Pensees Publique

2004: A (Short) Review

I directed four plays (Pirates of Penzance; Midsummer Night's Dream; Kiss Me, Kate; Christmas Carol) and began work on a fifth (King of Fools);

I did not complete The Next Novel, but I did complete the first draft of the new musical and a Tale of the Twelve Kingdoms;

I stayed in the same classroom and learnt to teach a new curriculum;

I began the first steps to considering Consecrated Virginity, but did not follow through on my daily visits to the Blessed Sacrament (mea culpe!);

St. Mary's Parish closed and we all survived the broo-ha-ha and are quite happily ensconced in Immaculate Conception Parish;

We survived familial heartbreaks and extremely tight budgeting;

In those toughest times, God was already there.

There is more - far more - that I should like to write. But that will have to go in quite another journal. Suffice it to say, that looking upon this abbreviated list, the creative accomplishments have been tremendous, but are not matched by holiness. Lord, I long to be holy. I don't know how.

In the dangling conversation
And the superficial sighs

As for the last day of randominity and daily nothingness (full of sound and fury, signifying...nothing - except for the daily humble life, which is goodness in itself), I shall add:

Have actually taken today off. Am impressed with self for doing so. Watched the "good parts version" of Errol Flynn's (what a great name) Robin Hood (oh, ROBIN!), and the final disk of appendices of LOTR:ROTK and find that:

Beyond tearing up a lot over the contents of the final disk (mostly in a "man shall be saved by beauty" way), I am laughing as well to discover how far Peter Jackson pushed everyone, how he didn't communicate as well as he ought, how crazy everything became and I am laughing because it's so true.

Sadness, sadness, heartfelt pain
If all our love has been in vain
If ever you should tell a lie,
Then, my friend, I shall die.

Sorry...aherm...extra randominity there, courtesy of the heart-wrenching ("children's") book, One Unicorn. What a movie that would be!

Had dinner over at the Browns' last night after rehearsal and a quick nap. One of the most delightful evenings in a long time. Talks about science and paper cutting and snowflakes and sound equipment and art judges and costuming and the educational system and the secular society and the gatekeepers of the universities and the seminaries and swordfighting and I don't know what. Much needed after such a day where my heart nearly stopped (but that's for the other journal).

Julie's Finding Neverland CD is floating through my ceiling. Which leads one to comment that Music From Another Room is such a great phrase, even if the movie looks questionable.

I am too much bound up in theatre. I realized, I've not had a significant break since before Brigadoon (because after Bearskin I went right into pre-production for Pirates). On the one hand, my brain is still roiling with ideas for future productions; on the other, I am simply...tired.

My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends –
It gives a lovely light!
~ "First Fig" by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Yup, c'est moi. Yet, not upset, just wondering what lies ahead. And, a sonnet for the road:

Only until this cigarette is ended,
A little moment at the end of all,
While on the floor the quiet ashes fall,
And in the firelight to a lance extended,
Bizarrely with the jazzing music blended,
The broken shadow dances on the wall,
I will permit my memory to recall
The vision of you, by all my dreams attended.
And then adieu,--farewell!--the dream is done.
Yours is a face of which I can forget
The colour and the features, every one,
The words not ever, and the smiles not yet;
But in your day this moment is the sun
Upon a hill, after the sun has set.
~ Edna St. Vincent Millay

I don't agree with the sentiments of that one, now - although it certainly struck me my first year of collage - but the imagery...! I am reminded of a sketch I did Junior year in Austria in...which class was it? Church History? The French Revolution? Of "By all my dreams attended" - of a girl in white flanked by an angel and a demon - because not all dreams are lovely, as Lewis first pointed out to me.

