Manufactured Magic

Still magic.

Dad on safari.

Happy moment in Norway (EPCOT).

Remember the time we wrote our names up on the wall.

New Show

I've been nervous all week about starting this new show process. I've been holing up in my room wondering if I'm making something wonderful or something terrible. Our first rehearsal was Tuesday. Bisque texted me on my way home.

BISQUE: How was the rehearsal?
ME: It was scary, but I did it.
BISQUE: Yeah, you did!
ME: I feel a lot less scared, but still scared.
BISQUE: It's scary to create something!

18 MONTHS IN THE WINDY JUNGLE THAT DREAMS ARE MADE OF

The hardest part of this whole artist lifestyle I'm trying to live is not the pay, is not the rejection, is not the constant creativity. For me, the hardest part is the scheduling. It's not just about finding opportunities, it's knowing that once you accept them, you've shut out three other things. It's realizing you can't take any random weekend trip you want. It's RSVPing "no" to weddings and seeming flakey when someone asks you a simple question like "Can we get dinner?" It's having your planner open for literal hours penciling in which dates the show should be vs. when rehearsals for that other thing will be vs. when should you reschedule that one appointment to keep yourself open for that potential audition...and all of that is minimum two months away in the first place. AND every person who is working with you on everything and every person who is your friend are all doing the exact same hair-pulling planner-scribbling stuff.

And yet, this is the dream. Maybe its the part of the dream no one told us about and we couldn't possibly have guessed, but this is it. I was stressed about this project I have coming up in February and pitifully slouched on the couch. Bisque said, "I dunno why you're not happier when you just got CONTRACTED TO WRITE YOUR OWN SHOW AT THE S______ C____." And I was like, "OH YEAH THE DREAM I FORGOT FOR A SECOND THAT I AM LIVING IT." Tomorrow I am going to wake up and think, "Ohmygosh. How incredibly wonderful I have so much to do today."

Deprezzed Pep Talk Texts from Bisque

ME: I hate my life. I am sitting on the ground in Englewood.
BISQUE: Peak act of depression right there.
BISQUE: Sitting on the ground in Juarez might be worse.
BISQUE: If you keep thinking things are bad and won't work out, then by golly that's how things will be. But if you're grateful and positive and put love into the world, then that's what you're going to get back. So you can either sit on a disgusting sidewalk and or you can get your cute ass up and go get a donut.
BISQUE: Which sounds better?
BISQUE: The donut is always better.
ME: What donut are you talking about?
BISQUE: Any donut!
BISQUE: Donut is a metaphor for all donuts and being happy.
ME: There are no donuts in Englewood.
BISQUE: That's racist.

Losing Not Free Things

Last night Bisque's bike was stolen from our third floor balcony. I came home from sketch rehearsal to find him somber and shirtless, missing that mint green zip machine. I loved Bisque's bike. It was hip and cute and accompanied my loved one on the lake shore trail, to music in the park, to Potbelly. It hunkered down in the snow. It was purchased in the desert.

It hurts. It hurts to know something was taken from you. Something with a lot of personal value that is now irrelevant to the thief. It hurts to feel like these things happen. It hurts, or some feeling like it, to recognize this happens all the time in this dumb city. People are jerks, they do not watch out for each other. I get honked at for using the crosswalk designed to be used. We get shoved. People crowd around the el doors, fighting before the cars even stop. Why do we live here? I call the appropriate government office to ask when to buy the appropriate vehicle stickers. I get an answer, I sit on the hot train, walk half a mile, get told I'm in the wrong place.

And I am trying to be empathetic. Before bed Bisque starts, "I'm against the death penalty but..." I laugh because I know what he means. If you steal such a happy seafoam fixit, perhaps you should die. When people steal they think they need something more than you, they have to survive (in some sense of the definition). I should understand at least my life isn't in a place where I must steal to make it all happen. But that hurts too. The amount of times I get asked in one day to help. The shaking change cups and the cardboard signs. The people who launch into their stories while I'm waiting at a red light. That guy who swore he'd pay us back the $25. That guy who tsked at me like I was the rudest person alive for not buying him a new amplifier battery?(!) The woman who stands in the same spot on Belmont asking surprisedly for a dollar, her little play of pretending this is the first time she has ever needed anything. It's not fair that when some quiet skinny man shuffles into Taco Bell Bisque buys him dinner only to come home to a porch rail ripped off.

Perspective

S     T     E     P

B      A      C      K

Selfie at Clara's wedding.

Pro photographer's shot.

I found gold in the wreckage/

put it on a necklace.

