Monday, August 25, 2008
ANd the World Goes 'Round
Funny about Time...and it's passing: looking through Facebook at all the wonderful and varied things my students are getting hired to do, all the great performance opportunities they are being given throughout the world, and all the brave striving they are all engaged in, it (of course) takes me back to when i was their age, and, in them, and all that they are doing, I see my self and so many of my own memories...so much of my own past in this business.
It's like remembering the fragrance of flowers in a garden after you have already passed them by ....the trail of how they looked and smelled follows you...at least in the vivid part of your brain that remembers such things....these beautiful young actors and actresses are flowers in the garden of my life...and their professional activities stir the soil of memory.
Their first apartments, the joys of call-backs and the terrors as well...the "where will my next job come from:" mantra...the shock at discovering that it all does not work as you thought it would...the sheer sensual joy of being on tour for the first time in new and exciting places....the friends...the smell of life on the road...the shopping malls and discovering that America lives a plastic life, repeated mall after mall, mile after mile...going to strange new lands and taking walks in jungles! All the drinking, the loves, the fatigues and the opening night parties....the need for quiet and space and being afraid to sleep alone in strange hotel rooms...the huddling together of young animals in new surroundings, and the pride,...the sheer pride and pleasure of giving your show to those night-after-night crowds of strangers...where do they all come from? The smell of the streets (either familiar or strange streets) when you come out the Stage Door and realize you have your whole night (and life) ahead of you....
The smell of summers on porches of hotels, as you wait for your late night dates...
I could go on forever, which is what I feel these students of mine are doing for me: allowing me, in some real way, to go on and on...
I yearn to be them...yet am glad I am not.
Because i remember all the illusion I lived in as well.
and all the concomitant lack of wisdom that only brought more pain than was necessary....but then again, who's to say what is necessary in a life?
Must get on with the day....yet, like a comfortable bed I know I can always fall back into, this blog is here, and I will be back to it soon ....it is my way of honoring these students and my own journey at the same time...honoring and enjoying.
It's like remembering the fragrance of flowers in a garden after you have already passed them by ....the trail of how they looked and smelled follows you...at least in the vivid part of your brain that remembers such things....these beautiful young actors and actresses are flowers in the garden of my life...and their professional activities stir the soil of memory.
Their first apartments, the joys of call-backs and the terrors as well...the "where will my next job come from:" mantra...the shock at discovering that it all does not work as you thought it would...the sheer sensual joy of being on tour for the first time in new and exciting places....the friends...the smell of life on the road...the shopping malls and discovering that America lives a plastic life, repeated mall after mall, mile after mile...going to strange new lands and taking walks in jungles! All the drinking, the loves, the fatigues and the opening night parties....the need for quiet and space and being afraid to sleep alone in strange hotel rooms...the huddling together of young animals in new surroundings, and the pride,...the sheer pride and pleasure of giving your show to those night-after-night crowds of strangers...where do they all come from? The smell of the streets (either familiar or strange streets) when you come out the Stage Door and realize you have your whole night (and life) ahead of you....
The smell of summers on porches of hotels, as you wait for your late night dates...
I could go on forever, which is what I feel these students of mine are doing for me: allowing me, in some real way, to go on and on...
I yearn to be them...yet am glad I am not.
Because i remember all the illusion I lived in as well.
and all the concomitant lack of wisdom that only brought more pain than was necessary....but then again, who's to say what is necessary in a life?
Must get on with the day....yet, like a comfortable bed I know I can always fall back into, this blog is here, and I will be back to it soon ....it is my way of honoring these students and my own journey at the same time...honoring and enjoying.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
SURROUNDED BY LIGHT!
The way this particular cafe is designed, 3 of its four walls are windows, so this morning, as I wait for the young and wonderful Chase H., I am , indeed, surrounded by light....and there is nothing I would rather be bathed in than pure sunlight. Of course, it helps that I am also sitting in a clean, modern, air-conditioned and comfortable room, with fresh coffee and tender bagel by my side...but even without that, the light, the crystal and transparent nature of light,would brighten my spirits....as, at this moment, it does.
I'd like to dedicate this particular entry to Rick W. Good morning. Thank you for your continued support,encouragement ...and that wonderful dear wife of yours, without whose conversations, of late, my life would be a little drearier. I can't figure out what I like best about this woman: her warm talent, easy, and generously given in every single rehearsal, her sense of humor (edged with that indispensable wryness that only life lived can provide), or her observing mind...we have had some good beginning talks...I say "beginning" because I truly look forward to more of same...all by way of saying: if you can't be here with us right now, at least she's here, and that is a good thing!
