Eliza

She's here!  She's here!

(Finally.)

2:26 PM - 12 Comments - 13 Kudos - Add Comment

Update from the ends of the earth...

Life has been fairly busy lately...but then, when isn't it.  I just thought I'd check in and let all of you know that I'm still alive and kicking. 

The short Version:  Dirk knocked me up.  The season will soon be in full swing.  Zoe is smart and creative.  Dirk is gearing up to finish the summer children's series.  I'm puking my guts out, but will get the chance to act in the main season this year.  ---I'll be playing a fat girl and a pregnant girl (I know it is a stretch, but I think I can handle it.)  Dirk is in almost every play this season.  Zoe will be in Christmas Carol.  So, I guess the Fitzgerald clan is "representin'."  The cats are all doing well.  Not much more done on renovations to the house.  Things are good.

If you want to know more, I'll have to catch you after I get over my nausea.

(I'll try to be a little more vigilant about updating you in the grand sceme of things.)

Currently listening : The Electric Spanking of War Babies By Funkadelic Release date: 02 November, 1993

1:49 PM - 6 Comments - 5 Kudos - Add Comment

Trapped.
Current mood: numb
Category: Life

I'm trapped in a closet inside of myself (no, this is not some "struggling with my sexual identity thing".)  I feel my connection with the outside world drifting further and further away.  I'm not sure I remember exactly who I am inside.  I wonder if I'd recognize myself if I bumped into me.  I feel tethered and lost all at the same time.  If only I could see myself the way I really am. 

8:51 PM - 6 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Now playing...
Current mood: grateful

So, the season is underway at Kentucky Repertory Theatre.  Currently in production are Greater Tuna, the first of the trilogy involving the wacky people Tuna Texas; and The Gospel of Mark, a dramatic retelling of the stories from the book of Mark.

I'm now hard at finishing the design for The Merry Wives of Windsor and Lying in State.  Merry Wives, is a heavily conceptualized version of Shakespeare's play, being set in Mobile, AL in 1957.  Or rather, I should say, in the style of that era, but without any of the civil rights movement overtones.  I'm experimenting with a bold use of color based on the Chagall painting, I and the Village (my profile pic at the moment.)  I'm hoping by using familiar 1957 sillouettes, in super-saturated colors, it will clue in the audience that the world of the play is somewhere distinctly like our own, but somewhat different.  It will definitely push the show in a much more presentational style.  I hope it works.  (Pray for me!)

I figure, if nothing else, it will look cool...no really, I think it will be the least of everyone's worries.

You should come see it.  (What am I saying, no one ever comes to see a show in order to see the costumes.)  I know... I bitch and I bitch...

Anywhoo, I miss contact with the outside world.  Somebody give me a call or drop me a line or something.  It is few and far between that I remember what life is like outside of the theatre.

No, I do seem to remember a few things.  Zoe is starting a new school next week.  She's terribly excited.  We went to the back to school bash and all she wanted to do was to look around the library.  (I think she would have stayed all day if I had let her.)

I do hope she makes friends quickly.  (If I know her, I know she will.)

We moved here to make life better for all of us.  ...We're definitely getting there.  It is just going to take some time to work all the kinks out.

6:25 PM - 5 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

My love...
Current mood: ecstatic

I am so glad that I found my love...

I feel honored to get to spend the rest of my life with him.  He loves me so wholey and completely, I just don't know how to respond.  I love him from the core of my being. 

I love him for his faults, and in spite of them.  I love him because he sees me as I am, imperfect, tarnished.  

My love...  what else can I say? 

Currently listening : I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You By Aretha Franklin Release date: 20 June, 1995

9:08 PM - 2 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

I miss...
Current mood: transparent

people (i.e. not being invisible to the rest of the world.)

5:22 AM - 4 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Someone give me strength
Current mood: working

So it all starts back up today...the second job, classes, endless confusing schedules of how to shuffle the car and Zoe about in order to do all the things I need to do.  UGH. 
Hopefully, I can pull some sort of resignation out of my ass and accomplish something.

4:10 AM - 5 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Life is something to remember

Gran had another stroke today.  She fell in the backyard around 10:00 and nobody found her until around 4:30.  She had managed to pull herself to the back door.  That makes the third stroke in the past month.    She wouldn't go to the hospital, though I'm sure she's broken something this time. 
I can't really blame her.  There just really isn't much they can do anymore.  Her legs have hardened now.  I'm scared she will get gangrene.  She has a huge knot on her head and her elbow is about the size of a grapefruit.  She's bruised from head to toe.
I can't bring myself to tell her to keep fighting this time.  She really doesn't have much to live for, except for my own selfish reasons.  She's in pain.  I wouldn't want to put anyone through what she feels.  She's just waiting it out now.
Gran has always been a mother to me.  She's the only one of the family that really ever tried to help me or cared.  It is hard to have to let her go.  She taught me most of what I know in life.  Now I have to let her know that it is okay to give up the fight.
I love her.  I don't know how I'll ever get along without her.

7:21 AM - 3 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Responsibility to one's self
Current mood: drained

If only my life would allow me to take the time I would...
... take a relaxing bath, listen to some Carol King, and sing myself into a meditative sleep..
...take an extended sigh of relief and look around me to see the beauty that can exist in others.
...try to pay attention to my own needs both emotionally and physically.
...realize that I have to love myself before I can expect others to be able to love me back.
...revel in the joy Zoe brings to my each and every day.  I could drown in her precious little arms.
...begin to take the time to nurture my creativity, in words both written and painted across the wall.
...scream at Lake Michigan from the rocks on the 52nd street beach.
...learn to balance my life between my ambition, desire, and family.
...driive toward something in life rather than just exploring aimlessly.
...develop my business ideas and watch them come to fruition.
...make sure my goals are based on my needs rather than my own unrealistic expectations of myself.
...rise to the occassion, no matter how hard the struggle.
...realize that I am significant to myself and others.

