Dance Weekend

John and I spent the whole weekend seeing and supporting dance. We haven't done that in a while and it was nice to take the time, get a little dressed up, and see what San Diego dancers are doing. We saw "One to Echo on Friday night, a curated show by Bound Contemporary Dance with A.S. Peterson Dance, Buffy Swallow, Amanda Waal and a video by Company of Strangers (edited my Monica Gillette, who was one of the dancers in Love and Murder lo those couple of years ago).

On Saturday we went to the Butterworth Dance fundraiser called "The Happening." They had a silent auction and performed a few of their pieces along with a piece by a new company called Tangocentric. John won me a beautiful brown beaded necklace to go with my new obsession with brown. I wore black for so long and it seems the tides are shifting. Don't know what that says about my emotional state, but it sure is spicing up my wardrobe.

We were supposed to see Allyson Green and Nadine George's site-specific work as well, but we got the dates mixed up and thought it was tonight instead of last night. I don't know what it is about John and I making plans together and our inability to properly read calendars; it only seems to happen when we're together. I was sad to miss the performance, but glad that I went to Butterworth, supported Molly Terbovich, who is one of my performers on the 17th, and ate some good grub.

Favorite moments of the two evenings? Amanda Waal, in a more extended version of a piece I saw during a "Ray at Night," rolling on her side and releasing a tiny red balloon into the air, her soul passing, and then later throwing lanky, fluid movement through a sound-score made up of different people discussing the last things they saw before they died. The three dancers in Alicia Peterson's piece finally coming together in a satisfying bit of unison after sitting in incongruous juxtaposition for so long. Monica Gillette's mad editing skills in making Hassan Christopher look as if he was doing one movement in three different places without stopping. (I've watched John put those moments together in the editing room; I know what kind of intuition that clarity takes). Jillian Chu's choreography. Period.

Twon's deep, M.C. voice. The fluidity and togetherness of Traves Butterworth's dancers, a lovely bit of dragon imagery in "Silk Road," Seeing Jessica Reed perform again. Getting caught by a board member as I stood guard over my necklace at the silent auction. BDC's espresso cake which was clearly fattening and decadent but impossible to walk away from.

Today John and I went into the studio to put the final touches on "Weiblich Ist?" and "Utazo (The Traveler)." We made several copies so we can send them out to a lot of people and hopefully get people watching. Going to concerts this weekend inspired me for my own, plus I got my first seat reservation yesterday and it made me feel like I wasn't doing all of this for absolutely nothing.

It's dry as a bone today with Santa Ana winds blowing, but my Christmas shopping is done and Lucius and Stella were sleeping together on the couch when I walked in so things are not all bad. Tonight I'm making quiche and we will watch a movie and enjoy being together; that's really what the holidays are all about.

As Traves Butterworth said last night, "Go support the arts this Christmas." We need it; it's every man for himself.

It's All About Who You Know..

Acutally...it's all about who knows you. And so, the publicity push for my concert begins. I've been putting hints in people's heads for some time now, but three days ago I sent out a mass email to 200 people in my acquaintence and yesterday I sent a press release to every newspaper and radio/tv station in town. I even sent a couple of personal emails to critics I know in hopes that they will be interested in coming and maybe writing a little something about what they see.

This is the part I have trouble reconciling with myself. I make work because I want people to see it, but I hate promoting myself. I feel somewhat selfish and overbearing when I encourage people to come to my concerts. It's ridiculous because it's the only way to get an audience, but I want people to come of their own volition, not just because they feel strong-armed.

But I bite the bullet and do it. I should be proud of my work and running around screaming it from the rooftops. In fact, if anyone reading this post is in the San Diego area, or has friends here, they should come see it too. It's December 17th at 7pm in North Park. A place called the Arts & Entertainment Center at 30th and University. I'll be there, John will be there, my three dancers will be there. As for the rest of the audience, it's anyone's guess.

It's a good show. I'm particularly proud of my second video, the one John and I just finished. It's well put together and I think Zach did an incredible job with the music. So much so that I want to hire him again for another video. We should make this a regular family affair.

So that's the show right now. Both videos are done, I'm still tinkering with some changes in "They'll Devour Me Too" but it's basically done, My six-year-old other and I have finished our duet, it's just the massive cleaning we're looking at now, and my solo is mentally understood, it just needs time in a physical space. I'm feeling confident in having a show prepared when I walk in the door on the 17th. Now it's just getting people there. I guess I'm not feeling too terrible about that either.

In other news, I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping. That is to say that my family is done and I have an idea in my head about what I want to do for John. I'm sending out a few cards this year but not nearly as many as other years. I must get working on those but hope to get them done over the weekend.

Leaving for Virginia is coming much quicker than I want it to. I've grown to like living at home (imagine that) and the thought of getting on one more airplane and thrusting myself into an unfamiliar place is a bit nerve-wracking. I've got all of my score materials, however, so at least I'm getting a jump on that.

Life is rushing along and me with it.

Hungary

This is me on the Danube. The bridge is called the Lanchid, which means "Chain Bridge." It's built by the same man who built the chain bridge across the Thames (Tierney, I think), and it is an incredible sight to behold. It was my first destination when I woke up on my first morning in Budapest. John left for the Opera Hotel and meetings about the Lizst project (which is why we were there in the first place) and I walked towards the Danube, which is called the Duna in Hungarian. The bridge connects Pest, the more modern, flat and cosmopolitan half of the city, with Buda, a Medieval, hilly section with a giant hill at the base of the bridge that holds Buda Palace, the Fisherman's Bastion and other incredible sights. It's one of the most beautiful skylines in all of Europe and I was blown backwards by it as I walked towards the sunny, dew-filled riverfront. It was the beginning of great things in terms of my little video. What an inspiring way to start.

This, on the other hand, is the last night we were there. John had more time off than we thought he would. It allowed us to shoot all over the city, take in the House of Terror (a chilling museum of the Soviet regime housed in the same building as the Nazi Party and, later, the Secret Police), wander through the Museum of Ethnography with its wonderful photo exhibit and beautiful national costumes, and see an opera at the most ornate opera house in which I've ever stepped foot. We saw "Figaro," which did not impress me as much as I'd hoped. The Cherubino was fantastic and the Susanna was a terrific actor, but the direction was stunted and the action often overplayed. It was an enjoyable evening nonetheless, and the Countess had a voice to die for.

It also allowed us to take our final evening and go to a local Balkan folk dance night at a youth center called Petofi Csarnok. It sits, monolithic, in the center of the city's woodland park, which is much like Central Park with a skating rink on a manmade lake and a big castle in the center, plus statuary everywhere you turn. We wandered through the darkened park to the Csarnok and were a bit dubious at first because the place seemed deserted. This was my only opportunity to shoot locals dancing so I was on the verge of being dissapointed until I got up my nerve to walk in the door and find the contact person I had been speaking with. He led me into a little dark room with a fantastic band and six young dancers who got together once a month to practice their dances while Pravo, the ensemble, played up a storm. They were dressed in everything from traditional dress to jeans and boots, and they pounded out the rhythms laughing while John and I shot. The director finally dragged me out on the floor as well, and John got footage of me doing some Balkan folk dancing. Something I never thought I'd do. The picture is before I was pulled onto the floor. The folk dancers are doing a fast circular dance and the band is jumping away in the back. I should folk dance all the time; it would be a great weight loss program. I've never been so tired and sore.

We shot some other locals too. This is a pic of John video taping a couple of Roma musicians in Vorosmarty square. We are standing right outside of Cafe Gerbaud, which is the most famous cafe in Budapest, known for its intense cafe culture. We had coffee and cake there later, but this morning we only had an hour before John ran off to do some location scouting. We came across these two, I dropped 200 forint (about a buck) into their hat, and they struck up a brilliant tune. My dancing to their playing is part of the opening to our video, which we titled "Utazo (The Traveler)."

This is John and I in front of the Fisherman's Bastion. This piece was built in the 19th century but looks much older. Right behind it is the Buda Hilton, which was built on some monestarial ruins. Sounds awful of them, but they've preserved much of the ruins in an outside area and you can walk through the walls and look at a statue of the more prominent monks. This may be my favorite view of the city, as the Bastion is right on the river and you can look across to Parliament and the Basilica rising up in Pest's flat landscape.

