Notes From The Future

[I was going to write a pithy piece about some terrible local theatre this morning, but when I signed into my blog I found this:]

June, 2016 or 2018, depending.

As a Time Traveler, I will have several points I needed to warn you about. They shouldn't have alarmed you terribly much. When it comes, there will be nothing you can do to avoid it.

If you had listened, you will probably live.

The first thing I need to tell you is that, at least where I'm writing from -- and I'll explain that in a minute -- the earthquake was far larger than any of you (including my respected uncle, Geologist Edward Cargile, recently of the USGS), had ever supposed possible. Now there are those among you who would note that if there was any future from which Edward would write, it would be from a future where The Big One on the Hayward Fault is epic beyond even James Cameron's budgets. Just as Harold Camping would end up in a future where the Rapture is a reality and Carol Channing would end up in Modesto. Which is where she was, until recently. Seriously, in your time, the right now that applies to you, Carol Channing was living in Modesto. I'm not kidding.  And, as she has moved away from Modesto, I suspect that she knew what was coming.

The first thing I need to tell you is that you are not prepared.

Did you buy a duffel bag with a week's worth of supplies and "first aid"?  Buy maybe thirty more of them. Then, if you're in the western end of the Tri-Valley Area, store them in your attic. Build a trapdoor on your roof so you can get in and out of that attic easily.

This blog is cobbled together from things written just after the quake, when power was in-and-out, as well as notes made by hand in the weeks following, when there was absolutely no power and the stultifying heat of Livermore in the Summer carried the sickly-sweet stench of the terminally unlucky, if ever a breeze dared move.  Switches in tense are frequent. I apologize; my daily window of time is brief.

At one time, the USGS had an animation on their website of the likely major destruction zones in the 92510 area; I think they took it down because it upset people.  If more people had paid attention to that animation, things might be better where (and when) I am.  The animation was quite conservative, but you won't believe me so I'll dive right in to what you are least likely to believe.

Everything West of the Hayward Fault moves about ten feet North in about two seconds' time, snapping overpasses, destroying the 238 interchange and the BART line leading to Dublin, Pleasanton and Livermore. The houses on stilts on the hills above 580 in San Leandro and Oakland fall down. So do the flimsy-looking atrocities in the old quarry. 580 itself is a wreck, as is much of Mission Blvd., all the way down to Fremont and beyond. But things are worse right there at 238/580 where a BART train, passing at the moment the quake strikes, is on the tracks when the back two thirds of the train move ten feet North along with everything else.

Simultaneously, the Calaveras Fault -- which is really the Eastern Auxiliary Arm of the Hayward Fault -- works some special legerdemain of its own: it cracks open and swallows large portions of 680 all the way up to Martinez. The bridge is permanently damaged, of course; all the bridges are damaged, and the Benicia bridge falls down. Now think of those elegant arching roadways at the 680/24 interchange in Walnut Creek, knocked down like a cranky toddler's wooden blocks. Think of the refineries in Martinez and Benicia, none of which were built with anything like this earthquake in mind and, Fukushima-style, begin to spew toxic materials into the estuaries and the bay when their pipes are snapped like the flimsy plastic tunnels of a Habitrail left in the sun since 1978.  Alamo, at the base of Mt. Diablo, feels earthquakes every day; a woman who lives on a house on a hill sufficiently elevated from 680, sees smoke rising from Mt. Diablo and calls to report a forest fire.

It's not a forest fire.

You have no idea what you are in for and you're not even really taking it seriously because I write funny blogs and how could I possibly travel back in time to warn you about some over-the-top disaster that matches my worst fears and every prediction I ever made after too many beers at your barbecue?  What am I, some kind of Noah? Some kind of Cassandra? Harold Camping's first disciple? High Priest of the Seismic Soothsayers? None of this reads funny. I might delete this paragraph. I haven't decided.

The tsunami that occurs out there in the Pacific is a doozy. It's the Queen Mother of a royal earthquake swarm just itching to infest.  Lots of damage done along the coast, and it's large enough that what makes it into the bay, while lessened, is still an Incredible Hulk-style punch to anyone and anything at or near water-level. As of this writing, it is understood to have occurred because of a piece of the continental shelf that snapped off somewhere near Monterey. The resulting tsunami travels right up the coast of California and slips directly into the San Francisco Bay. I'm thinking of some kind of E-Ticket joke, here, but who is still alive that remembers the E-Tickets? Anyway, the East Brother Lighthouse spends some time fully submerged. Think about that.  Moving through the bay, the wall of water finds a large wall of debris where the Mothball Fleet came loose and careened into the collapsed Benicia bridge; the water, however, finds a delicious new pathway and follows what is already flowing into the Calaveras gorge that was 680.

The estuaries, having flooded and filled with water from the bay and reeking effluvium from the burning refineries, have now caught fire; water, following the easiest course and pouring into the gorge right around the 680/242 interchange, is now bolstered by the tsunami and the gorge is full of cars and screaming people trying to get their kids up and out of this unexpected canyon and stop to think for a moment what it would be like to be clutching your toddler to you as you scramble up what might be an escape when your child says, "Mommy (or Daddy), look," and you turn and there about twenty-five feet away is a flaming wall of water moving too fast for you to outrun it. Of course, you won't be around to participate in the class-action lawsuit that even now is taking aim at Chevron and whomever else it can blame for the negligence that sends this flaming wall of water right down 680 through Walnut Creek into Alamo, Danville, San Ramon, Dublin and into Pleasanton.

To be clear, the gorge that was 680 actually goes into the bay itself, and as the bottom of the gorge is at a lower elevation than the level of the water, well, it should be pretty clear that even without the tsunami, things were bad. If you've ever built a sandcastle and watched the tide come in to destroy it, you have some idea of what occurs.

Power is out in a lot of areas. Footage of Fukushima and everything that happened in Japan doesn't begin to approach what occurs here.  680 is largely gone. 580 exists in chunks. Roads at sea-level in the 510 and 925 are flooded. BART is broken. Silicon Valley is entirely submerged. No sea-level servers were prepared for a tsunami. Nobody was prepared. FEMA, being FEMA, is already poised to fuck it up worse by "helping" us.

Livermore is not as badly hit because it's 500 feet above sea level. It's still bad, though. And the water levels are rising.  We don't know where our neighbors are, and Veronica and I haven't been to the store in a week when the quake strikes. I've been waiting for a check from a voiceover job and it was supposed to come today or tomorrow.  The only things we have in the pantry are some jars of vinegar, some pasta, a few cans of corn, sardines in mustard sauce, a jar of dried Eucalyptus leaves and a box of Malt-O-Meal with moths in it.  We have one third of a large bag of dogfood left over for Max.