Getting Paid to Make Things Up

Summer is ending. Cobra was here--an excuse to go to the Art Institute twice in one week. She's en route to a Fulbright and I'm wondering how many people notice I'm trying to pull off gym shorts as fashion. Yesterday afternoon I closed the bedroom door on me, UnReal on Lifetime, and some Oreos. This is August dinner.

I walk longer distances because why not. At rehearsal I say unabashedly, "I'd rather gossip than plan anything." Is the whole reason for doing art the dishing in-between? Eh. Or I go to Kam's studio to gab. Or it is nearing midnight but Tulsa is on the street with his green backpack. He comes over for water in huge plastic cups.

At Cirque de Soleil, our one planned date, Bisque and I see my old castmate. We split a cab home to the Northside. Bisque tells me Wrigley Field is important, and I say "Do not even." because Southside pride is strong. My shoulders are very brown, I notice, when I run in the sports bra only. Fish tummy. A Jar looks good, better than usual. Trimmed and hip. He is so vigorous with life and opinions I think about being a polarizing person and how truly wonderful it could be. I finished my screenplay. This draft anyway, and the things I dislike must come to an end soon.

Paychecks for improv!

Grapefruit Body Wash

Was only going to be in Boston for two days, so I used the grapefruit body wash in Bex shower, assuming two squirts would not be missed. I rarely eat grapefruit because it's so obnoxious, but if it's on a brunch menu? Some brown sugar-crusted magic? Sigh, sigh, I have the luck of remembering the first time I ever ate grapefruit. I was 3 or 4 and up tootling around the house as my childhood insomnia had me to do. First stop was usually my grandmother's recliner. Sometimes I could shake her awake and ask for a story. One this night, I'd like to think it was summer, but who knows, she grogged awake and asked if I'd like to try grapefruit. I did because what is that. She took me to the kitchen and explained the two halves, the special spoon, the tartness. I slurped it up. From then on every time I visited her I asked for some, but it was never in the kitchen again.

I liked the body wash so much the day I got lost walking through the city (making a 2 mile journey into 5) I stopped in a CVS to alleviate some of my back sweat and bought some. It's what I have been using here in Maine. A happy, fresh way to start my day. The new cast member Dollar arrived Sunday. I started noticing something in the tub--sometimes my pink bottle was suddenly open. I had left it closed. But then I started noticing sometimes I would walk into the bathroom to find the cap open, then closed, but I hadn't showered. Last night while brushing my teeth I asked both the guys to come into the hall. I asked, "Who has been using my grapefruit body wash?" Dollar admitted it. He seemed embarrassed (?) to be caught in a way that made me wonder if I should have said anything at all. "I don't care!" I said. I just wanted to know. Then, Tulsa: "Wait, what does it look like? Pink? Yeah, I've been using it too." It was like the time Hill and I were hanging out at our guys' house and we realized on the way to lunch we were all wearing the same deodorant. It made me feel gushy, honestly, that my castmates and I all pump the beady syrup into our palms once a day. I shouldn't have said anything, I thought. This doesn't matter. "You can use as much of my body wash as you want!" I exclaimed between spitting my toothpaste out. Dollar walked into the bathroom, picked up the soap, said, "excuse me for a moment," and opened it over the toilet. "No!" I whisper-yelled at 2 in the morning. He put it back. This morning I got the third shower. The pink line was lower.

Moss: Part II

Muggy run Friday. We may as well have been inside the old sneakers we wore. "I'm going to go down and splash some water on my face," Bisque says about two miles in. Good idea. There's a lake right there! Who knew!

So we hop down the concrete steps to the waves lapping some rocks. I see the rocks are moss, so I bend down where I am am splash myself the best I can. But, before I can say, "Wait, don't--" Bisque is stepping onto a big mossy slab. In one second I panic. There are so many options--yelp, lunge and try to catch him, close my eyes...I gasp as his feet fly from under him and he lands square on his back halfway submerged in the water. I frantically garble, "Where is your phone*! Talk it out of your pocket!" Phone was safe despite every other part of his shorts and tee being drenched somehow. He was fine. he carefully stepped back onto dry land. We walked the rest of the way home since he was sogging. Sore neck for a couple days, but it was no big deal.

I've been thinking about that moment. What if I had flailed and tried to scoop him up as he fell? Surely my quicker response time could have saved him the womp. But then I think of the logistics, and even if I COULD have reached out, might I have kinda nicked his head causing it to eventually hit much harder on the stone? It could have all cracked open right there. In this case, my best intended action may have been murder.