John and I had a terrific time. I would go back to Budapest in a heartbeat. The people were friendly, the coffee to die for and the scenery was heart wrenching. Hungary has a difficult history; much of the city of Budapest is new because it's been plundered so many times, sometimes by its own people. It's an interesting mix of Eastern and Western European ideals and, although the language is nearly impossible to speak and understand (I only conquered "Thank you," and for those who know me, you know that's not much), many young people and some older people speak enough English to get by. More popular is German, which can get you through the day nearly anywhere. Almost every restaurant had an English language menu, and absinthe is legal, though I never partook as I was dancing so much.

Click on the title of the post to go to my Flickr site. It has a bunch more pictures and descriptions. If you want to see the video, it's premiering at my concert on December 17th....yes, shameless plug, but that's why I journal on line anyway.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Just a brief note to say Happy Thanksgiving! Despite our travel day, I am very happy to be home and now getting ready for the holidays and my length of time away.

The picture is sunset over the Danube, with Buda castle and the Lanchid looming in the back. What an incredibly beautiful, friendly city. I could go there again and again.

John and I are spending the holiday alone. I am making leg of lamb and made a pumpkin pie last night. It'll be great to celebrate in our home. I hope everyone is having as lovely a day as I am.

More after food and sleeping...

United Airlines Sucks! And, How to Feel Like a Foreign Criminal in your Own Country

So we just got back from Budapest. An amazing city and one of the most beautiful city centers I've ever experienced. The Danube cuts right through the middle and the bridge-lined riverfront displays gorgeous architecture after architecture. John and I shot almost four hours worth of footage which I will comment on later, especially my experience with Petofi Csarnok and Balkan Folk Dance Night. You can see photos at my Flickr site with long descriptions. Click on the title of this post and it will take you to Flickr.

The nadir of the trip was both travel days. We flew United/Lufthansa and it was torturous. Granted, we didn't make the reservations, they were made by the man in charge of the film for whom John was scouting. As soon as we got the reservations several weeks before we left, we got on the horn and tried to get seating reservations. We were told then and when we went on line (where we couldn't even bring up the reservation despite the fact that it was in our name) that no seat assignments would be available until the day of travel. The people on the phone told us that no overseas flight ever gives seat assignments before the day of, which is a total lie. This is the 6th time I've traveled to Europe and the first time I've gone to the airport having no idea where I was sitting.

So, on both trips, our seats ended up being the last seats on the plane. On the way back, our flight from Washington Dulles to San Diego, we couldn't even get aisle seats, so we were in the aisle and center of the last seat on the plane. This was not for lack of trying. Trying not to get discouraged, we dutifully called from Hungary, went on line, and tried to go to a ticket office in Budapest. John ended up calling the United States from our SIM-card enhanced cell phone and they told him the same thing - no seat assignments will be given until you are at the airport.

Okay...this is where I get really pissed. We showed up at the airport at 5:30 in the morning the day we traveled home, and got our seat assignments for all of the flights. Like I said, our flight from Dulles gave us the worst possible seats on the plane. I ask, "is there anything else available?" The agent says, "No, these are the last two available seats. All the rest have been reserved."

My next logical quesion, "How is it that they've been reserved? We've told that we couldn't get seat reservations until we checked in at the airport and that flight is more than 18 hours away. Are you telling me that everyone but us has already checked in for the flight 18 hours ahead of time?"

She says, "No, these seats have been reserved beforehand."

And so we get into a circular argument here about who is lying to whom? How could they all be reserved beforehand if you can't get seats until you show up at the airport? We were told this on every flight we checked in for - everyone but us seemed to reserve beforehand. How are we the only ones unable to do this? I shouldn't have to pay the same amount of money for a ticket and be shoved in the back by the restrooms. The legroom in the back is not as good either, so John was stuffed into a seat with his knees pressed against the seat in front of him. United did nothing to help us and even seemed to intimate that it was our fault that we had such bad seats.

The flight to San Diego was particularly frustrating when the flight attendant actually admitted that they didn't have enough meals for sale to feed the last five rows of the airplane. How is that possible? Because we're in the last five rows, we are not entitled to eat? United doesn't seem to think so.

In conclusion of my flight experience, I have to say, DO NOT FLY UNITED! They are a shabby excuse for an airline with terrible customer service and circular logic in their answers that brings up constant inconsistencies. I am completely dissatisfied in every way and would gladly pay more money for an airline that will treat me with respect. This isn't the first time I've had problems with them, but these are definitely the most heinous.

That being said...the other heinous part of traveling these days is customs and security. I was treated with kindness and respect by all of the security and customs officials in Hungary and Germany. We get back to the United States, however, and I am suddenly thrust into a long, slow line and treated like a criminal in my own country. Dulles has no organization whatsoever. After passing through immigration, we were thrown into a hall to recheck our baggage. There were people packed wall-to-wall and screaming at you to stay in line (what line?). We couldn't get to the recheck spot they screamed at us to go to without cutting around people who had already dropped off their bags, and we were screamed at by another agent wearing sunglasses (??) as we tried to give him our bag. At that point we waited over half an hour to get through two operating security tables with no line up to the front, everyone just shoving and squeezing through the crowds. TSA agents were screaming at us in some sort of half-English pidgin slang and shoving us into various lines as we got within spitting distance of the conveyor belts. People were crying and hyperventilating and I kept thinking that I had an easier time at customs when I flew into Mexico.

It's a hideous experience and a true equalizer as the ladies who lunch in their pearls and heels were in the same shoving, heaving, sweaty line as poor college students who spent the whole fall backpacking through Europe. All of us equally pissed off.

We got to the gate just as it was boarding and we were spitting at each other and stinky and tired and wholly unhappy. Nothing like reentering your own country to make any sort of travel wholly undesireable. We should have stayed in Europe.

And that's my diatribe. We reallyl did have a lovely time. I will recount it later, but I had to get this off my chest first.

The Eve Before the Trip

We leave tomorrow morning. We fly to Dulles then Frankfurt and finally to Budapest. Everything seems to be ready. I spent the whole day on line trying to put together a list of addresses for cultural facilities that might let me shoot on their property. I've only heard from one of them, who has invited me to a Balkan folk dance party on the 20th. Should be interesting no matter what happens.

We had a bit of a setback this morning. John called me to tell me that our hotel had not been secured. We thought it was taken care of but apparently not. He went on line at work and searched around for something affordable. We settled on the Hotel Pest, which is pictured here. It's a 3-star in an 18th century building with terrific reviews on line. I hope it lives up to its reputation. The best part is its location. It's right next to the Opera House and very close to the Lizst Academy of Music. Nothing like being in the middle of it all to inspire my shooting schedule.

Last night John and I went to see Pink Martini - Finally!! We tried to go when they were at Humphreys this summer but I got called away to work at Glimmerglass in New York and we ended up eating the tickets. Last night they were at 4th and B, which is a far inferior venue, but the band was still amazing. Check out the link if you haven't heard of them. They're from Portland, Oregon, and I discovered them about seven years ago when "Sympathique," their first album, was brand new. They do global lounge music. Bachelor pad favorites in Portugese, Italian, Japanese, French and even English. They have a great version of "Brazil," and "Bolero," and an incredibly creepy version of "Que Sera Sera."

There are twelve of them, with a great torch singer, China Forbes, along with piano, full drums, trombone, trumpet and a cross section of strings. All of them incredibly accomplished. I was especially enamored of one of Paloma Griffin, one of the violinists, who sat in the very front a bit stony-faced but passionate in her movements as she drew her bow across the violin. I enjoyed every minute of their playing and banter and wished there was a dance floor available. John says he doesn't dance, but I think if I can just get him out there...

The crap part was the venue. The people running the gig were loud and rude and seemd to think we were all teens at a rock concert instead of 30, 40 and 50-somethings at a big band performance. They stopped an incredible tango couple (and were admonished by the band for doing so) and spoke at full voice, yelling across the room, at extremely quiet times in the performance. The drinks were massively over priced, they didn't have a good liquor stock ("DiSarrono on the rocks, Oh, you don't have Amaretto...um, Kahlua and Cream, oh, no Kahlua?"), and they served everything in little plastic cups - even martinis. All through a beautiful Japanese song there were terrible noises and scraping sounds from the lobby and none of the people running the venue seemed to care. I was somewhat appalled. Pink Martini deserved better.

