every time. We picked four body parts before each show. Everyone's favorite (especially if you're 15) is hips. Most memorable was the afternoon performance when the dressing room was moved into the smallest room in creation and we stood outside in the hallway and whispered the song so the approaching audience wouldn't hear it shouted from above.

I received fond gifts from my students. Cards, a gift certificate (!!) and a bottle of wine called "The 7 Deadly Zins" ("very funny...you didn't purchase this yourselves now did you?"), and fought back a little well-up as I watched them slip into the backstage area before we started. I was reminded of my college years performing in an ill-conceived black box, where the performers would enter the stage area from behind the audience AFTER the house lights had gone down. All holding hands, we would be led onto the stage and into the wings by a stage manager with a blue-tinted flashlight. The blue lights backstage always give me a twinge in the stomach...nerves from a bygone era in my life.

So, that's over. I am left with some great pictures, and a downward pointing directional sign that simply says, "Hell," a part of the set from our "Anger" section. Haven't decided where in my house it goes best yet.

The picture is, of course, the back of my postcard. It's a self-portrait, taken at my parent's house a year and a half ago. I'm not ready for the show to go up yet, but John is helping and I think I'll be there in a month. I still have to travel to Hungary, shoot a dance video, finish choreographing a solo piece to Johnny Cash, solidify my piece with a 6-year-old spitfire, and make some changes with my duet. It's a lot, and I am being brought back to my work with Cerulean in Chicago, lo those many years ago, when I ran around town with my friend, Lynne, printing off tickets, sending out press packets, calling newspapers, shoving postcards in people's faces and hoping beyond hope that I got everything done, that I did everything I could to promote.

And so I am promoting here as well. If you're in the San Diego area, come see it!!! The website is linked at the right. I can't verify that you'll like it, but I can verify that I put everything I had into it. It's the only way I know how to work.

Off that subject . . . in other news, election day is tomorrow and I'm still not sure what I want to do about most of these propositions and some of the people I'm supposed to vote for or against. There's too much on the ballot for me to possibly take in properly and I always get into the little cubicle and have a brief moment of "Oh, the hell with it!" before I settle in and take it seriously. I wish I really felt like I made a difference.

It's hot as Hades here and I find myself longing for a real fall and winter. I think I'm truly a Northern girl at heart (as John is a Northern boy). Every time we get Santa Ana winds here I get stopped up and miserable and feel like punching anyone who gets in my way.

John and I have been pricing pet steps to put by our bed so Lucius, my middle aged, somewhat crippled cat, can get up on the bed (and off the bed) without seriously injuring himself. Expensive little buggers those stairs. How can a square of foam cost $140?? I am baffled at how much we spend to make these little quadrupeds happy (while causing myself oodles of sticker shock and stress).

That's all for the moment. More shameless plugs and inconsequential musings later....