Noi

Tu sei il mio segreto addorato
Ti porto con me in pieno sole come i fiori nel mio giardino.
Sorriso e scherzo come quando ero bambina
Tu, amore, nel cuore sacro
Sei una cosa ch'io copro dagli'occhi osservatore
ma anche si vede pienamente nella mia faccia.

Perché non voglio che parlano di noi come qualcosa brutta.
Perché noi, quando facciamo l'amore
Perché noi, quando ridiamo
Perché noi, quando bacciamo -
Noi siamo gli figli dorati di Dio
Dio, chi sa tutto.

Sa che noi veramente siamo cosa dal mondo eterno
D'un mondo di sole dove tutto e semplice e bello.
Ed io mantengo questo segreto
Poiché la gente vuole ridurre tali belli segreti.
Perché hanno paura di esso
e sono gelosi da noi.

Ma noi capiamo che le cose del mondo e le cose dal altro cielo
sono cose molto differenti che le cose della terra.
Questa comprensione è come possiamo vedere nei cuori d'un altro.
E questo è abbastanza.

I'M MAD AS HELL!!!!!!!!!

You know. I'm seething and angry and crazy and blubbering and I know this is supposed to be my HAPPY blog but, in truth, I see this as a good thing. Anger can be a motivator. And in my life, the times I've gotten good and angry have ended up being positive. So, I'll include this here.

I’M MAD. I MEAN, I’M LIKE CRAZY STUPID ANGRY!

Why am I not singing for a living? Why am I not, at the very least, getting hired??? Why? Why have I sung for 20 years with NO success in sight? And why do people still treat me like I’m the poor retarded girl who thinks she can fly? What am I missing? Why, if Martha thinks I’m sounding wonderful, and so many other people think I’m sounding wonderful, then why the hesitance to actually put me in the spotlight? What is it they’re hearing or seeing that makes them hesitate? What? How do I get over this hump? I WANT TO GET OVER THIS HUMP!!

Because I know I can do this in a way that will leave everyone wondering why on earth they didn’t put me on the big stage sooner. I just know it. I’ve had the reaction after a few performances and I’ve had people come up to me after in shock and awe because I don't give off all my energy at rehearsals. I save. I just think that's how I function. And then, at the performance, my colleagues, friends, audience members, are all shocked. I've had it happen almost everytime. They come up to me after like, "You were freaking phenomenal. The voice was more aligned and fluid than I've heard it, your acting was fantastic" etc. I had a director last year tell me he didn't think I had it in me in rehearsals and that he was really pleasantly surprised. He said the performance floored him and he actually asked, "where was that during rehearsal?" I don't know. That's the answer. I soak it all in and build it as I go then I let loose the day of. And maybe that's part of the problem. Maybe the people who are working with me worry it’s somehow a fluke. But I know I can deliver that more times than not.

Crap. I am so frustrated that fate hasn't somehow stepped in to shake up my dormant so-called career. Other people have walked in and sung for someone who felt like "this woman NEEDS to sing on my stage!" and then they're off. They start getting hired. Somehow, they've inspired someone to take a leap of faith. I need that. Whatever the hell that is, I need one or two such events to get me to start working so that I'm SEEN as a WORKING singer and no longer as some poor struggling singer. I NEED this to happen for me.

Singing - revisited

Funny thing. I just got up about 2o minutes ago and went to my piano. I took out some Brahms songs and some Strauss songs. Songs I haven't sung in years. First I attempted to pluck through the accompaniments on the piano and then I started singing. I sang through about five songs. That's when I realized. I'm not sick of singing. I love to sing. Maybe I'm just not so crazy about the pursuit of singing as a career. Maybe, on some level, I've never really wanted the career and it's just taken me all these years to separate the two things. Which begs a pretty interesting question. Now what?

Well, for starters, it's interesting to note that because I have a huge voice, everyone always wanted to hear me sing arias. Big, honking, impressive arias. And so, I haven't really spent long periods of time singing some of these beautiful art songs. The other thing I'm starting to learn about myself is that I love the music more than I love the singing. I love to make music. When I'm singing those big ole honking arias, sometimes the music gets lost because it's kind like gymnastics for the voice. These songs are little complex works of art. I started with Brahm's "Wie melodien" and worked my way into Strauss' "Allerseelen". These are songs where the piano is singing a duet with the singer. They are equal partners in creating a complete picture. I happen to love Duparc for this very same reason. You can swim in the harmony and your voice can ebb and flow with it. This is the stuff I really do enjoy singing. And yet, I haven't done very much of it.

I find it fascinating that it's taken me so many years to have a cohesive idea of what I really love about this art form. My ego was being stroked for so long. I had the "powerful, big, high, easy, florid" voice. Of course, I was born to be a huge, huge opera star. And that was the message my ego has spent years being fattened up on. Yet this huge career never evinced itself. I think, in part, due to the many mixed messages I was receiving but, in hindsight, also because of the many mixed messages I was likely giving out. I didn't really love most of what I was singing. I loved doing the tricks and getting the applause. But when I sit down to console my soul, it's these songs I tend to pull off the shelves. These songs and the Obradors and Nin-Culmell and Rodrigo. Montsalvage, Barber, Schubert, Donaudi. These self-contained treasures which I've used as warm ups and workouts to prepare for my "real" music. It's these songs that give me the most pleasure. So maybe I need to sing them more and maybe I need to sing what I love simply because I love to sing it. And for me, this will be enough.