I hope they'll be back and in a venue more appropriate for the type of show they present.

And so, it was a night of fun and today was packing and running last minute errands. Tomorrow is getting on a plane over and over again and the next day will be running around Budapest. It's all up in the air - I have no idea what this experience will bring. It's terribly exciting and makes me a bit anxious, but I'm sure things will calm once I get there.

I'll let you know.

Feeling Better Today

This picture is of my neice, Elsa, showing me how well she spins in the living room of my parent's home in Missouri. I've been thinking a lot about my neice and nephew and how far away John and I are from them. The holidays always bring up issues of family and right now I am missing all of these people I love.

I think this bit of homesickness has been part of my problem lately. I've been in a funk, as was demonstrated by my blog entry yesterday. I'm feeling a lot better today. I took a three-mile walk and got a blended mocha at this amazing coffee shop called "Mystic Mocha" in North Park, and dropped off some more postcards and, well, ultimately revved up enough endorphins to keep me out of this funk I've been in for the last week.

I think I'm on the brink right now of a lot of things. The brink of this trip to Hungary, the brink of the holidays, the brink of me leaving for almost five months, always the brink of insanity methinks. It puts me on an edge I don't particularly care for and now I'm trying to figure out how to back up.

There are people moving into the house next door. The moving van has been out front all day and I hear noises like vacuum cleaners and electric drills and tiny shouts and sometimes laughter coming from inside the walls. John and I have discussed buying a house but it's a near impossibility for artists in the land of Southern California. What an exciting time it must be for them, but I imagine, as I would be, they are also stressing about being able to keep their finances in order and their house from falling apart. It's one of those future things that I want and don't want all at the same time.

My three cats have all been really ornery with each other lately. Lucius had a huge, bleeding scratch across his face the other morning and I've been periodically hearing screeches and growls coming from the other two as they swipe at each other an jump on the other from behind. The weather isn't nearly as hot as it was and John and I have been in good spirits with each other (despite my bit of funk) so I'm not exactly sure what's going on with them. I don't recommend three cats. There was nothing John or I could do about it as we love all three of our little quadrupeds dearly and had to force them together when we moved into the same abode, but the work load increases ten-fold when you put three of them together. My cat is particularly difficult. It's too bad he's so sweet and utterly cuddly.

I'm leaving in about half an hour to go rehearse with my six-year-old performer. She has very distinct ideas about this piece the two of us are putting together and the whole process has been a huge lesson in compromise for me. I want her to be in on the creation process but we rarely see eye-to-eye about what the piece is actually about. I thought it was going to be a conversation between me and my younger self, but it's become more of a battle of wills between a type-A of my generation and a type-A of hers. The girl's got a mind like a steel trap and a sharper tounge than I ever had at her age. I admire her spunk, and it's been a huge learning process for me. I'm interested to see what we ultimately come up with.

Life never ceases to amaze me.

Video Stills and Papering the Town

John gave me a CD of screen grabs from "Weiblich Ist?" They're always the best publicity photos for a video because they're photos that come directly from the edited piece. Here are a couple that show me on opposite sides of the gender spectrum. Scares me a bit that I look just like my brothers in the tux. People always said that my parents looked alike, and they passed on those similar genes. All four of us look like clones.

I spent the whole afternoon dropping postcards off at various coffee shops and bookstores around town. Actually, the first part of the afternoon was spent driving up to Encinitas to pick up a paycheck I have been owed for a very long time for my work at Canyon Crest. I'm not a fan of dealing with beauracracies, and this one has given me nothing but headaches. Suffice to say, it has ultimately cost me about $80 to get paid by the school district.

After that I papered the town. Not my favorite job, but it's a good feeling that people will walk into so many different places of business and see my postcard there. I hope it will drum up a few ticket sales, but I really have no idea what will make people want to come to my show. I certainly hope I can put butts in all 120 of those seats. What a nerve-wracking thing.

Tonight is a meet and greet with a man who does an arts radio show. I'll take some postcards there too. I think I'm pretty good at schmoozing, and it's important to get the word out, but it wears me down. I just want to sleep.

Well, Holy Crap!

Bush Takes Blame for GOP Election Losses

On CNN. My favorite quote:

"The message yesterday was clear: The American people want their leaders in Washington to set aside partisan differences, conduct ourselves in an ethical manner and work together to address the challenges facing our nation," Bush said.

All those things we learned in kindergarten: cooperation, following rules, acting ethically, learning to get along...it took him a while to stop stamping his feet and jutting out his lower lip, but it's good to see our president trying to act like a big boy.

Also...no more Donald Rumsfeld. Woo-Hoo!!

So now it's just up to Virginia...I've got fingers tightly crossed. Maybe we can actually see some real checks and balances in these last couple of years. A congress led by the Democrats will at least make the time leading up to 2008 a bit more bearable (please?)

Election Day Musings

We are in the midst of a knee-sweat inducing Santa Ana, and yet I put on my lightest summer clothing and walked up the street to Alice Kirby Elementary, my polling place, thinking that I would have to stand in line and would find myself sweating in places without sweat glands as the school is unairconditioned.

I was the only one there.

My electronic voting booth was broken the first time. I'd stick the voter card in the slot and my ballot was immediately cancelled three times. Ten minutes it took me to figure out how to get the thing to stick (after finally switching booths).

I was still the only one there.

Went through the countless elected representative and judicial nominees, the umpteen propositions set before California voters today, made sure I was answering each one exactly how I wanted. Mused at the fact that the whole thing was really quite easy after the whole broken booth thing was taken care of. Watched my voter tape roll through the system with my picks easily recognizeable. Still not one hundred percent about the voting machines, but much happier since I got to see my answers roll by instead of letting them disappear into the bowels of the computer without me being able to check them. That was seven or eight minutes. Turned around to grab my "I voted" sticker.

I was still the only one there.

Walked out the door into the blinding, arid sunlight; the palm trees offering no respite in shade, the asphalt steaming, my sunglasses not doing enough to keep me from squinting. No one was around; no one was walking up to the door, no one was parking their car.

I think I am the only person in University Heights who voted today.

Got home and had an email from my friend, Lynne. Her husband is from North Africa. This was his first election as a citizen of the United States. He finally got to vote for the first time in his life. She had attached a great shot of him outside the polling place, pointing jubilantly at his "I Voted" sticker, looking like he might be saving the world. How wonderful to have that kind of enthusiasm for a practice that so many Americans consider a burden, or are too cynical to deal with. So many would rather watch the shitheads take office so that they have something to perpetually complain about Do they not understand that they might not have to bitch if they actually did their civic duty?

Everyone should have a chat with someone like my friend's husband. For him this is a new and grand experience - to have a say in what our government does. We have no idea how lucky we are.

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....

Wal-Mart Thinks Bin Laden has been Delivering their Chips

So, this poor Argentinian man, Oscar Brufani, makes his living delivering potato chips to markets around Argentina. His biggest customer was Wal-Mart until a couple of years ago, when he showed up to deliver and the following happened:

"Brufani already noticed the two men in suits when he was unloading his crates: They were staring at him. They eyeballed him, whispered to each other, looked at him again. Then they went to the store manager's office.

"You can't work here anymore. Orders from upstairs," the store manager said when she finally arrived at the car park, Brufani remembers. He asked whether he had done anything wrong, and she told him no -- the problem was his beard. "The controllers think you look like Osama bin Laden. If you appear on any of the images recorded by the security cameras, I'll lose my job."

Those North Americans are nuts, Brufani thought to himself. Do they really think bin Laden would spend his time delivering chips to a Wal-Mart store in La Plata?"

What the hell is wrong with people in our country? The man wears a beard because he likes it. Hell, my father wore a full beard for years and years, would he be banned from work today because he looked too much like a terrorist mastermind? Fear has taken over. Bush has perpetuated it. And that, more than anything else people are doing, is helping the terrorists at their work. He has helped the terrorists achieve exactly what they wanted - making our entire country break down its freedoms because we are "terrified" of what will happen if we maintain our way of life.