And that, in the spirit of Joycian randominity and long-deserved (add your own accent grave) sabbatical (on the wrong day - although it is sunset now) - reminds me of the poem (if we can call it that) that Kristen and I came up with our Junior or Senior year of High School, simply called "More." I must have it somewhere about. We were on the bus coming from the French Club's annual trip to see Les Mis (yes, it must have been at the end of Junior year) and we were sitting in the back and one of us asked the question, what ought there be more of? Moors, poofy sleeves, heroes, rescues, creaky stairs, ominous shadows, swords, kisses, fog, sashes.... I can't remember what all. We showed it to our beloved English teacher, Mr. Ciervo, and he pointed out that the curious thing to him was that we should desire "ominous things" as part of our landscape. I think my reponse was something along the lines of, well, one requires plot after all. But his comment has stayed with me - particularly in the study of theology - because, years later, I still desire those ominous shadows to be there (at least in theory, and only if thoroughly defeatable by said hero). This is a great mystery to me, yet. It bears thought to wrest it away from jeuvenile Manichaeism, and learn a deeper truth about the nature of the world and our place in it.

When reading the great theologians, I am often struck with the thought that: "This would make a great plot." (Chesterton seems to have been likewise struck and often says so.) And yet when one considers how to play with the essential elements of metaphysical and mystical truth, one is constantly brought short by the realization that any "adaptation" one may do of this weighty truth of our Savior's would be a pale comparison and simply fall short of the majesty to which one aspires. Such thoughts bring to mind the philosophy behind Medieval iconography where they didn't even bother to make Mary look gorgeous - because they knew their human craft would fail. There's a comfort in the "long defeat."

Oh, Lord, I am not worthy
That Thou shouldst come to me;
But speak the Word of Wisdom,
My spirit Thine shall be!

And humbly I'll adore Thee
The Bridegroom of my soul;
No more by sin to grieve Thee
Nor fly Thy sweet control.

Oh Sacrament, Most Holy,
Oh Sacrament Divine!
All praise and all thanksgiving
Be every moment Thine!

It is a day for poetry. It is a day best expressed in poetry. The ending of things always are. There can be no prose about death and rebirth that comes near to touching on the thing. I had a couplet for yesterday, just before I fell into that graced half-hour sleep, but I cannot recall it now. A moment "to a lance extended" - true enough. I have spent all yesterday and today praying - arrow prayers, merely - for it, those ("one loved one")...for everything. It is a child's prayer: "Lord, please bless...." "Lord, I'm still here, please bless...." "Lord, are you blessing...?" "Lord, is this in Your Hands?"

And that is the question "here, at the end of all things" - is it not? And the answer, one hopes (and hope does not disappoint!), is a resounding "YES!" Oh, we are no more than children. "Daddy, is this Yours?" "Daddy, can you fix this?" "Daddy, are you there?" Reduced, at last, to Abba, Father - please! It sounds so altrusitic to say that I have passed beyond the point of caring about the...thing itself. I would willingly sacrifice it - I can think of a dozen immediate benefits to sacrificing it - but that the thing itself is the blessing as well as the curse. One ought to reverse that. One ought to call it by its true name: the cross.

My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
Why so far from my call for help, from my cries of anguish?
My God, I call by day, but you do not answer;
by night, but I have no relief.

Yet you are enthroned as the Holy One; you are the glory of Israel.
In you our ancestors trusted; they trusted and you rescued them.
To you they cried out and they escaped;
in you they trusted and were not disappointed.

But I am a worm, hardly human, scorned by everyone, despised by the people.
All who see me mock me; they curl their lips and jeer;
they shake their heads at me:
"You relied on the LORD--let him deliver you;
if he loves you, let him rescue you."

Yet you drew me forth from the womb, made me safe at my mother's breast.
Upon you I was thrust from the womb; since birth you are my God.
Do not stay far from me, for trouble is near, and there is no one to help....