I just get so tired from the struggle sometimes that I forget there must be a reason behind all the maddness.  Why do I do all of this in the first place?  It is easy to forget in the midst of the battle.  Maybe someday I'll value myself enough to put my own needs first.  Let's hope for my sanity that day is fast approaching.  I'm dwindling.  I'm afraid someday that all of me will wash away with the dirt and sweat, down the drain, and nothing will be left to start again.

10:32 PM - 3 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Someday...
Current mood: tired

Someday I'll slow down.  Someday I'll stop working all the time.  Someday I'll learn when to say no.  Someday I'll take myself seriously.  Someday I'll lighten up.  Someday I'll learn what is good for me.  Someday I'll care.  Someday I'll let people care for me.  Someday  I'll get out of this god forsaken state with what little inkling of sanity I have left.  Someday I'll stop calling myself crazy.  Someday I'll allow myself to live, instead of just surviving.  Someday I'll really let myself loose and stop comntrolling the urge to murder those around me.  Someday I'll learn to accept myself for who I am.  Someday I'll sit down and never get up again.  Someday I'll jump into Lake Michigan.  Someday I'll put my own feelings ahead of others'.  Someday I'll tell everyone to shove it.  Someday I'll learn to like myself.  Someday I won't care anymore.  Someday I'll lay in the bed and eat myself into oblivion.  Someday I'll forget that none of this matters and I'll die.
But, for now...I'm tired.  I guess, I'll just go back to work.

Currently listening : I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You By Aretha Franklin Release date: 20 June, 1995

9:10 AM - 3 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Rundown of KY Rep designs
Current mood: busy

Just in case anyone was looking to see one of the shows at KY Rep this summer, and were interested in knowing what they might be looking at...(not that anyone ever comes to see a show just to see the costumes.)

The Importance of Being Earnest

A period romantic farce set in 1895 London.  Plenty of misnomers and mistaken identity.

Costumes:  1895, La Belle Epoque  silks, lace, big hats,big hair, stays, buttoned boots, parasols, gloves, and petticoats  For the boys, top hats, tails, waistcoats, sack suits, boaters, and plenty of muffins

Shiloh Rules!

A dramatic creation of modern female civil war reenactors at the 1862 battle of Shiloh.  A tale of divided sides and the passion of the battle between real and experienced.

Costumes: 1862 and modern mix.  Corsets, layers of petticoats, big skirts, pointed boots, fitted bodices, aprons, destressing, uniformed soldiers, a park ranger, stetson hats, and lots of guns 

Philadelphia, Here I Come

A touching story of a boy on his last night in his homeland.  Strong ties bind him to his broken family and relationship he must leave behind to find his new life in America.

Costumes: 1960 Ireland.  Dark and tweady, with touches of humor throughout.  Multiple roles call for different looks.  Pay special attention to the green plaid dress in the first act, it belonged to Gran and has great sentimental meaning.

Macbeth

Blood, guts, witchcraft, and sex.  This is not your Daddy's Macbeth.

Costumes: Post-appocalyptic Scotland, sometime after the bomb.  Very mad max, leather, vinyl, rubber straps, buckles, metal work, salvaged pieces, tattoos, and stretch webbing, whips, cloaks, and utility kilts.

Dracula

Still to come, (opens in September.)

Jack and the Magic Wonder Beans

Childrens' show to open in October.

(In the meantime, I'll also be working to begin the WKU season: Inherit the Wind, Tartuffe, Ragtime, and some undisclosed forth mainstage show which I will be designing.)

Currently listening : Travelling Without Moving By Jamiroquai Release date: 14 January, 1997

7:10 AM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

So much to miss...
Current mood: restless

I miss Chicago.

Currently listening : Come Away with Me By Norah Jones Release date: 26 February, 2002

9:32 PM - 4 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

CAR WENT CRUMPLE
Current mood: gloomy

I was hit yesterday by a car coming from Cave City.  My car is crumpled.  I'm fine, just shaken.  So, I am very limited in my mobility at the moment, especially considering I need to drive to Horse Cave every day to get to work. Just to let you know that I might be calling you to catch a ride.
I guess it is all just my bad luck.  I'm a little nervous about the whole driving thing.  I'm sure it will be fine, just expensive.   Who knows what the world may bring next?  I fear this may be the end of my beloved "Tin Lizzy."  HHHUMPH.

(You may now take a moment of silence for the passing of the wrecker.  She's been sent to the farm.)

11:52 PM - 4 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Importance of Being Earnest
Current mood: accomplished

The Importance of Being Earnest opens Friday.  The costumes are just about done.  I have to say, this one is definitely worth seeing...especially the costumes.  I challenge anyone who cares to fifty personal brownie points for seeing the show.  Blood, sweat, and tears have gone into my work (don't worry, it has all been washed out.)  (Lauren, if you are reading this, the props look awesome, too.  Good luck on the lornette.)  Hope to see you there!    

4:55 AM - 2 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

I'm the sewing nerd...
Current mood: determined

...and I'm tired.

Five weeks, three shows, three periods, not much sanity left.

Pray for me.  Do a costume dance under the full moon.  Light some incense. 

Help me remember that there is life beyond my work.

6:04 AM - 4 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment