We passed a building that looked suspiciously like a greenhouse. Then I noticed the cross and turned to my sister.

"Glass churches are God's version of ants and a magnifying glass."

A little while later, we saw a shopping cart full of fire extinguishers.

Puddles in Trolley Tracks

Murky droplets lace silver window
Oil-slicked asphalt dotted with dew

Wet, a blanket pulled over mouth and nose--
Curls my hair
Stretches my leather
Rolls in my ears.

The city rains on itself.



When they come to me...

I woke in the wee hours of the morning, pitch dark outside, with a roiling in my gut. I felt sick. Not as sick as I was the last time I had food poisoning, but definitely sick. I was certain, however, that if I could just force myself back into sleep, I wouldn't be violently sick. So sleep, I did.

It felt like hours of dreaming, and when I woke up, I remembered every second of it. But of course, I got distracted talking to Peter, and I lost it...apparently all of it. Trying to remember a dream is like trying to hold an air-filled ball underwater. Smooth, wet, and propelled by forces over which I have no control, it slips from my grasp. Just when you think you've got it right where you want it, it's suddenly gone...leaving only ripples in its wake.

The rain shot down out of the sky. Not in one-dimensional torrents or two-dimensional sheets, but rather in waves. The water through the air and splashing hard against the asphalt made the darkness thick, and it was not by sight that I knew I was on the bridge. Water on all sides: a drop off the bridge, through the rain, into the river.

I pressed on at 30 miles an hour on I95, hydroplaning, but dry. I sang.

"How was Philly?" she asked.
"Sleeptastic," says I.

Right...yeah...went back to Philly for...about 12 hours for the express purpose of getting to stay with Peter. I'm such a silly girl. :)


Oh, by the way, I'm home in Jersey which is why I haven't been posting. Sorry!

It's a great thing to realize that you sincerely believe that bare footprints in sand require a clear set of toes.

*sigh*

So, right. I've managed to fall into the summer of minor disappointments. No real major ones, but plenty of minor ones. For example, I've killed my pet snake, my best friend from home who promised to visit me here in Philly isn't coming, I've slowly come to hate my job...and now this. Ok, so this isn't quite as minor.

I get this email yesterday morning from the director of our summer show. We'll say his name is John, for simplicity. So John emails me at 2:30am Monday morning, expecting me to read it, I don't know when. The email says 'You missed rehearsal on Thursday. The next rehearsal is at 8:30pm tomorrow, the next ones after that are at 7pm Thursday and Friday." I respond, "You said you'd email us about a rehearsal last Thursday and you never did. As noted on my audition sheet, I'm going home this Thursday for a week and a half, and an 8:30 rehearsal Tuesday night is fine...unless by "tomorrow" you mean "today." And even that's alright, but you'll have to call me, if that's the case." He did email me at 2:30 in the morning. When is "tomorrow" at that hour? So he calls me and leaves a message on my cell phone, as I requested, says that Yes, he had meant that the rehearsal was Monday night and that he'd like to speak to me afterwards about my going on "vacation." I should also note that I told him that if he absolutely positively needed me for a rehearsal while I was at home, I would have to drive an hour to an hour and a half each way, but that I might be able to manage it.

So, fine. I had a choir rehearsal from 6-8, but an 8:30 rehearsal would be fine. Convenient, even, since I would already be on campus and also wouldn't have to miss frozen drinks and American Idol. So I get home, check my email and see "Sorry for the email inconsistency, rehearsal is tonight, Monday night, at 8PM."

Yeah, that's inconsistent, alright.

Fine, so I emailed him back saying "Alright, I have a choir rehearsal from 6-8 and the choir director did threaten to keep the altos late, but I'll get there as soon as I can." I go to choir, we get out by like 7pm, which was cool. The other person in choir with me who is also a cast member for the summer show....right, she and I went and got cold drinks, wandered back to the theater, chill and talk for 45 minutes or so...It gets to be 8pm...no one. At which point I get pissed. And feel free to let the rest of the cast members, who slowly trickle in, know about that. No, not their fault at all, but I did get to vent somewhat. John finally shows up, we all set up in the rehearsal room. He says "First thing, scheduling. Tam, you said you can't make it back til 7:30 on Thursday and Friday?"
I say "John, I'd have to like you an awful lot to come home even one of those days, let alone both." And I certainly wasn't liking him at that point.
He says "Well, I didn't see that note on your audition sheet, if you can't make it back for rehearsals, then I'll have to get someone else to do the part."
"That's fine."
He then feels the need to add, "If I'd known you'd be unavailable for this time, I wouldn't have cast you in the first place." Well gee, John, maybe that was the point of writing it on my audition sheet. So he says "You can read and block for tonight, but then..." I sit in relative shock and recoil for quite a few minutes, trying to get around the lump in my throat the idea that I wouldn't get to be in the summer show while he discusses schedule with everyone else. Finally John says "Ok, any more questions?"
Over-loudly I say "Yeah. I have a question."
"Yes?"
"The stage manager read for me last Thursday. Can she read for me tonight?"
"Um...yeah."
"Good. See ya." I get up, put my left flip-flop back on, careful to keep my head down and my tears under wraps. I always knew long hair was good for something.
He says "I'm really sorry." I freeze, my right foot pointed into my sandal...
"It's cool." Never looking up. Pick up my things, walk out quickly but not running, out the door and sobbing all the way to Peter's room.