I simply won't continue to chase the career just because many years ago someone said I should.

Why do I sing anyway?

I'm a singer. Have been for many years. I've had many people encouraging me and many people in high places who really felt I should have had a huge career. For some reason, that never happened and I felt like I let down a lot of people. Almost 20 years later, I am still chasing the dream but recently I started asking myself the question, "Why am I singing?" And I finally got my answer, "because I always have". At this point, I'm coming to realize that singing is kind of a habit. Something I've always done. It's also something I define myself by. But, honestly, I'm not even sure I enjoy it anymore. So, it seems sort of crazy to keep doing it. Sometimes I feel like I have to do it, like it's a compulsion of sorts. But many times I feel I don't really need it anymore. Lately, more and more it's like a phatom limb. The feeling's gone but I keep looking for it. Maybe it's just gone and like love lost, it's time to move on?

Just a thought.

How Does my Garden Grow?

Took some photos of what's growing in my garden right now. There should be some more coming in a week or two cuz my dahlia's are still not in full bloom.

Hope you like...

Okay, this is just the side by the garage. I'm proud of the bench cuz it was rusty and ratty and I painted it this week and now it's so pretty.



The trellis against the neighbor's fence have 3 different types of Clematis. Two of them are currently flowering.



That's just a mess I have growing on the side of the house. In there somewhere is a hydrangea that should never have been planted there. It's obviously not making it.



I have an herb garden... who would have ever thought. What you see in the first photo is a huge sage plant, to the left is a huge rosemary bush (which I didn't get in the photo) and peaking out of the sage plant, is a little lemon verbena which I thought had died but apparently it's decided it will survive inside the sage.


Then I also have thyme and basil.



That's the birdfeeder. Somewhere I have pictures of birds at the feeder. I'll post them sometime.


I don't know what these are called but I have two pots filled with them in the front of the house. They're just happy flowers.


The picture below doesn't really do it justice, but here's the front corner of the house where I have the main garden. I'll have to take some better pictures. The big maroon flowers are dahlia's. There are 3 more dahlia plants in this picture but the flowers haven't bloomed yet. When they're all in bloom, it will be worth taking many more pictures (keeping my fingers crossed).


Tada! This concludes my "love of gardening" post. Now I have to go workout.

Toodles!

iPhone

I had a feeling that the Apple store in Edison, NJ wasn't going to see nearly the frenzy of the stores in New York. I guess it's confirmation that I live in a swamp.

I entered the mall around 9:50pm and could hear my footfalls in the hallway leading to the Apple store. When I passed the ATT store, there were maybe 7 people in there. There was a rent-a-cop at the door to the Apple store but there was really no need at that hour (I'm guessing it was a little more lively earlier in the evening). There were perhaps 25 people or so in the store. Roughly half of them were playing with the iPhone displays up front and the other half were actually interested in other stuff elsewhere in the store. I was able to make a phone call (called Rich), check the internet, send him a text message, etc. As I suspected - cool little gadget but I'll wait for the follow-up/upgrade. There's no java or flash in the browser, which means there are many, many sites you will not be able to get to and that damned phantom keyboard is annoying as hell to maneuver.

It took me a good 10 minutes to send a one line text message cuz I kept hitting the neighboring keys to the key I was aiming for. Plus, the comma and period are located in a separate "mode". You basically have to switch out of ABC mode to get to the period. When you're typing text and want to put a period on a sentence, it's TEDIOUS to have to switch, punctuate and then switch again!! And, you must switch again if you want numbers. Also, when typing in my husband's phone number on the number pad (which is much bigger than the alpha pad and should, in theory, make it easier to get to each number without fail) I again, had to re-enter his digits several times because it would give me a 0 when I wanted a 9 or a 2 when I wanted a 3. It was really annoying. Perhaps the unit I was using had a problem because too many hands played with it that day. But, then again, it was 10pm and people had only been playing with it since 6pm. Kinda made me wary.

Oh yea... I can wait on this one. No annoying $500 phone for me.

Snow in Brooklyn

I wrote this post on February 12, 2007 but apparently never published it. Just read it and thought it needs to be up here.

This morning, while I was cutting up some soppresata in the kitchen for my breakfast, I heard someone outside chipping away at something icey. No doubt an iced up stair or a driveway or a chunk of ice keeping a gate shut. I myself was out there this morning hammering away at the edge of the driveway so that we wouldn't skid out onto the street. But something about being in the kitchen with the sun coming through the window and hitting the side of my face at just the right angle took me back to memories of Brooklyn.

Sometimes I forget I ever lived there. Much about my childhood is fuzzy or shoved down and out of sight. But the chip-chip-chipping sound made me think how things here in suburbia are slow. I suddenly had a flashback to snowy, icy mornings where I grew up and all the sounds came towards me all at once like some sort of orchestral flood except the instruments were shovels and hammers and car horns and all the players were Puerto Rican. I marvel at the difference between where I am right now in my life and where I grew up as a child. There, an icy morning would be filled with noise.