Read the full article by clicking on the link below.

Brecht Opens Tomorrow

...thank heavens!

We had our final dress rehearsal tonight. It's a short piece so we had the chance to run it twice. These kids have worked really hard. I was looking back at old rehearsal pictures and realized what a long way we've come from that first rehearsal with a golf cart sitting in our rehearsal space and some of the worst French pronunciation I've yet encountered.

We've gone from sloppy shapes to beautiful angles with my three students stuck behind a scrim for most of the show. I have a student who slithers artfully across a piano, one who kicks over a chair with incredible verve, another who, after much coaxing, singles out audience members to tell them how much better she is than them, and a young piano player who blows me away every time he touches the keys.

I can't say that this has been a stress-free love fest. High school shows are difficult because they lack the support of a professional theater. No matter how much I'd like to say otherwise, I produced this show nearly on my own. I fought with space problems, a missing costumer, no funds, no stock, and a fire alarm that kept going off in rehearsal after rehearsal. Everything that professional actors know instinctively has to be explained in great detail in a high school rehearsal, and never assume that anyone will remember anything I say. However, I will walk away from this feeling like I've given these kids something to think about, and maybe I've inspired one or two of them to do their own work...

It's been a learning experience for all of us.
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This is day one or two of rehearsal. The first time we worked as a full group in the cabaret set up. The first rehearsal they all learned how to play blackjack. I think they are showing off their new-found skills here.

The first time we put together the Pride tableau. This is one of my favorite moments in the piece.

The Pride Tableau in a cueing session. The lights are the essence of the piece. They train the audience where to look. The addition of the scrim changed how all of the students responded to each other on stage. It was a riot watching the tech crew load that thing out of the scene shop and bring it over to our little neck of the woods.

This is the climax of the piece in full costume. Anna's revelation, I call it.

Here we see the cabaret moments come to fruition. Still playing blackjack, but finally looking the part. It's only missing a little smoke and some whiskey bottles, but we joke that it's a smoke-free, juice bar cabaret. They're all the rage in Berlin.

My amazing family in their silhouette corner. They worked so incredibly hard to achieve these gorgeous tableaus and I am amazed at the results. I could watch them all day.

The cut out in the letter was my student's idea. As soon as they realized how much they could contribute, the ideas started pouring out. Much of the design of the show was put together by brainstorming with these kids. I love being able to say that the show is as much theirs as it is mine.

I give all of my shows as gifts to my performers. Sometimes I get something back in return.

And How!

John and I worked all weekend on "Weiblich Ist?" Our little dance film - six minutes long. The image is the logo for our new little production company. I think it will have my voice saying "And How!" like the little girl in the old Shake and Bake commercials. I wish the company actually brought in money to pay for these films, but I guess we can't have everything.

It's great to work on little pieces with my husband. It's unbelievable how quickly he cuts together all of the pieces to make a cohesive whole. We have a montage in the middle of the piece that seemed to fall together by itself, but I know it took his honed skills to make it happen. We make a good team.

Brecht opens on Thursday. Tomorrow is a cue-to-cue, and I worry that we aren't ready. The kids actually had a pretty good run on Friday, but we are still missing some props and some of these changes are still pretty rough, and I know the five in the ensemble are really stressing about their cabaret songs, though they shouldn't. I'm really impressed with how those came together. We have this amazing, mop-headed piano player who talks each of the kids through their music and suddenly they have this instant cohesion with the music.

I didn't really work on anything pertaining to Brecht Project this weekend. I needed a respite. Actually, that's a lie. I went to Nordstrom Rack yesterday to look for the infamous thirties-esque shirts for my two main characters. I think I found something, but it wasn't a picnic. There was a tour group from Arizona shopping there - not to mention that Mission Valley is a heinous place to be on the weekend anyway. Nordstrom's was packed and I stood in line for what seemed like hours, shifting from foot to foot with my arms laden with bad looking shirts in colors I would never dream of wearing, while college kids from Arizona yelled into their cell phones all around me.

Anyway, I laid off the rest of the weekend and John and I spent time at the editing trailer, drinking copious amounts of coffee and laughing a lot. We also ate a late breakfast at Brian's American Eatery (Brian's Big Gay Eatery, as some people call it), watched "Zelig" and "Shadow of a Doubt" last night, and actually read books that didn't pertain to our work. "Zelig" was actually extremely funny. I never realized how well Woody Allen and Mia Farrow fit into the '20's era. Mia Farrow especially; she looked amazing as the demure pschyanalyst. The whole film is pretty genius. Woody Allen slipped himself into real footage from the time period way before "Forrest Gump" came out, and I think he did a much better job of it. There's one moment when he's trying to get Mia's attention from the podium where Hitler is giving a speech that is seamless and hysterical.

I also got started on both stage works for my concert. It was great to see Molly and Kim again, as we struggled through remembering "They'll Devour Me Too." It always amazes me how we can't talk through old choreography, but put the music on and we just start doing the steps. Our muscles have an incredible memory. The hard part will be trying to change some of the choreography and retraining our muscles to understand it. Muscle memory doesn't often like change.

A Job Here...A Job There

This is the iffy black box that I am tyring to present "The Brecht Project" in at Canyon Crest Academy. The kids and I step inside this hole for several hours every afternoon. They work hard, the kids, but putting this show up by myself has not been an easy task. Right now I'm trying to put together costumes. We don't have the money to truly go period, so we are trying to hint at the 30's while pulling things off the rack at AmVets and Salvation Army. The piece has also become a pretty prop heavy show. I didn't start off thinking that it would be, but as these kids keep working and suggesting, I find that every day we are continuously adding things to enhance. My poor A.D., who will unknowingly be in charge of preset, has her work cut out for her.

Yesterday was our last rehearsal without our amazing piano player. He's fifteen or sixteen years old and can pound out anything you ask for. I call the piano man "the heart of the piece" in the script, and he has proved himself to be just that. I'm excited to see what happens as we slowly get the set and costumes together. We open in a week.

I also just finished a video shoot for a little piece called "Weiblich Ist?" I wrote it and John and I shot it and John will edit it. The premise of the piece is a woman who is trying desperately to dress like her true self. She goes from a full ball gown to a full tuxedo and everything in between. Ultimately, she walks out the door in jeans and a t-shirt. KInd of like me.

We shot it in one day. It was a long, long day. I ended up exhausted and needed a day to decompress the next morning, but I think we were all satisfied with what we got. My friend, Cynthia, came along and helped me get dressed and undressed throughout the day. I love sets where we all get along - where we laugh constantly. I think there were only two or three times where there was any tension at all.

The piece premieres on December 17th at my concert, ". . .In Time" at the Arts & Entertainment Center in North Park. I'm shooting a little video in Budapest in a couple of weeks too. The Brecht piece goes up next week at Canyon Crest. These kids are pretty fantastic. I wish all of this work didn't wear me out the way it does.

Party at Keturah's House

John and I had our San Diego wedding reception over the weekend. There were about sixty people (7 or 8 of them rugrats) running around our little apartment, eating food I made and gulping down the Guinness. John included. I was over-ambitious with the menu. I was trying to make as much Irish pub food as I could muster, but around 6:15, people started piling in the door and I was there, standing helpless and spatula-clad by the stove, trying to fry camembert while everyone was hugging me and handing me wine and champagne. I hated being torn between finishing my menu and greeting my guests, so I finally popped the Shepherd's Pie in the oven and walked into the living room to mingle.

I had one little girl who kept sending me presents through my mail shoot, a couple of kids who were addicted to the Dubliner cheese I'd put out, and a whole group of people in the front room who make me smile constantly. It was great for us to be surrounded by so many people we care about. I stress myself out too much about throwing parties when it's really all about sharing a drink with friends.

John's coworkers delivered a couple of beautiful toasts to us, and John's friends in Los Angeles had an incredible bouquet of lilies delivered. It's nice to be appreciated and loved.

