Because It's Not Easy

Saying what you mean and meaning what you say all the time. I worked on this for long hours that turned into days that turned into weeks that turned into, "have I spent so long on it now that it's disingenuous?" But it's not.

I shared some scraps of it with you guys, but here's the final incarnation. Well- one of the final incarnations. It was tweaked quite a bit for each individual school, and I'm willing to bet not a single program actually read it. Not even especially not the program I was accepted into, but I did enjoy writing it. And I think it's just a good exercise for artists to do. "Statement of Purpose" is probably the most intimidating name for it, but having to justify why you're doing what you're doing is hard. And like most hard things good for you (insert penis joke here. And another one for the word "insert". Why are prestigious programs not calling me back again?)

Please kindly respect that this is not an invitation for your editorial, or an exclamation of how pretentious or not pretentious enough I am. It's just me sharing some work.

Read at your own risk.

            I am an asset-filled, resourceful harbinger of my generational and personal heritage and history. I am the proud owner of a beautiful collection of many mistakes. Today I am a knitting teacher, performing, table-waiting, dishwashing, directing, paper pushing, traveling theater artist. I explore funny walks, interesting sounds, stitch patterns, puppetry, meal serving, Mexico and play constructing. I’ve made sweaters, pigtails, mittens and skins from yarn. I tinker with other devisors in an attempt to find universal truths, turning to classic texts for examples. My diverse background in making provides me with a rich tool set for theatrical creating.
            I strive to be equal parts detective and explorer. I am well versed in how to speak clearly onstage and how to love deeply, quickly and easily in life. I utilize a lexicon as effectively as I do my empathy. I have an equally deep desire to research and analyze as I do to be guided by immediate kinesthetic response. My work ethic is paralleled only by my demand for adventure and play. I continually mine and forage my fields for a perfect blend of unusual and classic, something as guttural as it is soothing. I think of a theater as a laboratory, my brain as a mad scientist and my body as a Bunsen burner. I have a voice that is strong, full and hungry for a venue, feedback and hoards of co-conspirators.
            I have torrid love affairs with stories. In listening to, learning from, telling and re-telling I attempt to consume stories while sharing them, to make them a part of me and my soon-to-be history. When telling stories, I indulge in collaboration with fellow artists, finding new meanings in old stereotypes and iconography, and blending the necessary technical with the unexpected and honest instinctual.  I explore cultural and personal heritage through story telling, recalling symbolic imagery and morphing it to serve specificity in story.
            I crave more tools as an artist. More modes and methods of communication with an audience and my co-creators, more instruments with which to devise and play. My current theatrical vocabulary allows me to tell interesting stories and is wrought with potential. I am a rule-following, limit-questioning wise-cracker who longs to break off chunks of the technical rules and gnaw at them until they’re mine again. I look forward to picking apart each rule, each “should” and “shouldn’t” to discover why it has earned its respect in the theatrical hierarchy and how they can best serve story, questioning each one as I follow it.

            I look forward to a future of meeting new artists, co-creators and audience members with contrasting and diverse backgrounds, to a future of learning new rules that are ripe for following, bending and breaking. I’m looking to a future of collaborating with like and different-minded people who are up to the task of planning the world take-over of story.

Free To A Good Home

Is the sign I'll be wearing around my neck at graduate school auditions next year. Don't get me wrong, I know I aimed high in my grad school application process. I know I was shooting for Ivy league and private schools with nary a legacy nor an interesting ethnicity to my name. Never mind that no one says, "Second time's the charm!"

At the end of the Pier during my visit auditioning in Chicago. It snowed 19 inches my first 12 hours there. It was wonderful.

So next year I'll attend the mass "college fair" style graduate school auditions, white flag in tow, CV thicker than a New York Times Bestseller, experience far beyond any recent undergrad, little investment in any of the programs there and some damn fine, well-polished monologues. Not to mention my charming personality (and hopefully by then I'll figure out a way to check my cynicism at the door).

