Houston Day 339 - Hello from the Zen center

So this last week I have joined the countless Texans who regularly go on a "cleanse" (because the everyday diet is so unhealthy for many Texans!) but not the kind of cleanse where you just drink lemonade for two weeks and try to pretend you're not hungry (one of my fellow reindeer during Rudolph did that and to be honest, it seemed awful).  It was a program outlined in the Yoga International magazine that I read.  The basis of it was doing yoga every day and eating a very restricted vegan diet.  I wanted to do it as a kind of spiritual discipline: to take this time as I come to the end of this season of a very light work schedule to settle a little deeper into myself, to balance out my physical and mental health before I head into Hope Stone tech week and Pink rehearsals straight after that.  And it's been great.  I feel very zen, and balanced, and rested, and in touch with myself.  Am also experiencing a hunger for spiritual challenge and community that I haven't felt in ages.  I got out a bible this week! Just coz I felt like it!!!
Other stuff going on in our world...I've been taking screen acting classes, as well as some more Shakespeare classes, and have learned & improved a whole bunch.  We went to see our first TUTS show last night, with Nick and Bekah, and also marked the first time the four of us have been to a show together and not just Nick, Bekah and Lucas coming to see my show or Nick, Lucas and I going to see one of Bekah's shows.  The show was La Cage aux Folles and it was brilliant.  Brilliant.  Brilliant.  A great show, and a really top-notch production.  Makes me feel good about the state of the theatre in Houston (although I think all of the actors were from New York :-/ ).  After this week Lucas should finally be done with the lease sale stuff at work, so that takes a load off.  His not-yet-functioning car Lance (the 1980ish Subaru brat he's been working on) got towed to the mechanic, so hopefully at some point we'll have two cars.  Life is filling up to the point now where that is becoming necessary.  And pt is ok here but not amazing...it took me an hour and a half to go to Main Street today to drop off my contract and pick up my Pink script (which, by the way, looks great - I can't way to start!)
Lucas is now home from a long and stressful day at work, so we're going to sit on our front porch and enjoy the mild evening sunshine lighting up the street.

Houston Day 330 - yay, I got cast

Just  a quick note to inform y'all that I went to an audition last night for a new theatre company called Ohana and had a great time and got cast in their first show.  (A last-minute decision to use a slightly dodgy English accent was, apparently, in the director's words, "inspired".)  It's an evening (well, a handful of evenings) of one-act plays called Awesome America!!, and each of the four plays is set in a different random American tourist attraction.  I'm in Perspectives on the John which is about the toilet seat museum in San Antonio (which apparently does exist).  Apparently the company is part of a larger plan to make the east end of downtown Houston the next big thing.  So that's a fun thing to be part of.  I also got rejected by Houston Grand Opera for Show Boat, but let's not focus on that one.

Houston Day 327 - reflections from my library

Teach me how to be someone

Whose heart can explore

While still staying here.

Let this be the year we both travel.

("Goodbye, my Love" from Ragtime)

I'm sitting on Auntie Lallie's old couch on the wide landing in our house that we've designated our library.  It's a beautiful place to be in the early evening because the sun comes through the enormous window over the staircase opposite, and it's also usually pretty tidy, so unlike the rest of the house, I can enjoy the space without having to clean up first.

We didn't decorate it this way on purpose, but I am surrounded by momentos from our travels and from around the world.  In front of me is the wall-hanging Lucas bought in Tibet, beside me is a painting of the outback that used to belong to Grandma, and to my left I can see souvenirs and gifts from Japan, England,Thailand.  There's also a picture in an ExxonMobil frame of us sitting on a longhorn; 3D Jesus; greeting cards; photos, posters and awards from shows I've done and seen; the "bimbo" toy that was made for my first birthday; and one of the many crocodiles given to Lucas during his PhD.  Plus also a billion books (the ones whose quantity made the packers complain).  And that gorgeous photo of me and my sisters taken on my wedding day that reminds me how much I treasure them every time I see it.  This is an interesting room to be feeling reflective in.
In some ways I feel like we've been here so long I'm getting twitchy (gosh I have a short attention span sometimes) and in other ways I'm reminded gently of how new we are here.  When I meet new people and tell them how long I've been here they usually react with a comment about it not being very long.  But I think the twitchiness is mostly due to the six weeks of underemployment (ending in two weeks, YAY)....and also, ironically, I think not being as fully grounded and embedded here means that my mind is not fully engaged all the time.  Sometimes in my life I feel really quite stupid, and then sometimes I am amazed about how much my mind is just always begging for more.

Houston Day 319 - from my new home at Hope Stone

Yesterday, after the lovely Tausha from Citywide Massage dealt with my back, I went to Hope Stone....actually, now I think about it, I've fairly been living at Hope Stone these past couple of days.  I helped out Amy, the 2IC of everything, doing office drudge work for a few hours, then I had coffee (well, roast almond tea) with Jane, the 1IC, mama of Hope Stone at Bungalow, my new favourite coffee shop.  Today I went to two classes, and now I've just checked in the little kids (please God, I hope I've done it right - I still don't get the way admin works here) and the teens are slowly trickling in.
In between all of that, I've been watching a hell of a lot of "Downton Abbey" and doing some fairly hardcore thinking.  When my life slows down between shows, I have time to look around and see how the rest of my life's doing, and often need to do a fair bit of emotional homework on stuff I've ignored while I've been busy.  It's fairly taxing, but good.  Part of what I'm thinking about is trying to decide whether I'll pursue a particular work/day-job opportunity that's come up, or whether I'd rather stay as available as I can for shows, or whether I'll end up letting everyone down trying to juggle multiple commitments.  Hmmm.  I'm also, as per Bekah's improv lessons she's giving me in return for singing lessons, trying to pay attention to what my body language, particularly my feet, are communicating in any given situation.  Think about it - if your weight's back on your heels, and you've got one foot pointing to the side, you're not communicating full alertness and engagement in the situation you're in.
Tonight we're off to see Ragtime at the Miller Outdoor Theatre (yes, this is the one I considered auditioning for way back in December).  Shemica and Vincent are both in it, so that'll be fun to see them.  Once Shemica and I figured out how to understand how the other one talks ("Are you having a go at me?"="I know you ain't comin' for me, bitch!"), we've become pretty good friends.
The Miller is a beautiful theatre - think Sidney Myer Music Bowl.  We've got friends coming, we've got many many cheeses from Houston Dairymaids, and it should be a good night.  And it's Ragtime! I'm so excited to see this show! I hope the production's good.