...But you, LORD, do not stay far off; my strength, come quickly to help me.
Deliver me from the sword, my forlorn life from the teeth of the dog.
Save me from the lion's mouth, my poor life from the horns of wild bulls.
Then I will proclaim your name to the assembly;
in the community I will praise you:

"You who fear the LORD, give praise!
All descendants of Jacob, give honor; show reverence, all descendants of Israel!
For God has not spurned or disdained the misery of this poor wretch,
Did not turn away from me, but heard me when I cried out.
I will offer praise in the great assembly;
my vows I will fulfill before those who fear him.
The poor will eat their fill; those who seek the LORD will offer praise.
May your hearts enjoy life forever!"

All the ends of the earth will worship and turn to the LORD;
All the families of nations will bow low before you.
For kingship belongs to the LORD, the ruler over the nations.
All who sleep in the earth will bow low before God;
All who have gone down into the dust will kneel in homage.
And I will live for the LORD; my descendants will serve you.
The generation to come will be told of the Lord,
that they may proclaim to a people yet unborn the deliverance you have brought.
~ Psalm 22 (selection)

And that, my dear Emily of 2004, is as good a place to end this as any I can think of. Pie awaits upstairs, as is the annual New Year's movie, and praise God for His blessings, not the least of which is family. Ashira a l'Adonai, ki ge'oh, ge'ah!

Mood: Lyrical
Music: Continuing Finding Neverland, which seems appropriate
Beauty: Is.

File this one under

..."what the?"...

So, here I am, battling the great computer once again (who needs a volcano when there's a virgin willingly wading through the lava that is Microsoft?) which is telling me that I have 2GB out of 18 available on my computer when I know that isn't the case - I attack with an assault on the C: drive's "properties" to defrag and clean whilst skillfully surrounding the enemy with Norton Antivirus when - the computer retaliates with an embargo: no movement, nada. I simply lob my hand at the plug and pull it. Then I put it back together, at which point the defeated fortress has no choice but passive-agression, which I smugly ignore by sketching costume renderings for my actors (droooooooooooool!). And now I have my 8GB back. Nyah.

Yeah. So Moresca-style clothing is SO what we're going for. Hmmmm...$10 per parti-coloured tights? And those hats look sooooooooooo juicy...um...nice. (Droooooooooooooooool.) Oh, ho! They may impede scheduladge - but they cannot stand in the way of a pencil on a sketchpad! Doublets and jerkins forever!

(Which always puts me in mind of the Gulling of Benedick from Much Ado. Kenneth Branaugh's brilliant delivery of the Benedick speech against love, particularly Claudio's, and the latter's fascination with the "cut of a new doublet." Ah, spit that nasty word out, Kenneth! Tra la, I love the spring!)

Mood: Pas mal, now that I've conquored the sniveling Compaq, merci. However, I've the odd clean yet mal-de-tete-y rawness just behind the eyes, as though I've been crying all day. I mean, yeah, I teared up quite a lot at ROTK but...I mean, honestly, who throws a cupcake?
Music: Finally opened and played the Troy CD. Really quite good. But then you can't go far wrong with Horner. My eye is set on King Arthur and More Music From Gladiator but will have to wait a couple paychecks.
Thought: Oh, Great Howard Shore, Cleanser of All Things Wagnerian - when, we beseech thee, wilt thou release the Extended Editions of all thy Glorious Music (most noticeably the New and Wonderous Chanson that played over the Lamentably Short Houses of Healing Scene) from LOTR? Ah, Great Howard Shore! Hear our Humble Request! We Musicaholics implore thee, yea verily yea.
Thought Redux: Soooooooooooooo must rewatch The Court Jester.
Thought Thought Redux: Sooooooooooooooo must rewatch Zefferelli's (sp?) Romeo & Juliet...purely for costume purposes, of course.
Thought Reduxiated: I'm so PROUD of Peter! My little pumpkin is all grown up and requested the Complete Works of Shakespeare and is up to act three of Midsummer Night's Dream all by his lonesome! Oooooh! Tweedles!
Reduxiated Thunk: C'est la matinee, maintenaint, et je dur dormir...quelque temps. Folle Amelie!