In the mean time I'll continue to pick up 15 hours in an office, 35 in a restaurant, 25 in retail, rehearse 4 hours a night for a show, direct some amazingly talented and beautiful performers each weekend of the month and catch up with the contemporary play reading series for children. I'm fairly certain I've been talked into teaching this summer again too. I have a feeling all of that will keep my mind off how much more disappointed my mother is than I am that I didn't get into grad school AGAIN.

Do you guys remember 1982? When my mom and dad get approached by graduate programs before they even finished undergrad and offered a bunch of money to pursue their education instead of jumping straight into one of the very plentiful and very profitable professional sectors of their field? Remember that? An remember how right now, in 2015 is exactly like how it was then, with all sorts of well paying jobs and tons of educational opportunities? Remember how all that's totally true?

Yeah. Me either.

So tell your friends in academia. I'm sick of being overlooked. Imma 'bout to blow some minds next year. With my killer grammar skillz and spelling and connection to youth culture. All the programs be like, "Damn gurl, where you been all our two years with your broad spectrum of professional and educational experience and clear communication skillz?" An' I be like, "Ask Yale." Because as I was told while visiting to audition for them (not BY them, to be clear), "White girls don't get into Yale."

As promised: Me eating my most recent rejection letter. Sweet, sweet, delicious rejection. I just can't get enough of you.

Now. To be fair. If you look closely at that letter (I have blurred out the name of the school because I have a lot of respect for the program and don't want anyone to get the wrong idea that I'm bad-mouthing them or "mad" at them some how...) you'll not that I was a finalist for their program, which accepts 7 students out of the roughly 800 that audition. They were very kind. One of only two schools that I really still wanted to go to after I auditioned with them.

Also to be fair: I did get accepted into a program. Initially I was called back and had such a weird, backwards, uncomfortable experience sitting in on classes and talking with faculty and staff and while the performances I saw were lovely- I've been doing that level of performance, even producing that level since I graduated from my undergrad program. They were very kind to offer me a spot in their MFA program. They have no opportunity for financial aid. I wasn't into it. Thank goodness I know myself at least that well.

Snapped this while I was chillin' with the Ewoks on my visit to a school that actually liked me.

I love my life. I love the work that I get to do. The stuff that's directly connected to theater and the stuff that's not and the stuff that falls somewhere in between. I work in a restaurant with people I would never meet otherwise. I work at a yarn shop with people I would never get to meet otherwise AND I get to teach people a skill, or save the day on their project or help them welcome their first or seventh great-grandchild with cozy goodness. I get to direct a variety show that I'm fairly certain saves my life every time I see them. And every time I elbow my way into a circumstance, somehow, someway, people ask me to stay.

So watch out graduate programs. The elbows are out next time.

...And nearly a year later...

I will spare you any reasons that it's been eleven months since I've mentioned anything via blog. I disappeared from a lot of things and didn't give anyone else explanations, so posting one here hardly seems fair.

All that nonsense aside: I'm applying for graduate schools again this year. Because one year of rejections simply wasn't enough. I want more. MORE I TELL YOU. I HAVE REJECTION HUNGER! (I really wish I could post a photo of me eating one of my rejection letters from last year, but alas, they're in storage). I've been in the process of gathering thoughts for my statement of purpose (which is coming along nicely, but messily). Last years SoP was, well, boring, for lack of a better term. I've been carrying around a notebook with me for the past few months and jotting down thoughts about my work as a theater human while I'm in a plane, having dinner, knitting, at concerts, getting too drunk at bars and turning the conversation too serious with my friends and winding up in tears because alcohol and feelings are AWESOME. So suffice it to say, some of them are ridiculous. Let the sharing begin. And if some of these stand out to you as particularly awesome or particularly dreadful, please feel free to share, just keep it classy, people, okay? And if you really want to ridicule me for your personal opinions on my personal business just send me a personal e-mail like every other self-respecting human does when they want to tactfully ridicule people on personal stuff. Right. So here:

Story-telling is important to me.

Learning bravery and brevity

causing a story

necessary narrative

equal parts detective and explorer

I am the proud owner of many mistakes

Technicalities as second nature

Breaking off the technical and gnawing at it until it's mine again

creationism means something different to me.

consuming story

consummating story

world takeover of story

if theater is a lab- labs are designed for experiments conducted under a set of guidelines.

my brain is the mad scientist and my body's the Bunsen Burner.

