Another 8 Days Fly By...

BLOG WEEK (could it be 4??)

So let's talk about rehearsals: rock, rock, stone, pebble, rock. . .
This is normal. This is THAT TIME.
Besides the rotating accommodations I've had in the last two weeks and backstage dramas (comes with the territory), there have been mind-blowing moments onstage. Director Tony and I have had ongoing mind-melds, a look with no words, finishing sentences. Collaborator Alleluia arrives with mesmerizing, sensuous movements demo'ed by dancers Alex, Greg, Clarissa, and new addition, C.J. Night after night, or day before night, we witness lightbulbs lit in the eyes of cast members, varying in intensity, length, focus. But everyone, really, EVERYONE, is geared to moving the play forward. Their comments among themselves are about scenes just finished or the ones about to start. There is a room-roaming buzz, lovely to see.
And then there's the home life, the REAL area of life with REAL dramas, ones that make for the fodder for onstage Moments. Home is where I relax, where -- in one day -- I get buoyed up for the next weekful of rehearsals and flyballs and pebbles in the pathway morphing into a mountain of magnificence and awe, when you least expect it. Yet home is where I am aware of the mussed couch, days old fridge items, unwatered plants, their "postures" mirroring those of loved ones. Their eyes look mournful, puzzled at my absence, and even more confused by my short presence, again.
The play's been trimmed from 111 pages to 105...we think. Frankly, it feels like I cut about a quarter of it. The actors' responses vary whenever I cut, trim, or transpose. Their patience is admirable. Behind our fortresslike table, we see where work between rehearsals yields new discoveries, and when it's been back-burner'ed. What's really evident is the cameraderie among the cast, dancers, core team. Cool. It's like watching a slo-mo racetrack, who stretched far ahead in the first quarter-mile, and who hangs behind, maybe waiting for that one, enlightening opening to surge ahead or catch up.
There have been health issues, myself included. Someone got food poisoning, another an asthma attack, telltale sneezing. Some are building new skills, blues harp,  stringed banduria, of course, escrima arts. Tonight, we saw, we all did, how tools for survival come into play in the most challenging circumstances: we saw how a skillful "snow job" works, we saw a symbolic gauntlet thrown, we saw a Lady's performance. As a writer, having "seen" that scene in my head over the past 5 years, I could live on the heady perfume of my words, working, for awhile -- till the next amazing Moment. I "see" that, too, for the future, that there will be many.