So, we had that nice weekend and now we're both in the middle of project after project after project. I've got high school kids working on Brecht, a dance video we're shooting this weekend and we're still looking for a full-length freestanding mirror and the rights to the music, a trip to Hungary coming up and cats who can't seem to do anything but make messes wherever we look.

Life is constant. I guess I just wish I could have a couple of days without anything now...the grass is always greener. If I wasn't working I'd be chomping at the bit to get a project started.

By the way, that's John downing his Guinness. Thank god for the small moments of joy we get spiked with every day.

Bad Memories

This news about a plane crash just broke on CNN.

Apparently a small aircraft crashed into a residential high rise on the Upper East Side in New York. No one knows where the airplane came from; it wasn't being tracked. There's very little information about what happened or is happening thus far.

Smaller scale or not, it brings up bad memories from several years ago. That immediate feeling of dread in the pit of my stomach.

I have too many friends in New York.

Random Bits on Columbus Day

Today I left the house to run errands and quickly realized three things: the bank isn't open so I can't deposit any checks, the post office isn't open so I can't overnight a package to my brother, and everyone who works at the bank and post office plus a ton of other people who work god knows where are at the party store shopping for Halloween costumes. Sometimes my timing can be really off. With most of errands unaccomplishable on a bank holiday, and my nerves shot after trying to buy party napkins and plastic champagne glasses while being surrounded by fake cobwebs and screaming witches, I retired to Borders Books for a tea and a glance through the magazines that people had left on my table.

Transitioning back into reality after a vacation is tougher than I remembered. I haven't truly vacationed in so long. I come back into the country only to realize that Republican senators have been making advances on under age boys and Asian despots are testing their nuclear abilities and our country's still being run by a moron...that was nice to forget for a little bit actually. I also just read today that the Army is only meeting its recruitment quota right now because they've lowered their aptitude standards for entrants. Perhaps they think if their grunts are stupid enough, they won't realize what a shit-hole they're stepping into as they step off the planes in the Middle East.

Anyway...I actually went to Borders to pick up a German newspaper to use with my actors this afternoon. I thought Borders used to have this huge wall filled with papers from all over the place and now I couldn't find a single newspaper in the entire store. What happened to that? I couldn't find an Audition News or a Backstage West either. 'Twas very frustrating and I was left reading Real Simple and Esquire, a discordant grouping of magazines sitting on my little table.

I had my first rehearsal for "The Brecht Project" this afternoon. I have a great group of students in this piece. The theater, however, was completely empty save a golf cart when I walked in the door. I had no idea how to proceed with no chairs and tables or ANYTHING to double as a prop or set piece. There weren't even rehearsal cubes. It's crazy to start so completely from scratch; I haven't worked on something that required this type of dealings in quite some time. Opera is so different in its ability to provide immediately. I'm hoping by the end of the week we'll have a good group of stuff to deal with and move around so the kids can start understanding the rhythm of the piece.

My cat has decided he hates the litter box again. John and I don't exactly know what to do. We've moved the litter box to a new location (the one he seems to prefer right now) to see if it is a locational problem, but if it isn't then we're sort of stuck. I love Lucius to death, but he seems to everything he can to make our lives difficult. He sits on his purple pillow on the couch with those big eyes and little white puffy face and I can't help but fall all over myself to help him out, then he walks in his room and poops on the floor. Impossible.

I guess that's it for now. Things are falling back into the swing. Someone asked me the other day if I felt any different now that I'm married and I really don't. It just seems like us, the way we're supposed to be. We grilled tonight and ate dinner together like we always do and the day-to-day stuff continues in this fashion. I love every minute of it.

The pic is of the two of us on the Doolin Pier, looking out over the Atlantic Ocean. The sea was wild that day, the wind cold and blustery. The waves were taller than we were. It was a glorious time to be out on the edge of the world.

And Two Small Tidbits from Cashel, Ireland

And, because I can't resist, here are a couple of my favorite shots from Ireland. We took about 400 pictures over there so I'm just beginning to sort them out, but the Rock of Cashel and the nearby Bru Boru Cultural Center in Cashel, County Tipperary was one of my favorite spots. This first shot is of John lounging on a bench just outside of the Rock of Cashel, a huge 13th Century ruin on top of a giant hill. I think there may even be a hint of a smile on his face.

This shot is of John's favorite statue outside of the Bru Boru Cultural Center that he's named "The Blissed-Out Dancers." They looked so happy and limber that I decided to join in for a snapshot. I wish my legs were that long.

I promise not to bore with too many more of these. I'll be setting up a Flickr account soon and you can leaf through at your leisure.

More ranting and musing soon.

Scenes From a Wedding

We're Back! It's been two wonderful weeks in Chicago and Ireland and here I am, back at home and ready to start up again with life.

Much more to come, but here are a few snaps from the wedding taken by John's sister, Patricia. My brother took professional shots, which will be up soon.

The first couple are during the ceremony. We were praying so hard that the rain would stay away through the vows, and our concentrated thought worked. We had a dramatic background for pictures and it started into a torrential downpour the moment we entered the restaurant!




Elsa, my adorable niece, got ahold of my bouquet. She is quite the ham. Takes after her aunt. This is the first full family photo we've had in six years. It was quite a gift for my parents to make that happen.

Sideways

Not really sure why the photograph below decided to present itself sideways. Can't seem to correct it, so there you go. We'll all just have to crane our necks a bit.

Perhaps it's fitting in some strange way..

Looking Forward

This is me, taken by John, standing at the meeting place for my site-specific tour approximately 15 minutes before I led a huge group of parents through the Canyon Crest grounds. I was a bit nervous that parents wouldn't find the meeting place; it wasn't outside of a theater, it wasn't in an easily recognized entrance, yet it was a great place to start because the breezeway behind me opened up into a huge plaza that spoke architectural movement. Behind me sat 8 students, poised and ready to begin their sound/movement vignette as soon as the gates opened and I led the crowd inside.

I was infinitely proud of my students on Saturday. They worked hard, developed pieces that truly demonstrated a comprehension of the concepts I taught, worked easily together without descending into chit-chat and laziness. I led around 70 people through the 40 minute tour, which ended with all 33 students making their way through the halls and staircases into one huge group in the middle of the plaza. Parents were ecstatic, singing praise and grinning with cameras held high. It's a terrific sense of accomplishment to see parents impressed by what you've passed on to their children.

It was my final moment before a two week respite to marry and be a tourist.

Yesterday and the day before was all about getting ready and attempting to relax about the air travel, the wedding logistics, the family dynamic. I painted my nails and read my book in between packing, laundering and fretting. We are finally down to the final moments and I feel like I've prepared well. So much more relaxed than yesterday; yesterday afternoon was moments of panic attack and feeling like everything in my head was exploding. Sometimes I feel like I'm struggling to pull my life together every moment, and then I come to my senses in one fell swoop.

Today was better. My floors are clean. My cats are fed. There's a pizza winging its way to us. Thank god for the small things.

On Site

Today is the presentation of this huge site specific work we've been leading up to in my movement workshop these past couple of weeks. I tend to do this to myself a lot: create these hugely ambitious projects and then fret as the end rears it's head that I won't be able to pull them off.

This one, however, is up to the students. I've looked over my paperwork, my graphs of which students can go where, how many can work at each station of the tour. I'm leading the audience on a tour of the school and students will be in various nooks and crannies showing off their new movement skills. As we pass by, they must run the opposite direction and stay out of sight in order to get to their next station. Sound confusing? It's been a huge headache to figure out the logistics, and in a few hours my work will be tested and we'll see if I did all of these math problems correctly.

I love putting together huge pieces like this, despite my griping. There's something wholly satisfying about orchestrating a gigantic piece of movement and then, like a clockmaker, stepping back and watching it tick. The nerves come in the actual planning stage. Once these kids get working on their pieces, I'll be better equipped to deal with my adrenalin.

I leave for Chicago and my wedding in four days. It really can't come soon enough - nor can Ireland, though I look at all of those hurricane models in the Atlantic and wonder if their Northern path won't impede our travels a bit. I hope they can all dissipate before we embark across the ocean.