YES!

The answer to all my questions comes in this:


You are the Minister of Silly Walks


What Monty Python Sketch Character are you?
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...and in wonderful Peters who are straightforward.

Mood: Better
Music: Soundtrack for Hero
Thought: Sllllllllllllllleepy. Praise God for silly walks. I feel the need to prance a bit.
And oh heck - why not?: Even though I was *shudder* "It's a Small World" first...sigh. I'm sure it was admitting to liking cotton candy the first time through that doomed me. Changing that yielded the following:


The Indiana Jones Adventure: An excavation of an
exotic temple promises to reveal its mysteries
until something goes terribly wrong! You are a
wild jeep ride through a vengeful ancient
temple that has been treaded upon one to many
times. Your experiences read like an action
adventure flick (could it be that you are based
on one?) and your John Williams-esk score makes
you grandiouse, purposeful, and larger than
life. Fully immersive and completely themed,
you really do give your passengers a wild ride
and work hard for their sastifaction... in fact
each trip through your caverns of fire, snake
pits, lightening illuminated ruins, and dart
filled passages is just a little different.
You are chaotic, but to the point and somehow
you bring out the noble side in everyone, the
inner Indiana Jones in every soul, even if
Disneyland couldn't secure the rights to the
likeness of Harrison Ford. Beware the Eyes of
Mara indeed.


What Disneyland attraction are you?
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Cantique Noel!

Wish I could remember the rest of that in French. Alas, I can only remember my flub of "Va Allemagne"! Oy - the oddities of life.

Merry Christmas to one and all!

Like most of our parties, it wound up being a progressive affair. Last night John came over, which was very nice, and then I gave out the book presents for Christmas Eve, which was super because...drumroll please...Going Postal by Terry Pratchett came in! Yaaaaaaaaaaay! Which means, naturally, that I finished reading between staying up until 2:30 last night and bonding with it after mass this morning (before the third installment of presents).

God was very gracious (again, as always? Aren't the words "God" and "gracious" in a sentence redundant to begin with?) and gave us many good gifts from friends and strangers. Let's see - noticeable among them is LOTR:ROTK, which all four-ish hours we watched after the final installment of presents (we did books last night, a few this morning pre-mass/post-breakfast and then the remainder post-mass, and then the remembered remainder - aka the presents I knew I'd forgotten to wrap and were, indeed, cleverly hidden by me downstairs where I couldn't find them among many other useless bags). I must admit, the extended edition vastly improves the movie. I found it unbearable in theatres, but this was back up to par. My only sadness was that I wanted the Faramir/Eowyn section to be fleshed out. But alas, it seems neither Jackson nor Tolkien can do romance in LOTR for beans. So I shall call me a silly girl and sigh in discontent.

I've quite a bit of a headache, thanks to odd sleeping hours and finishing off the last of this cold. Fortunately, said residual cold did not impede my lectoring at mass this morning. They did the readings for the mass at midnight, which was wonderful because the readings are definitely an improvement over the common ones for the day of. But all the same, as I was lectoring, and preparing to lector, and just after doing my small bit of the mass, I felt....

Oh, what good are feelings!?!?! This is a conundrum. I am not a Spock, nor was meant to be (am a teacher, one that will do, to progress a scene, speak a word or two - must memorize the actual poem rather than portions of) - and I know that emotions were given to us by God as part of the human experience and I am not set against them...only I get frustrated at them when they are so at odds with actuality. Or rather, when I can't quite discern how at odds or evens they are with the greater truth. Let me begin again at the beginning.

Last Sunday, I was a complete wreck. I couldn't really speak in the morning. So Jules, having by the grace of her guardian angel, woken up NOT for the 7:30 a.m. mass like she had intended, but indeed for the 11:30 a.m. mass which I was meant to lector at, agreed to lector in my place. I offered to take her next time - now knowing what it was - and discovered much to my surprise that it was today, at the 10:30 a.m. on Christmas.

