Houston Day 174 - bye Tom & Huck, it's been real swell

...for the most part, although the beginning of the process was frustrating in the extreme.  And then there were some other hiccups too...a couple of times kids in question time asked where Huck Finn was, and Shemica had to come up with a better answer than "well, honey, that actor was fired".
The best thing about Tom & Huck, aside from doing a fun show with fun people, is that it got me follow-up gigs with Express Theatre.  Rudolph (Christmas show) opens on Tuesday, and we start rehearsals for Freedom Train (black history month show) in January.  I'm feeling quite at home at Express now.
One thing, not just at Express but everywhere, that is becoming easier is the language barrier.  I know geographical variations of English are such a tiny language barrier compared to my friend Kristen who just up and moved to China a few years ago, but it has been a bit of a cause of stress, particularly because it took me by surprise.  A couple of things that have made me feel better are: 1) the knowledge that the one kid at Hope Stone who I can't understand frequently baffles the other teacher too and 2) the discovery that the African-American vernacular is considered by some linguists to be technically a creole or a dialect distinct from other kinds of English (thank you Wikipedia)...so it's possibly forgivable that I sometimes struggle to understand the conversation when I'm the only white person in the room.  It's kind of similar to talking to some of Dad's Scottish neighbours.  A couple of the folks at Express are very sweet and take care to 'translate' for me so I have learned some new words & phrases, including one which I won't share because I don't know how to spell it.  I've taught them some Australianisms too.  This week's lesson was the difference between "chookas" and "choccas".  I was explaining "choccas" as a shortening of "chock-a-block", which was met with a blank look, and the realisation that the word is an abbreviation of an already colloquial term.  Really, Aussies, sometimes we go too far.
Nick & Bekah came to our last show today, which was really thoughtful.  I hadn't asked them to come, because being childless adults they're not really the target audience, but Bekah insisted on coming to support me.  She's a great friend!
So the post-show blues have exactly twenty-one hours to do their worst before I go to my next rehearsal.  I think I can handle that.