Truer Words

John sent me this op-ed piece by Richard Cohen about what we've learned in the five years since the 9/11 attacks. I think it rings true. I couldn't help, yesterday, but stand in the middle of all the memorializing and look back on the past five political years in utter dissapointment. A taste:

It is not merely that bin Laden has not been captured or killed and that videotapes keep coming out of his hideout like taunts. It is, rather, that his initial strategy has borne fruit. It was always his intention to draw the Americans into Afghanistan, where, as had been done to the Soviets, they could be mauled by the fierce mujaheddin. He tried and failed when he blew up the USS Cole off Aden at 11:15 a.m. on Oct. 12, 2000, killing 17 sailors and crippling the ship. But he succeeded beyond his wildest expectations when the United States responded to the Sept. 11 attacks by invading Afghanistan and, in a beat, then going to war in Iraq. It remains mired in both countries to this day.

I was also relatively appalled by our country yesterday when I turned on USA and there was, what seemed, a huge 9/11 memorial taking place. People were holding "God Bless America" signs and waving flags, and a woman in a red, white and blue, rather skimpily clad, outfit was belting out the National Anthem as parents with little kids swayed in response. Immediately upon the end of the slutty-looking blonde's rendition of "The Star Spangled Banner," two men in spandex outfits, one in a pink feather boa, jumped into a ring and started beating the holy crap out of each other: knocking their faces into the bars, hitting each other over the head with folding chairs, slamming their combat boots into the neck of their opponent. All while these kids in their American Flag shirts and 9/11 Memorial Signs looked on and cheered.

No wonder our country is so utterly messed up; is so clearly devoid of proper priorities.

I am appalled, once again.

Back Pain and the Cats-As-Aliens Theory

I woke up this morning with my entire back killing me. I know why - it always seems to be my own damn fault. I taught a class on basic lifts and sharing weight/counterbalancing yesterday. I pulled countless students up onto my feet in a superman pose and took several students onto my back to demonstrate the various ways to find human shelves. I am paying for it today; I don't have that kind of strength and ability the same way I used to.

I guess my back and neck always hurt. I'm used to the dull, whispering pain that set in about ten or twelve years ago and never fully left. I know my neck has gotten worse over the years because I sleep in awkward, curled positions and my tics are ten times worse in my neck than in any other part of my body (save maybe my stomach). But when you stand this much pain for this long, your body gets used to dealing with it; it makes you wear out sooner but you work through it and your life goes on. It's frustrating to wake up feeling debilitated by pain because I know the hurt must truly be excruciating if I can't seem to work through it; if I can't get it off my mind.

On a different, lighter, perhaps more disturbing note, John and I had a phone conversation today as he sat up at UCSD mastering the AIDS awareness dance film he's been working on for the past - it seems - 400 years. He's convinced that, if aliens have in fact infiltrated our society in order to learn things about the way we work, that they have come in the shape of cats. I don't disagree. Take, for instance, the photograph above. How other-worldly is that? He thinks that the consistent midnight tearing about the house in which all felines seem to partake is actually a response to calls from the Mother Ship. He even goes so far as to say that aliens came down thousands of years ago and took the shape of cats with the intent to conquer the world, but they enjoyed the petting and being fed and being pampered and worshipped so much, that they just never left.

John and I live with three very odd aliens. One of them is sitting on my lap right now.

I wonder if their untapped powers include curing back pain?

Teaching is Hard

I have much respect for high school teachers. This week I spent a couple of days teaching movement classes at a high school in North County. Four classes in a row. I dripped home and dragged myself into bed every night. Today was a less stressful day and I'm still exhausted - totally spent after talking these kids through class. I have a new understanding of why my teachers loved to give in-class work so they could sit silently behind their desk and watch us do our thing. After an hour and a half of constant talking, my throat was torn to shreds.

It's not that I don't like the kids either; I think they're all pretty great. Smart, not over-chatty, full of excitement and wonder - less cynical than I thought they'd be. I have another week with them. I might be used to schedule by the time I finish up.

I had my final callbacks for the piece I'm directing there as well. It's hard to cast a small piece when so many people want it and audition so well. I'm doing a project based on the Brecht/Weill collaboration of "Seven Deadly Sins," and I was pleasently surprised on how many students were interested in attacking Brecht. He certainly scares off people much older and wiser.

I have four days off coming up. I am, in a word, stoked. This will give me an opportunity to get a good handle on all of these projects I've got my hands in. I leave with John for Chicago in less than two weeks and I still feel like there are so many loose ends to tie up before I leave. I want to completely enjoy Ireland in every way without worrying that something isn't getting done.

Click on the link to go to "True Majority." John sent me a petition to, hopefully, get ABC to pull the new docudrama about 9/11 that is supposed to air in 48 hours. The show is basically attempting to rewrite history in order to cast the Republicans in a much stronger light, and blame the Democrats for the terrorist attacks. It is completely exploitative, partisan and factually dishonest. So much so that even Rush Limbaugh was surprised that the network agreed to air it. Help them see the error of their ways and sign the petition.

Everyone's A Critic and Points of No Return

My pieces at Celebrate Dance were reviewed in an online magazine. I wasn't expecting to be discussed at all in the media, but my picture even made it in. It was a strange moment to click onto the website and see myself circling through space, looking away from the camera; I had no idea there were press photographers present.

The review was mixed, but I think relatively accurate. There are definitely parts of the duet that I'd like to go back in and tinker with. There's a fire missing in some of the heavier parts that I think can be corrected, but it requires a little more work on my part and some concentrated thought about the order of movements and the smoothness of transitions. Going back into a piece that's already been performed and switching it up and around can be really difficult. Humans get set in their ways so quickly.

Reviews are difficult items as well. I try never to look at them too seriously, or to realize that everyone in the auditorium is coming to the show with their own experiences and their own perceptions. A review is simply one person's opinion. Though I am self critical enough to know when truths have been stated.


She really liked my solo. That made me infinitely happy. I walked into that with utter doubt as to whether or not it would read to the audience, and have a lot more confidence that the stories I'm telling are valid and coherent. The audience response coupled with the printed statements give me fire to move forward.

I'll have a chance to try the duet again in December; this time on my own turf. I officially rented a gallery space to present work on December 17th. Writing the check was nerve-wracking, but it's put me in a state of no return. As John and I walked back to the car on University I said, "Well, now I guess I HAVE to make art." The commitment is good for me. It won't allow me to rest back on my haunches and self-doubt.

The Arts and Entertainment Center is a great space in a burgeoning neighborhood. North Park is filled with theaters and coffee shops and boutiques, and an early show on a Sunday night will be great I think. The space is just big enough with interesting chandeliers hanging from the ceiling and a constantly changing collection of paintings and shadowboxes on the walls in the front gallery. The woman running the place took me on a tour and answered a ton of technical questions for John about various avenues of lighting and how we would set up a screen to show a dance film.

So now I'm looking forward to what's next. I am shooting and editing two short films in the next couple of months, with John's help of course, and continuing my movement exploration that will evenutally lead up to a larger piece about my relationship with my father. This time it's a duet with a little girl, which should be challenging in itself.

Today is hot and steamy, humid remnants of Hurricane John, which is backing off of Cabo and slowly moving out to sea. John and I (and the cats) don't respond well to the hot weather. It was part of the reason I loathed Miami as much as I did. We tried to go to the Farmer's Market this morning and wandered aimlessly around for a bit, slurping lemonade and buying fruit, then finally decided to escape to the air conditioned confines of Brian's American Eatery for brunch. We ran into some friends at the Farmer's Market and all four of us stood there in the sweltering sun with a complete inability to form sentences as the humidity hugged our brains. Sitting at the counter at Brian's was much better and helped me prepare to come home and enjoy the humidity in a completely different setting.

I did, however, buy the necklace I will wear on my wedding day as we walked from white stall to white stall. It's a string of freshwater pearls and quite lovely in its simplicity. It's coming fast and furious. Let's just hope the weather is nice and I don't sweat through my crisp, white suit.

Random Thoughts on My Fiance's Birthday

It's interesting how birthdays become less of a thing as you get older. I remember birthdays as a kid: the fight for parties, the clamoring for the right present, cake, ice cream, hoping someone will sing to you. I forgot my birthday was coming until a couple of days before, and now John's is here and he's at work, editing. He wants a quiet night at home; I feel for him.