*It says a lot about the importance of technology in society that the first thing I asked about was his replaceable cell. Bisque later mentioned casual fun is not as fun anymore because of cell phones. On our walk home I mentioned it was right of passage to be pushed into Peppermint's swimming pool with your clothes on in middle school. No more of that with iPhones in pockets!

Insomnia: Teacher Weights

Can't sleep. I'm up worrying about my student in the hospital.

It was such a good day. A summer Sunday. I slept in, finished Anne Tyler's A Spool of Blue Thread. Bisque and I walked two miles to the beach. We were sticky upon arrival, so the mighty cold lake felt refreshing. The life guard plopped his row boat three feet from us, the only swimmers, who were perpetually humming "Jaws" and splashing around. I watched the Tig Notaro doc on Netflix, curled up into my grey hoody, and napped because the sun was coming through the windows just so. And this new couch (we got a new couch!) was ever so inviting. Suddenly, I needed to be productive. I cycloned around the apartment for two hours cleaning the closets, recycling old documents, organizing my lip glosses hurled under the bathroom sink. Bisque went for a run, and we agreed to meet up at sunset on the rooftop pool at our gym. Humidity retired for the day, I laid contently in a sun chair watching the orange sky melt. I walked to CVS to use my coupon, and chocolate dusted almonds were on sale for six measly dollars, would you believe it?

Finally, in the deep dark of night, we turn off all the lights, dunk ginger snaps in milk, and watch MTV's Scream. Bisque reads aloud to me from a young adult book. Before bed I notice I have a work email. It's from this kid's mother.

This kid, this sweet, cheery (one would assume) kid is struggling again. Severe depression. Things were unsafe. What does that mean? Are they certainly safe now? I'm worried this good student is going to fail. This is the last week of the term. I'm worried this good person is going to die. I can't stop thinking about it and wondering what else I could have done. Did this kid know I cherish all of my students? That the essays this kid writes are excellent, and that's not something I write on every paper? Please keep this kid alive, I keep repeating. Repeat One, like the button on a Discman. Keep this kid alive.

And now I'm worried for them all. Tomorrow is the final exam. I want them all to pass so badly it bunches my guts. They won't. That one missed, like, 6 classes and two essays. He doesn't have the practice hours in. This one can't implement verb agreement. And this person doesn't understand "logic" "proof" these things are nothing to him. "Meet me before the exam! Anytime. Email me. Send me practice paragraphs, grammar questions. I'm here from you." I checked my email devoutly all weekend. Nothing. And some of them really needed it. Nothing. Until now. Now I have one new email from the mother of the special kid. Please keep alive.

Intersection of Upset and Grateful

"If I express my dislike for something, it is usually because the other 99% is perfect," my sister explains to me. We're talking about negativity. How I think it's a complete bummer and how she thinks it's a mere expression--and certainly not to be taken personally. (I know that too, but I still do it.)

Road trip gummies.

Would the world move on without the perfectionists bringing storm clouds to the silver sidewalks? Could the perfectionists quietly toil instead? Are things as they are perfect, or at least as perfect as we should be entitled to? I worry a life of constant critiquing doesn't leave much space for gratitude--which is the number one potion.

Ah, so, these are the times one must escape to the north woods. These are the days a knotted tummy and work email are not options. There are barrels of bulls eyes in the candy shop, a near-empty movie theatre, the late night chats, finding a toad, setting off a firework in the driveway, and the glittering flowage. The bags of carrot chips, the humongous muskie, a rope swing, and a new book--just cracked.

Fish fry.

Brownie sundaes for dinner.

Pontooning.

I could make you satisfied in everything you do/
All your secret wishes could right now be coming true.

Two Reasons to Love Bisque

1. On Sunday we went out for farewell coffee with his sister Fizz. Bisque asked for a macchiato, and I got a biscotti. When the barista chirped "MACCHIATO" I did a double take. At Starbucks a macchiato is basically a latte. At this trendy place where I always get terrible service, but there are very nice love seats and a giant open window, a macchiato is about a thimble of caffeine. I brought the "beverage" over to my guy. He looked at it, I believe on the cusp of playing it cool and being disappointed. He said, "This is not what I was expecting, but I'll try it." And I really liked that. I think a lot of times we pretend like, "Oh yeah, I knew that." But it's just so much better not to. Being honest about the smallest, most frivolous things is how we build muscle to be honest about the big swampy messes--how we learn to have open minds to admit we were wrong about a political candidate or professional mistakes.

2. He said to me last night, "If you're too focused on your dream, you might miss a dream."

Bro and sis post-pizza.

A dream is a wish your heart makes.

Stingrays!

Just one thing I did last weekend was touch stingrays. Just one thing!