Power is intermittent here -- probably some lab-related perk -- so we suspect that the food in the fridge will not last terribly long.  We have carrots for Chauncey, and much of a bag of food for him. When that runs out, he can live off lemon and dandelion and jasmine leaves; there's even alfalfa growing in the yard because I scatter it after the Halloween party. But I suspect that, eventually, we may have to eat him. I promise that I will take Max down to the railroad tracks at the end of the street to hunt wild hare before we ever turn to eating the Ambassador from Rabbitania. He is, after all, an excellent source of fertilizer for crops; to eat him would truly be unwise. We shall see.

We've been watching TV when the power is on, watching from traffic cameras as the wall of flaming water and debris advanced. If this blog is disjointed, it's because I only write when the power is on. I'll see about smoothing it out later. We have briquets but no meat. A barbecue but no matches.

Veronica just walked in with a plastic bag of food from the bottom of the pantry.  My heart leapt.  Then I looked in the bag.  The first thing I saw: Dandy's Brand Oatmeal Coffee Cracker. Golden Oatmeal.  Coffee and oatmeal, good partner! more healthy.  The exterior features a picture of the crackers, front and back, detailing both Oatmeal and Coffee Cracker.  We have this food because of Sam Craig.  He delights in giving me bags full of food from Asian markets.  Every one of my birthdays for the past several years, and even on his own birthday back in 2012, Sam gives me these odd products.  Veronica tells me that the entire bottom of our pantry is full of these bags.

Underneath the crackers is a can of Rice Sweat, Taste So Good, You Scream!, with a label featuring the possibly terrified eyes of a 20-something Asian woman.  Nong Shim Octopus-flavored chips, 0g Trans Fat. Excellent news that I can enjoy the flavor of octopus and avoid Trans Fat at the same time.  Shirakiku Fermented Soybeans Mito Natto -- does not contain Seasoning Sauce, keep refrigerated. Oops. So much for the Mito Natto. A Taiwanese bottle of Plum fruit Vinegar. A 20 oz. can of Aroy-D Banana in Syrup. A gigantic can of Budweiser and Clamato. Hair Lump Sugar Treat, Why So Chunky? For SURPRISE! I honestly cannot figure out what's in this can, because the label features what looks like a bowl of tripe with a radish carved into a rose in the middle of it. Chaokoh Quail Egg in Brine; Ingredients: Quail Egg, Water, Salt, Citric Acid (as antioxidant), Tetrasodium Pyrophosphate (as firming agent). 

It would be nice if the Hayward Fault had a firming agent -- it's Serpentenite, which under pressure becomes talc; anyone who has ever slipped in baby powder on the bathroom floor knows how slippery talc is.  But maybe time was the firming agent, and maybe that's not so good.  Our complacency calcified. We always said we would buy earthquake supplies on the next paycheck.  

This can of Quail Egg in Brine is manufactured by Thep Padung Porn Coconut Co., Ltd. of Nakhonpathon, Thailand.  I wonder why they bother selling Quail Eggs in Brine when they could make a killing off Porn Coconuts.

Sirens in the distance, a helicopter overhead. The silence after the quake was deeper than the silence that followed the 1989 Loma-Prieta quake. The last time there was major movement on the Hayward Fault was 1868; it threw buildings into the air, they landed upside-down; I've seen the photos.  The 580-680 interchange is a burning lake and it's getting larger. The burning tide is still moving South, toward Sunol. It will eventually reach the intersection of Highway 84 and Sunol Road, where it will flow into the Sunol Water Temple Agricultural Park. That's a major source of water for San Francisco. It's the origin of the Secret Sidewalk above Niles frequented by teenage potheads from Livermore High. I don't think anything or anyone will stop the water.

There's an inscription at the Water Temple. It reads, "I will make the wilderness a pool of water and the dry lands springs of water. [Isaiah 41:18b] The streams whereof shall make glad the city. [Psalms 46:4] S.V.W.C. MCMX [Spring Valley Water Company 1910]"

How glad will the city be when its water is toxic refinery waste?

[This is obviously a well-written prank. I have several computer-savvy friends who could pull this off (A certain Mr. Hunt comes to mind. Fess up, B.!), but what strikes me as really odd is that whoever did this has my voice nailed perfectly. It's like watching my doppelganger get naked with Veronica: hot, but I want it to be me. Or at least I want to participate.)

So: who is my literary cuckold? You may expose yourself, zing, in the comments below or in a private e-mail. Until then, you may stay the fuck out of my blog. Changing password. Now.]

Oakenboard Youth Theatre

Realizing how ridiculously desperate most parents seem to be about getting their child on stage and showing the world that she or he is a star, Mitchellson Mitchellson decided twenty years ago to capitalize on the parents' dashed dream of personal stardom by forming the Oakenboard Tavern Theatre Festival Under The Stars Festival Theatre Youth Comrades.  This was when Mitchellson was undergoing some sort of personal communist revival as a reaction the the felling of the Berlin Wall.  He began wearing olive drabs and famously made the public announcement that, starting that year (1992), he would no longer draw a paycheck from Oakenboard Tavern Theatre Festival Under The Stars Festival Theatre.  This was met with astonishment by the board, staff, design team and actors of Oakenboard, because it was well known that Mitchellson drew a hefty paycheck; as his longtime creative partner Lew Wiwwy maintained the books, the precise amount was not known.  Lew is notoriously tight-lipped.  But with a mainstage that boasted 423 seats, at $35.00 a pop (remember, this was 1992, that was a lot of money back then, particularly for a quasi-regional community theatre in the far, far East Bay suburbs), and with shows that -- owing to the proximity of no less than five retirement homes, two retirement communities, multiple schools attending every Wednesday matinee -- always sold out, Oakenboard made $14,805.00 on every performance.  How, exactly, they sold out, I'll get to in a minute.  For now, let's continue with math: two shows Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday, one show Thursday and Friday comes to eight performances a week; sold out, that means $118,440.00 income per week. With a six week run, that comes to $710,640.00 total income per production. Not counting possible extensions, remounts and their black box space -- I'm only calculating the money the mainstage brought in.