You have to imagine the following bit of dialogue being screamed at the top of the lungs by people who didn't grow up wearing coats and hats and scarves. They well convinced they could neither hear nor be heard while wrapped up like this. Now, imagine they're cold and desparately want to go back to their apartments which are like 90 degrees, because that's what passes for "comfortable" in New York. They are excited and speaking at a speed of 60 words per second complete with flailing arms while jumping up and down to stay warm. This following exchange is just a blur of a moment but I swear it's coming to me from the past.

"No, no, pon lo en riversa! pon lo en riversa!" (No, no, put it in reverse! put it in reverse!)
"Ahi! Ahora si que se chabo!" (Ah! Now it's trashed.)
"Tienes que sacarle mas hielo! Chui, ve y traeme la mangera!" (You have to get more of the ice out! Chewey (a nickname), go get me the hose!")

Chip, chip, chip, chip, chip (coming fast and furious from across the street). Nothing slow, nothing soft. Everything sounded like it was in your bedroom and your bedroom was on fire. So you got up to look cuz you sure weren't going to sleep through it anyway. And that memory brought a smile to my face. I thought to myself, "My childhood Brooklyn was a funny and energetic place to wake up to on a morning like this."

Big Fat Assumptions

I need to rant. I just got off the phone with my mother. I called her to tell her that I'd gone through all of her and dad's health insurance papers and sorted out some issues, wrote some letters and faxed some stuff out. Their doctors' bills should be resolved soon. Then I also informed her that I bought her and dad a lottery ticket today. Cuz I know they could having a much better retirement than they have and, well, you never know.

After this I told her I was about to go do my workout but then I added flippantly, "not that it's doing me much good." To which, after proving myself to be a dutiful daughter, she added dryly, "well then, just stop eating." I figured that was a good time to end the conversation. If my own mother, who's watched me for years cannot understand my plight, then no one can.

I have been working out pretty regularly now for a bit over 10 years. I started in my early 20s when I had gotten into the worst shape of my life and knew I better do something about it. Then in my late 20s I managed to get into the best shape of my life. This is how I managed it. It was the same year I took a year off from singing because I was frustrated with the whole process. So, the time I would have spent practicing, I now had freed up for workouts. I upped my workouts to 5 days a week. I was doing a VERY HARD African dance class (people left there dripping pools of sweat down the corridor - gross, but effective). Generally, after the African dance class, which lasted an hour, I'd go do weights and crunches, which usually took another half hour to 45 minutes. I'm certain that at the height of this, I never spent less than an hour and a half at the gym. My eating habits were generallt like this. I'd take whatever food i thought I might want to eat that day, let's say it was a sandwich (like an average ham and cheese sandwich) and split it in half. One half was breakfast with a cup of coffee. The other half was lunch with juice. The rest of the day I drank water and for dinner I had steamed broccoli or maybe, if I was hungry, a veggie wrap. I had also started running and had a new boyfriend who kept me busy with dates and parties and emotional drama . It took me a full year of this sort of measured eating and perpetual motion to finally take off 40lbs. In essence, any time I didn't spend at work (I had an office job), I was working out and I took the equivalent of one "normal" person's lunch and rationed that out over a full day. This is what it took for me to lose 40 lbs in one year. So, when I say that I'm one of those people who has to work like a dog to lose weight, I know what I'm talking about. I've done it at least once.

Nowadays I work out maybe between a half hour to an hour anything from 2 - 5 days a week, depending on my week. Lately, it's more because I've decided to try to push the weight loss issue again. I only drink soft drinks once in a while, I drink loads of water, eat salads for dinner and, while it's true sometimes I have a loaded egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast, I make up for it by making the next two meals, light salads with very little chicken, fish or beef on the side. Do I have one drink on the weekends with friends? On occassion. Do I have one or two desserts during the course of the month? Yes, but the point here isn't to defend my eating and exercise lifestyle, it's to make the point that despite my managing to be overweight I'm not some sedentary eating machine. I don't never exercise and/or sit around eating bags of doritos and drinking Yoohoo. If you look at my exercise habits and eating habits, I'm not doing anything that should make me a big, fat, girl. And yet, I am. I can honestly say that the only way I know of to not be a big fat girl is to do what I did 10 years ago. I have to become obsessive about my exercise and eating habits. I have to eat the bare minimum and exercise the absolute maximum.

This is what your "average" person cannot empathize or comprehend. For someone who only needs to lose 20 lbs, you can keep up the perpetual motion, tiny eating for a couple of months or so. After the weight comes off you can taper off and go into maintenance mode. But for someone like me, who really could stand to lose between 50 and 60 lbs, I'd need to keep up that kind of momentum for anywhere from 6 months to a year (as I learned). It's hard work and difficult to keep up. And you know what happened the SECOND I slowed down? The moment I decided to only work out 2 days a week for a month? This is no exaggeration. I gained 15 lbs. the first month I decided I wanted to be a normal person and not be at the gym each night till 9:30pm. I wanted to go home, call up a friend and have a cup of coffee and chat. I didn't want to be in the gym 2 hours each night and then commute home another 1/2 hour. The minute I wanted a LIFE the weight jumped back on my body like a stalker who knew the restraining order had been lifted!!