Others include: seeing new Insidious movie in the fancy theatre with smuggled in Garrett's popcorn, brunch, a new interactive theatre show about grifting, participating in Americans for the Arts conference, an evening stroll in Daley Plaza, visiting the Modern Art Museum, a comped one-woman show at the company I work for, and let's not forget all the regulars like aerobic step, breathing, and the sky.

Lt. Fran

Little old lady
with no legs. She said, "Under
my left boob. It hurts."

Barnes and Noble book
club. Can you return the ones
I didn't get to?

Her body was in
a box in the church in the
town she lived always.

This was the same stained
glass as in 1970.
Familiar wafer

slipped into pockets.
Paul bearers, and you got out
of the car, saying,

"I want to see that."
And you listened to the stuff
people say every time

in the first pew, same
windows as 1970.
There's nothing inside

that box. There's a dish
of potato sour cream cheese
something we all like.

The pious cooks hint
it's time to move on from the
congregation's gym.

Tables are folded
and suddenly there is a
basketball at play.

Then a few. The men
in their ties and black slacks shoot
around. The moms and

daughters and sisters
watch on. Watch on. Not a bad
way to go in June.

Not Cooked Yet

We always think we're at the end of our journey,
but we're always at the beginning.

Phoenix Weekend, April 2015

Changed into shorts as soon as we landed. A caramel apple pasty. Gathering like high schoolers in the hotel lobby. Every day a new morning run--sand and buildings from the 80s and cacti. Buying birthday balloons for Mama Bisque. Earned iced coffee. At least six donuts. Screenplay revisions with Shells, the best breakfast burrito. Galloping through a rare rain. It followed us. Artisanal strawberry Pop-Tart on the patio with Ro. Diamondbacks game and a churro dog (churro in a long john covered with ice cream), all the messed up thoughts. My old house. Cager makes a pillow fort after Catfish. Night cap ice cream pretzel cone for free because they were already evening the register. Family brunch on the sunniest day. Dresses and a massage, poolside talk with Hill, burnt shoulders. The last double date, shaved ice, I stand in a parking lot waiting for my last friends to arrive. Ru screams out the window, and I get in the backseat. Good morning and goodbye.

Rejection: Part V (Via The Avett Brothers)

"If you're loved, then you're never rejected."

Flannel Coat

Putting away clothes piles last night--
Bisque has dubbed me "Piles" because little stacks
of my stuff accumulate all over our apartment.
Piles of sweaters on the ground by my half of the bed,
piles of papers next to the couch, piles
of candy wrappers on the kitchen table, it goes on.
So putting away a pile last night your flannel coat
fell on me from the back of the closet.
It is blue checkered. You lent it to me
when I was 20 and never took it back. I quite liked
it and paired it with my daisy slip-ons.
The next year we disagreed about a girl's short story
in Advanced Fiction Writing. In the story some girl
was talking to an ex-boyfriend and told him she still
wore his old band tee to bed. You said, "That's weird,
you would never wear an ex's clothes after you
broke up." I said, "I would if I liked the clothes!"
It's my flannel coat, and I don't remember you
in it. I wear it, me. This was the first time in years
I thought about
where it came from.

February, You Can Eat A Rock

Good riddance to a despicable month. March is traditionally my least favorite part of the year, but I have faith it can be better than the trash pile that was February 1-28 in 2015. I hate you, February 2015. I hate all the stressful emails, I hate the whipping winds, I hate the uncomfortable notes, I have hated being sick for four weeks straight. I hate the greasy white board hands, the freshmen who never stop snapchatting, the sharp word, losing the will to keep my phone close, the interrupted dinner stories, and my hair wiley uggo hair.

Of course, there was a lot of good this month. Let's not forget that. Let's just commemorate those times.

Benny the Bull blimpin'.

Karaoke night with cohort. This was "It's All Coming Back to Me."

Galentines Party Apps.

My Valentine.

My music improv team in a finale pose.

Night Work

AT RISE ALICE, 20s in oversized tee and gym shorts, is in bed writing with her laptop open. Soft folk music is drifting out of the speakers. BISQUE, 20s and lovable, like a big chinchilla is next to her. He is laying down with his eyes closed. A lamp is on on the nightstand.

ALICE: Want me to turn off my music?

BISQUE: That's at the bottom of the list of things to turn off.

       (ALICE looks at the lamp, at the computer.)

ALICE: Want me to go into the living room?

BISQUE: (Beat.) No.

       (ALICE gives a self-satisfied, "Humph.")

ALICE: Okay then.

       (BISQUE narrows his eyes.)

BISQUE: Well, at the top of the list of things to turn off IS THE ATTITUDE.

END OF PLAY.