Pre- and post-mature nostalgia

It's been a sweet and emotional past few days. Wednesday was our final voice class, and we worked on our tragic chorus a bit with Simon, who led us through a really beautiful and heartbreaking exercise with our text. Afterwards, we sat in a circle to feedback, and I had a wide-angle-lens moment - taking in everyone around me, the atmosphere in the room, realising that this time is drawing ever closer to a close, and just feeling so unbelievably blessed. I indulged in a bawling session, red nose and all, and sucked it all in.

And yesterday was our last class with Steph. Lovely, spunky, bashful, playful Steph, who has grown with us as a teacher and brought us so much. Another joyful class that ended in tears - and not just for me this time.

Having Erica in town (she just left yesterday) has also got me thinking about Uganda again, and looking through other people's photos has broken my heart all over again that my camera's memory card was stolen in Tanzania. It was difficult at the time, but now that the memories have started to fade I'm really wishing I had those pictures. It's starting to feel like it was so long ago, that experience. Strange to think that someday I'll feel the same way about LISPA.

"I wish I had taken more pictures..."

Takin' care of business

My my! I've been so busy at work today! Doing work-related things! I haven't even had time to write my grant.... DUE TOMORROW. Dun dun DUN!

(Do I sound manic? I have three words for you: End of Term. Oh, and one more: Mocha.)

Seder

Last night, Rebecca opened her home to all us goys and showed us how to celebrate Pesach. We read from a Haggidah she'd compiled herself, and ate Maror and Charoset Matzo sandwiches and parsley dipped in salt water, and drank all the glasses of wine at the appropriate times, and laughed and were raucous and interrupted each other, and remembered those who are oppressed, and sang loudly, and opened the door for Elijah. And then we watched The Ten Commandments.

It was a beautiful, beautiful evening.

Patience is a virtue if you're in a rush

I've made a resolution to stop worrying so much. To breathe through the tasks and responsibilities that stress me out, and to try to enjoy myself more. To let what will be, be.

For the next month, I'll have people staying with me for a month straight. Today, my friend Erica (from my time in Uganda) is coming to visit a bunch of us other ex-vols, and she'll be here for a week. Immediately after, my friend Jack is taking me up on my offer to put him up while he finds a flat in London. He'll have to be out by the 7th May, though, because that's when Gemma arrives. (GEMMA'S COMING TO LONDON!!! HUZZAAAAAAH!)

It's worth remembering at times like these how quickly time goes. I've been trying to get my head around this particularly over the last few days, when I've realised we're down to our last week and a half of classes at LISPA, ever. Starting on the 28th and continuing through graduation on 18th July, we'll be pulling 10 hour days consisting only of creation time and presentations. Wow.

The tipping point

Things are getting crazy at school, and more than a little stressful. We're all looking for extra rehearsal time for extra creation projects, and struggling with those we already have. The days get more and more full and go more and more quickly. Natali and I were bemoaning this fact the other day - the stress of it all! the overwhelmingness! - and then she said, "But you know what? We're going to miss it."

Which is true. And it's all going to be over so bloody quickly...

In other news, I've been recalling how much I enjoy living in London. Maybe I won't come home just yet...

There were bells on the hill...

I very nearly peed myself yesterday in class. We are a very funny bunch, if I do say so myself. Especially when we're taking the piss out of people who take their art really, reeeeally seriously.

And then I went out for drinks on a work night, and sang "Til There Was You" in pretty harmony with Aram and Diogo and Maria, until we were shushed by a very grumpy bar worker who told us he didn't like music. This is after we had been applauded by fellow patrons! Philistine.

And now I'm tired, and a little hungover, and full of Thai food. Mmmm. Friday.

Goin' to the Chapel

Homework assignment for Monday:

Come dressed as you would for an upscale wedding, prepared to sing a song of your choice that you would sing at a wedding.

Please give me ideas. The more the better.

Ah, sweet mystery... solved.

I came home from school tonight to find a FedEx envelope addressed to me. It was empty save a CD, still in its shrink wrap, by someone named Sylvie Lewis. The return address was Matt Searle, Cheap Lullaby Records, Venice, CA.

Who is Matt Searle?! Who is Sylvie Lewis?! Who do I know in Venice, CA?! And how the hell did they get my address? I've combed the liner notes for clues, but there are none to be found, it would seem.

And to make things a bit odder, a but funnier... I'd left the CD playing in the kitchen as I came upstairs to write this, and Carrie just walked in:

"Your song is playing."
"What?"
"Track six. It goes, 'Isabel, what the hell, you don't write, you don't call.'"

ADDENDUM:

Thank you, Lindsay! It's lovely. And my song is ever stuck in my head :)

It's very pretty, but how much does it cost?

In the past two weeks, I've been freaking out about the future. Looking at plane tickets home for Gem and Mark's wedding has raised all sorts of questions, the most pressing of which is whether to buy a one way flight or round trip. There are lots of questions about London, and how viable it is to stay here, and why I want to stay here, and how much. There are questions about where else in the world I'd like to be, and who I'd like to be with, and what kind of community I want to be a part of. There are questions about the kind of art I want to make, and how I want to make it, and with whom. There are questions about how much I want to keep moving, and how much I want to settle, and how much all of this is going to cost. The sheer unbridled possibility of it all has become a little less thrilling, a little more stressful.

In the past ten days, I've looked at flights to Puerto Rico, Seattle, and Bangalore. I've become production assistant/stage manager for the next Finger in the Pie show, which starts rehearsals in two weeks. I've listened to Andy talk about the theatre company he's starting in Mankato. I've thought about living in North Carolina, about doing a clown workshop in Boulder, and about how much all of this is going to cost. I've panicked at the thought of leaving London earlier than expected, and how that changes the colour of everything here. How it makes me feel like a tourist.

In the past two days, I've thought about spending my October in Paris, in Malta, in Portugal. I've gotten sad at the prospect of saying goodbye to Simon sooner rather than later. I've been wondering about where I'll be for Thanksgiving. I've thought about bouncing from Rhode Island to L.A. I've wondered how much all of this is going to cost.

More than anything, though, I wonder what it is that I want.

Blast from the past

Once upon a time, when I was about eight or nine, there was a boy in my class that I couldn't stand. I don't remember too much about him, to be honest, except for the dorky sweaters he wore (but come on - in the early nineties, who didn't?) and that... well, yeah, that I couldn't stand him. Something about coming across as really awkward but arrogant at the same time. Or maybe he was just one of those kids who wasn't considered cool but refused to realise it and was irritating by virtue of his sheer persistence and audacity. His name was Juris, and my best friend and I, keeping with the cruelty of young children the world over, dubbed him "Jerkis".

Somewhere along the line, despite all my efforts to the contrary, he decided he liked me, and would leave gifts on my desk - a rose quartz sphere, and a broken "gold" wristwatch with a digital face. This drove me nuts, and made me really, really uncomfortable. I even ended up calling a summit with our homeroom teacher to be sure that the unwanted attention didn't continue. It worked.

The other night, for some reason, he occurred to me and I was telling Baerbel about that incident. Then today, on Facebook, purely through links of friends of friends, I found something that totally cracked me up.

How times have changed.