Now to the emotions: surprise, excitement, pride, shame at said combination of emotions, concern lest Julie a) be sad at losing lectoring then or b) deny letting me lector then; and frustration that I couldn't really discern which concerned me more, and overriding guilt that I was forcing Jules to lector because I had a cold. All of that in no particular order. Except that overweening pride, with its pathetic cockatoo feathers strutted high upon its hat, minced ever at my side this week. Mostly it simply existed and sniffed and I forgot it entirely and went about my business of trying not to be sick and editing the heck out of Christmas Carol and/or going around and begging the city of Marlborough in general and God and teachers and administration in particular to intercede on behalf of King of Fools.

But then, alongside the cockatoo of pride slunk the morbid shadow of general meanness, and that brought along - to belabour this not merely extended but anguished metaphor - the stuffy clerk of helpless scruples. I am a mean person. I am proud, haughty, entirely selfish, lazy whilst being an OCD workaholic, arrogant - you name it. "I could accuse me of more sins that it were better my mother had not borne me." A regular Hamlet without the dashing iambs. Consequently, I'm sitting in mass, preparing to lector on Christmas Day - the day of God made manifest - and all I can think of is: I am such a mean person.

I believe. Of course I believe. I say "of course" not because of any merit of my own - Heavens truly do know that - but because for whatever reason it has pleased God to give me a bedrock of faith. Of trust. Of certainty. It's the sort of belief that is more like a skeleton than a fortress - it's baked into me - it can be fractured, I can weaken it, but chances are, it's not going anywhere. And I utterly don't deserve it. And I don't know how to pray. And I don't know how to believe - and yet that's foolish false humility, too, because I do know these things: but instrinsically, as it were, the same way a baby doesn't consider its anatomy but simply kicks and gurgles and pulls at shiny objects with fingers that have never been existentially scrutinized but work all the same.

And I read. I was fully unprepared. I said a Divine Mercy last night, and an Angelus, too, because I noticed it was midnight at the stroke of (or rather, that fact was divinely brought to my attention) but my heart wasn't AS in it as it ought to have been. I didn't spend a vigil night fasting and praying and being before the tabernacle. I didn't seek out a priest for confession before I lectored for mass. I didn't specially choose a white garment to wear for the occasion - for the honour. Rather I grumped at my family. And yet I read.

To what extent is simply the awareness that I am a class A jerk a holy thing? Or to what extent is it a case of the scruples? I know how one attains holiness - the saints point to it, and the prophets, and Christ Himself came to give us perfect example - but how does one maintain holiness? I get so frustrated at myself for becoming lazy in my prayer life - but I am more frustrated at my legal mind that tries to shy away from such thoughts lest I have to do something - and at the same time I feel so utterly, utterly helpless.

The consolation is this: I am utterly helpless. And I cannot form some complex mathematical diagram to pinpoint how close or far I am at any given point from Heaven. And the feeling, as good a spur and Dantesque goad, as it may be is simply no more than that: faith and works, NOT faith and feelings. No, Hamlet, the readiness is NOT all - the action is. And I am an ass and I am an ass and I am an ass - and that is not all right, but the acknowledgement of it is, and now the action to move away from that state must not only begin but continue. The Chinese are very right to say the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Only one must make the overwhelming effort to continue on to the second and the third and so onward to the edge of time. The first step is simple. The remaining steps are hard. And it is so very, very easy to sit down.

After mass, John came up to me and told me how well I read - and that meant a lot. Particularly because I did not feel (that word again!) that I had done as well as I ought. But John is not one for empty compliments, and my prayer is that God used me, as stupid and unreliable as I am.

