This Old House

Tonight my key got stuck in my front door when I came home. I called the horribly mean maintenance people three times in two hours to try to get it fixed and these are the responses I got (no joke).

1. The first woman asked for my name, phone number and address and said that she would call me back in 20 minutes after she tried to call the super of the building. She, of course, never called me back.

1.5 I called and someone hung up on me, so that doesn't count.

2. Another woman asked for my name, phone number and address and told me that it wasn't their problem and that anything to do with the front door was my problem, "so call a locksmith."

3. The third woman, and the most glorious, told me that their company no longer owned the building, that she didn't know who owned it now and that I would have to figure out who owned it and call them with the problem.

So I got a big bowl of ice cream.

Of course after about a half hour of struggling, the key slipped easily out in my hand while I was fiddling with it on while on the phone. Awesome.

All My Jobs

So far in New York I have organized children's books, been coat check boy at a private gallery, file organizer for an ancient man, managed a group of ex-cons working as carpenters in the Bronx, assembled a giant (and I mean massive) wall for a fashion show, receptionist at Leman's, French tutor for a crazy rich kid on the upper East side, cleaned house for a gay orthodox Jew, danced around in a Lion costume for thousands of 3-5 yr olds, script reader, private bartender for a French family (which was almost a disaster seeing as I know next to nothing about mixing drinks, thank heaven for text messaging friends who can google things for me on the spot) reviewed plays for the Innovative Theatre Awards and soon I'm going to be an apartment painter.

I don't know what I would do without variety.

Jump cleaning

When I was about 7 and my older brother 9, we invented our own bartering system. I'm fairly certain that it was he who actually came up with the system and I just went along with it, but it was there none the less. We each chose what the most important thing we wanted from the other person was and then traded them. Billy, my brother, had a very simple system. What he like was cleaning. He liked having the house in perfect order, counters scrubbed, dishes done, carpet vacuumed so that the lines were perfectly perpendicular. There was actually a rule in my house about how many times he was allowed to vacuum, but I digress. I'm not exactly sure I knew what I wanted because my currency was a little more complicated. The smallest was the "jump." That required my brother to go outside and jump on the trampoline with me for 15 minutes. A "jump" was 1/4 of a "clean," which usually involved an hour of cleaning. In general, a "play" was equal to a "clean," both taking up an hour. So four "jumps" are a "clean" which is equal to a "play." Then there was also a "performance" which was 2 "cleans." The "performance" was only used a few times because 2 "cleans" was enough to kill me at 7 years old. I hated cleaning with all my heart and soul. However, when the "performance" card was pulled, it was well worth the several hours of activity. First we, as a creative team, would choose the piece to be performed. It always involved the tapes of our favorite shows like The Little Mermaid, Meet me in St. Louis, Beauty and the Beast ect... Wow, if my parents didn't figure it out then. After we'd chosen, we'd run around the house getting set pieces (like the dining room chairs to make the trolley car or the fountain in the living room for the town square), costumes (mostly table cloths of different colors to wrap around our heads to make hair or the one costume I had growing up which lasted several years of halloween as a bear then a groundhog then finally a skunk) and props (stuffed animals, something for mics.) We would always rehearse and perform in my parents bedroom because it was dark and painted in deep reds and greens and held all the most elaborate and expensive furniture in the house. The audience (my parents and sometimes a family pet) would sit on the couch against the wall and we would perform in the space between the couch and the bed. We were incredible. Our production of the highlights of The Little Mermaid brought down the house. I was of course Ariel, because I was smaller and more squirely to handle the costume change when I got my legs, and Billy played the sea witch. When we did the Trolley Song from Meet Me in St Louise, Bily was the Judy Garland role and I played all the other people on the trolley. I had at least five quick changes. No wonder we didn't really get along with the other kids on our block.

This system of currency is a cute concept if it had only lasted for a few years in elementary school. But it actually lasted well into our teens. We kept a mental talley of how many cleans, jumps and plays we had. The names became ineffectual for discribing what we used them for. For instance, I got a screaming deal one day when Billy was really bored and wanted to play Gin, a game my grandfather taught us as soon as we could hold cards. I got three jumps out of it. It was the best day. Or when I wanted to hang out with my brother and his friends, it cost me a whole play.

