weds June 3 2026 -- five project day

At 5 am I was tossing and turning. I had to send the final casting email. We’ve been looking for the right actor for nearly two months. I wrote the decision email the night before, but needed to sleep on it. Strange as it seems, a young man’s voice floated into my head. In my half-dream state, the voice assured me, essentially, this is the right choice, if it isn’t, I will take care of it… I’ve only had a voice in my head like that a handful of times in life. Once while crossing the street as a child, once in my friend’s spare bedroom at 30, once on a beach in Moorea, and now I suppose right before I pressed SEND on an important email. Four different voices, I should note. I think I know whose voice this was, but, of course, I’ll never know for sure.

I managed to rest 6 to 7 before getting up to smash a dance workout then hop on my 8 am meeting with the high school theatre festival coordinator. We chatted about how I might attend a career fair or give some remarks to the students, tell them I did this exact same program 20 years ago and it drastically changed the trajectory of my life. Had to sidebar with the guy, what was the show that got him hooked? (He was in MacBeth as a freshman of course.)

By 9 I was really sad about the LA primary election results. It’s not over, but, to quote Puhg first looking at the polls for the reality star villain, “I don’t understand the world.” Yes, chef. Zipped to the cafe for an iced tea and necessary journaling session, to clear my little head. I ran into DR writing, chatted with the barista who is also pitching a comedy series, volleyed a few signifiant texts.

Showered, laid out various outfits for my big meeting. Puhg picked it in the end, as he does have a much better understanding of fashion than I do. I’d chosen a ratty concert crop top and pink skirt. He chose some smart black wide leg jeans and a classy pink linen tank. He also recommended I wear a bra. Wanted to reach my lawyer about the regional theatre deal, couldn’t, set a call with her assistant for later in the week.

Wrote the marketing team some notes about the announcement copy, wrote the director thoughts on the new option for understudy since our first choice passed. We did three rounds of callbacks to find the correct pair, but now we’re out of time. Director just happened to see this girl the day before at a different audition, gave me her name. I watched ten minutes of her YouTube videos and decided she’d do. This business is insanely unfair.

Ate an apple, peanut butter, cinnamon yogurt bowl while brushing my hair straight and listening to a new age YouTube video about embracing the next chapter. Drove to WeHo singing reputation and thinking about my path as a writer. I'm the one living it, but sometimes driving to meetings I have to think about me in third person. What's the story, for this storyteller...

M & B’s office was much bigger and fancier than I anticipated. I had to wait on a sofa for a little bit, read more of Cruel Optimism. One gal greeted me and told me about moving here from China. Then the other gal, more a honcho, led me into the conference room. I took a strawberry peach LaCroix from the mini fridge and they told me all about the program I’m being considered for. It’s incredibly cool and competitive. 500 applicants. And I…didn’t apply. I jumped the line because my dear friend SR put me up for it. All news to me.

They tell me what they’re looking for, and I simply don’t have it. They ask, well what are you working on? I tell them about my newest creation, the one that I’ve been breaking for the past year and a half. I'm positive it's not right. Honcho says, “I love it. This is exactly what we’ve been looking for.” As they walk me out I fish for my parking ticket. They ask if I need validation. I shake their hands and say, “Absolutely! I’ll take a compliment from each of you please!” They laugh and then I go to the front desk. The 20something there has a really cute tattoo, a bubble heart. He says it’s favorite “right now.” I repeat, “right now.”

I have to burn rubber to make my 3 pm meeting back home. I give my ticket to the valet and he pulls me into a disagreement with two other folks working in the garage. They want to know if a man or woman should cook. In about ten minutes I know all I need to know about this trio. I suddenly blurt, where is my car? A parade of porches and bmws and Teslas have rolled through. I point to my scratched grey beloved in the corner of the lot and someone fetches it.

I make it home just in time for my meeting with one of the most famous living comic artists. He’s very nice and sometimes I don’t think he’s listening, but then I realize it’s just that he’s signing covers while we talk. I’d been angry at this team last week because they dropped a bunch of balls. This week that much is all still true, but I have accepted it. I consider, as I do basically every day, how to stand up for myself in a way that doesn’t annoy people. Nearly impossible I keep finding, via trial and error.

Once we wrap, I see AB has texted me. Our production company has officially asked for script delivery! I double check formatting and send it off, finally. My manager emails: a prod co loves my play, they asked for a coffee but he thinks I’m too busy—can I zoom? We set.