Who said flagellation wasn't still in vogue? Ah, that hermitage is looking better every day. But this is the greater task that I need to take - the erimetical life would be too simple - I need to learn to be. I was about to write "be human" - but, rather, I need to learn to be. To be still. To be with the great I Am. To be loved. I often don't know how to do that. Elijah on the mountaintop - Moses barefoot in the cave - my Savior in the garden of Gethsemene. Lord, teach me how to be. I think that may be the first step. You made me, Lord. You formed me. Now show me How. Amen.

Mood: Reflective
Music: Finding Neverland a la the ceilingboards that divide Julie's room from mine.
Thought: Regarde en haute.

Feeling hot, hot, hot!

I can never tell if I'm running a temp. So, yup, I caught the school cold and I'm hoping that today was the culmination of it. Stayed up far too late again last night, finishing scene 2 editing of Christmas Carol, and reading Alphabet of Thorn by Patricia McKillip which was amazing! And then I slept. Got up - meandered a bit - blew my nose LOTS - got down to the task of making follow-up calls in order to find a theatre - dropped off the form at Kane School to see if we could use that - said two decades of the rosary - made more calls - finished the book - completely conked out - woke up - blew my nose even more - curled up miserably on the couch - watched stupid TV until Jules & Mom kicked me out so that Jules could study for her ethics test - the thought of philosophy woke me up a bit, joked about being glad to take Julie's test for her - went downstairs - computer froze - got it back on - checked e-mail - wrestled with Word documents - and after this and that wound up here.

When one is on the couch with a hand flung over her eyes whilst House and Veronica Mars are on during each other's commercial breaks and the sniffly Emily is muttering to herself in French, one knows that she is very, very ill. Symptoms? The TV is on. (The French is always optional.)

So, onto good news. Visited with Patty a few days ago and brought her the cards. Lovely visit. It occurred to me that I was visiting the sick, which was very cool - but during the course of the two hour conversation, I wondered if I wasn't the sick one being tended to! She and Mom hung out tonight and for that I am glad. Ch. stopped by last night which was unexpected but at least for me turned into a surprisingly nice visit - this and that stories and info that I didn't know about some of the drama at school. And talk of chorus. I swear, I am GLAD to be in my little bolt hole of a classroom. Presumably half my drama kids are, too, because the place is never empty. Also good is the editing of Christmas Carol - and the possibility of Marlborough theatres (please God!).

And super good is the Memorarae: "Remember, O Most Gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to your protection, implored your help, or sought your intercession was left unaided. Inspired by this confidence, we fly to you, Virgin of virgins, our mother. To you do we cry, before you we stand, sinful and sorrowful. O Mother of the Word Incarnate, despise not our petition, but in your mercy, hear and answer us." Powerful prayer.

Oh, and God sent us more turkey! (And clementines - a nice change from the Snyder form of quail in the desert!)

Mood: Sick. It's always just this side too hot or cold.
Music: Phantom of the Opera - the new one
Sadness is: Diet Coke dying in the cold weather.
Happiness is: Many many lots of glasses of OJ.
Frustration is: ALL THE BOOKSTORES BEING SOLD OUT OF Going Postal from Terry Pratchett! Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
Coolness is: The movie of A Series of Unfortunate Events.
Goodness is: Praying for Jules' final final exam! And for those whom I have been asked to pray for. Especially, my kids.
I'm dreaming of: My ooooooooooooown theatre!
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder is: Feeling guilty for not doing more work when I'm ill and I already spent several hours earlier doing work for King of Fools. Honestly, child. You're an idiot.
Sickness is: Evident when I've been falling asleep like clockwork every 4 PM for the past two days.
The Hour Is: Far too late for this little one to be up and about. Gute nacht!

Nearly at the act break

And about two and a half more usable hours before I really have to put myself to sleep. When the school secretary warns one of burn-out, one ought to listen. Went home early. Took two hour nap. Still bleary eyed. Working on darnable scene - trying to figure out how to a) put in "She Left Him on the Floor" and b) Frederick's definitive moment of falling in love with Cassandra. Feel the need for a second day. Lord! Halp!