Sometimes I think life would be a lot more simple if we used the currency we chose. Don't think about the nightmare of who would decide how much everything was worth, or those people that would choose strange sexual acts as their currency of choice. But really, isn't that the idea of a utopian society. A group of people having and sharing. Its not? Well, isn't it a nice thought anyway?

Some journal

I am a journal writing maniac. Maybe its my Mormon upbringing, reminding me to write in my journal to teach future generations. Maybe its that my mother is a columist and because I grew up reading what was essentially her journal in the newspaper every week, I was instilled with the understanding that writing is a good way to express yourself. Or maybe its just that my biggest fear in the universe is forgetting and so this is the way that I try to keep things remembered.

So there they are on a shelf in my bedroom, all these little pieces of me. Every year I tell myself that I'm going to read them all once a year, just to peruse my life. And every year they collect more dust, completely unread. I think I'm scared to read them. I'm worried that it will be like looking through your Junior High School year book. You want to look back and laugh at all the awkward things, like your hair and the clubs you were in. But then you crack the binding only to find that your hair looked awful, you were far more awkward than you remembered and you were on the Chess team. (Don't make fun.)

Plus, I'm completely and discusting honest in my journals. I won't let my closest friends read them. At some point I'm bound to have been angry at them or have done something that would have made them angry, and there's a good chance they'd find it in my journal. I'm not saying that I use my journal stricting for confessions. Heaven knows how tedious and long winded that would be.

When it comes to blogging, sometimes I have trouble knowing when to draw the line. I want it to be interesting, but I don't even read my own journals! How can I expect someone to want to read my blog? And it isn't the type of blog with cute little photos showing what an amazing amateur photographer I am, its not wraught with spicy anonymous confessions, and so far has not included a single amazing recipes that I just have to shout to the world. But maybe thats not what its for.

So anyway, I wanted to include some sections from my journal the past few weeks as a blog entry.

1/30/08
I got a call back on Friday and by Monday they wanted me to have learned the three songs they were emailing me. I got sick the next day. So I pretty much lost Saturday and Sunday to a drug induced Dayquil stupor. I did, however, get mostly over my cold and sore throat in two days which never happens to me. I'm usually tanked with illness for a week. So I didn't spend as much time as I could have learning the songs. Plus I'm always nervous with new material. I've been listeneing to the recordings of the songs they sent me non-stop since Sunday night. So basically I spent three and a half days entirely devoted to this callback. I walked into the room and was already pretty freaked out. After the first two songs, where I could hardly remember the words, I was done. 3.5 days for 6 minutes. The problem was that I really wanted this job. I wanted it far too much. I knew that I had a lot of work to do, but I focused on it so much that in my mind it was built up way too high. I prayed a ton about this audition. That I would be able to do my best and that if it were right, then I would get it. Do I think what happened was what was supposed to happen? I'm not quite sure. The rejection isn't what bothers me, its how much I hate it when I don't do my best.

2/1/08
We went to dinner with Nathan and Luke at this Peruvian restaurant in our neighborhood tonight. They have lived in Sunnyside for over two years, but have failed to ever come to this place because it looks like the kind of place where we might be racially profiled. And I'm pretty sure we were. I've narrowed it down to two possibilities: they either thought we were health inspectors or writing a travel book. I think every single waitress in the place asked us how we enjoyed our meal at least twice. Then the chef and owner came out.

2/2/08
Well, I finally got a good spot in the audition line. That involved being at the Equity building at 7:10 am before they opened the building. I took yesterday off to get over my discouragement. Its all ups and downs with me. With acting in general. You can only take it every day for so long and then you have to step back to get some perspective. Not unlike a prostitute I assume.

We went to the Chinese New Year's Spectacular at Radio City. It was like a three hour dance recital for a Chinese dance school. But as I was watching the chorus of dancers, I realized how much I love performing! I would love to be the fifth guy in the back carrying that spear. I keep getting called back for leads that I'm just not quite right for. Too young, too old, too tall, not enough of a tenor...so I must be right for an ensemble somewhere, right? I have three more callbacks this week, so I guess we'll see.