So much to write about....but as I am dedicated to not specifically naming people , places, or things (I do want to stay under whatever radar is dedicated to censor- and censure-ship), I am gently nudged into the realm of the abstract and into the depths of what really matters: what lies beneath the story. And that's good for me...more soon...my breakfast date is here.
Later, same day:
A productive day all 'round, I'd say. Fun rehearsals, clear communications with various members of my Outreach initiatives , schedules adhered to and goals met........things accomplished...and one more dinner meeting to enjoy, then home to puppies and that pal who is my wonderful husband...we may even get to go grocery shopping TOGETHER, a rare luxury.
Eckhardt Tolle has somehow come into our lives.
Friends introduced us to him and his marvelous way of making the numinous coherent and instructive .....they sent us a link to the Oprah website and on it we found the link to her astonishing series of "classrooms" with Tolle, all about his books.....it is simply wonderful: this deep journey into human consciousness, and it's on the web! hosted by a popular daytime tv host! Will wonders never cease? Could the Age of Aquarius actually be coming real? Of course, as tired as I am, we turn on the webcasts nightly, and the sound of Tolle's voice, combined with the comforting message of the inviolate nature of the true deepest part of ourselves puts me right into a state of such relaxation, that i very naturally fall asleep and actually sleep well, which is something I have so NOT been doing since coming here to this theater......and yet, somehow, his knowledge, his insights, his soothing assuredness communicates to me even as i slumber, and I wake up optimistic,...or is that simply what well-rested feels like? It's been so long....
Amazing how enlightenment will come into one's life, no matter how many excuses one invents not to be in a room with it! With age comes a certain earned grace, and if this stuff of Tolle's is not grace personified, then nothing is: he may well be a latter-day Buddha....he is most certainly a Bodhisattva , no question about it...and I am glad he shares this present human plane with me right now!
Well, off to my dinner meeting.....yum! Have a little angst with your salad course?
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Dogs in the Sunshine
When I take Cyrano and Sally out in the sparkling day to pee, they shine in the sun, and look freshly minted from the puppy factory. The thing is: they are ever-enthused, always on the edge, and compellingly concentrated on whatever is before them, and where Ego resides in most humans, there is, instead pure canine astonishment.
I love astonishment. It...well.....yes,it astonishes me....Astonishment has the power to cleanse any palate and, thanksfully, restores me beside the still waters of trust ..the opposite of astonishment is the quality of being jaded and tired. Astonishment is bright scarlet...jaded-ness is...well, of course...green. And not a pretty green at that.
So, of course, as I watch the cutting flashes of red in the green of the weeping cherry tree outside our picture window, I see not just the standard Virginia red Cardinal, but the possibility of life beyond the Now. In astonishment I see Hope...because if something can astonish me, then that means i am not as dead as I sometimes feel.
Trapped in the needy clutches of Ego, I am paralyzed by the hot air of its urgent boastings....and though these explosions of hot air stifle me, I am chilled to the bone by them as well....I am so tired of it...so tired of the making of excuses instead of the making of something better.....the world makes excuses...I do believe that is how it survives. It talks itself into believing....convinces itself to drink the kool-aid, and thus the world turns....leaving many dead bodies behind...or at least dead souls.
I do sound a bit down, don't I???...well...actually, I am not down much at all today...i do need to get some more sleep, and hopefully, before my afternoon rehearsal, I can do just that...but, the day invites me, and something inside me, something looking for an answer to some deep unformed question, is keeping me writing down and down and down...into a place i rarely give myself time to enter.
And it's not a bad place, it's merely a thoughtful one.
The Avian Cafe outside out living room window, suspended from that weeping cherry, is clearly the new hot spot in town....hummingbirds come to sip and sip....birds large and small come to nibble....I wonder if I am the floor show, as I peer at all these flying sprites and their companions...I am certainly a looming presence....but man, are those cardinals red! A scarlet counterpoint to the bright red hummingbird food in the neighboring feeder....the red sugary liquid I can believe...it's the red of nature, the pure red possible in bird feathers, and flying as well! That's what gets me. Red came before Crayola....red was part of nature's plan all along, and we are only borrowing it. Looking at these birds makes me realize that.
And here we are back at Ego again: the temerity to imagine that we invented the various shades of red in the world...Man takes and captures and pretends that what they have taken was theirs all along... somehow this makes us feel less insignificant, i suppose...I suppose that need - to feel significant - is at the bottom of most stupid behaviors.