So, done with the theatrics...since this is supposed to be thinking out loud, here's where I list all the affronts done to me so that I can have them nice and tidy when I speak to someone in the theater department.
1. Failure to notify me of a rehearsal. Not inadequate notification. NO notification. I wasn't even doing anything that night. It would have taken no more than two minutes and two phone calls for them to get ahold of me, even after the rehearsal had started. Phone: Hey, Tam, we're having rehearsal, where are you? Me: Oh you are, are you? Ok, I'll be right there.
2. Taking an attitude with me for missing his rehearsal.
3. Giving less than 24 hours notice of a rehearsal.
4. Changing rehearsal times, the most recently stated of which was inaccurate.
5. Being totally ignorant of time constraints listed on audition sheets. Yes, John, that is what they're for.

You might say, "Oh man, he's going down." That would be a reasonable assumption to make of a student director exhibiting such behavior. But reasonable isn't one of the many words that describe some members of our theater department. In point of fact, if I ever want to be cast in a mainstage production, I can't talk trash about John the Golden Child, no matter what he's done. And yes, ridiculous as it sounds, I do want to be cast. That was the whole point of doing this stupid summer show with a crappy plot and even crappier dialog. To get experience and exposure on stage. Is it my fault that John has no idea what to do with a stage manager? No. But I refuse to just sit silent about his total incompetency, the key is just figuring out how to do it without screwing myself over. So thanks to Peter's clever and wicked little mind, I will be soliciting the advice of the super-cool and yet oh-so-devious Production manager who has a good healthy dislike of both my former student director and also of some key members of the Theater department staff. Hopefully, he'll have something helpful to say.

And right now, I'm blogging instead of going to work, so I should get to that.

I steal back one more day of my summer.

This time, not for Peter and myself, but mostly for me and partly for my mom. As I told her..."Oh my god, mom, what was that? Oh...oh, don't worry, it was just my work ethic flying out the window."

I should be home cleaning/waiting for mom to get here until 12:30 or 1, so if anyone wants to go to the Liberty Bell or something like that, feel free to ring me up. ;)

So. I got a part in one of the summer shows. Out of four female roles between both student-written plays, I got...I guess it's the third biggest? Heh. So anyway, I'm playing a senior in high school, member of the gymnastics team who only takes the tv production class to keep her gpa up. Peter bursts my bubble. Says, 'Well, who else could they have possibly cast as a gymnast out of the girls who tried out.'

Thanks.
He is right, though, the only girl who looked more like a gymnast than I do...well...she was pretty awful, and I may not be a great actress, but I'm not awful. I read through the whole script today. Yeah...clearly student-written. But I can probably take care of my own costume and one of my own props. It's supposed to be some small piece of art that my character is turning in that day, and I have just the sculpture. Of course, I need to get both of them from home, so ick, but it should be interesting anyway. I have some really sparkling dialog, too. For example, "It's about goddamn time! Oh, hello Dr. Stroud."

But really that hardly even scratches the surface.

An entire world has been reopened.

Yesterday afternoon, I decided to do some laundry, and so headed down towards our basement where the washer and dryer are located. When I got to the ground floor, though, I saw that my downstairs neighbors' door was open...and lo, the one female of them stood in the living room ironing. Knock on the doorframe. 'Hi, I'm Tam. Sorry I haven't come down and introduced myself earlier. Is that the washer I hear running?'
'No, that's just my stuff in the dryer. I'm Erin.'

I'm not so bad at this, you know. Go downstairs. Load and start washer. Go back up to the front hall.
'Actually, Erin, I had a question...I was told there was dsl, and it worked for a little while, but it's been gone for like a month now. Do you know what I can do about that?'

And lo, all it took was a ten dollar check and a little visit back to them this afternoon, and now I have access again. Yay.

So, I can shop for new beds from the comfort of my own room. I can check my Drexel email and use instant messenger. I can remind myself of why I love MUDs...because I can still type faster than almost anyone else I know. I can shop for peoples' birthday presents! I can see when exactly it is that Dar is playing in the area. I can look up new guitar tabs to learn. I can crack up with Kat over the things Peter likes to do while listening to a new cd for the first time. Not that I have yet, but I thought about it today, and I could definitely do that at some point.

Oh yes. And I can blog and check my sitemeter all I want.

I should have reliable dsl in my room, now, so if I don't post, I have no excuse.