2/5/08
Tonight I'm going with my friend Seth, who was on foreign exchange in France at the same time I was, to some fashion week events. I think I need to go home and cut my hair so I look a little more cleaned up and put together. But then I get worried that I'll end up like that girl who cuts her hair the day of prom and then has photos of her terrifying, unfixable hair for the rest of her life.

Advice

Advice is a very funny thing. Sometimes I feel like I get so much advice that my head is going to explode. My big problem is that I'm so scared of letting people down that I want to follow all the advice that is given to me. Do you know how hard that is to do?
It should be a simple task, 1. Get advice 2. Take advice 3. Be wildly successful!
But many times it just doesn't seem to end up that way.

One common reason may be that people who give advice give it from a very personal place. They take a sample of their life and tell you what they have learned. But you're not them. You're life will not work out in the exact same way. So why take advice at all? And how can you let someone down by taking their very personal advice and saying "Wow, well that really didnt work for you. I don't want my life to end up anything like yours so I'll just do something else."

And then there's the problem of multiple and overlapping advice. If you were ever in college then I hope you know what I mean. If you dont know, then you might want to whip out those old notes and look at everything that was told to you. I'm not trying to challenge the concept of teaching, nor am I saying its a bad thing. However, when two different teachers have two different visions of what you're life should be, it can be a hard thing to translate what you want. You're working hard, trying to do what is right according to someone, and BAM! someone else tells you something entirely opposite!

When I get overloaded with suggestion, I tend to get tired and a little agitated and want to do something wild and crazy in response to everyone's advice like move to Russia. Or France. Or China. Or something.

I guess what I'm trying to say I've learned is that the best teachers know they dont have the answers. Those are the people that I try to cling to. I love when a person can just say, "huh, I don't know." In theatre that can be a very rare thing. Maybe thats why I'm so drawn to it. I would so much rather figure something out with someone. Even if its something they already know, like in the teacher student scenario, I would rather take their knowledge and put it with yours to create a greater knowledge and understanding for both parties.

So in that light, nothing in this blog is supposed to teach you anything. Heaven forbid someone learn something from me. I should be the "what-not-to-do" advice. Its like that excerise show that was always on in the 80s. You know, there were three little discs of different heights with people working out on them. They were supposed to be High, Medium and Low intensity, but by the time it got to the Low it just looked like something completely different. Well while the High and Medium are doing some sort of jumping jacks, I'm the one knitting. And thats ok with me.

I came, I saw, I felt uncomfortable

I adjudicated a show for the Innovative Theatre Awards on Sunday night in the West Village. It was my first time at an Off-Off Broadway theatre. Now, I know what you're saying to yourself "Isn't Off-Off Broadway just a platform for mediocre actors to perform in something that has Broadway in the title?"

Yes. Yes it is.

Now, I wrote the book on the importance of theatre that doesn't have to rely on ticket sales so that it can express itself freely without consequence. Well, actually it was a paper. I understand its importance and I totally support it. But by supporting it I can say that sometimes its really awful. But I always love going to it.

This performance, called Archipelago, was a nice cross section of the awful and awesome. It was a collection of short plays, many of them new and most of them absurd in some way. They even paid tribute to Mr. Absurdist Drama himself, Samuel Beckett, by putting up a particularly dreadful version of Act Without Words I. It was truly the lowlight of the evening.

Because each piece was only a few minutes long, the concept of each mini-play was all you ever really had time to develop an opinion of. One play that I really enjoyed was about an artist who had closed herself into four large walls made of canvas strapped with eleven sticks of dynamite. She was waiting for something to detonate the explosives and splatter her all over the canvases, and thereby create four very unique works of art. She spend the entire play on her cell phone talking to people about fairly normal things like problems with her boyfriend and soup and how she hoped that when she did in fact splatter, that some of the color would come out orange.