While they have cut back their season considerably in the last ten years, consider, now, that in 1992 they did eleven full mainstage productions per year. I know that's odd, the math is impossible: with a six-week run, that becomes 66 weeks. Well, Mitchellson Mitchellson decided that Oakenboard Tavern Festival Theatre Under The Stars Festival Theatre was going to outdo all its competitors (by which he meant Theatreworks, ACT and Berkeley Rep -- a comparison at which those theatres still chuckle) by doing eleven shows per season.  That's two more shows per season than the far more manageable (and sane) number of eight or nine shows per season.  When he announced this sometime around 1988, the audience actually stood up and cheered.  Mitchellson was charismatic that way.  Sometimes, he still is.  But he could make hundreds of people, many of whom were veteran pilots of WWII, engineers, physicists from the Labs in Trevarno, Livermore and Tesla -- people with math skills, I'm saying -- Mitchellson could make these people believe that there were 66 weeks in a year. The audience and, apparently, the board of trustees, swallowed this eleven-shows-per-season idea hook, line and sinker.  

The staff and designers were infinitely (and silently) practical and pragmatic about Mitchellson Mitchellson's astounding announcement.  They all knew, instantly, what would come.  Every stage manager's inner calendar immediately went into overdrive, calculating and calibrating until -- eventually -- its gears jammed and the tension built and the calendar exploded with a great big cuckoo-clock Ragnarök.  To stage managers who for years had dealt with Mitchellson Mitchellson's increasingly unstable emotional state, his night-and-day changes of schedule, changes of temperament, changes of show lineup, his sudden mid-rehearsal re-casting (no explanation, ever, because Mitchellson believes an artist never explains himself), this inner cuckoo apocalypse was the sound of blissful release.  Because they understood.  Mitchellson's season was impossible.

With fourteen extra weeks per season, this meant that the 1988 season would no longer end in December with Mitchellson's celebrated production of A Christmas Carol [wholly plagiarized from ACT's production via grainy VHS bootleg, to which Mitchellson was utterly faithful -- even in his misunderstandings brought about by static and rolling picture: blizzard! Earthquake! Tsunami?], which he insisted on running through Christmas right up to New Year's Eve (with a gala NYE party afterward, at which all cast members were required to appear in costume  and in character, injuries or personal lives notwithstanding; one Scrooge was fired and banished from Oakenboard for having been overheard whispering to his wife that he was miserable from a sprained ankle sustained on Mitchellson's "daring" raked stage -- the only daring thing about it was the extreme angle of the incline and the fact that someone -- guess who? -- felt that insurance was a waste of money for a non-profit theatre).  Instead, the season would end fourteen weeks later, on April 9, 1989. Which, of course, meant that the next season would be ending one year and fourteen weeks later on July 15, 1990. The next season after that would end on October 20, 1991. The next would end on January 26, 1992.  This cycle was going to continue until some ancient Mayan appeared to correct the calendar with ancient Mayan magic, because that's what it would take to get Mitchellson to change his mind.

So stubborn, in fact, was Mitchellson Mitchellson, that he insisted on sticking to his original plan for the 1988 season, just cramming in two more shows underneath it; this meant that there was a show rehearsing while A Christmas Carol performed, so that it would be ready to open the Wednesday following New Year's Eve, requiring rehearsals on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.  How did he get away with this egregious abuse of actors' time?  Simple: while he did start with Equity actors, he eventually lost them all because of his stupid schedule; he recast the entire show with non-Equity understudies and newbies, maintaining that the audience was so old that they wouldn't know the difference.

Most of these actors, being both new and/or not professional (by which I mean unequipped mentally and emotionally for the rigors of constant theatrical "employment"), did not have the chops to survive such a schedule.  Injuries increased.  Morale dropped. The quality of the shows began to flag.  The audience and, eventually, the critics, noticed.  Oakenboard began to lose money.

There was a time, friends, when Oakenboard really was good at what they do.  I promise you.  It wasn't that long ago.  Before Mitchellson's brilliant sixty-six week season scheme, they really did sell out every performance.  Sure, they did the same family blockbusters in an unending and only slightly varied pattern (Annie, HMS Pinafore, Oklahoma, HMS Pinafore, Oliver!, HMS Pinafore, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, HMS Pinafore, The Wizard of Oz, HMS Pinafore, The Music Man, HMS Pinafore, A Christmas Carol and HMS Pinafore), but they sold out. Which is saying something.  

Mitchellson Mitchellson did not see the connection between his grueling schedule and the loss of quality.  He always assumed that he was working with professionals, and he demanded a performance to match his assumptions.  Meanwhile, word had gone out among the Equity actors in the Bay Area: do not approach or deal with Oakenboard. Repeat: do not approach or deal with Oakenboard.  Mitchellson Mitchellson, ever deaf to any but his own voice or Lew's, went blithely about the business of single-handedly destroying the theatre he'd built.

Which is precisely what the stage managers knew would happen when they calculated his schedule.  It's also why they were all four of them completely gung-ho about making sure it happened precisely as Mitchellson wanted it.  For the next four years, those four stage managers ran every single moment of that theatre like clockwork.  Every available space was used for rehearsals, Mitchellson was run ragged with their incessant pestering that he be on time -- they even began giving different calltimes to the actors and Mitchellson so that he would actually arrive when he was supposed to.  When he began to figure that out, they started making actors ferry him about in their cars, in one case making sure they cast the same actor in every single show for two years running, so that he would drive Mitchellson everywhere he needed to be.

Mitchellson Mitchellson fell into disrepair along with his theatre; shoulders stooped, belly sagging, unshaven, unkempt, temples rapidly greying, he became depressed. He began to identify with the oppressed people of the Soviet Union.  He even -- and this is true -- began hoarding toilet paper.  Some say he stopped wiping altogether, and that it may be a habit he has yet to resume.  

It was in this state of deep mental and physical exhaustion that he devised the Oakenboard Tavern Theatre Festival Under The Stars Festival Theatre Youth Comrades.  Touted as a superb opportunity for the youth of the region to learn the art and craft of theatre from the very best the Bay Area had to offer, it was in fact Mitchellson Mitchellson's desperate attempt at grabbing more money for the theatre.  Classes would run for two weeks, beginning immediately (he had, as yet, no staff to teach the classes), at a price of $900.00 per student.  Five classes each, running from 4:00 pm to 6:00 pm every weekday, with 30 students per class.  That was the plan.  Never mind that there was no room, no time, no staff and no curriculum.  Those were details.  What mattered was the math.  Numbers are powerful.  Show a group of otherwise intelligent adults a string of numbers, tell them it means something, and they'll sign on to just about any idea.  This is what happened when Mitchellson met with the board after his big announcement. The reason they asked to meet with him -- something they almost never did -- was simple: Mitchellson had followed his announcement of no-more-paycheck with the announcement that his entire staff, designers, crew, and all future casts would be doing the exact same thing.  The silence that descended over the gala that night was so thick and heavy that even the injured actors had stopped whimpering.