So, I rant here because I am tired of people, my mother included, making assumptions about me just because they've never had to grapple with this issue personally. I could lose weight - yes. But for several years now I've decided that the full time obsession with exercise and diet that would have to be my life is more than I've wanted to deal with. And no one can better scream at me, "but your health!" That's just bullshit. I eat a pretty healthy diet, I live clean, I do most of my own yard work and handywork around the house, I work out enough so my body is pretty strong and flexible and oddly toned for a fat girl. I don't think I'm in danger of having a heart explosion. And if I am, I'd like to point out that many an athlete has suddenly collapsed.

I worked for a scientific research firm at a very presitgious university for many years. I know that when a field of study is hot, they will crunch the statistics to make it look anyway they want. Right now they want people to lose weight and they want the health insurance companies to have an easy out. But that's a discussion for another day. I'm not saying being overweight isn't dangerous. It is. I'm not saying that there aren't people who are seriously impeding their progress and their success in life by being overweight. There are. I'm also not saying that being seriously overweight and out of shape doesn't put you at risk for certain diseases, it does. But so does being slim and smoking or being slim and never exercising and secretly vomiting up your meals. Many things that aren't easy to spot are dangerous for your health. Being overweight is just an easy target. The scientific and political community is being just as lazy with this issue as they were when they started the "just say no" campaign.

Sorry... back to the current rant.

Mainly, I just want everybody to shut the hell up. When all the people in my life and all the people I come in contact with are spending 2 gruelling, sweaty hours at the gym (walking on the treadmill doesn't even come close to counting) 5 days a week and eating salads and mini sandwiches with water for a period upwards of 6 months, then they can come to me and call me fat and lazy. Until then - shut the F*(# up!

Helio's Ocean

I have been in search of the perfect phone. The phone that makes IMing and Email easy and makes web surfing as easy as surfing on my laptop, whose battery lasts at least an entire day with regular use, has a decent camera and allows me to upload my own personal ringtones, it should have bluetooth and preferably WiFi. And it must have a QWERTY keyboard, preferably one that folds out or slides out because I'm not fond of the permanent kind like you find on a Palm or a Blackberry. All of this has to come in a package that isn't going to cost me an arm and a leg.

So, several months ago I saw a Sierra Wireless Voq on Ebay and thought I'd try it. It has no camera and no bluetooth and is a tad quirky but, in all honesty, for a cheap, early generation PDA, it's mighty impressive. I was able to download the Opera Mini browser to it and put my ringtones on it and download all my email to it and the keyboard flips open on it. All in all, for the money, I was pretty happy with it but I have had my eye out for a better version of it. Plus, Cingular has been killing me with fees for text messaging and web access, which are all separate, as are Multimedia messages.

Along came Helio's Ocean. From all the reviews I read and the pictures and specs I found, it sounded like the answer to all my dreams. Helio's lowest rung service is as follows: For a flat $65/month, I could get 500 anytime minutes and everything else was included and unlimited. Yes, unlimited everything - weekends and evenings, texts, web browsing on a 3G network, multimedia texts, downloads, etc.

So I got one. The phone really is a beautiful piece of machinery. It's a little heavy. Some people might call it a brick. But I like a little weight on my phone. I hate feeling like it might break at any moment. The battery life, for the week I had it, was really good. I texted, surfed (or tried to... more on that later), phoned, emailed and the battery seemed to hold up for more than a full day of activity. About a day and a half worth. It plays MP3s via the speaker and headset, and the quality of the sound was pretty good. The camera is really, really nice. I had no idea a small phone could take such good pictures. The flash is strong and it has many options such as greyscale, sepia, a timer, and 4 through 12 continuous pics per click. The keyboard slides out to landscape view and is pretty easy to use, although my favorite fold out keyboard is still on the Nokia 6800 and N70.

Getting and sending email to any pop account is very easy to set up and it all works quickly. Thanks to the large screen, you can easily see your messages and attachments.

Where it got ugly was when I found out that Helio hasn't yet gotten the software together that is supposed to help you synch your phone to your contacts and calendar from Outlook on your computer. Instead, they recommended that I export my contacts to a .csv file then upload it to AOL or Helio's mail, then download it back to the phone. Very ugly. Then there's no way to save the contacts to the phone's memory from there. You only have access to those contacts so long as you're signed on to Helio Mail or AOL but if you sign off, the contacts are gone. To put your own personal ringtones on the phone, you also need do something totally convoluted. You need to rename an MP3 as an mmf, email it to yourself, download the attachment then save as a ringtone. And then you pat your head and rub your belly while dancing the macarena.

Surfing is also a challenge. Their browser sucks. A lot of sites I went to were either completely destroyed and difficult to see or truncated so you couldn't get to them. So, I tried to download the Opera Mini Browser because I had this same problem with my Voq phone and once I downloaded the Opera browser, all was well. It wouldn't download. It wouldn't download no matter what I did. I figured it was either incompatible or they blocked the site. So, I called Helio.

