Notices following auditions

I went to an audition on Tuesday and have not yet heard anything. My experience has been that if I am not cast at the audition or within a couple of days thereafter, I can expect a thank-you-but-no-thank-you call or e-mail. So, at this point, I am expecting the worst, but I don't yet know. I swear that if I am ever a director, if casting takes more than a couple of days, I will send out an "I'm still thinking about those to be cast" e-mail followed by phone calls and a TYBNTY e-mail ASAP. Those who do not act do not realize that the days following an audition can be pure torture as the actors wait for the results. With social media, it can be worse as people start posting how they got parts...and you are still waiting for some sort of contact, which is what happened on the last audition before this one (where the director never did contact those of us who were not cast).

One of the women at the audition recognized me from another audition and asked if I had received a part in that play. When I said I hadn't, she expressed surprise, stating that she thought I was very good. Maybe I was, but I was undoubtedly too old/too tall/too short/too fat or otherwise not right for however the director envisioned the roles to be cast. I keep telling myself that talent is only part of the equation. A person might be the best actor in the world, but if he or or she does not meet the director's vision, he or she is unlikely to be cast.

Long time, no post

It has been a long time since my last post. A lot has happened in that time. Some highlights: Scott and I got married on the 4th of July. We bought a house with a small orchard and adopted a beagle-pointer pup from the local shelter. I've attended a lot of funerals and memorial services, most for people who lived long and productive lives, some for people who died far too young. My older daughter graduated from college. My younger one has been student of the month and was on honor roll every trimester last year. We've been on stage, done Ren Faire, done the Dickens Festival. I am now a DTM squared. Scott has taken up sword fighting. We joined Facebook. I finished a knitting project without ripping the whole thing out.

Days go by too quickly.

SHALL WE DANCE?

This is from the 10/11/07 posting over at Steve's Corner regarding dance classes for the Fezziwig Ball:

Next week is the start of dance lessons again, yeah! Time to get the dancing shoes on and hopefully this year Quirky and I will be able to finally dance the Venitian Waltz together. Also, time to start finding some more clothes to go with my victorian re-enacting outfit. Quirky and I do re-enacting not a whole lot since I was in school but this year we are going to do more.

Ah hah! Perhaps that is why we are having problems waltzing together--I'm try to dance the Viennese Waltz. Seriously, though, we are continuing to find it difficult to Viennese Waltz together. We waltz just fine with other people. As Robin, the dance mistress, said last night, the problem when we dance together seems to be that either both leads or neither leads. Scott's theory is that since we are both the oldest children in our families, we both want to take charge. I mentioned my fear of falling since I seem to keep sliding out of his grasp and my difficulty in trying to figure out where he wants me to go. He gets frustrated with me because I sometimes stop when I have no idea from the way he holds me what he is trying to do or get me to do, a problem that exists only on the dance floor. It doesn't help that at class people simply stand around on the dance floor, creating roadblocks, rather than dancing. We talked about waltzing in a parking lot so that we can use the lines to help us move forward in a straight line. It will all come with practice, I'm sure.

Last night, in addition to the waltz, we worked on the shottische, a contradance, the first figure of The Caledonians, and my favorite, the Spanish Dance. We actually did just fine on the waltz part of the Spanish Dance--even though I think that both of us were leading.

The Electric Slide and Mint Chocolate Ice Cream

Last Friday at our annual "Employee Appreciation Day," actually a one-hour event in which judges donned plastic gloves and aprons and served us ice cream, I proved that it is possible to dance the Electric Slide while consuming a waffle cone filled with mint chocolate ice cream. Enough said.

The Reality Of Growing Older

I was the Table Topics Master at my Toastmasters club today. Considering that I recently celebrated a birthday, that my family will get together this weekend for my mom's 84th birday, and that my oldest daughter turns 21 this month, aging is on my mind. Thus, I chose as my theme "The Reality of Growing Older." I asked each speaker to comment on one of the following quotations:

"I was born in the wrong generation. When I was a young man, no one had any respect for youth. Now I am an old man and no one has any respect for age."--Bertrand Russell

"After you've done a thing the same way for two years, look it over carefully. After five years, look at it with suspicion. And after ten years, throw it away and start all over."--Alfred Edward Perlman

"It is well documented that for every minute that you exercise, you add one minute to your life. This enables you at 85 years old to spend an additional 5 months in a nursing home at $5,000 per month."--Unknown

"Thousands of geniuses live and die every year undiscovered--either by themselves or by others."--Mark Twain

"It is not good for all your wishes to be fulfilled. Through sickness you recognize the value of health, through evil the value of good, through hunger satisfaction, through exertion the value of rest."--Heraclitis

"A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives."--Jackie Robinson (whose words appear on his tombstone as his epitaph)

"You know you are getting older when you stoop to tie your shoelaces and wonder what else you can do as long as you are already down there."--George Burns

"Women over 50 don't have babies because they would put them down and forget where they left them."--Unknown

I concluded by sharing this quote: "So much is pressing in on humans today that no one has time to stand still long enough to evaluate it. They gulp life and taste nothing. They eat life and have no savor."--Geraldine Farrar (former opera star, on her 80th birthday)


Here are a few others on aging from my quote file:

"Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young."--Henry Ford

"Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for a moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to the future generation."--George Bernard Shaw

"One thing that stirs me when I look back at my youthful days, the fact that so many people gave me something or were something to me without knowing it."--Albert Schweitzer

"Nobody grows old by merely living a number of years. People grow old only by deserting their ideals. Years wrinkle the face, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, doubt, self-interest, fear, despair--these are the long, long years that bow the head and turn the growing spirit back to dust."--Watterson Lowe


The Word of the Day provided by our Grammarian was "scintillating." I commented that the word appears on my blog. When I asked how many people read blogs, only one hand went up. One person asked what a blog is. I doubt that he was the only one with that question. I mentioned this blog and sent out an e-mail letting people know where to find it. I am curious to see how many people actually look for it.