Mood: Bleary
Music: "Such Great Heights" on Flannel Collage
Prayer: William Shakepeare, Oscar Wilde and G. K. Chesterton - if you're up there, pray for me! Amen! And all other authors. Amen.
Marvelment: Read through tomorrow. T-minus 17 hours and counting.
In the words of Peanuts: Specifically, You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown, the "Book Report" quintet: "I'll wait til tomorrow/because I work best undre pressure/and there'll be lots of pressure if I/wait til tomorrow...." Yaaay for Peanuts! Yaaay even more for Foxtrot which had a cartoon out yesterday about the difficulty we LOTR afficiandos are suffering with the necessity of waiting for Christmas for our copies of Return of the King: Extended Edition. We wants our precious NOW! So in honor of that, I shall post these picture and say yaaaaaaaaay!

Little sleep and four auditions

A tired Emily makes. Regard the captive Emily slump into the door, slump up the steps, slump around the house, assure (slumpedly) familial unit that all is well and the show is cast and all is well and I am extremely happy with the cast and that this slumpedness has no bearing on actuality except that I am actually very slumpedid. Slump.

Have printed out cast list. Have I'm With You mix CD on. Glad to have suddenly found said mix CD which we thought had been long lost. Tomorrow we pay bills and are grateful for the opportunity to do so. Colleagues who are Marquess-like are.... Were I not a Christian woman, Elmira Gultch! But anywho. Alles gut. (Das Slump.)

Confessions went well today. Praise God for priests showing up! (Hmmm, there's a deeper meaning in that.) Just three days to vacation - can it be? Must finish script tomorrow. Made good progress on it today. Must do up review tomorrow for Islam with Juniors. Must make up test for Juniors for Thursday (regard the captive Emily grow ferally gleeful for a moment then decide to give into the inevitable slump). Must find out who has my "By What Authority" book so that I can brush up my chapter two for tomorrow. Impossible week this week - so many interruptions right before break that keeping the younglings on task will prove slightly daunting. Ah - whatever. Alles gut. Leviticus - here we come!

I'm still marvelling over the fact that we're actually - I mean, actually, not theoretically, not possibly, not maybe - we're really, really doing "King of Fools." I mean...I've been thinking of this silly play for the past, how many years? Since fourth grade, I think. That's when we moved to New Jersey - I had just turned ten. I think it must have been my tenth birthday gift from Grammy - that sounds right. And so that make it...seventeen years!??!? that I've been thinking about this story and this play??!?!?! (Hoooooooooly cow.) Didn't Wagner take that long to finish the "Ring Cycle"? Anywho.... That means that I probably wrote "Who is the Lord"...no, no - I think I read the story, liked it, came back to it my eighth grade year. Because that's when I saw Les Miserables for the first time. So, that puts it to 1991 since I've started actively writing music for "Thrushbeard" - so that makes it 17 years since the introduction and a "mere" 13 years since the first piece of music was written for it. And then very off and vaguely on since then. Holy cow. Frederick and Cassandra have been around and named at least since high school - towards the end, though - so perhaps that shaves things down to only 10 years since the preliminary adaptation of the plot. And now....

We're doing it. It's cast. I have faces and voices to put with the folk who have existed solely in my imagination until just a few hours ago. And then to hear - soon and very soon! - others singing those songs that I've known for so long. I still marvel - I'm in awe, consternation, bemusement, gratification, humility and humiliation and slow-burning pride that tries to wave it's teeny flag beneath the pile of other emotions - when my students hum my songs, when they make it their own. Can it be? I feel like a child being told a story, being led into some wonderful world where all is fantastic shapes and grandeur. This is my Heaven. This is the joy of theatre: to direct a story in order to be told it again and again and again.