Eating a story

I have a theory that space is time's hot sister

The work I do is physical and meditated and meditative and spontaneous and wise and cracking wise and mundanely legendary.

The work I do is rich in texture, iconography, stereotype, language of movement and culture.


I crave more modes and methods of communication

I am well versed in how to speak properly onstage and how to love deeply, quickly and easily in life. I utilize a lexicon as effectively as I do my empathy. My work ethic is paralleled only by my desire for adventure and play. I have a voice that is strong, full and hungry for a venue, feedback and hoards of co-conspirators.

Creating an environment in which we allow story to happen


So yeah. That's what I've been up to... Gets pretty hippy-dippy sounding pretty quickly, doesn't it? And yes, I am working on patenting "Mundanely legendary" because that pretty much describes most things in my life- and for a girl whose blog title is "over-underwhelmed" can you really be surprised at that?


See you in about a year, I guess.

My Mother Confused Me: Part 1

I remember the a time when my parents were happy. I remember the "hmms" of approval over their morning coffee. I remember Doonesbury seeming oddly optimistic, even in while playfully ribbing the Nation's current state and the latest presidential address. Ladies and gentlemen: I remember the Clinton administration.

And yes, I remember the scandal. Oh sweet delicious, sizzling, scandal. What good American doesn't love a delightfully, tasty, full-of-gory-details scandal, right?

Now, I was young when the shit really hit the fan for President Clinton. Not quite a teenager, but there was no pulling punches in my household when it came to talking about sex. I don't actually remember a time when I didn't know what sex was or where babies came from because whether or not my sister and I wanted to know, my mom was a little too happy to tell us all about... well... most everything.

Seriously. In the nineties? You don't get much cooler than tenor sax and Ray Bans.

The Clinton scandal was particularly memorable for me because of my parents reactions. They loved Bill. There wasn't much not to love, as Monica Lewinsky demonstrated for the Nation. Sweet saxophone playing, foreign relations-whiz, charismatic speaker, solid hand gesture-er, general super-cool-guy-president that he was. My mother often scoffed and rolled her eyes at the news reports on the matter (a rarity, because I also remember when my mother loved watching CNN with Peter Jennings, may he rest in peace). One day not too long after the scandal broke my mother looked me dead in the eyes and said, "Honey, listen to me and remember this," she said with a tone of hearty importance with her hands on my shoulders, "It is nobodies business who anyone sleeps with. I don't care if it's your neighbor or the President of the United States of America. It's nobodies business except for the two people sleeping together. But this:" She gestured to the newspaper on the breakfast table, "Is none of our business."

I took a great deal of comfort in that fact, and I have no idea why. It wouldn't even become applicable to me for well over another seven years, and even then I pretty much wanted everyone to know I was gettin' some. I think the general principle behind the sentiment was something I related to on a core level though. Man, woman, transgender, cheater, faithful, chronic masturbater, it simply has no effect on the work that person does in a professional setting, and honestly has very little to do with what they do in a social setting. It's private. People's sex lives are nobodies business*.


But you all probably know that that's not true.

"Young lady, people be gettin' busy and it's no one's business."

Now as it turns out there were a bunch of crazy undertones to this well-developed manta of my mother's (her second favorite I heard often as a child was, "No one knows what happens behind closed doors." Are we seeing a theme here...?). Had I had my wits about me I probably would have started putting things together as she stuck by these phrases nearly religiously. But come on, I was eleven, get off my back. The bottom line, ladies and gentlemen, is this:

It is every one's business with whom everyone is sleeping.

Yeah. I made that shit poetical. You're welcome.

Here's the thing: Should it be no one's business? Yeah, I think so. Maybe? Probably. I have no idea honestly. But the stupid truth is everyone wants to know. And while I personally am not one to nose around these situations, I'm certainly not going to stop someone from telling me all about whose sleeping with whom (I'm also not quick to believe it or give any of the shits about it...). I'm about 9 months into being single for the first time in my adult life and realizing that I'm actually an extremely private person. Don't misunderstand me here, because I'm a far cry from shy, just very private about my own god dammed life because it's mine and it's full of my awesome choices and I choose to be a little particular regarding what I share with whom. This extends to everything I do, my family issues, my financial issues, my plans for the future, my personal quarrels with people. I'm rarely the first to jump up for show n' tell.