Another was about a guy who had just jumped off a building. The whole play was what was ran through his head after he jumped and before he hit the ground. The actor was strapped with some bungee and was slightly hanging out over the audience. In concept it was good, but it didn't really go anywhere after that unfortunately.

The last that really got me was a housewife obsessed with cleaning glass. She talked about all the birds she had accidentally killed by keeping her windows and sliding glass doors so clean. Then one day, after a particularly rigorous buffing, her son ran full speed into the sliding door he thought was open and died. Fantastic actress and just disturbing enough.

The last piece I couldn't tell you much about. All I know is that one of the actors came out and started talking and then started taking off his clothes. When he got down to his skivies, he stuck his hand down and pulled out little plastic flowers which he then threw at the audience. Between begging him in my head to keep his clothes on and then dodging the crotch flowers, it was altogether too distracting.

So I'm looking forward to continuing to judge these shows as they are sure to provide me with ample entertainment.

What did I just do?

Today is an appropriate day to write because we've been living in New York for one week today! Jeff and I packed up our lives into our moving truck and said goodbye to Utah. We had brunch with my parents at Sundance on our way out of town and headed up the canyon and to far, far away.

We drove up the mountains and across the square states. It was a pretty crazy drive in the big moving and truck and the gas was stupid expensive, not to mention the fact that the truck only got 10 miles to the gallon. Luckily, my dad, adorable man that he is, tucked some cash into my hand on my way out the door which greatly offset the gas costs. I left my parents a card on their bed and closed the door behind me. Someday I genuinely hope to be able to be as generous to someone as they have been to me. They really have no idea that I would never have been able to do the things I've been able to in my life without their help.

We stopped for our first night in Wyoming. Billy played our operator for a while and searched out a cheap place to stay. We stopped at a Walmart in Laramie and prayed that people were just getting into the Halloween holiday spirit with what they were wearing and the way they were acting. For a Sunday night, Walmart was the place to be in Laramie. It was hoppin'. We bought some groceries and had to sneak them back to the service counter in the electronics to avoid a half hour wait in line. The motel we stayed at was literally underneath a railroad track. We weren't really bothered though because we were completely exhausted.

After and insanely long second day, we stopped our second night in Nauvoo, Illinois, my old stomping ground. We spent the whole next day sight seeing. I dragged Jeff to all the sights I used to give tours in, some of which I hadn't been in since I had given tours. It wasn't weird, as I thought it might be. I have such a strong connection with that place that it just felt homey to me. I told him all the stories and filled him in on all the myths and historical gossip. I give a pretty mean tour of Nauvoo, and I say a hell of a lot more than the missionaries are allowed to. Wow, I'm kind of a geek.

So, once we were finished making rope and learning how to mold a boot, we hit the road again in the early afternoon. I was ready to put some heavy time behind the wheel, so I dug into driving. We figured if we drove all night we could make it to New York by the next day around mid-day. 4 energy drinks, 3 boxes of Junior Mints and several movies later we had gotten half way through Pennsylvania and Jeff took over. He drove us through New Jersey and across the George Washington Bridge into our new home just before noon.

We navigated the moving truck nervously through the tiny streets and to our mini-storage location and for some reason at that point I started feeling a little down. Up to that point it hadn't really hit me. People said that to me a lot before I left, that it wouldn't hit me for a while. What wouldn't hit me? It made me think of getting hit by a bus, but thats a surprise sort of getting hit. This was like standing right in front of a speeding bus and staring it down. You wait for it to hit you. In my case I didn't know it was a bus. I had no idea it would feel like that. All I could think was "What did we just do?" And it wasn't in the laughing, exciting sort of way, but in the negative, scared, 'lets turn the truck around and drive back' sort of way.

Our storage unit proved to be tiny. Way too tiny for the mountain of stuff in our truck. Half way through the process of unloading, we had to rent out a second space. At that point we had spent 1/3 of what our sublet cost on storage. We jammed those suckers full. There is NO space left in room 2-9-9 or 4-14-29. We to literally throw boxes over our head to stack them up high enough to make things fit. I have no idea how we're going to get it out, but I don't even want to imagine right now.