Here's a little secret about non-Equity community / regional theatre, for those of you who don't know: everyone gets paid except the actors. Director, stage manager, assistant stage manager, designers, crew: all paid. Actors: not paid.  Or, if the theatre is super generous: a stipend of about $250 - $500.00.

Here's a little secret about non-Equity actors that non-Equity actors don't know: they will work for dog shit. They actually think they will get noticed in a dog-and-pony production of Godspell playing in the benighted hinterlands of the farthest suburbs.  In the backs of their minds, everything they sacrifice for their art will be worth it when they land that role on Broadway.  Do they audition in New York?  No.  They stay here.  Mitchellson Mitchellson knows this.  He capitalizes on it.  

Some people thought maybe he was trying to get the board to fire him with his unilateral decision to refuse pay for the entire company.  When the board convened an impromptu meeting with Mitchellson in the dressing rooms, DQ happened to be back there doing laundry.  She overheard them talking and climbed up onto the dryer to peek through the hole they've never patched from the errant cannon ball of 1982's Cyrano (yes, live cannons; yes, in an indoor theatre).  What she saw was Mitchellson writing on a mirror with a marker. What he wrote was 30 x $900.00 x 5 x 33 = $4,445,000.00, then he pointed at each number in turn, saying, "Students, per student, number of classes, number of sessions, how much we make. I'm saving us an entire year of expenses, except for royalties and concessions. And I'm making us over four million dollars. I'd say that's worth a raise."

Mitchellson Mitchellson capped the pen, put it in his pocket and walked out of the theatre. Nobody saw him for six weeks. Several predicted the end of the Oakenboard Tavern Festival Theatre Under The Stars Festival Theatre, but then phone calls began coming in from parents wanting to register their kids for classes. They'd heard bad things about the cult in Pleasanton and were relieved that Mitchellson Mitchellson was in charge at Oakenboard's school. (Yes, someone actually said that. Laurie, veteran stage manager, saved that answering machine message for years. Made an MP3 of it recently. Keeps it among her playlist, on shuffle, so it pops up to delight her out of the blue.)  

The classes for the first four sessions filled up.  Resumes began arriving from potential instructors.  The staff organized things as best they could (which meant better than if Mitchellson had been there to supervise), and on the very first day of the very first class, Mitchellson Mitchellson walked into the rehearsal space, plunked down his tattered olive messenger bag near the piano, and addressed an anxious crowd of thirty-five eager teens and tweens:

"Most of you are worthless. You will never amount to shit. There is maybe one of you who could make it professionally, but if you had a chance you would already be working in New York. You're here to learn about theatre, and your parents hope you'll be a star. You will not be a star. You will work your ass off and you will fail. Unless you can prove me wrong."

Every single one of the thirty-three sessions of the first year of Oakenboard Tavern Theatre Festival Under The Stars Festival Theatre Youth Comrades filled that week. Remember, people had money back then and this is a wealthy suburb. Was a wealthy suburb. Could still be considered wealthy, by comparison to, say, West Oakland, where there is a trapeze school but no theatrical academy of which I am aware. If there is, it's not full of grinning, chirpy rich kids all determined to prove themselves the absolute best actor the great Mitchellson Mitchellson has ever seen.

People say a lot of things about him.  But he was clever.  With that one little speech, with seven lines, with one small paragraph, Mitchellson Mitchellson had secured the most psychotically loyal chorus and supporting actors any theatre has ever seen.  In a mostly white suburb.  In the far, far East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area. Near some national labs and a town nobody can find.  In the shadow of Mt. Diablo.  In the shadow of Mt. Hamilton. In the Oakenboard Tavern Theatre Festival Under The Stars Festival Theatre Youth Comrades.

For free.

Integrity

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Popcorn & Perception

I love to go to the movies. For me, this is Church. I'm serious about that. I deeply need to go to the movies at least once a week, and I would go to the movies every night if I could. I love to watch movies. I absolutely love them. I even love terrible movies; there's something so amazing about a film that some idiot worked very hard on and thought might turn out good, but that turns out (to anyone other than the filmmaker, perhaps) to be not quite what the filmmaker had planned.

I was at an informal production meeting last Wednesday, when I referenced my first feature film and my feeling that it was not successful. The entire table, all theatrical professionals, chorused immediately variations upon this theme: What are you talking about?! It was a huge success!

I confess: I was baffled. Truly baffled.  I directed the film and I had not heard it was a success.  It is possible that they were getting their information from somewhere exceptionally odd, but all of them were saying the same thing.  So the mystery is: was it a huge success? If so, why haven't I heard anything about this success? If not, why do people think it was a success?

Still baffled.

Piece Pricing and Price Piecing, the price of peace.

Several years ago I worked for a crooked theatre academy in Dublin, CA. I left when I began to smell smoke and found employment at the construction company owned by the parents of former students. While so employed, I built price sheets -- spreadsheets of exactly what each piece of work performed in a given construction site would be worth. This is what is known as 'piece work': where a guy gets paid however much for each room of crown molding he installs, or for each cabinet or whatever. There are many differing opinions on the value of piece pricing vs. hourly wages. Frankly, I come down squarely on the side of piece pricing, and I would feel the same way if I were a skilled construction worker, and here's why: it seems to me that I would be more motivated to skillfully complete as many pieces per day as I could, so that I can take home enormous paychecks (crown molding, for example, is extremely lucrative this way). Were I working for an hourly wage, it would not matter how many rooms I complete per day, I'm still getting a paycheck. This is going to lead to a team of unmotivated, bored, lazy workers; I don't want to be on that team. When workers are unmotivated, bored and lazy, management gets angry and starts penalizing the group for the actions (or lack thereof) of the individual. This leads to grievances, disgruntled employees, rage, "accidents" and accidents.

While I was very thankful for that job and truly enjoyed working for that company, I auditioned for Oliver! at PCPA and, by February of 2006 I was driving between Santa Maria and Livermore on a weekly basis, rehearsing the role of Bill Sykes at PCPA as I performed Kodaly in She Loves Me at the now-defunct CTA/Crossroads Theatre in Walnut Creek. For playing the role of Bill Sykes, I was actually paid, for the first time in my life, over $1,000.00 to be in a play. Perspective: in 2006, I was 33. So, at age 33 I was finally paid over a grand to do what I do for a living. Think about this. Since 2003, we've been paying rent that has always been more than a grand. So, at any given time since 2003, Veronica has always been paying more of the rent than I have. Sure, there were times when I paid more or all of it. But most of the time, she's paid more. And sure, from 2003 to 2011, I paid for all of our Internet access. But the rent is far larger. So, clearly, if it were not for Veronica and her generosity, I would have nowhere to live and nothing to eat. Financially, I am a complete loser.