Hitting the Highlights

My fiance over at Steve's Corner has asked me to update my blog. Unlike some bloggers, such as our friend Lisa, my blogging thus far has been infrequent. In order to appease the man in my life, I'll list these highlights:

(1) Scott graduated from the Naval Postgraduate School with a Masters in Systems Engineering. We went up to Monterey for the graduation, where we met up with Scott's parents and with members of his cohort. Obviously I am very proud of him and the two and one-half years of hard work he put into the the Masters program. I look forward to his putting that knowledge into action both in his professional life (obtaining lead positions at work) and his personal one (wedding and marriage planning). And of course I look forward to our having more time to spend with each other.

(2) In honor of his graduation, I agreed on a wedding date: the first Saturday in October 2008. He said he'll hold me to it.

(3) I was able to spend quality time with Scott's parents, including a day at the Monterey Aquarium. They are wonderful people and already treat me and my girls as part of their family. My younger daughter has been referring to them as her grandparents ever since last November. The five of us went to the Spaghetti Factory the night before they returned home, which was great because it was the only opportunity by daughter had to see them this trip. They are talking about returning in February for the Dickens Festival in downtown Riverside.

(4) My daughter's volleyball team won its first game. That puts them 1-1. I was thrilled to see her actually get a point by serving. Actually, I was thrilled just to see her serve go over the net. If there were an award for the greatest team spirit that day, her team probably would have won it. They enthusiastically celebrated each point scored and cheered each other on.

(5) I received a Notice of Entry of Judgment letting me know that my maiden name has been restored. I decided some time ago that returning to my maiden name will have positive effects on my mental health. I found out today that the court is a bit slow--the judgments are not Imaged and input into the system until about five days after they have been entered. I was told that I could mail in a request and get the judgment back in two or three weeks. I think I will check back later in the week and then, when I find that the judgment has made it into the system, go down and get a certified copy. Then the real fun begins. The DMV won't do a name change until the change is made with Social Security, and Social Security won't do a name change without a certified copy of the name change document. I need to change my name with my employer, my credit union, my credit cards, the utility companies, everyone who knows me .... And I've been waiting to apply for a passport under my maiden name. After all this hassle, which I last went through about 23 years ago, I think I will be loathe to ever change my name again! (Yes, Scott, after we get married we can be known socially as Mr. and Mrs. H, but I'll keep my maiden name for everything else.)

Make More Joy

The following comes from e-mail my sister and I had today about celebrations. In many ways, her life is harder than mine since she is raising three boys, one of whom is disabled. She seems to find more joy than I do--maybe "make more joy" is a better way of phrasing it.

LC:

I make huge deals out of the boys' bdays that they never mind who sends them cards. I put signs all around the house--stupid rhymes & stuff. It is a ridiculous tradition that I thought they were sick of by last yr. I didn't do it the morning of Matthew's bday last yr & he looked all over the house & asked about where the signs were! I told him they would be there in the afternoon--that I was doing afternoon signs vs. morning ones. Good grief, I then spent 2 hours making up my dumb signs and decorating the dining room table--making a king type chair, decorated with "reserved for the bday boy" seating & all the things I've done in the past. I guess I will need to keep that up forever.

Me (partial post):

What a cute tradition! We don't have traditions, other than the Advent calendar that often stays on the wall year-round, and celebrating Epiphany (another round of gifts). And going out to dinner.

LC:

We have a ton of traditions & family stuff. We have a bunch of phrases and words....

"Don't have a BBM!!!" (bean burrito moment). That means don't overreact about something. It came from a day when I was eating a bean burrito while driving and got mad about something & my burrito spilled out all over me.

"Go & BFR." That means go & brush, floss, rinse.

Matthew is "JAM," one of his many nicknames. That is "just a minute" because he never gets up & does something immediately.

We have a ton of those acronym sayings.

We have a lot of stuff like "surprise day"...a random day, usually about once per month when I give M&M a surprise or we do something that is a surprise to them. It can be as little as the car "forcing" us to go to Blockbuster to rent movies (we don't do that much, so it is a treat) or my giving them books or video games or a special dessert (key lime pie is a good one!).

Jerry & I used to celebrate our anniversary each month with "monthiversaries" but hey, those are long gone. That was a card or note or flowers or whatever.

When milk or anything spills, we stop what we are doing & everyone must laugh, even a phoney laugh, before it is cleaned up.

Santa calls the house throughout the year. I pick up the phone & have conversations with him. M&M know that only I can hear him & the phone could even have a busy signal, but Santa talks through it to me. I pick up the phone & say something like, "I know they are misbehaving, but they generally are very good." It makes them laugh no matter what. When they see me reach for the phone, it breaks up anything (fighting). That is quite hysterical, now that I really think about it.

I am hugely into celebrating ANYTHING. Maybe because we don't get out that much with JJ or because he affects what we are able to do so much--that I feel the need to do what we can do...my stupid other ways to celebrate & make things special.

Me (partial post):

I can't even remember the last time I put up a Christmas tree. I don't think it was this century, unless you count the little one I put on my desk. I didn't even get that up last year.

LC (partial post):

I am totally big on Xmas. I just love holidays, I guess. I love Halloween. I love Easter. We had a huge egg hunt for the disabled pals of JJ this past yr. It took over an hr for them to gather the eggs w/their siblings. Very fun. I think I'm all about making memories so the kids can look back and recall fun times.


My sister has the right attitude. She doesn't wait for the fun to happen; she makes it happen. I hope her kids appreciate what a wonderful mother she is. I can learn a lot from her example.