Customer service admitted they don't have all the software finished yet for the Ocean. They also said that I could possibly install the opera browser from my PC to the phone. I explained that I couldn't possibly make that happen since the sync software doesn't exist. The only thing I can do with the USB cable is see the Music folder and the Video folder. This doesn't help me at all.

So, because Helio apparently shipped out the Ocean before having all the support for it, thereby making it difficult for me to fully enjoy it, I am shipping it back to them this week. First I need to figure out how to take the pictures I took off of it. Since the USB cable won't do it, I am told I should buy a micro SD, copy the photos to that, then to my laptop. So, even in trying to return the thing, they are making me spend time and money to be able to do so. You see my frustration?

In conclusion, if I discover that Helio has the necessary support for this phone and will either pre-install or support the Opera Mini browser, then I would be willing to try this again. Cuz Cingular is nickel and diming me to death and I'd love a good reason to be rid of them.

SOFRITO

My friends and I went to an upscale Puerto Rican restaurant in New York this weekend. It's called SOFRITO. For those of you who don't know what sofrito is, it's pretty much the basis of all latin cooking in the islands. It's used by Puerto Ricans and Dominicans mainly, but it's also used in parts of South America. It's a paste made in a blender of herbs, onion, garlic, special peppers. In a typical latin household, the wife would make this up about once a month, put it in a large plastic container, then spoon it out throughout the month into various dishes she was cooking. It's absolutely awesome and, without it, you cannot get an authentic latin caribbean meal. The name of the restaurant says it all.

The food was phenomenal. Having grown up eating sancocho and pernil and maduros and arroz con habichuelas, I can attest that this is the real deal. It was nice having a birthday dinner with my childhood friend, her sister and her cousin because there we were, all grown up now having each become professional women after having come from humble Puerto Rican and Dominican backgrounds. Our group was comprised of a doctor, a speech pathologist and an opera singer/voice teacher. (I didn't ask what her cousin does but she seemed pretty well put together and smart as a whip.) There we were, four girls from "the hood" in a very chic restaurant on third and 53rd reclaiming our roots yet celebrating our accomplishments all at the same time. Actually, we were there to celebrate Mary's 40th Birthday! It was like a coming of age party for us all. The restaurant owner, Jimmy Rodriguez, who has owned several well-known spanish restaurants, has apparently realized that the new latin generation needs a place like this. A place where the next generation can meet and carry forward.

However, because of its east side, New York location, we each assumed the same thing when we got there. This is going to be some watered-down-for-the-gringos experience. We were wrong. We couldn't have been more wrong. The food was completely off the charts good!! Nicely presented, charming, warm service and tasty, tasty, authentic flavor. We were seriously shocked. I ordered sancocho as an appetizer. It came in a small "caldero". That's a small pot, but it's a very typical pot you'll find in most latin kitchens all over New York. It was a nice touch. I dipped my spoon in and could not believe my taste buds. It tasted like my mom's!! It tasted like my godmother's!! It tasted like home and it was gooood. I looked to Mary and Goldy and Soett and I said, "You have to try this. You're not going to believe it." They each did and then we just had to share it. Soett's comment was that it tasted like her grandma made it. Mary said "I'm so sorry dad's not here. He would love this." Seriously, it's comfort food for the Puerto Ricans and Dominicans who have arrived. We also ordered maduros (sweet plaintains) which were heavenly good and sweet, as they should be.

Mary ordered the pernil. You can judge a latin restaurant by it's pernil. If the pernil is good, then they are the real thing. Mary's eyes rolled back in her head. "You have to try this." We all did. Seriously. It was so good I feel a need to scream it out to anyone who might give a $hit. That adobo/garlic flavor that is supposed to be the defining taste in the pernil experience - it was there. I have tried pernil in many places over the past several years and this is by faaaar the best I've ever had. And I don't mean the best I've ever had in a restaurant. I mean, the best I've ever had running neck and neck with my godmother Sofia's, which was good enough to make you weep with joy.

I cannot leave out the drinks. The drinks were completely out of this world too. The mojito is one of the best out there. I've been disappointed by mojito's I've had elsewhere but this is a really, really good mojito. And, if you grew up liking Coquito (even if you didn't but like coconut) then do yourself a favor and order the Cocotini. It will send happy burbujas (bubbles) straight through you.

I give Sofrito 5 stars for flavor, 4 stars for general presentation, 5 stars for service and 4 stars for decor. (The bathroom, I was told, was too small for the place, but the rest of the restaurant is really chic and sleek and nicely done with a kind of nouveau latin flair.) The biggest surprise of the evening was the bill. For four women, including appetizers, drinks and tip amounted to roughly $175. For a New York restaurant, that is an inexpensive night out but there was nothing cheap about the experience.

Suburbia is making me a nasty girl.

Okay, I have some observations here. I lived in New York most of my adult life. In upper Manhattan in Hudson Heights. On a beautiful tree lined street, in a pre-war building, surrounded by many artistic and smart people. There was a beautiful park within walking distance and Lincoln Center, my usual haunt, was a 20 minute train ride away. It really was the Nirvana of my existence.