Puhg lumbers in to see my tornado of a desk. I fill him in on everything, mostly positive but it’s all laced with thick anxiety. “Condolences on your good news,” he says gravely. Not unlike the other night when I was hunched at my desk. He walked in, gave me one look and diagnosed: “Living the miserable dream.”

Tons of emails about casting. How many shows will the understudy get, should they be paid equally or less than cast, will everyone flier if needed. Therapy at 5, so I close everything down at 4:50. I talk with J about disappointment, and how some people get uncomfortable when I express it. But if I don’t express it, then I’m uncomfortable. Also, if someone suddenly seems unsafe, is that good gut or bad wiring?

I close my computer. Sigh the biggest sigh ever only to see my manager calling. He wants to hear about the meeting. He chatted with the comic producer too, will link with my lawyer tomorrow. I admit I’m annoyed with __. I chuckle, “Ah the special moment in every creative partnership with someone I would have died to work with, where I kinda hate them.” Manager chuckles himself, “I can’t wait to get to that point for you.” I say, “And likewise.”

As soon as I sit down, SR calls. He inquires impishly, and I tell him it went very well! He says he knew it would! He encourages me, then, he has to go on a hike. I write down notes of what I need to do first thing in the morning. I feel myself crashing. Puhg suggests Burger King, and I agree. It’s Whopper Wednesday, which means $4 Impossible Whoppers on the app. I order very boring Whoppers. You can have it your way, and I do. No toppings except lettuce and barbecue sauce.

Puhg offers to scoop our paper bags, but I could use a little jaunt. We drive into the palm trees at dusk. Right as well pull up, the sign blinks on. They made a mistake and give me free fries. We eat our feast while watching an episode of Widow’s Bay.

I pick up my phone for the first time in an hour to see a billion missed emails and texts—details about cast offers. I stand silently volleying for a while then change into sweats. Tidy up my corner, sit outside genuinely doing nothing at all. Thinking at the trees, 9:30 - 10:30, when Puhg and I watch a Couple’s Therapy while eating churro-flavored Fat Boys.

a birthday

Henne just called to yap about summer and wish me a belated birthday. He apologized for missing it, but I actually didn't notice. "Birthday" felt more like a vague energy this year.

At 11:59 on May 18th I was at my aunt's rental. I'd driven over after a very long work day of explosive emails and callback zooms. We'd sat down and chatted and suddenly I realized the sun was almost gone and I never had dinner. I googled a liquor store around the corner, so we walked, quite casually, to the boardwalk. I selected two bags of salt & vinegar chips and a chocolate chipwich. The pink sky was starting to fade into navy ocean.

We spent hours laughing on the twinkle-lit patio, also appreciating a bizarre concert. A handful of 20somethings were doing karaoke a couple buildings over. "Shake It Off" made it to us, tamborine included, for example. I timed things so I was eating the ice cream novelty at midnight.

I woke up at 6 and couldn't remember if I had to move my car by 7 or 8. I decided to move it right away, in case. Got a primo dawn spot and a latte and an almond croissant and journaled and read Jung facing the water. Hugged my aunt and zoomed back across the city blasting Taylor Swift as is my right.

Puhg greeted me with a huge hug and a wonderful display! A vase of orange flowers, a sweet card, a jug of nice soap, and a box of aloe cleaner my mom sent. Necessary work plunking, a dance workout, a heavenly shower. Puhg offered to take me wherever whenever for lunch so I chose my favorite falafel shop by the movie theatre. I brought my own can of cherry Coke and we sat outside in the shade. Puhg asked me some questions about the year, like what I learned and what was hard and what was fun.

In the late afternoon I answered texts and did a some volunteering for the mayoral race and sat outside writing notes for a teeny speech. Around 6 I put on my new pink two-piece set and a little blush and headed on down to what has become my annual girls' fete.

Nine of my best gals all descended on the ivied corner table. Half of them got fries to share. I myself had gotten chips and dip to share. It was just so incredibly festive. Some gals munched cakes and others slurped martinis. Lo told me this is the only party she attends where she doesn't worry about who will be there. It's adorable that some of these people have become friends over the years! I love to get quiet and eavesdrop on all their chattering, but then I have to remember to chatter too.

After an hour I clink my glass to give a speech. It's two-parts and about ten minutes. First I talk about how this year was my year of Being Nuts. I give five examples of things I really wanted to do, knew I should do, but felt afraid to do. Yet I did them all. Usually with the help or support of someone right there! Then, related, I give everyone two compliments. Like how MS cheered me up in January and told me I was right, to ask about being cheered up. Or how KM lent me a swimsuit and dried my angry tears. Or how SW keeps me sane and so does ER in a different way. How I can count on SR to bop around the neighborhood and JC to host reality TV nights. Tira I can text, "They're annoying me." And she'll say, "I hate them," without knowing who "they" even is. We all cheersed and they sang happy birthday while we were shuffling the hundreds of fries around to-go boxes.