And God is so good and all will be well and all things will pass and all that I fear will work itself out and there are ways and means and there will be time and there will be time (time for a hundred visions and revisions) and God is so very very good to His least deserving servant! Praise the Lord, now and forever! Amen! Alleluia!

Mood: Was slumpidity but is now rather exuberant
Music: "Into the West" on I'm With You mix CD
Thought: Right. Back to work. Ugh - too late! Must - make - self - do - it - anyway!
Thought Redux: Please let all my actors get along and like their parts. Amen.

And in further news

I just hopped over to Barbara Nicolosi's blog and saw her naughty and nice list and said a very naughty YES for the fact that I am not ALONE in the corner with the late Douglas Adams as we both discuss how much we "love deadlines...love to hear the sound of them as they swoosh past" us!

FWAHAHHAHHHAHAHHAHAH! The consortium of belated authors continues to thrive! (If we can get there...maybe this Saturday...if something else doesn't come up.)

Right. Off to meekly work on King of Fools.

After I get a Diet Coke. And go upstairs. And wander aimlessly for a minute and think about whether I'm actually hungry since I missed dinner. And then come back and bang my head against the screen in yet another productive session.

Hey! At least I did my work for my ACTUAL work already - printing out examinations of conscience, info on the Kurds, and other goodies. And I did up the audition form (yay for Word documents saved from other productions!) and am about to do up the character sheets.... Yeah. And I have enough workable scenes to do auditions from. So. There.

Must make up dance audition piece. May use either "I'm Going to Run Away" or "You, Wonderful You" - probably the former because it's already on CD.

Mood: Eek!
Music: "Over Me is My Love Enthroned" from, what else?, King of Fools.
Prayer: Oh, please Lord! Send me all the actors I need to make this show amazing! Amen.

Ye olde traditional montage

Is now here...(drumroll please!)...voila! A complete waste of time in the creation of a new desktop image! I give you the highly successful A Christmas Carol! Click here to see the picture. :)

In other news, I finished (finally) the dance breaks (or bits, rather) and am currently listening to the brilliant CD's made by E. Th., the amazing orchestrator, in preparation for finishing up the script for King of Fools for which *eep* auditions are tomorrow. (Out of the frying pan into the fire...?) Yeah.

I feel rather like Abraham - stranger in a strage land - no place to lay my head - still looking for a place to perform for TWO weekends.... This whole thing is utterly insane - or rather, I should say, theatre is by its very nature insane, so why not? I feel the need to quote Ursula LeGuin at length. Anywho.... Enough babbling. Time for the long-neglected bullets!

Elf is an amazingly funny movie. And just the thing to cheer up this particular household with some very gloomy familial members - with good reason to be gloomy. But, anyway.... Yay Elf!

Roxio does like me! It burnt my DVD! Yaaay! Now, I just have to figure out all the details of how else it works. Ah, that and the other software, aussi.

Going to put on the first CD of music for King of Fools. (Shoot - must come up with dance for tomorrow's audition.... Aaaaaaaaaugh!)

Penance service hopefully going forward on Tuesday. Must make phone calls tomorrow.

There is so stinking much to do - still. How, precious, how?

Hmmm, perhaps on second thought, lists are not such a good idea since they turn into "to-do" lists and one loses the Tao of Pooh, as it were, and begins getting very nervous about what's not been done. So, on that note....

Happy Gaudete Sunday everyone! Hrumph!

Mood: It would be a lot easier to run around with a head.
Music: King of Fools part deux - the first CD won't play.
However: I've been listening to the movie version of Phantom for the past week in preparation for December 22nd baby! Yeah! Baby, yeah!

The play went well

And now we must sleep. Until then, I am:



I took the most accurate villain personality test
created by: The Arch Villainess Gracie



Mood: Sleeeeeepy but very very satisfied - the play was a hit. :)
Music: Shrek 2 - the movie
Thought: Where's my hot chocolate? Gosh, my play shirt is comfy. Good party last night. Onto hardcore teaching soon. Tra la.