All the photos regarding whispering in the search I did featured women. I find that slightly insulting and largely inaccurate. Okay, somewhat inaccurate.

Regardless of what things should be and what's "right" in any given situation I've found it to never be that simple. Or easy. Or fun. It's just a giant mess, because that's kind of what being a human being is. A giant (wonderful) mess. We're all just slightly different and play by a slightly different rule book and we all have different boundaries about which we're constantly educating each other.

So, should it be any one's business with whom you're sleeping? I doubt it, but I'm sure we'd all like to know.

*Unless of course someone is getting hurt or anything is happening against any one's will. Obviously. Or you're a sex addict. I guess that's a thing.

Facebook. The Creature Itself.

I recently had a pretty big life event occur, so of course, Facebook was the first to be informed.

This turned out to be fairly wise, as many major life decisions can be difficult to spread to everyone immediately and depending on their nature can be down right awkward to discuss. That's not to say that awkwardness was entirely avoided. Thankfully not everyone is consistently glued to their Facebook and actually still need direct human interaction to be educated about the current state of their friends' lives.

For the most part, I was pretty grateful that Facebook was there to aide me and my now ex in a transition that was already quite difficult and extremely long. It meant we didn't have to discuss it with a huge amount of people and were able to keep professional things professional and friendly things friendly, which was exactly what we needed.

What I didn't expect, and what was pretty unsettling was Facebook's reaction. I'm not talking about my personal Facebook community, I mean Facebook, the creature itself. It was no shorter than my very next log-in session after my relationship status had been altered that I noticed my advertisements for Netflix and life insurance had been changed, without any sort of finesse whatsoever, I might add, to available singles web sites.

Really, Facebook? I understand that you're an intelligent series of algorithms that is wired to cater to me and figure out my specific demographic based on what I like and ignore and what precious little information I choose to share with my community (like the status of my current romantic relationship), but by that you should also very well know that I had been in that relationship, unchanged since I first began my account with you in 2008 (and in reality, the relationship actually began long before that) and you're already hitting me with internet dating sites? Jesus, Facebook, have some Goddamn class. Even (mostly) every dude I know laid off the creep factor for a very respectable amount of time. But not Facebook. Facebook has no shame.

While the singles ads have been unsettling (and quite persistent) what's been more disturbing to me is the rapid increase in weight loss tips and weight loss drug advertisements. I should hope most of us now know that it's not just Facebook that can figure out who we are and what we want out of life (or what they would like us to want, more accurately), but it's the whole internet. But that's a rant post for another time...

This weight loss business concerned me for a variety of reasons. Having never really been a single adult before, I'm still figuring out how all of this works. Do all single women want to lose weight? Do all men want single women to lose weight? Am I now deemed more vulnerable to the weight loss ploys because I don't have a boyfriend to constantly tell me how rockin' my bod is? Is self-esteem and confidence assumed to only come from one's significant other? Where are the ads that promise me a bigger butt? Why do they all refer to "One weird old tip"? And why is belly fat the root of all evil everywhere? I have so many questions!

I suppose this all came to me as a surprise mostly because I was filled with a myriad of concerns when my life changed drastically. There was a huge priority shift in most aspects of my life. Weight loss was not one of them. Housing. Friendships. Moving. Second guessing decisions. Judgement. Family. Paying Bills. Moving. Division of shit. Moving. Thirty day notices. Heart Break. Moving.

The last thing on my mind was how much I weighed, or which single men were available to me online. In fact it's pretty rare that women with countable ribs or men who post selfies make me swoon for any reason. My theory is that Facebook casts a wide net though, because they did hit one thing pretty right on.

Shoe ads.

Well played, Facebook creature. Well played.

Body For LIFE!

Disclaimer: Any dude or dude-minded (such as myself) readers may find this post tedious and a little mushy at times. The only comfort I can give you to urge you to continue reading is that this post does contain many mentions of all sorts of body parts, mostly female, because that's the kind of body I have, so I feel like I know more about it.