He brought me flowers yesterday; beautiful, colorful Gerbera daisies. I should have been bringing him flowers and instead, he walked into the kitchen while I was making dinner and handed me this gigantic bouquet. I wish I could have fresh flowers in my house all the time. They are sitting on the long black table in the front window so everyone walking by can see them. They're better than plants because you don't have to keep them alive. I have an absolute brown thumb. I kill cacti. I have one Christmas cactus that's been alive for 12 years and everything else I've ever tried to grow has died a miserable death; committed floral suicide more like. Cut flowers though, they stay beautiful as long as they can, then you replace them.

So, I've been tracking the path of Tropical Storm Ernesto, which may become a hurricane by the end of the day. Thank god it's bypassing the gulf for now, but it looks like it's crashing into Miami or thereabouts. I"m so glad I'm not going to be down there for a while - I'd like to let all of the hurricanes get it out of their system before I have to spend any time in that toxic city. I hope their recovered from the predicted barrage before I start on "Samson et Dalila."

Speaking of forces of nature, I smacked our cat, Stella, today. I'm not usually corporal in punishing my cats, but she's been so vile towards Lucius lately, sneaking up on him, winding up her butt, then leaping out onto his back as he walks away. She's like a miniature Orka whale, gliding through the house, waiting to dive down on her prey, and poor Lucius runs hissing into his room every time. I want him to feel comfortable in this entire house, but she's making it very difficult. She hides behind doors and on the other side of the couch, just waiting for him to let his guard down. Aaargh, they're like little kids; the only one who's remotely well adjusted is Monty, who spends his whole day grooming his paws and sleeping.

Wish I could do that with my day.

Celebrating Dance

So it's done. My first time back on stage in over a year; the first time professionally presenting work of my own (that isn't in an opera) in three years. It's hard to take that first leap, but it felt good afterwards.

Celebrate Dance is an odd venue to present work no matter how experienced and easy going you are about performing and watching your work performed. It's loud and chaotic and the backstage area is small and filled with kids running back and forth and a backstage crew that doesn't exactly know what's going on. We had a short tech rehearsal the other day and I was still being asked questions seconds before I went on stage about whether the music or the lights come first. The stage is dirty from all of those feet tramping across it, and my spike marks were hopelessly gone by the time I got out there with my chair, but being on stage is being on stage; once you're out there it doesn't matter where you are: the adrenalin is just as high, the lights are just as blinding, and the applause feels just as good.

I stood in the wings during my duet and watched my girls amp up the energy as the piece went on. I had no idea that one of my dancers had given the other a bloody nose at the very top of the piece. They covered it well, and I was smiling by the end. I'm not sure how my piece went other than the fact that people laughed at the beginning and clapped at the end. Matt, the man doing the cameo appearance as my father, sat in a chair and read his newspaper as I danced around him, and disappeared at exactly the right time, and I crawled into the chair and feigned sleep to make the end of the piece.

The one snafu (besides the unfortunate bloody nose) was at the end of my solo when I finished and was still in silence and the lights were supposed to come down and they didn't. They stayed hot and hopelessly bright and I opened my eyes back up and realized that they weren't coming down. I made a split executive decision to stand and bow and bring out my dancers, and there we go. The lights started to come down as I stood up and popped right back up to the bow lights. No harm no foul. Our applause was terrific. It was all I needed at the end of the day.

Yesterday I got word that I could get space at the Arts and Entertainment Center to do my concert in December. Finally, stuff is beginning to happen in the direction of my own work.

Now I have time and room in my brain for wedding work.

Life Here, Life There...

The picture is of my two beautiful dancers, Kim and Molly, in a pose from the duet I'm premiering at Celebrate Dance on Sunday afternoon. The piece moved, as a choreographer, relatively quickly as soon as I realized what it was actually about. I went into the studio thinking I was making a piece about the culture of jealousy in which women are raised. I walked out realizing that I was making a piece about the relationship between me and my brother. Our minds work in strange ways; sometimes it takes moving around the space to understand what's going on inside of them. Kinesthetic revelation I guess.

The solo I'm performing is about a father/daughter relationship. I'm really into this study of familial politics and chemistry right now. Perhaps it's the time I've been away from my family. Perhaps it's this idea of starting a family of my own. I don't know, but it's permeating everything I do, everything I write. I can't seem to get away from it, even when I try.

I think it's also why I'm so frustrated with my seeming inability to find a performance space for the winter. I either get shot down or no one calls back at all. The more I work, the more I have to say, and now I feel like I have no venue in which to do it. I'm a bit shocked at myself that the urge to make my own art is so unbelievably strong. There was always a part of me who thought that I would be perfectly fine with being the assistant the rest of my life. I'm fairly positive that isn't the case now.

On the other side of the world, the Lebanese are fighting to keep their families together as they begin to rebuild, as they begin to try and understand what's happened to their lives. My brother sent a link to a series of interviews of people living in al-Khiyam, Lebanon, done by the BBC. Everyone feels differently about Hezbollah, about what's happening in their country, about Israel, but the same thing rings through for all of them: they want their families safe and their lives to be what they were. An indicative quote:

She insists she is happy, "because what they destroy we can rebuild, unlike if a friend or a relative, a father or a child, is killed".

She's lucky. We're all lucky if our friends and family stay safe and close. I can't imagine being in a place like so many Middle Eastern countries, where wondering if your loved ones are safe is a daily (hourly) concern; where you never know when you wake up if one of them will be gone forever.

Finally a Bit of Break

Both pieces are finished, the Playhouse wrapped up at the end of the week, and I am finally enjoying a week of less responsibility and running around.

I actually took time with John today to walk down to the Farmer's Market in Hillcrest, to clean house, to brush my cat and make up a menu of meals for the week. It's the little things I take for granted when I get so busy I can barely see straight. I was planning on peacefully sleeping in, but someone has recently acquired a couple of yappy dogs in our neighborhood, and they started their racket at 7:30 and continued for several hours. Why people want those noisy dogs around baffles me to no end.

My one career frustration right now is trying to find space so I can actually do a winter show. Nobody seems to want to call me back; it's an epidemic. Everyone keeps asking if my show is happening and I can't say yes until I know that I have a place to do it. I'm hoping, with a little extra time this week, that I can hit this a little harder and nail down a place to go with my time.

In current events, I'm watching the news right now and noticing that Ford is now making cars that are specially created for obese people. I'm not sure why this puts such a sour taste in my mouth, but it angers me that our society just seems to accept this lifestyle and diet that continually makes us unhealthier and unhealthier. Instead we say, "It's fine; we'll just make bigger car seats." How is that a solution, this perpetuation?

Lucius is next to me, fast asleep. I watched the Women's Gymnastics National Championship tonight without working at the same time...as much as the news and the world and the people around me can make me nuts, my life in and of itself is pretty good.

Roll Out The Barrel

I've decided that the Polka is the great equalizer. Everyone can do it, no one gets left out, and everyone ends up with a huge grin on their face by the time the music winds down. I'm having a bunch of my students at the Playhouse do a little polka pass during their showing on Thursday, and even the ones who have negligable coordination are bouncing racously across the stage in grand gestures and toothy smiles.

I've found this polka phenomenon to hold true in every theatrical forum I've yet encountered. It was, in fact, the first thing I ever choreographed for opera. I was so incredibly green, had no idea how opera worked, walked in the door and said (to all of these fairly well respected singers in their high heels and sports coats), "Okay, everybody up! We're going to Polka!" They all looked at me like I was out of my gourd . . . probably a pretty astute observation, but I pulled them out of their chairs and got them all doing "step, hop, step, step" in time and eventually they were doing the exact thing my students are doing: asking for copies of the polka music, wearing themselves out dancing, falling down with laughter.

The great thing from a theatrical choreographer's standpoint is that the basic polka step works well for a variety of peasant dances that rear their ugly head in both opera and theater. Once the actor/singer has mastered the basics, any small addition is easy to accomplish.

And any sense of kinesthetic accomplishment among my students and singing actors makes my heart swell.