To matter....to materialize...so as not to be invisible...thus: to (turn ourselves into) matter.
To become more substantial...less air, more earth...heavier, weightier, with more importance.
I could wander among words all day.
I love astonishment. It...well.....yes,it astonishes me....Astonishment has the power to cleanse any palate and, thanksfully, restores me beside the still waters of trust ..the opposite of astonishment is the quality of being jaded and tired. Astonishment is bright scarlet...jaded-ness is...well, of course...green. And not a pretty green at that.
So, of course, as I watch the cutting flashes of red in the green of the weeping cherry tree outside our picture window, I see not just the standard Virginia red Cardinal, but the possibility of life beyond the Now. In astonishment I see Hope...because if something can astonish me, then that means i am not as dead as I sometimes feel.
Trapped in the needy clutches of Ego, I am paralyzed by the hot air of its urgent boastings....and though these explosions of hot air stifle me, I am chilled to the bone by them as well....I am so tired of it...so tired of the making of excuses instead of the making of something better.....the world makes excuses...I do believe that is how it survives. It talks itself into believing....convinces itself to drink the kool-aid, and thus the world turns....leaving many dead bodies behind...or at least dead souls.
I do sound a bit down, don't I???...well...actually, I am not down much at all today...i do need to get some more sleep, and hopefully, before my afternoon rehearsal, I can do just that...but, the day invites me, and something inside me, something looking for an answer to some deep unformed question, is keeping me writing down and down and down...into a place i rarely give myself time to enter.
And it's not a bad place, it's merely a thoughtful one.
The Avian Cafe outside out living room window, suspended from that weeping cherry, is clearly the new hot spot in town....hummingbirds come to sip and sip....birds large and small come to nibble....I wonder if I am the floor show, as I peer at all these flying sprites and their companions...I am certainly a looming presence....but man, are those cardinals red! A scarlet counterpoint to the bright red hummingbird food in the neighboring feeder....the red sugary liquid I can believe...it's the red of nature, the pure red possible in bird feathers, and flying as well! That's what gets me. Red came before Crayola....red was part of nature's plan all along, and we are only borrowing it. Looking at these birds makes me realize that.
And here we are back at Ego again: the temerity to imagine that we invented the various shades of red in the world...Man takes and captures and pretends that what they have taken was theirs all along... somehow this makes us feel less insignificant, i suppose...I suppose that need - to feel significant - is at the bottom of most stupid behaviors.
To matter....to materialize...so as not to be invisible...thus: to (turn ourselves into) matter.
To become more substantial...less air, more earth...heavier, weightier, with more importance.
I could wander among words all day.
Saturday, August 09, 2008
Saturday and Hummingbirds
The new shiny copper hummingbird feeder is now hanging from the tree limb in the front yard.
And i am sitting in the corner of the soft leather sofa, coffee cup in hand, seeing a beautiful Saturday morning come to be: blue joys, enormous beastly feathery things, (I am smiling at the error: of course I meant to write blue jays!), are nibbling at the birdseeder ,also copper, and a fat and lively female cardinal is munching there as well....everyone seems happy,and the Baron-Yonka Bird Restaurant is buzzing with birdie business!
The glints of sharp reddish - orange off the brown downy feathers of Madame Cardinal are eye-catching, and she seems sharply happy to be away from the nest for a while...a Saturday on the town! Starting out with a good munchy breakfast! And the watery red of the hummingbird sugar water is a pleasant counter-balance to the red in her feathers....I have this great front row seat!
Cyrano, the soft and beautiful dachshund of my heart, has his little head heavily resting on my foot! His sister Sally nestles between the leather cushions of this sofa, and if the three of us never had to go anywhere ever again, if we could never move from here, we three would be happy. I don't miss New York City at all today.
In fact, truth be known, I've not missed it at all...or if I have, it has been only for brief moments, when a sharp homesickness has made a stab at making me forget all the City's unpleasantness, dirt and noise! Soon, no matter how busy and exhausted we become here, I am soothed by the mere presences of the trees in our yard, or the garden in the back of the house. And i recall how walking out onto West End Avenue had become an unpleasant chore - And how descending into the 103rd Street Subway station has become an unavoidable horror. People are not supposed to live like that, crushed and inevitably soiled with the daily energies of a human hive....no, (and I don't care how many museums and arts events there are to be found there) people are not supposed to live like caged animals, and that is what it had begun to feel like to me: a cage.