If she ever reads this blog (which she will probably only do if I bug her about it, which, in this case, I will not), Veronica is going to be very angry with me about this; she doesn't like it when I write about money or post things on Facebook about how I would have come to see Ain't Misbehavin' if I could afford to fill the gas tank for a 120-mile round trip to Suisun City when I'm not making any money on the travel. Veronica doesn't want me to talk about our financial situation; she wants us to be proudly silent as we starve and shiver. She doesn't even want to ask family for help with our wedding. This is why we will probably not get married this year. Frankly, knowing what kind of wedding we both want (it will cost about $10,000.00, not including the dress which, oh Christ, I have no idea ...), I cringe at the depressing yet realistic options facing us: drive-thru Las Vegas or local Justice of the Peace.

The fact is that it's amazing I can survive as a non-union actor in the SF Bay Area. Last month I turned down an offer to play Koko in The Mikado for $300.00; more asshole me for not turning it down the moment I learned the amount; it would have cost me more in gas just to get to rehearsals.

Last week, I was offered the Captain in Anything Goes at The Willows. It only paid $500.00, and I knew I couldn't make that work financially; I was told to name an amount that could work. Expecting them to make a counter offer, I said $370./week (the Equity minimum for that space). I'm non-equity, but that's the high end where I was starting what I thought would be negotiations. I should have made that clear in my e-mail, because the response was, basically, "Ooh, sorry, no, we can't afford that. But thanks! Bye!", only much nicer. So now I feel like the Supreme Asshole of the Universe for appearing to demand vast sums of money from starving little companies.

This week, I was offered the chance to direct The Sound of Music for Solano Youth Theatre, up in Fairfield. It would have paid over twice what I made playing Bill Sykes for PCPA. I have previously been Lead Director for their vast three-pronged productions of The Wizard of Oz and Thoroughly Modern Millie, and was director of the Vallejo Cast of Annie while playing Oliver Warbucks in the Mainstage (adult) cast of the same production. This was back before Solano Community College cut funding for the Solano Youth Theatre, prompting SYT's move to Vacaville. Withholding details, I can only say that I am only now getting over severe long-term stress-related health issues that stem directly from stress experienced while working with SYT, and I could not accept the job if I wanted to continue to heal. I said as much to the truly lovely person who offered me the job and I have not heard back.

I am almost 39 years old, I have a BFA in Theatre from the prestidigitatious Boston Conservatory and I haven't been able to pay my half of the rent since ... July? August? This is all very amusing on a collaborative Chekhov/Woody Allen level because last year I directed a feature film that had international distribution before it was even completed.

And I made a whopping $3,000.00 on that job.

Oh, sure, I've got 3% on the back end -- but that only comes after the producers have paid off everyone else they need to pay off. It doesn't matter that I turned my house upside down to give them three free locations, that I got my neighbor Larry to vacate his studio for a weekend to get them a fourth free location. I am only worth $3,000.00 and a 3% I'll probably never see.

"But Edward, how can you say you'll never see that 3%?"

Simple: I just don't believe I'll ever see a dime of it -- or, if I do, it will be such an incredibly small amount when compared to the time and effort I put into the film, that all the ridiculous financial stupidness I've displayed in the past will pale in comparison to the deep and soul-staining chagrin I will feel as I skulk into my credit union to deposit the tiny check that was the beacon with which I convinced Veronica that the utter disruption of her home for about a year was, eventually, going to be worth it.

It seems that, in the eyes of local companies, I am simply not worth what I believe my talent and experience should earn. And telling them what I believe I should be paid is not even going to get me a counter-offer, just a polite no-thank-you. This is deeply alarming.

The simple fact is, I cannot work for less than a living wage -- and these companies want me to work for less than minimum wage. People say it's the economy, but the economy was booming in 2006 and at PCPA I made less than I did six months later playing Fagin in Oliver! in Idaho. And, now that I think about it, Idaho got me an hotel room for almost my entire stay. So it's not the economy. It's me. It's whether or not I'm willing to work for shit pay.

I'm not willing to work for shit pay. And this is why I'm not working. It's the equivalent of what I hear from everyone who joins the union: the work dries up. Only in this case, I'm causing the work to evaporate by my refusal to work for free and not even have enough to cover my gas.

It would be lovely if one could do piece work in theatre -- paid for the complexity of the role, per completed performance. That would be very interesting. Totally impossible, given the rules and the blah blah blah of it all, but very interesting. The first thought that comes to mind is that theatres would go broke -- more broke -- with this plan. The second thought is that, if they set the piece pricing for smaller roles extremely low ... hell, if they set everyone's piece pricing extremely low, they might even be able to make money. This is probably why there's a union for actors.

Meanwhile, I must find truly gainful and artistically fulfilling employment in the arts. There are jobs out there in corporate America that might hire me, but frankly my non-theatrical résumé is extremely sparse and they do not know what to make of a theatrical résumé. In my opinion, bringing a theatrical résumé to a non-theatrical job interview is tantamount to arriving in costume. I see many talented actors I know who have sold out and have day jobs in cubicles. I would go mad. More mad.

So: every day, I write. Every night, I work on my secret project. Sometimes I blog, out of sheer self-indulgence -- though I must say it is extremely gratifying to read comments on my blogs. I wish Blogger would alert me that there are comments. I had no idea until I went and looked for comments. Maybe there's a way to set Blogger to tell me when there's a comment, but Blogger is confusing at best. In the meantime, it's after 1 am and I'm putting a lot of effort into something that doesn't pay me a dime.

Big fucking surprise there.

Shouting at a Rabbit

In Livermore, California, every night around ten o'clock, a man carefully closes his living room door, then moves a hard-backed wooden chair near the living room closet. Placing some electrical equipment on the chair, he opens the closet door, and, connecting a device which rests therein to the equipment on the chair, he enters the closet and closes it behind him.