I now live in suburbia. Suburbia in New Jersey. It's not Nirvana but it has it's definite selling points. For starters, there's space. I have suffered a need for space for a long time. I lived with a lover in New York for several years in a studio apartment. That probably started it. Then I got a spacious, sun filled, 1 bedroom in the aforementioned building. It had an eat-in kitchen and a deep soaking tub. For a single girl living in Manhattan, I'd hit the jackpot. This was loads of space for me. But then I met my husband and, once again, I wanted more space. When his job had him commuting between Princeton and New York, we figured we needed to move to some location between the two points. That's how we ended up buying a house in Middlesex County. I fell in love with the house because it too was pre-war. It had the familiar plaster walls, the high ceilings, old oak floors. It felt somehow familiar, and since I've never lived in suburbia, I needed familiar. I needed something to link me to my Nirvana. This house was it.

I instantly fell in love with the concept of gardening. I love putting things in the ground, caring for them and then watching them bloom. For a city girl like me, this seems like some kind of miracle. I used to frequent the garden in Ft. Tryon Park and admire the blooms, photographing the butterflies and the people on benches, the George Washington Bridge, the Hudson. It was all breath taking and wonderful, but now I am experiencing nature's beauty from a much more hands-on experience. Digging in the earth, putting in the seeds and bulbs, watering them, weeding them, then watching them grow into gorgeous, colorful flowers. That seems miraculous to me. Before, I just thought these things appeared around me, as if by magic. But now that I am responsible for picking them, placing them and cultivating them, I realize how much I took for granted in my beautiful uptown park.

I am now getting to the crux of the problem I'm having today. In the midst of all this beauty and nature, I have noticed a disturbing trend in my personal upkeep. When I lived in New York I would never leave the apartment without makeup. I would never "just bum it". Even if I went out in jeans, they were always neat jeans and a cool top and good hair or a cap. I just wouldn't dare just run out of the apartment any old way. Not even to throw out the garbage.

But something happened in suburbia. I would like to preface this next bit by saying this only happens once in a long while, but it does happen, and I should be more disgusted with my behavior, yet, oddly, I'm not. I have allowed myself to fall asleep late at night in my t-shirt (I know this is probably TMI but I'm blogging here). I awake, having not showered, having fallen asleep in my t-shirt, throw on a ratty pair of jeans or, worse yet, holey sweatpants. I grab the car keys, jump in the car, drive my husband to the train station, then sometimes I stop to pick up some coffee and lotto tickets. I come home, do a workout and THEN I shower before teaching. Eeeeeeew. You don't have to say it - I will!! And what's worse is my hair on some of these mornings. Sometimes it's homeless lady hair. Sometimes it's really God awful. And yet, I have very little shame. I behave this way. It's piggish. It's disgusting. And yet, since moving to suburbia, I find this behavior to be fine so long as no one knows (of course, now you all know). I guess I'll continue to do it unless I'm caught in the coffee shop looking (and possibly smelling) like a homeless woman by someone I actually care about. But the thing about suburbia is that it seems to me you're less likely to run into people you care might see you looking this way than in New York.

In New York, you immediately have your building elevator and/or lobby to contend with. Your neighbors are close to you. If you stepped out into the hallway looking and/or smelling bad, there is a very high chance that the cute professor down the hall will be waiting for the elevator or just stepping off of it. If you walk to the corner store to pick up milk, you are very likely to pass at least 5 people you know in the neighborhood who you might prefer not see you looking your worst. Dr. Ruth Westheimer, lived two doors down from me. I had gay male friends in the neighborhood. They are the absolute worst of critics. Even the gay men in the neighborhood I didn't particularly know would give you "the look" if your hair looked like a brillo pad. So, really, if you cared at all, you showered and brushed your damn hair before going outside.

I blame the cars here in suburbia. There's very little "walking to the store" here. You leave your house, where no one will see you but your immediately family and pets. You jump in your car. Again - no one to see you. You dive into the store where maybe you'll see a few people, but most of them are either too self-absorbed to notice how bad you look or they look just like you do cuz they're caught in the same routine. You grab the milk, the eggs, the whatever, and dive back into your car. You enter your house where there's no pressure that the cute guy on the 5th floor might see you and puke.

Yep, suburbia has taught me to dig in the dirt, take fewer showers and brush my hair less. Not sure I like it but I get to practice whenever I want, I work out in my basement, I love my garden and cardinals feed at my bird feeder. I do manage to shower and dress before my students show up, although they'll attest that sometimes I don't quite get to the hair and makeup. If they want me to always look good, they may have to wait till a celebrity or a gay man buys the house next door.

Beauty

I have ceased my quest for perfection. Many beautiful things are imperfect. I will now begin creating beauty and accept it's flaws as the necessary contrast required to bring out the perfection within the imperfections.

Life on Earth

People! We spend so much of our time here bemoaning the human condition. Bemoaning our fates. Some of us go as far as to wish for death and hope for a better after life. Sweet heaven, loving Lord, virgins, enlightenment, milk and honey - on and on we go about how much better it will be after we're on that other side. The side beyond the light.

But what if what's actually happening is that we all clamored and begged and lined up to come here? What if all us souls were somewhere else - bodiless and bored. Perhaps we were fine enough. Happy enough. But without the ability to really feel, to run, to jump, to breath in and out. Without all that we felt incomplete. Maybe we entered a lottery or did favors to get here. Maybe we chose this - somewhere else. And maybe by not fully living each and every moment we're here we are cheating ourselves out of a huge opportunity. What if, despite the disease and the wars and the terrorism and racism and global warming, this is the pinnacle of what it means to be human and thus we have chosen to return here over and over again? What if the blessed other side is us?

Just call me DDR Super Dork! (lol)

OH MY GOD!! I AM OFFICIALLY A SUPER DORK!!

I know some of you have been waiting for me to post a new blog - Jen. So, something finally happened today that I feel a need to blog about.

I finally did it!! I did DANCE DANCE REVOLUTION!! I loved it! I freaking wanted to play all afternoon long except like I already felt like some loser degenerate adult skulking around the kiddy arcade at lunchtime waiting for no one to be watching before I guiltily put my four tokens into the slot and then attempted to encrypt the freaking JAPANESE WRITING ON THE FREAKING SCREEN... WTF??? Anyway, luckily, it's not that hard to figure out. I looked around to make sure no one was looking. There was a guy in his 50's or so shooting at something a few machines over (another obvious lunchtime lurker) and a guy in his 20's not too far away winking and smiling. I decided to ignore him cuz he seemed like a bigger loser than me sitting in his little race car game.

I chose the Beginner level, followed the instructions and started. I looove this game! I want one for my house! I made it through the first two stages and got to the final stage but then I think I must have screwed up cuz the game ended. I haven't the foggiest what my score was. Except I guess I had to do relatively okay cuz there were lots of those pop up "good" or "perfect" flashes. I wanted to put in 4 more tokens but I didn't want to chance being spotted by anyone I knew so I fled like I was hiding a crack addiction or something.

But... I'll be back...

PFO's

So, I was comparing notes with other auditioners. They call their rejection letters "PFO's" (I thought it meant Piss the Fuck Off, but I'm told it means Please Fuck Off. Either way, it means you've been rejected). In any case, I probably shouldn't feel bad because after comparing notes, it seems even many of the more seasoned and accomplished singers got like 100s of PFO's before seeing any real success. Maybe, if I hadn't spent so many years cringing from the PFO's I might be further along. If I'm honest with myself, I think the longest string of auditions I've ever done was probably a string of about 10 over the course of a month. And after 9 no's and 1 yes I was so drained that I stopped and didn't return to auditions for several more months. So, I have had a tendency to get discouraged by the rejections and then stop for a long period of time before returning.

If I'm further honest with myself, I've probably done only about 60 auditions or so ever. Of those, I probably got 15 - 20 of them. So, percentage wise, I'm actually not in bad shape. But the 40 or so rejections hit hard. I suppose what I'm learning is that I can't afford to get bent now and take any breaks. I have to do like 50 in a row this time and not even look back. If my more successful friends have had to withstand 100s of PFOs then I need not to get bent about 10 or 20 or them, if it comes to that.

At the moment, I seem to have one PFO and one non confirmed PFO. Onward.

:-)

Popping Pills

Okay, this morning I'm drinking a yogurt drink while popping vitamin B, D and A and also a Melatonin tablet and aspirin. That's 5 pills. As I'm doing this I'm thinking to myself, "I'm doing this cuz I've been feeling rundown lately and I want to put stuff in my body that will help me out and give me nutrients." But then I had this very morbid realization. I didn't need any "help" before. I felt perfectly fine and energetic without this crap. But something happened in the last few years where now my body needs "help". Despite trying to exercise and eat a varied and mostly healthy diet, making sure to include fruits and veggies each day plus fish a couple of times a week. Despite all this, I still have days when my body just feels like it's not quite functioning up to snuff. Something aches or I just feel sluggish. So I've started taking vitamins and baby aspirin daily cuz I am trying to feel better (the aspirin are to help thin my blood because I found out a couple years ago my platelets are big and I'm probably a candidate for clots).

So, after realizing that I am stuffing pills down my throat in order to feel better, I had a further panicky realization! "This is just practice for the real thing, isn't it!?" The vitamins and ocassional pain killer are just a warm up!! Your body starts to send little signals out that things are slightly off kilter so you'll reach for something in a bottle to help strengthen your immune system or help your hair and nails grow or loosen your blood so it won't clog you prematurely. But then one day you NEED things in little bottles - lots of them. Then it only gets worse!! This is just Act I!! By the time you get to Act IV, you're not shaking out little pills because you feel somewhat slow on the treadmill. No, now you're taking large pills because you can't pee normal or your eyes fog over or you can no longer digest oatmeal or your hand trembles uncontrollably when you're trying to open a jar of applesauce!! Oh My God!! My head starts to scream!! These vitamins and yogurt drink are the beginning of the slippery slope!! It's just a practice run!! Get used to little bottles and funny drinks cuz that's where we're all headed eventually!!

And now, I would like to apologize for that completely irresponsible and insensitive freak out.

The Tequileria!!