On Location Once Again

The following are a few random shots from our weekend of shooting with UCSD-TV and San Diego Dance Theater. As always, it's been a joyful experience working with my fiance, and the great people he always seems to have on his team. This is why I choose to work on these sets for free, touching up people's makeup, bringing towels and water, and generally keeping the continuity of billiard balls, chair placement and wayward hoodies straight. Soon I will be making my own video short, so any time I can spend around this equipment is valuable.

The first pic is of the dancers making their way down a hallway at the San Dieguito Academy. It was so bright and sunny that day that their colors popped beautifully. That's Veronica Martin-Lamm leading the pack in red, with Victor Alonso, Grace Jun and John Diaz following right behind.



This shot is just a couple of hours ago at the San Dieguito Boys and Girls Club. Jean is taking Grace and Amir through the paces of their duet as Matt watches the angle through his camera. They were huge troopers today in a relatively warm environment. Keeping the sweat to a minimum was a real challenge.



Dr. James Ellzy leads the pack down the hallway during an actual take of the first pic. Brad Olander is led backwards, steadicam in hand. I had finally positioned myself in the right spot so that I didn't have to scramble away as they all came barreling towards me.



Peter Kreklow, our D.P. watches the dancers through the monitor down the opposite hallway, to be as far out of the camera's reach as possible.



No, John and I are not in therapy. That's the two of us after a long day of shooting on location at the San Dieguito Academy. Me being the photographer, I think that may be one of the only photos of me on set.

Why It's Better To Work At Home...

So the recent events have not so much rendered me fearful of flying but prematurely exhausted at the thought of six hours in an arid cabin without water, book or laptop. So many have said that the days of carry-on luggage are coming to an end, and I just keep thinking to myself that, no matter how much we take away, if someone really wants to take down a plane, they will figure out a way.

These flutterings about airlines now charging for water and kids having to board the plane in the UK without the safety of their favorite teddy-bear in hand seem relatively inhuman to me, despite the fact that I understand these huge reactions to try and make travel safe.

Travel has never been safe. There is always a bit of danger in leaving your roots and home and going to places unknown. It seems that terrorists are trying very hard to kill my wanderlust; they have not yet succeeded.

In a completely unrelated realm, I am happily (and busily) at work in the town where I live for the first time in a year. I am just finishing up the La Jolla Playhouse Conservatory and overlapping a bit by helping out my fiance as he shoots a dance film in conjunction with San Diego Dance Theater. The film is about AIDS awareness and is directed towards teeneagers. I am only a P.A., but pleased as punch to have very little responsibility on this project seeing as I have so many other projects going up that require me to be somehow in charge.

This was the first dance-for-camera that many of these dancers (including Jean Isaacs) have done. They were agog at the catered lunch and craft services set up by the front door. I forgot how amazed we all were during "Soul Of Saturday Night" when we first walked onto the set. Dancers aren't used to such thoughtful treatment. We really do get kicked around quite a bit. Perhaps this is why my interests are turning elsewhere; I'm sick of getting no respect for what I do.

Today I got respect solely for touching up makeup on the dancers. I love good working environments. They are truly few and far between.

Elegy

John was filming at La Jolla Chamber Society's Sumerfest tonight, so I got to go and see their "Modern Composers" concert at the North Park Theater tonight. The whole concert was a series of Asian and Asian-inspired pieces: Bright Sheng, Steve Reich, Lou Harrison, and an incredible piece by Tan Dun entitled "Elegy: Snow in June."

Like last year, when I had the opportunity to perform at Summerfest with Allyson Green during "Dancing to Beethoven," Allyson was back to put a piece of dance to one of Summerfest's concerts. This year she's doing it twice, and this was the first, swirling dancers in white, Steve Schick and his boys banging away at an incredible percussion set up, and Felix Fan, the virtuosic cellist, sitting in the middle of it all, exuding genius in all directions.

The piece was originally about an ancient Chinese execution that shouldn't have happened, a woman who was killed despite her innocence. After the massacre at Tiananmen Square, Tan Dun dedicated the piece to the students who died there, and Allyson and the musicians dedicated this performance to all victims of violence the world over.

The piece was all white, ending in all red, with video projection of lines of Chinese names filing past at different speeds. It was lovely and arresting and a gorgeous ending to a concert of strong work.

I love seeing good theater.

Empathy

I have a lot of trouble dealing with other people's pain. The reasons behind this have changed over the years I think; I've become more sensitive to the fact that other people hurt. I can't put my finger on when the change happened, but my responses to others in crisis have become harder for me to rein in or deal with. I sometimes feel it is working opposite of how it should; my skin should harden as I grow older, but in many ways I feel thinner on the outside, more susceptible to sympathies, to breaking down myself. Perhaps it's my own slow healing.

I think I had a much harder childhood than I ever let myself know or imagine. I talk to people about my experiences or see others going through what I dealt with and I realize that I was dealing with more than any teenage girl should have to take on. At the time I wanted everyone to hurt along with me; I wanted everyone to experience the same kind of pain so we could all be in some sort of club together; maybe I thought it was status quo. Maybe somewhere inside I realized my need to cry and contort and fall on the floor in a heap but couldn't break through the decorum of my psyche unless I took others down with me.

As I got older I adopted this crazy, "Get Over It!" attitude that inflitrated my relationships with everyone. I couldn't stand to be around people who wore their hearts on their sleeve, and felt that people who expressed true emotions were babies or weak or . . . I don't even know. I couldn't accept that I was still hurting and therefore couldn't allow anyone else to hurt either. Other people's pain made me uncomfortable because I didn't understand my own.

So things have changed again as I've gotten older. The last two years were such a raw, horrible healing process for so many of my transgressions, my situations, my past ills and wounds. I come out on the other side with a different view of my experiences and a different view of how women deal with their world in general.

I don't want anyone to hurt anymore. I've come to the conclusion that what I went through in various moments of my young adult life was absolutely heinous and no girl should ever have to go through any of it and how could we STILL perpetuate a world where girls grow up scared and out-of-control and angry and unable to deal with their lives. Sometimes I see girls fighting the way I did for so long and I wish I was the only one who ever held these misconceptions; who ever felt stuck and unable to reach out. There are these futile moments I've begun to have on a regular basis where I want to save everyone and know, horribly know, that I can't.

I used to get so angry at myself for breaking down, for letting anyone (including myself) see any sort of womanly humanness in my nature. I used to cry and then beat myself up for it - fight it off, steel myself against the onslaught of uncontrollable emotion.

Now I just get in my car and cry like a baby. Too many women know unneccesary pain in this world.

Passport Woes

I just spent almost $200 on a passport renewal!

$200!

I should have taken care of it earlier. I think there are a lot of things on my list right now, but stuff like this falls too easily between the cracks. I am leaving for Ireland in just under eight weeks, and the passport official told me that would be cutting it really close, so I had to double my price and pay for expedited postage.

What a huge racket. Huge, but I bit the bullet and wrote the check and had a hideous picture taken of myself and put everything in an envelope with my fingers tightly crossed that I would receive my new passport in a number of days. It will, at the very least, alleviate my fears of getting to the travel date without proper identification. Not that it was something to be fearful of, but I have become very adept at being scared of everything.

It's really gloomy and cool here today. I was happy to have the day off and ran errand after errand, meeting up with John and lunch to go look at a possible site for my dance concert in December. We'll see if that works out; so far I haven't heard from the guy and I've left several messages for him. This is the part of being a "creative" that I hate - we have to plan and work out logistics in the real world.

I'm not really into logistics. I wish I could just do my work and not worry about anything else.

The place is a great space, however. It's a big open room with clean marley floors and basic lights. They have a little sound booth and risers and chairs. Everything you need for a small show. I think most appealing to me is that the audience can be configured any way I please. I'm really into this idea of alternative performance space right now. I don't think everything always has to be set into a proscenium. Everything I'm working on right now has an intimacy and look that doesn't necessarily lend itself to the proscenium. I think by placing the audience at odd angles or spread throughout the performance area, you pull them more easily into the action.

Maybe it's my own frustration with being an observer instead of a doer lately that wants to change up the audience/performer relationship and play with perspective from everybody's view.