In the closet are a large variety of overcoats. These date from various periods throughout the 20th Century, the earliest being something French from after World War I. There's a white polyester suit he purchased so that a costumer wouldn't freak out when she bought the wrong item in preparation for a one-man show he did in 2009. That one-man show earned him a BATCC nomination for Best Actor in a Musical. The award went to a giddy twink from a show at the Nude Conservatory. He thinks about this as he adjusts his chair in the closet. There's the suit he bought so that he would not have to wear it, and here he is in a closet in Livermore. Somewhere in SF there's that handsome young twink, definitely not in a closet -- literal or figurative -- and far more likely to win a BATCC Best Actor in a Musical award; his looks, his youth, his nude cock onstage ... all of these things are things that our aging, slightly pudgy protagonist did not have in his favor in that one-man show in 2009. Besides, how do you justify full-frontal male nudity in a one-man Bluegrass musical about Jesus? More accurately, how do you justify that outside of the Nude Conservatory Theatre?

The white polyester suit is in plastic; who knows, he may need it dust-free at a moment's notice. Though why it's so close to the door he cannot guess. He thought he'd put it deeper into the closet, to hide his shame at owning something so very very bright bright white. It's as though the cast of Uptown Saturday Night were in a Crest commercial. He has to be careful not to touch the plastic over the suit while he's using the device in the closet. Worse still, next to the suit is a wrinkled tan shirt which he often accidentally nudges after snaps to reset. He has to be careful of that, as well. Thankfully, he recently took a cozy brown fake-fur blanket off the couch and hung it up over the clothing rod; it seems to be doing the trick, and it helps keep garments where he shoved them when moving the chairs and the little side table into the closet.

The device is on. He can tell because of the waves on the equipment in the room behind him; he can also tell because of the little red light glowing near the top of the white ball that makes up the bulk of this coveted device. Without it, he would not be able to do what he's doing tonight. He would not be able to get done what he feels he's too late getting to. He worries, now, every time he's doing something not related to his goal. It hasn't affected his sleep, yet, but that's because every other night he takes a melatonin with a Valerian root and has the deepest, oddest dreams ever.

Last night, he dreamed he found a secret and free room at a hidden Whole Foods headquarters: the room was protected by security but you could get in if you knew it was there and you knew the password and something about gardening. It was a very pleasant room, full of seeds. Full of root stock. Full of all kinds of books on gardening, and baskets of obscure, useful items craved by the home herbalist, the amateur alchemist, the clandestine potato farmer and the lonely pumpkin enthusiast. At a large communal table in the main area, lots of nice people were studying gardening and reading books and talking about it; the place felt like a pocket of delightful secret normalcy in a world where too many people seem to not care where their cigarette butts end up and why. The seeds, the books, the time in the room, the root stock, the advice or training one could have -- all of it was free. If you knew about the room, if you brought knowledge to share and the passion to help others grow wondrous gardens, that was price enough. There were carrot root stocks -- you'd buy this slice of withered orange thing and put it in the ground or a planting pot, and carrots would grow from it like an aspen grove. He felt like he'd come home. He felt like the luckiest man alive. He never wanted to leave again, and he couldn't wait to get started.

In the living room closet with the door closed on the cord that leads to the equipment on the wooden chair, he sighs. Burps. Sips some water from a refilled water bottle he refilled in spite of dire warnings from some famous singer not to refill water bottles. It's convenient to have a water bottle in the closet, and an open glass might spill. There are other solutions, but he's nervous about time and focused on the task at hand. He sighs again. The task at hand. Christ, what a fucking task it is. He shifts to the right on the chair, takes a pillow from the floor to his right and places it under his right elbow. He leans forward slightly, to the right. This is how he's been doing it every night since he finally got the configuration right, once he hung the blanket up and got the device. It's left him with an odd crick in his back, on the right, between the shoulder blade and his spine. He'll see the Chiropractor, as soon as he has time.

He farts. It's satisfying. He laughs because of the device.

A sound now, on the other side of the wall from the closet -- in the neighbors' side. The owner's side. There's a cubbyhole in the closet that goes under their stairs. It's full of Christmas decor and more coats and several prints. They only have one thing hanging on the wall (it's a limited original Edward Gorey print, she got it for him for Christmas several years ago, and he loves it), everything else has ended up in the closet because the living room keeps being used as a location for film shoots. He should charge for this, but he's usually in the films and that will eventually lead to money, right? Maybe. These days, it feels an awful lot like maybe not.

The sound comes again and he realizes someone is there, in the foyer of this grand old house; someone is there not ten feet away from him but on the other side of walls and stairs. He hears a creak, a slight jingle of keys or maybe little bells, then a thump. A click. The lock of the front door has been engaged after the door has slowly closed? Perhaps. Perhaps not. He turns off the light, because noise is louder in the dark. He stands slightly, to see through the little windows in the closet if there's anyone on the front porch. It's empty. But the foyer is not. Someone is slowly, step by step, moving up the stairs.

"I think someone's there," he says aloud. Louder than he intended. The footsteps stop on the stairs, to his right, not even on the landing over his head yet. He waits, breathing lightly.

The footsteps continue. Whoever it is, they are being very quiet. Clearly sneaking in after ... Eleven? Ten-thirty? He's left his phone and watch and everything else electronic outside the closet. Just in case. It's taken him weeks to get it this good, and having anything screw it up now would be devastating to his project. He glances at his left hand as he listens to the footsteps going across the landing over his head, then heading up the stairs directly above him and quietly into the upstairs hall; on his hand is written the following curious phrase: "Boobs -- Make Good Point, pronto -- nipples probably not." It's a mysterious phrase indeed, full of meaning, full of flavor and depth. He muses for a moment on boobies. Titties. Funbags. Nipples. Perkies. Puffies. Yum-yums.

Shaking himself out of his reverie, he realizes the house is silent again. He does not know how long he's sat there like that, but he knows that someone somewhere is writing this down as he does it and it feels surreal, as though he is seeing his life on a page and a stage as he lives it, at the same time all of this he currently experiences is exactly what he saw in his mind's eye during a prolonged moment of déjà vu at a crosswalk near the Lawrence Hall of Science as they went back to their car when they found out that admission was cash only. Who does that, in this day and age? Cash only? What the fuck? If you're in a booth at the farmer's market, okay -- but the Lawrence Hall of Science? He suspects that the same people who vote for nude twinks over seasoned actors are in charge of the admission at the Lawrence Hall of Science. He briefly considers returning and gaining entry by showing them his cock. He doubts he would gain entry, or at least gain the kind of entry he'd like -- or even get into the building. Twinks get away with everything.

Leaning forward, he takes a deep breath, clears his throat and takes another deep breath. He burps again, shifts in his seat, takes a slower deep breath, and begins.

It takes about 40 minutes.