So, as I sit here, in the pretty southern morning, I am glad not to be there. And the weeping cherry right outside the window makes me happy, as it seems to confirm of my presence in its silent, benign way.....
Time for waffles!
Friday, August 08, 2008
OMG! MID-AUGUST????
Where did it all go? Time? Summer? Leisure? Ouch!
The Virginia Highlands Festival is almost over, and I've yet to buy one single item!!! What's wrong with this picture???? Surely, Buddhism cannot be influencing me THAT much, with its notions of the physical world being so transitory that it hardly pays to give it meaning...more like: I packed far too much in order to get down here again, and the thought of buying one more item that I may have to pack again one day is too much for my exhausted spirit to contemplate! So: except for the obligatory kettle corn (still somehow better bought at this Festival than anywhere else), I've bought not a thing!
Sadly for me, many of the booths are the exact same ones that were here when we left several years ago, (I've bought all I can buy from them in years past) and the new ones are selling really expensive stuff, which is another way the Festival has changed: it is now for people with money! God Bless'em...if people can afford this artistic stuff, by all means let them have it to buy...I cannot...so, my pennies are going into the bank instead! The truly festive air the Festival brings Abingdon is wonderful! Long may it wave!
The Festival plays we 've been reading during this time have brought our really smart community together for several afternoons of readings and it is terrific to hear people talk so smartly and knowledgeably about what they are seeing...it also gives us all a chance to talk to each other in ways we don't usually have time to indulge in, and I have most particularly enjoyed talking with the J's...the lovely writer RW...(who encouraged me to continue blogging, as he has enjoyed reading it over the years...) A A (a terrific local poetess), and several others who I never get a chance to see or talk to...
I am glad for these smart smart people in this community!
I am tired. Peter's folks are here with their friends from Africa, and it is nice...today is their 40th wedding anniversary and we will celebrate as a family on Sunday at a large brunch! Again, nice.
This weariness will someday have to be reckoned with. Life is meant to feel better than this...and I yearn for the ocean to heal me....please, Ocean, be there when I need you one day! I yearn to smell your salt, and let your endless horizons float me like a feather to a far away place ....I know there is really no place to go , and that what I imagine is far better than what is, anywhere, but at least horizons allow you to imagine expansively into dreaming...beyond the horizon anything is possble...horizons hold nothing back, but only invite...i need to RSVP soon..
The Virginia Highlands Festival is almost over, and I've yet to buy one single item!!! What's wrong with this picture???? Surely, Buddhism cannot be influencing me THAT much, with its notions of the physical world being so transitory that it hardly pays to give it meaning...more like: I packed far too much in order to get down here again, and the thought of buying one more item that I may have to pack again one day is too much for my exhausted spirit to contemplate! So: except for the obligatory kettle corn (still somehow better bought at this Festival than anywhere else), I've bought not a thing!
Sadly for me, many of the booths are the exact same ones that were here when we left several years ago, (I've bought all I can buy from them in years past) and the new ones are selling really expensive stuff, which is another way the Festival has changed: it is now for people with money! God Bless'em...if people can afford this artistic stuff, by all means let them have it to buy...I cannot...so, my pennies are going into the bank instead! The truly festive air the Festival brings Abingdon is wonderful! Long may it wave!
The Festival plays we 've been reading during this time have brought our really smart community together for several afternoons of readings and it is terrific to hear people talk so smartly and knowledgeably about what they are seeing...it also gives us all a chance to talk to each other in ways we don't usually have time to indulge in, and I have most particularly enjoyed talking with the J's...the lovely writer RW...(who encouraged me to continue blogging, as he has enjoyed reading it over the years...) A A (a terrific local poetess), and several others who I never get a chance to see or talk to...
I am glad for these smart smart people in this community!
I am tired. Peter's folks are here with their friends from Africa, and it is nice...today is their 40th wedding anniversary and we will celebrate as a family on Sunday at a large brunch! Again, nice.
This weariness will someday have to be reckoned with. Life is meant to feel better than this...and I yearn for the ocean to heal me....please, Ocean, be there when I need you one day! I yearn to smell your salt, and let your endless horizons float me like a feather to a far away place ....I know there is really no place to go , and that what I imagine is far better than what is, anywhere, but at least horizons allow you to imagine expansively into dreaming...beyond the horizon anything is possble...horizons hold nothing back, but only invite...i need to RSVP soon..