About half the cabal stayed an extra hour. I can barely remember what we all couldn't shut up about. At 9:30 it was time to call it. Everyone says I am a great gatherer. Well, if everyone says so! My Arizona playwright friend and Chicago improv friend, who have never hung out, drove east together. I had my strawberry cheesecake on the couch with Puhg, before falling asleep on his chest.

it's like I got this music in my mind

second play weekend

There had been Friday meetings set, but they were cancelled last minute. I suddenly felt determined to go to Six Flags. So I did. Got there just after open. Rode my favorite loop first, then the big dusty coaster (front row), the pirate ship, the revolution, answered emails, did some drafting at a picnic table over a free Diet Coke, even rolled calls about the festival poster near Bugs Bunnyland. Took a spin on the carousel before heading home around 2. A lot can happen with free parking and four hours. I texted Puhg while I was there, what was with the urgency. He suggested, could be some kind of anxiety purge. “The body keeps the score,” he added. Perhaps my guts have been so metaphorically rattled lately they long to be physically rattled.

I was an email freak the rest of the afternoon. Drove over to the west side around 6:45 to catch the play. The gals did just great. I didn’t stick around long after, had to process in the night. Puhg woke up when I walked in, confused but smiling.

Saw the show twice Saturday. The matinee talkback elicited tears but two prominent artists snubbed me in the evening. TM was inexplicably also in the audience and no one knew why, though he did laugh at my most brutal joke. I decided to take pride in how I handled these strangenesses instead of worrying too much. Had a bad expensive salad grr, walked aimlessly near the beach.

Sunday there was a very long discussion about how to organize the day which ended quickly when my aunt agreed to lunch. Had to dab up my face and fit but soon we were on the sunny patio with free garlic bread. I’d walked past the night before, at sunset, thinking, “now this is a place I’d like to go one day.” The cheesy Italian flag and angled roof. Our server advised me to read more Nietzsche. Tax Ant said that would never happen in the north woods. I’d gotten a headache on the way over, and I swear the spicy tomato ravioli cured it.

We took it nice and easy to the theatre, sniffing flowers each block. It was a packed house, which always feels so good for goodbye. I couldn’t help but peep from my back corner—did so and so laugh at that? Ah so and so set her head against so and so’s shoulder there. Oh good so and so’s dad chuckled. Puhg accuses me of loving to lean back and observe what I’ve sown. (And fine it's true!)

The cast did even better than their best. The talkback was incredibly special. Friends were there—ER for fun, AZ for research, BM as a fellow playwright, my manager, the original gaffer!, and more. I had a true giggle when we called JS in to be acknowledged for his amazing set, and he slurred he was already drinking in the lobby. He held up a little homemade frose for emphasis.

The lobby was such a scene. A girl bawled for a long time and a mom said thank you. A guy told me about gang violence in his high school, a couple about their church being targeted, two fellas joked, RB and my aunt hugged, photos, packing up for the party. Not based in science, but there was a release that happened—when I invoked my grandmother in front of the step-and-repeat.

Puhg and I went over to celebrate with the crew and even some cute parents and at the very end I showed the two muffins the photo of us I took a year and a half earlier. I’d said, “I have a feeling this is going to work out.” We re-created the image, looking about the same on the outside, though all three of us were much much different on the inside.

laughing til our ribs get tough / but that will never be enough

running thru my head running thru my head

Time for my annual tradition of reflecting on the music that meant something to me for the past year.

Vertigo, Griff -- how 2 b brave

Big Pink Bubble, Beach Bunny -- being a wreck and that's just how it is sometimes!

My Universe, Coldplay & BTS -- sung to Puhg in the flickering rainbow lights

All You Had to Do Was Stay, Taylor Swift -- an oldie that kept showing up

Diet Pepsi, Ben Platt -- a lesson in cringe coming back around

DNA, Knox -- pretty much, walking around with a broken heart

Before the World Was Big, Girlpool -- summer theatre indie production!

Pretty Face, Hoodie Allen -- twirling about Chicago

Walk of Life, Dire Straits -- sometimes you have to revert

Million Reasons, Lady Gaga -- rediscovering Gaga's sensitive side for some reason...watching her doc...