The dog doesn't snore tonight -- or at least, he doesn't hear it snore.

But the rabbit. The fucking rabbit! Revenge, perhaps, for having his little rabbit balls cut off, the rabbit begins loudly chewing on wood and cardboard in his hutch about twenty-five minutes into tonight's portion of the project. He -- our protagonist of the slowly silvering temples, who gets teary eyed at stormy sunsets and who plans to walk 2,500 miles alone in 2013/2014 -- not the rabbit -- opens the closet door and says, firmly,

"Chauncey, shut up."

All noise ceases. The dog, on the couch, looks uncertain; riveted by his Alpha's tone, it's clear he thinks he's being reprimanded. As long as he isn't snoring, that's fine with Alpha. He -- Alpha, not the dog -- closes the door and continues tonight's work. Three minutes later, the rabbit starts drinking his water, the loud steel ball-bearing in the water tube clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clanking with the same rhythm he -- our alphatagonist, not the rabbit -- imagines the rabbit would use were his balls intact and were he in the presence of an adventurous girly rabbit. He, you know which one, opens the closet door and raises his voice,

"Chauncey, stop it."

Silence. The dog is frozen, about to get off the couch. Shutting the door, our self-indulgent closeteer begins again and is several minutes closer to completion when the rabbit begins loudly gnawing a particularly sonorous portion of his hutch which seems to amplify the sound as though the rabbit were devouring timpani. He opens the door again and this time shouts,

"Chauncey: shut the fuck up!"

Silence. Broken minutes later by more odd rabbit noises.

"Chauncey! Fuck off, man!"

Silence, then tap dancing.

"Chauncey, what the fuck are you doing?!"

Silence. Silence. Rabbit brass band marches through playing The Liberty Bell.

"Fucking asshole rabbit!" he shouts from within the closet. He can't lunge out of there, he might knock the device over or pull down the thick blanket. He carefully extricates himself from the chair of big pillows, gingerly angles around to the door without slipping on the absorbent floor blanket or the cord from the device, jarnks the door open and stomps -- stepping over multiple cords -- past the wooden chair and the coffee table and the fireplace to the little gate which separates canine from leporine and leans on it, looking the frozen and intent rabbit directly in his big, dark left eye.

"Chauncey. What the fuck are you doing, man? What the fuck are you doing? Shut the fuck up. I'm serious. Just shut the fuck up! I have work to do, and you're fucking me up you little shit!"

So saying, he opens the little gate, steps through and puts a dried branch of Christmas tree (Noble? Douglas? he can never remember) in the door of the hutch.

"Here, you want something to chew? Chew on this you little fuck!"

Stepping out, closing the gate, he returns to the closet and this night's work.

Remarkably, the rabbit is silent for the last 20 minutes or so. The dog still looks a little scandalized, but some dog loves will erase that soon enough.

Sometime around 12:24 am, he finishes. He sighs. He get room tone. The rabbit is still silent.

Tonight in Livermore, California, a man shouted at his rabbit from the closet. Every night for the next several weeks, should you happen by after midnight, you will hear this man. Rabbits don't give a fuck what you say to them. They're going to chew what they want, when and how they please. They're going to spill their bowls of food ten minutes after you refill them and eat the legs of the hutch instead. They're going to stay silent all day, but the moment you're banished from the bedroom for rancid garlic farts and have just fallen asleep on the couch that was old in 1997, all rabbits on earth know you need silence and those cute little fuckmooks are going to chew, and drink, and prance their God-damned Rabbit Prances!

There's a man in Livermore racing against the clock. He's losing his patience, his sleep, and not enough weight as he would like. And what's he doing about it?

Shouting at a rabbit.

Middlestage Stage Competition Stagefest

I was invited to participate as an adjudicator in a theatre competition for the Middle Stage Fest in Sacramento on Saturday, February 11, 2012. I went to bed earlyish because I had to be up at 5 so I would be early to the Fest. Leaving the house by about 6:10, the roads were generally clear and the drive was uneventful. I did not stop for coffee on the way, preferring to arrive in a timely manner. I arrived at 7:30-ish, and a be-vested man in a backwards fedora told me that Ms. Elder was in her classroom. I was more interested in finding a toilet, so I elected to meet Ms. Elder, if ever at all, later in the morning.

My companion for the day, and the fellow who talked me into this, was Chris Guptill (Managing Director of SCT). I taught a very basic stage combat class for his lady's Pleasant Hill Middle School classes last year, and my Pied Piper effect has her convinced I should share my mesmerizing theatrical patter more widely. I accepted because he offered me gas money. See how easy I am? Such a gas whore. I should dictate foreign policy.

After the extremely disorganized check-in (I was one of several whose name had been submitted but for whom there was no information), there was a rambling, disorganized orientation for adjudicators. After that, Guptill bought me a coffee and we wandered the campus, searching for the room to which we were consigned for the bulk of the day. It was during our perambulations that I was accosted by a group of squealing tweens who had been the extremely lucky recipients of my brief but blindingly-bright tenure directing with Solano Youth Theatre. Brief because while serving as lead director of Thoroughly Modern Millie and The Wizard of Oz, I worked mostly with the Adult Cast, only fully directing a Youth Cast during Annie in Autumn 2010/Winter 2011. As usual, my habit of treating them like they will understand the basic concepts of acting led to my cult figure status among these young theatre geeks, so any time they see me somewhere, they screech my name like friendly harpies and swoop out of nowhere demanding hugs. Eew.

Allow me to digress for a moment on how to teach acting to kids. It's really simple, and can be boiled down to four easy steps:

1. Speak to them as though they are adults (family-friendly, always, but with direct respect and the expectation of excellence); to be clear: DO NOT BABYTALK OR MOLLYCODDLE THEM. Filtering theatre through babytalk makes it difficult to direct. Honestly, the habit of babytalking young actors is detrimental in the long run because it leads to an inability to communicate in a direct and open fashion with adult actors. I've worked with directors who had done so much youth theatre that they could not countenance my proactive, professional responses to their direction. Communication and performance become stymied as a result, and one finds oneself scratching at imaginary diaper rash.
2. Clearly communicate your expectations and establish and maintain the consequences of failure to meet said expectations; to be clear, consequences should come in five steps: 1. Verbal Warning; 2. Removal from Activity; 3. Note Home; 4. Meeting With Parents; 5. Expulsion (absolutely no refunds, ever, no matter what). Having the kids act these all out on the first day is fun, informative, and makes certain they all know the rules. Stick to these rules. Never make an exception, even if you've only got three minutes left and you're almost done staging the scene.
3. Laughter is the absolute best teaching tool there is. If you're not funny, sorry: you're fucked. They will always like me better.
   