This post is NOT about the book that shares it's title, which my Uncle bought my Mom (who was quite insulted) for Christmas one year. It's kind of a P90X lite. In other words; it's slightly less ridiculous than P90X, which is probably one of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard of. The only people who should dedicate their lives solely to working out three hours a day and planning meals down to a half a calorie are body builders, and maybe models, but I have a feeling their jobs have little to do with what the general population considers as "health".

The inspiration for this post came from a conversation I had with my parents after I may have had a little too much to drink: meaning the Mom sensor was turned off. My parents were kind enough to drive me to a Christmas party after I had a show one night (in truth, it was a pornament party- you know, a party where you bring a stack of porn and a bunch of ornaments and make pornaments, naturally). But I really didn't want to take a cab, so I kept my wits about me enough to not mention the true nature of the party to my parents.

In any case I was in the car and something like this ensued:

Mom: How's directing for Red Light Variety Show going?

Me: Great! I think. B (We'll just call her B for this purpose, because she has a bodacious booty) has a couple pieces in the show, which I'm stoked about because she's amazingly talented and has a booty for miles. It's amazing.

Dad chuckles, Mom is quiet for a moment

Mom: (In accusatory tone that only Moms can use without really realizing it) Do you think B would approve of how you're talking about her butt right now?


Me: Um. Yeah, she'd be flattered! She has an amazingly large and incredible butt, she should be proud, and is. She'd be more offended if I didn't talk about her butt.

Now, aside from this not really being typical Mom conversation (which, if you heard any given snippet of any of my Mother's other conversations, this is actually fairly tame) I was actually a little shocked. Mostly because I had clearly made my Mother slightly uncomfortable by blatantly discussing a body part, which never happens. My Mother likes to bring up the nature of erections at my Catholic-side-of-the-family reunions.

So I'm trying to figure out if this is a generational thing or if it's a demographic thing. I was simply discussing the nature of a particular booty. Fairly objectively (as you may know, this is not atypical for me).

For my research, I present to you: Life experience: This past summer I was teaching Jr. High School students (that may terrify you, if all you have to go on my personality is this blog, but take solace in the fact that it's theater summer camp). As we were warming up one day I was giving my usual, "Reach down to your toes, if you can touch them, great, if you can't, be grateful of your great long legs this morning and know that your body and what it's capable of will change every day. This is your report card. I have short little stubby legs so I can usually touch the floor." And a sweet, sweet (albeit, incredibly strange) young lady looked at me and said, "NO! Your legs are beautiful!" Very sweet, right? But I never said my legs weren't beautiful. And who ever told that little girl that short and stubby couldn't be beautiful? My legs kick ass. I can walk for miles and not get tired, I can get going fairly fast on my 70's cruiser, and the ESMP seems to like them just fine, never mind that short legs means I've got a torso for miles (again, some people may consider that "not beautiful" but they should check out my rib isolations. It's fascinating).

My problem is this: Talking about one's body objectively often brings in consoling and a soothing tone of voice that is something along the lines of, "No, no... you're a very pretty young woman." Well I FUCKING KNOW THAT! I never said otherwise! B was relating a story to me in which she was talking to a friend about how she couldn't wear a particular brand of pant because, "Well, I just have a lot more down there than you do." and her friend responded with, "Oh... no! B, you're beautiful." It's a non-sequitor. They were discussing pant brands NOT beauty.

All and all, I'm pretty sure this is a demographic thing. I'm fascinated by human bodies. It's absolutely amazing to me, that (generally speaking) you get to chose from two types of bodies: Lady part body or dude part body. So really, I have the same body as every other lady part body BUT I DON'T! Not even a little. I like it when you find "part twins". I know a couple girls who have matching noses, a couple dudes that have matching brow-bones, but everything else about them is entirely different.

In short: Biology is awesome. Bodies are awesome. But the real kicker for me lately has been figuring out what this body is capable of on a daily basis. Don't get me wrong, I won't be climbing Mt. Everest anytime soon (I like my body, why would I do that to it?), but I try to do one thing a day that I'm not entirely sure my body is capable of, just to see if I'm surprised. Like standing and going into a back bend. Sometimes I can, sometimes I can't, it hasn't looked graceful once yet, but it sure is fun to try. Call it six impossible things before breakfast, or whatever you want.