OH!! Almost forgot!!! Yesterday, at the airport, coming back from my audition in St. Petersburg, FL, this CUTE guy bought me a drink. That almost never happens to me. I mean, I see myself as the fat chick who guys don’t want to go near. Right? They don’t see me at the bar and offer to buy me drinks!! But we sat and had a very lovely chat. He seemed sweet. Actually, what’s weird is that by the time we got done talking I gave him my card. Not cuz I’m hoping to make him my next conquest, but cuz I just freaking liked him. I thought to myself, “if I’m ever back in St. Pete’s, this guy seems like he’d be nice to hang out with”. Really. It’s strange. I used to be so flattered if someone flirted with me that I’d immediately think “I wonder if…” but I guess I’m growing up. I just want friends. I know men supposedly don’t think that way and he probably was thinking he wanted to grab my boobs or something. But that won't happen cuz he strikes me as a lothario. He probably nails everyone he can get his hands on, so I really wouldn’t want to be made into another “notch”. But he also seemed smart, well traveled, cute, very witty and, from all he said, he knows where all the hot places are to have fun down there. So I hope he rings me or emails me cuz I wouldn’t mind hanging out with him if I were to end up down there.

Despite knowing I didn’t do the greatest audition, I am still holding out a tiny bit of hope that they say through my nerves and my rolls of fat and somehow, through the grace of God, have decided to give the fat chick a role in their little opera house.

2 down, 298 more to go

I studied for a while with a voice teacher who didn't really do a freaking thing for my voice, but she had been a big diva for a few years - very famous. She told me how the year before she finally got her big break she'd been to like 300 auditions and gotten rejected pretty much that many times. She worked on her technique diligently and then, suddenly started getting acceptances (but still a few rejections, she admitted).

So, after hiding for a year, I've decided I'm just going to audition until I just can't do it anymore. I just did 2 this week. The first one went REALLY well. But already I got a call saying they aren't offering me a role. That one is actually sort of understandable. My husband was with me. He said it sound glorious from outside. They have a small hall and, quite frankly, my voice seemed too big. He said you could hear me clearly outside where as the next person (I was still getting my things together) you could only sort of hear them through the door. So, I don't feel bad about that rejection. I sensed while I was singing that they liked me and they even asked questions about my availability. But maybe they did decide it would be too much for their small space.

Then I just came back from doing another. That one I don't feel as good about. I've never ever done well in auditions where you have to stand around waiting. And this was one of those. I was waiting in the hall with the other singers for 2 hours. I have got to figure out what happens when I have to wait the gets my voice a little out of my body. I didn't sing badly. I sang pretty well. But it wasn't my best. There were moments when I knew I wasn't fully anchored and moments when I could hear some of my old bad habits creeping in. It just wasn't good enough to nail the job, in my opinion. They were sweet and gracious but somehow I don't think I got it.

BUT, I will say this. It used to be if I did an audition that didn't go well or if I did ANY audition, I'd be freaking out completely for the next few days. I think that's getting better. Don't get me wrong, I have a little of that going on and I had a shot of tequila on my way home to take the edge off. Then I started thinking how I've been at this forever and still have nothing approaching success and I wanted to drown myself in a bottle. BUT, this morning I'm relatively okay and ready to get back in the saddle. I'm being methodical.

I have to keep strengthening the breathing (which I realized a couple of months ago has never reeeaally been completely right). Since I started doing those new exercises I have been making huge strides in overcoming the two big knocks on my voice. The two biggest knocks on my voice for yeeeeeears have been that there’s a flutter in the sound (this has been greatly smoothed but when I’m nervous, like in an audition, it still has a tendency to rear it’s hideous head) and that my middle and low notes do not match the top. This has all but been solved in the past few months. I just realized I probably shouldn’t get too down on myself for not landing the auditions I just did because, in truth, I’m making progress despite the lack of success. It used to be I’d go into an audition with a big fat aria and you’d hear all my high notes but my lower notes and middle notes had no freedom, sometimes sounded held back and the middle mix was non-existent. There really was a huge break there. My coach agrees that in the past 2 months these things are all but resolved. However, it will probably take a handful of auditions more before it translates under pressure. I'm trying not to let that stop me.

You make me drunk

Dear God,

There are things in this world that have the power to fix me right up no matter what ails me.

In no particular order...

Communing with nature either alone or with a good friend or special lover
A good, hard, sweaty workout
Singing to my highest potential
Dancing without a care
Making love with someone who leaves you feeling listless, drunk and grinning

Thank you for that power.

Seel.

Anna Nicole Smith

Okay, I know that Anna Nicole's life and lifestyle made her an object of much ridicule and disrespect. I admit that I chuckled a time or two at her antics. A lot of the time the joke was on her and we all enjoyed that because it made us feel better about ourselves. But, seriously, are we animals waiting to feed on another's misfortune and grief? Are we so lacking in our hearts that we cannot step back and see this for the sad misfortune it is?

From the reports, it seems that whatever it is that ended her life, it was precipitated by great grief. She may have literally died of a broken heart. The pain of her son's death overtook her. And now, greedy, grubby hands will forever spend their time trying to use that baby girl as a pawn. Her life will never be her own. That child has been born into grief. I see a sad, sad situation all around. Not one to point fingers at and enjoy watching.

Have we managed to sink even lower than the people whose lives we find so entertaining?

Enough already.