4. See Steps 1 through 3.

There it is: my secret in four easy steps. Of course, if you've got a funereal visage and you treat people like shit, these steps may not work well for you. Unfortunately, one of the long-term effects of my teaching is my having to constantly discourage hugs from excessively energetic future members of the 99%. I make a point of warning them about how difficult it is to make a living in theatre, how they must learn Excel and have other skills outside of theatre, and their eyes always glaze over. But I see relief and clarity wash over the faces of the parents and the first spark of adoration in their eyes as well. Which is a plus when they're MILFy.

The last thing I left this gaggle of brace-faced theatre enthusiasts was, "Do the dishes tonight, and always remember: your parents gave up their dreams for you." I think it hit home.

Guptill and I had to ask the assistance of a somewhat pear-shaped young man in old-fashioned (non-digitized) camouflage; he showed us where L-1 is and we entered to find some tweens and a couple of Moms sitting a little awkwardly, waiting. There were apparently two different versions of the schedule. Nobody told them they were supposed to be somewhere else first.

Three other adjudicators showed up presently, all of whom were in High School. Seriously. The majority of the adjudicators for this thing were in High School. And, as most High Schools teach Drama (not Theatre), and since most Drama Teachers are actually English or Spanish Teachers by training, almost nothing they say can be relied upon. Happily, the three HS adjudicators were generally well-trained, but the two boys had to actively fight the urge to give line readings or act it out for the younger actors. For those of you who don't know, line readings and acting it out for the actor are both temptations to which the unprofessional mediocritist gives in.

Guptill and I far outranked the other three, and as I am the only person on that campus that day or perhaps this decade who has directed an independent feature with international distribution, we automatically had more quiet oomph. So I allowed the three younger judges to give their notes first. The fellow to my immediate right, Jose, is very correct. He follows rules. He wants you to follow rules as well. I'll bet that he goes and tells if anyone breaks rules. I broke several rules that day, and broke wind at least thrice. Mmm, savory. Psyllium in my yogurt is really paying off.

The note Jose gives the most often, which is echoed by the other two young'uns, is that the tween actors need to make eye contact. But since this is for the Monologue portion of the Fest, I disagree. Here's why: it's weird when, in an audition, someone is looking directly into my eyes while showing me their work. It's a very uncomfortable feeling, very naked-in-a-bad-way. I always ask actors to move their eyes about four feet above my head. Pretty much anywhere as long as it's not me.

Finally, I have to mention to the actors -- because I've arranged it so that I am the last to give notes, even though I am second-from-the-left and right in the middle of the room -- that most directors and casting directors I know do not want you to look into their eyes; that eye contact is more for your fellow actors on stage, for the imaginary partner in your monologue, for the audience if appropriate; and that some casting directors want it because they need to see what you're like looking right into the camera.

Now that I've said this, it becomes part of the mantra for the day; it's sage advice and Guptill repeats it a couple of times himself. In the morning, we do two practice sessions with two separate groups of young actors: they give their monologues, we give our notes, then they move to a different room for more of the same from other adjudicators and we await a fresh batch. In the afternoon, two different groups of actors perform for us, but we give no notes -- instead we gauge their work on a form and submit it to the Teachers' Lunchroom for tallying. At the end of the day, students will be awarded Bronze, Silver or Gold medals. Everyone gets a medal. Even Eye Contact Jenny.

Jenny must have had some traumatic experience wherein a director screamed at her about eye contact; that, or she switched her eyedrops for crazy glue. She makes eye contact like her life depends on it. This is right before lunch, and I've just finished explaining to this class the thing about where to put their eyes because the last girl's gaze was bouncing around like an abbot in an abattoir. Jenny gets up and introduces her piece with the earnest sincerity of a theatrical true believer.

"Hello. [eye contact with every judge] My name is Jenny Diver and I will be performing a monologue entitled, For My Father, from the Monologue Teenbook Book of Teen Monologues for Girls. Thank you."

Then she turns and looks right at me. Bores her eyes through mine and into my brain and out the back of my skull. And this is her monologue:

"Happy birthday to me, Daddy. I'm fifteen today. I've wanted to tell you how much I love you for the longest time. I've wanted to tell you how much I loved the bracelet you got me when I was twelve, the ring you got me when I was thirteen, even the necklace I'm wearing today which I got just a year ago. A pearl necklace. From you, Daddy."

Already, I'm frozen in the wasteland of Cringe. She's so sincere, and she's not a bad actor. Maybe it will be over soon. I say nothing.

"What will you give me today, Daddy? I know you're different from other fathers. I know your gifts to me are special. I wear them because I know you love me. And because I know that there's two gifts you could give me that would change my life forever.
[Dramatic pause indicating new thought]
I also wear them to remind me that, someday, I have to get away. I wear the bracelet to cover the scars, Daddy, from when I first tried to get away from you. I didn't know then that suicide is against Jesus. So I wear the ring because in my heart I am married to Jesus, my true Father.
[Dramatic pause]
Jesus would never rape me, Daddy.
[Another dramatic pause as her tears fill up with eyes]
Jesus would never, Daddy. But you're not Jesus. I know that now. I counted the pearls on my necklace after you left my room on the night of my last birthday, Daddy. Thirty-six pearls; that's eighteen times two. Sometimes I feel like I'm two girls inside. Three more years until I'm eighteen, and can go on my own. Will I take both of me? Two girls, leaving you forever in three years. But not today. Today I'm two girls with one of two gifts coming to her. Which one will it be, Daddy?
[Long, long pause; someone claps, but it's not over yet. She's still staring at me. I'm afraid she has a knife.]
Will you give me my freedom?
Or another ...
[screams it:] ABORTION?! [we all jump]

I can't keep the grimace of discomfort off of my face, and I can tell Guptill has been watching me. I glance at him. He's chuckling as everyone applauds. Bastard.

Later, before I leave, I overhear one of the moms talking to one of the instructors, "Well, she wasn't supposed to do an original piece in the monologue rooms; I don't know if she'll be disqualified."

The intstructor says, "As long as the adjudicators didn't figure it out, her medal stands."

I almost stop to ask. But I've got a long drive home and on a certain level I just don't want to know. I'm on 99 South when the tears hit and I'm glad it's a sunny day because fog would have taken me off the road at that last turn.

If Jenny Diver's monologue was original, I hope it helped.

I hope she keeps doing theatre.

I hope she heals.