I’m going to sit and write this until —aAACHCHHOOOOOO— x5 - ugh. Dear Santa: puffs plus in my stocking, please?
Sheil has gone to Brazil for a month, and I am taking care of the cats. Ugh. (I do love them, I do love them, I do, I think I do…) My playlists having disappeared when my ipod was erased, I’ve resorted to leaving the music I’ve now put on it on shuffle. Does get a little strange when Girl Talk interrupts Loreena McKennit. eeeesh.
Classes end next week, and I can nearly see the end through my pile of snivvely tissues. My house is now cleaner than it has been in a long time, which means methods of procrastination are coming to an abrupt, if satisfying, end. I drove to Dundas in the middle of the night a few days ago in order to get to my early morning appointment on time, only to be phoned half an hour before I was due to be told it was canceled. Not exactly my usual procrastinatory way, but definitely effective. (Turned out somebody broke into Kim’s office and stole a bunch of computers!) Now, here I sit, with cat behind me snoozing, clothes all hung up, papers piled high on one side of my desk, Radiohead wailing and woozling (somebody, please, make me a playlist).
Today was my last Directing class. The play I’ve been working on the last couple months went up this week, and ends tomorrow night. I’m very pleased with the result, but today was interesting. I felt relieved after opening night, knowing that it was out of my hands (minus the music, which I play live per show). Today after class the eight of us students took our prof out to lunch. He is an incredibly talented, experienced, blah blah blah (bordering on divine to pissant twats like us) director/writer/everything theatrical. He spoke at length over lunch about the state of theatre in Canada, both bitterly and with passion, and presented us with a realistic perception on what to expect in our next steps. Listening to him speak, and having so loved the process of directing the play, I felt a little like a soldier being prepared to go out and fight the good fight. Which makes sense - a life in theater is like a continuous walk up a steep hill, with few brief moments of pause, of relief, of total ecstasy. Is it worth it? It’s not safe. It’s not anything like easy. But then, not much is, and at least for now I can’t picture myself in a 9-5 situation. Long story short, I had some doubts as I was walking home. I worry about my fear of rejection, my total lacking of a ‘tough exterior shell’ - which I have been told will be my undoing more than once by people I greatly respect. I know that I love theatre, and I know that that’s not enough. I know that there’s nothing I want to do more that I’m able to do. I took Ben for a long walk down the rail tracks when I got home, to the abandoned train station, and watched the sun go down. Splahhh.
Studying John Donne recently, and thought I’d share one of my favourite sonnets of his, from 1609:
Death, be not proud, though some have callèd thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul’s delivery.
Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy or charms can make us sleepe as well
And better than thy stroke; why swell’st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.
There is an alternate publication in which the last line reads ‘And death shall be no more, death thou shalt die.’ I think I like it better - death not as an insuperable barrier, not personified.
K Christmas now peeeeeeees. And tanks.