Walking around the storage facility is kind of like a combination of Gringott's from Harry Potter, a locker room and The Matrix, but in a really bad neighborhood. You rent out rooms, which are essentially 4x5x10 lockers, made from the same sort of metal and with the same door slide to open them. Its a huge maze of rooms with hallways that stop and start, leading you through complex passages until you find your space. I'm sure people lived in some of them.

It seems like so long since we left all our stuff there that for all I know the place could have been swallowed up by now.

After that we made our way to our sublet. We parked in front of a fire hydrant on our little street just as evening was approaching. It being Halloween, all the 'little spooks' as my dad would say, were out pounding the pavement for a sugar high. Our neighborhood is really cute. Lots of little families with their dogs all out walking. Even the homeless guy that took up residence on our stoop was giving out something. There's a quick lesson about checking your kids candy after they get home.

It took another 2 or 3 hours to move all our stuff out of the truck to the curb, then onto our stoop, then inside the doors up 2 flights of stairs, then up 4 more flights to our apartment. The physical strain of having no sleep, loading the storage units, and having not eaten yet that day were wearing me thin really quickly. Luckily, by the blessed virtues of heaven (and I think the fact that I made Jeff pull over and see this creepy but huge shrine to Mary off the side of the road in Nebraska might have had something to do with it) our friend Beverley showed up to help. She was all dolled up and in 3 inch heels, but like any good New Yorker, she helped carry our heavy boxes all the way up to our apartment. She's incredible.

Our sublet is pretty bad. Each room is themed. Do I need to say more?

We got out boxes inside, drank some water and then had to go and move our truck. So there we were, driving around Manhattan looking for a gas station and it hit me again. What did we just do?

After we dropped the truck off we took Beverley to dinner at some great and greasy pizza place. Jeff and I packed ourselves with tomatoe and mozerella in the form of two huge pieces of pizza and a calzone. Then we dragged our sorry butts back up to Washington Heights on the train and let ourselves into our new temporary home. We took the swimming pool life saver off the nautical themed bed in the bedroom and tried to sleep it all off.

Every day is a struggle. I mean that. It's hard.

Another huge blessing was my sister's contacts. I feel constantly lucky that she is a successful and well liked person because I feel like so many of my job opportunities have come from her. One of her friends in the city set me up with a job working in Children's books. I pack and ship books for book fairs at New York private schools. So I spend all day up to my elbows in Amelia Bedilia and first year reader books with title's like "My Cat's Secret" and "I saw you in the bathtub." I work for an old Jewish woman who sounds like she smokes 6 packs an hour and her two daughters who are constantly fighting at a full scream during office hours. I am really starting to love them.

I had my first New York audition. It was just like you hear about. I sat around for 6 hours, read for 2 minutes for the junior associate casting director's assistant's assistant (or so it seemed) and walked away.

I get up every morning and get on the subway, which has lost its fun magical ride quality. Its no longer like riding the monorail in Disneyland and more like the smelly thing I get into to go places and occasionally have a homeless recovered drug addict preach about the evils of sexual promiscuity.

But its all going to be ok. We're going to be fine. Otehr than someone trick or treating our full length mirror while we were moving our stuff up to our apartment, we haven't lost anything.

We figured out what part of the city we want to live in. We've started looking for more regular work. We got to go to two Broadway shows and to see the final dress rehearsal of The Rockettes Christmas Spectacular, which was the most overly indulgent Christmas spasm of flamboyancy I've ever seen. I loved every minute of it.

I find myself trying hard to not get jealous a lot. Trying to not get jealous of the 26 year old we saw as the youngest Jean Valjean ever with one of the most melifluous and gorgeous voices I've ever heard. Not to be jealous of my friend Seth who was on foreign exchange with me and who now works in fashion and lives the most glamorous life I can imagine.

I just keep telling myself that I'm in a good place and that it all works out. It might take me a long time to figure out my place here. I might never be rich and famous. I might never get in a Broadway show. It still breaks my heart, but life will go on. Everything happens for a reason. And even while we're sitting there in the middle of the street staring at that bus as it speeds toward us, we still don't know when it will hit us and what exactly its going to be.