Just A Dream, Nellie -- finding the motivation over and over, this time, at the knoll

I Am...I Said, Neil Diamond -- wondering what's magic at the pool

House Tour, Sabrina Carpenter -- pure 100% girl joy, sang in SW's convertible, in the shower, rushing around, and LIVE!

My Baby (Got Nothing at All), Japanese Breakfast -- windy warm date night at The Greek

Acoustic #3, The Goo Goo Dolls -- one of my all timers from high school, never thought I'd hear it live, and then, alone in the side section, I did

How It's Done, HUNR/X -- working on the new animated series

The Fate of Ophelia, Taylor Swift -- my little obsessive research

Father Figure, Taylor Swift -- sung excessively in the car with Pook

Curious, Hayley Kiyoko -- working on my newest project

Parachute, Hayley Williams -- a new era and one for me too

So High School, Call It Off -- yeah let's have some fun while commuting

Bad Romance, Lady Gaga -- she's still got it

Let You W/In, Lily Allen -- the future is female, the present is female, the past is female

Big Deal, Lucy Dacus -- I pretend to be the writer and subject on other planets in my head

Vodka Cranberry, Conan Gray -- late nights with candles and journals

Mature, Hilary Duff -- millennial women waking up to their power! and dishing!

All The Things She Said, tAtU -- I too loved Heated Rivalry

Austin, Dasha -- a spicy channeling

You'll Aways Find Your Way Back Home, Hannah Montana -- probably, shower song

Well, Whatever It Was, Joyce Manor -- stomping through the neighborhood

American Cars, Noah Kahan -- reflecting on family on the balcony

Sports, Beach Bunny -- Venice theatre magic

Anything, Simple Plan -- yeah let's have some fun while commuting pt. II

friday for a little playwright

Answered emails from bed about the poster, wrote the nepo baby about her audition (her famous mom DM'd me). The nepo babies are descending. A "new show" is reading young talent. They add me on Instagram and I observe how their lives cost about 500% more than mine even though they are 21. But I have something they can't buy. I don't blame or judge them. It's just weird. Art is weird. Money is weird. Nepotism is weird.

I trot to the cafe to catch Puhg. He's seated next to a middle age man we've become neighborhood friends with. He's always reading cool books. Totally coincidentally he's going to the festival with his middle school daughter this summer! He says he wants to go to my play with her. I eek, "That is my dream! When producers ask me my ideal audience. I say teens and their parents!" I realize I'm going to be late to my nail appointment, get up and hustle out. I kiss Puhg outside then look over his shoulder to see our friend DM watching. "Oh!" I say. He tips his head like, howdy ma'am.

I get light pink nails with the gal who is openly hostile to customers. I don't mind this because she's allowed to express how she feels, and the claws look good either way. I don't need laborers to pretend to like labor. I don't have an outfit for opening, and I do have a little time, so I zip down to the row of thrift shops. As I approach the first, I see Tira at the French sidewalk spot yapping with a pal! We get to chirp for a bit.

I try on about six dresses and decide they're all A-. I don't buy anything that's not A plus anymore, consider I could just wear my sleeveless black bag once again. On my walk home I am enticed by scones in a window. Get a latte and treat for twenty American dollars. I outline an essay and slather on the clotted cream. Two playwrights I know knock on my table as they're leaving. They're perfectly nice, but we did once get in a fight at a writers' group because they were ragging on how my generation isn't 1000% dedicated to working on weekends and while traveling like they were, and it got awkward when I said, "Well I notice you both have really nice homes." Anyway, I get up and hug them to show I'm not a regular demon, I'm a cool demon. As I'm leaving I see an exec I know. I knock on her table. She's meeting with her intern. They both buy tickets to my play. I walk home listening to MUNA's new album, thinking about how I saw seven friends, just by virtue of bopping around!

At home I feel ultra compelled to work on an essay. I answer a couple emails from my manager, but the piece has to come first. I complete a draft, race to shower, race to makeup, shove carrots in my mouth, then zoom across the city blasting my pop punk playlist of 8th grade jams. "Anything" by Simple Plan to Start. I'm not sure why, but that's always what I listen to on my drives west.

I kind of dread going into the lobby opening night. I pull into a parking spot at the window. I see the director in an adorable dress, our producer with the red bob in heels. They're laughing the joy of people pulling something off. I sit in the car a while writing notes for the main four. I add heart stickers and Sharpie stars. I wobble in around 7:40.