A Good Year

Around the end of December I start seeing Facebook posts pop up that say things like, "Fuck you 2012! I can't wait for you to be out of my life." Or, "Good Riddance to this year!" I understand, I suppose, it's part of welcoming the New Year in: shunning the previous one. Not only that but acknowledging that we are looking forward to the possibilities of a fresh start and noting all the things, places and people we left or were taken in the year before.

I have to be honest though. I had a pretty killer 2012. It's not the first year that my income produced from theater work (to be clear, that's not JUST acting. A majority of that is teaching) outweigh my "other random stuff" income, but this year it tipped the scales pretty heavily.

I thought I'd take a moment and reflect upon the huge variety of projects, shows and performances I was lucky enough to be a part of this year.

January-April: I toured some Shakespeare for high school students all over the state. I've mentioned the content of awesome of which this tour is filled, and this year was no different. We toured Macbeth, terrifying and inspiring children all over the state, bringing Shakespeare to people who wouldn't have an opportunity to see it otherwise.

Sadly, my computer crashed shortly after the tour ended, so I have very few photos from this tour (we took upwards of 1000).

April: Me and My Shadow. This show was unlike anything I'd ever done and it was pretty terrifying. Written by a good friend of mine with whom I went to college, working with many of the tour cast, plus some other favorite colleagues from college, designed by good friends and performed in a space that I'm slowly starting to realize is becoming my home as a performer, this show was for an improvisational experimental music festival. We had a nine piece band that underscored much of the production, live projection VJs, and a whole lotta weird. So glad I had the experience.

Also worth noting: Stage handing for Red Light Variety Show. More on that later.

I feel like photos like this is generally why people thing performers are weird. They're right.

May and June: I began rehearsals for my first main stage show at a company I've been working for since I graduated college in 2009 and have been wanting to work for since I saw one of their show for the first time in 2000. Pretty rad. Oh, and teaching. LOTS of teaching.

You can't quite see it, but my hair looks amazing in this shot.

July: TEACHING. SO. MUCH. TEACHING. I taught 3-5 year-olds Shakespeare for the first time. So that was... Well, it was. Also. A play reading at the end of the month for the show I ultimately directed in September.

August: MORE TEACHING. And another reading. This one written by three good friends of mine based upon the Lewis Carol poem; Jabberwockey. We had a fantastic turn out, great response and a really wonderful time.

Post show discussion. Sadly, you cannot see how sweaty we all are. We turned off the AC for the reading.

September: Rehearsals began for The Basement Company. A show that a previous roommate and friend wrote as a one act dark comedy. This show was really important to me, largely because it made me realize what incredibly talented, kind and generous people make up my co-workers and friends. So many people went pretty far out of their way to help me on this project, with very little gain for themselves, and I will be eternally grateful to all of them.

Again, worth noting: Another stage hand gig for Red Light.

October: You guys. I can't for the life of me remember this month. And I have no record of it. WHAT HAPPENED?!?

November: A really ridiculous and ambitious notion that I would write one blog post per day of this month that failed pretty miserably. You are welcome. Also, a surprise offer of performing in Breadcrumbs, with Alley Rep. Another really wonderful experience. The smallest cast I've been apart of and some really interesting text.

December: I began "directing" for Red Light Variety Show. The quotations are there because Red Light is my first experience directing something that doesn't have a script. And that's weird. It was certainly a learning curve, but a really enjoyable one. I mean, it's a bunch of people taking off their cloths in funny, sexy and talented ways, how could that not be anything less that fun?

Red Light is pretty near and dear to my little always-clothed heart. I have a lot of respect for the ladies (and gentlemen) that perform with them. The range of body types they exhibit, the confidence they have and the courage to honor the burlesque tradition is just inspiring. They all have normal bodies, that are all completely different, and all completely beautiful, and they know it, which makes them the sexiest theater group in town, for sure.

So. That was last year. Thanks 2012. Well hi there, 2013.