I am overwhelmed immediately, as predicted. Everyone is so nice though. I see my new friend, leaned against the wall. Another producer gives me a sweet pin. I greet the school shooting survivor and her friend. I get a desperation peach seltzer. We funnel into the theatre. I see my friend JG in the front row. I'm pretty surprised. I haven't seen her in six years, not since I happened to be taking a meeting on the same patio she was celebrating her first Emmy nomination. She didn't tell me she was coming.

They hold curtain for fifteen and I am SWEATING. I cannot stop bothering this poor survivor. I tell her, "There are gunshots at the beginning." She says she knows. I nod. I lean over, "And, you know, if you want to leave, you can totally leave!" She tells me she knows. I tap my toes a while. I tell her, "Just get up and go. At any moment. No problem!" The lights go down.

The cast does an incredible job. The best the best the best they've ever been. The crowd is on board right away. They howl a few times. I'm really happy in the moment even though I can't enjoy it because I am tensed out of my gourd trying to notice what this girl is and isn't laughing at. In the penultimate scene I see her wiping tears. I relax a little.

The girls bow and the audience leaps to its feet. The cuties jump in joy on stage. "Really good," the girl says. "Way funnier than I thought." Yes. Red Bob created an amazing after party for us. It was ballooned with grad congrats. There was a bowl of Pop-Tarts and vodka slushies, a corner to write, flowers, teen music blaring.

JG came up to me quickly, overwhelmed. "Thank you," she heaved. "Just...that really....I needed that." She wrote me an email that night too. I told her I'd keep it and I will. The 20something explained about his worries in movie theatres. The little costume designer, about her plans to cover the door. The teen there, 16 and never enters a room without scanning the exits. The photographer told me he cried like a baby.  This is all so meaningful. I really could listen to people talk about shootings all day.

Everyone gets silly. The couple couple. The AD tells me about her need to create. The school shooting survivor has two vodka slushies and does a handstand. Go off, queen! I have to do the "Oops I Did It Again" choreo or I wouldn't be doing my part as a millennial. QD brings her boyfriend in a turtleneck. The drunk one gets drunk. The nuts one gets nuts. She gives me a card. I cry reading it in the living room, still in my lilac blazer, at 1 AM. After I got home to Puhg on the couch, trying to wait up. He toddles to bed. I text my sister about a robin, waking her up in the middle of the country. Can't sleep until 5.

save the games for the girls on the tennis courts

cannot today

Thinking about Yatchface today. There are those things people say that become scripture somehow. The person who said the thing might not even recognize its gold like you do. It may be up to you to carry on the message. The person who said it, just a mouth, just the previous leg of the Olympic torch.

Yatchface was my roommate for our final term of school (with Grinz). One afternoon while working on her capstone paper, Yatchface closed her computer and announced, "I simply cannot!" I thought it was so hilarious. Because, like, yes she could certainly finish her revisions. She was wrapped in her messy bed with her messy hair and had nothing else to do. But also, she simply should not. How could anyone disagree?

I've often empathized with "simply cannot" but I don't know if I've ever actually lived the motto full send. I worked for Conglomerate for five years and never missed a deadline or even asked for an extension. Grill workers got one freebie "no show" before being written up. I knew this and held tight to mine all four years of college, cashed it in with a month of school left, when I was in bed crying. I'd cried in bed before my 8 AM shift many times, but I'd never gotten to prioritize my own emotions over slicing tomatoes before. The only time I ever showed up not 100% prepared for a speech tournament I bungled my first round and begged my coach to let me drop from the whole thing. She made me stay in the running, reminding me it's okay, normal even, to compete and not win. Maybe I could experience being average for once. I agreed, but that night I ran my piece over and over and over and in the morning I got perfect marks, squeaked into semis, then finals, then won. My coach got on the bus to see me holding my trophy. "You were supposed to learn a lesson!" she said, only kind of kidding.

So this, today, is a different level of simply cannot. I really, lately, simply cannot. On a puff of smoke level on a what are we all doing it's all made up level on a I don't know if I'm supposed to keep cleaning out my closet to stay nimble or hoard these sweaters for the colder winters level. Do I go to a place or never go to a place?

Projects keeps vanishing and the money goes with them. No one apologizes. Jobs are down, jobs are down, jobs are down, gas is up, gas is up, gas is up. This week the president said he'd be out of the White House in 8 or 9 years and no one interrupted him.

I've gotten nothing but brilliant signs from the universe I am on the right path with my plays. Doors keep opening and meaning keeps spilling out. The actor's brother died, and she insists, she's going on anyway in his honor. The new producer believes in the message so much he created a group chat for us. The activist writes me, "You're the best!"

But the work has never been tougher on me. My tasks this morning, for example, include organizing the casting tapes for one production and emailing the director my callback preferences for another. Making a promotional video, checking flights, script feedback. I've got to drive out to Venice tonight for a tech rehearsal. I should be eager to do all these tasks. But there's this force that won't let me do any of it. It's more than discomfort, it's certainly beyond laziness, it's Wrong. Something is Wrong. I felt this way the day before the fires, when I suddenly had the urge to go to the movies alone.

I struggle to pretend as much as I used to. But no one likes me when I'm not pretending. I used to be able to disappear for a few hours and come back ready to dazzle. Now it takes days, maybe weeks, to be remotely palatable. Friends don't reach out as much, and I did that. It wasn't my plan, but the person they're looking for doesn't live here anymore.

Anyway, that's why I'm writing this morning. It often feels like I can't count on anything in this world, but I can count on writing. No matter what happens I can write about it. Maybe I can write through it. Missing my hamster so much I could disintegrate.

mid pizza and Diet Cokes

Told K Ho, when she picked me up for lunch, I can't believe I said yes to this. Had essentially no idea what the process would entail or what the theatre would look like or even how I'd get around. I just trusted I'd figure it out. Although I don't often trust myself to figure things out, I am a good pilot for a weird little arts program. One could argue my whole life is but a collection of cobbled together weird little arts programs. I remember talking about it with a peer from grad school once. (Oh I'm sure I gave him a cute little blog nickname twelve years ago, but god help me if I can remember those anymore. I should have made a key. But I didn't. So now if I ever look back in my archives here I have to scratch my chin and whisper soto, "Interesting memory...but who is 'Frazzykins?'")

Anyway, I had reached out to this peer, AC, after I saw they were abroad teaching acting workshops. They were like, "Mostly did it for the grant money, but it's been really cool." And ain't that the way. I have all kinds of stupid things on my art/work resume because I've never not been grubbing for money. But almost all those stupid things ended up being incredible memories. And, yeah, I guess if I'd been in the position to do other things with my time, maybe those other things could have been incredible memories too. But, I kinda don't think so.

I've been cornered into non-self serving experiences, and that's been really special for me. And important to my voice. Maybe necessary to my voice. Maybe my voice refused to sing in places privilege would have sent me. I wouldn't have picked to teach a musical theatre camp for 5th graders when I was 28, but I was desperate, and I still think about funny things those girls did, realizations we all had together. I wonder if any of them thought about our Newsies history lesson while the writers' strike was national news.

Had to go to Maine to teach improv to seniors for a week right before moving to LA. Horrible timing, but the gig was for $800--money I'd need to sustain myself until I landed something in my new city. Was I irritated to be going? Yes. Do I still think fondly about doing comedy with elderly women, one who was blind?! YES!

I've done gigs for hospice patients and fried eggs and stuffed bears and worn a mascot costume and crafted banana splits and sliced ham and proctored exams for people who couldn't hold pencils and led comma seminars and coached speech club and fired guns and shot arrows and instructed drama games and counseled preteens through their relationship with god and taught teens on the South Side playwriting with the time I wanted so much for my own plays. I worked on a cruise ship. None of this is what I wanted, but I would never trade any of it now.

So doing a play workshop in Virginia for $300? Sign me right up. I took a redeye, got in at 6 AM. The director picked me up in pjs. The theatre was only 20 minutes away. An adorable little spot with a maroon awning in a strip mall. Right away, I liked it.

Director let me in the scene shop. There was a sketchy yellow couch and a sad rainbow afghan. I don't remember much else until I woke with a start at about 9. I wandered, shoeless into the lobby, where the whole staff was having a meeting. The executive director hopped up and pointed me toward the hotel.

I felt half-human and wobbled over, through a little dirt path between the trees. The desk guy told me my room wasn't ready, so I flopped in the lobby, greasy and ripe. A little before noon my shower dream died, so I changed my t-shirt and put on deodorant in the bathroom. My old high school bestie picked me up in this state. All par for the course. We got mid pizza and Diet Cokes. It was so easy to talk about the people we know and how things have been and especially, if there's a nuke, run into it. She said I seemed the same, and I said, ah that's nice but my soul's been broken, just a little.

I was able to clean up, in ten minutes flat, right before my first rehearsal. I rushed in right on time, to find my script in a binder at the table. At the spot labeled "playwright."