I haven't written in about two weeks because things have been hectic at work and I have been sick. Murphy's law, I guess. A week ago tonight I got a head cold which then turned into a pretty ugly sinus infection. So Tuesday, realizing that this wasn't just a cold, I went to the doctor and I knew it was pretty bad when she took one listen to my chest with her little stethoscope and immediately asked, "So, can you swallow really BIG pills?" So she put me on some major milligram antibiotics, some nasal spray (which I hate) and a prescription antihistamine. I don't think it's really working that much yet, but fortunately things seem to be getting better rather than worse, so that's good.

Last week I did the monologues for Patty and she loved every last one of them. She had hardly anything but positive feedback. Despite the fact that she's totally biased and not exactly an "expert" opinion (whatever the hell that would be anyway, I don't know), I have to say it was really great for my ego to hear her say again and again, "How do you DO that?!" Then I got sick and so my session with J last Sunday was good, but overall the pieces were kind of low energy because of that. But so far, I have not gotten nervous at all, which is completely amazing, given how close the auditions are. I feel very proud to have conquered that constant nervousness. Patty pointed out that it was probably because 1. I am very prepared, and 2. I have reached a point where I care much less about what one person thinks of my 3 minute performance since it's so subjective and whether I get in or not, I can still pursue what I want.

I did have nerves when I did the pieces for J's class a few weeks ago, though, and that has made me want to do them in front of more people who make me nervous. It's good to practice handling how your nerves affect you. That night they made some of my Shakespeare piece a bit unfocused and sloppy. Part of it was because there were like ten people in the room and I was trying to figure out where I could look without looking one of them in the eye, which would have broken my concentration altogether. So anyway, I'm doing them for another actor who has been through an MFA program tomorrow, and then for my parents on Sunday. Both of those should make me a little nervous. But whereas in the past I would have been nervous all day, when I did them for J's class I was just nervous when I got there. And that's to be expected. But tackling the nervous all day or even all week is a major accomplishment. In past performances that has been a very difficult thing for me and has often affected my health.

So my last session with J is on Sunday. I can hardly believe it. I don't quite know what I'll do with my Sunday mornings from now on. This is the most religious they've been in quite some time! :-) Maybe I'll sleep in. Or if I can be really disciplined, maybe I'll just sleep in the first weekend when I get back from Chicago and then I'll get back on a schedule of getting up and use the time to work on another play I just started writing. That would be cool.

I finally talked with the guy whose place I am staying at. He sounds so nice and I'm going to get to see the show he is directing the night before I leave. Katja asked me last night if I am getting excited. I didn't really have an excited response to the question, to be honest. I really want to get healthy, I still feel crummy. And yes, I am looking forward to the trip itself (except for the fact that it's gonna be bloody COLD there!), but no, I'm really not looking forward to the auditions. I mean, I'm really proud of the work I've done, but let's face it: auditions suck. I don't know anyone who LIKES auditions. I know plenty of people who have learned how to tolerate them, and on occasion if the auditors are really fun and responsive they end up enjoying them in the end (which I hope will be the case with some of mine), but I don't know of anyone who actually looks forward to them. Maybe some day I'll get to that place, but I'm not there yet. I am looking forward to doing them for myself and hopefully feeling good about the work I show there, but I'm not looking forward to being judged by other people who will decide my fate perhaps based only 15% on the work I do and the other 85% on factors I have no control over. It's part of the nature of all this, though, and so I can deal with it, but I don't look forward to it. Hell no.

But yes, I'm still glad I'm doing this. It doesn't really seem real that it's so close. But I can still honestly say that I am still going to look forward to all the things I'll be able to do whether I get in or not. I know that probably sounds like a great line and mask and like I'm hiding, but it's really true. In fact, my financial situation will be so much better if I wait another year to go to school that I'll almost be more nervous if I do get in than if I don't. Well, and for other reasons too. Because I expect to judge my abilities by the work I do in the three years of the program, not the three minutes of the audition. I don't think there is a soul on earth qualified to make a valid judgement on me in three minutes. Which is why I can't say I blame the people I know who secretly think, but of course never say, "why the hell would you want to do that?"

I leave for Chicago for auditions three weeks from today. I really am not counting, it's just that it happens to be exactly the three-week mark and I noticed when I was putting my contact information on the sign-out board at work for the days I'll be gone. Wow. The time has gone by fast. But I feel ready and I am looking forward to the trip.

Sunday I had a great session with J. He said it was great to hear me open the door on Sunday morning with such a tranquil voice. And I did feel very tranquil. He said it showed and that he thought I had conquered my biggest obstacle in all of this and that is nervousness, fear and confidence. And I think I got there as a result of me doing the monologues for other people. They became "public" so the speak, and that just helped me relax. As a result, I think we had maybe the best session so far. I AM SO MUCH MORE CREATIVE WHEN I AM RELAXED! I went through all of my monologues and he gave me a few things to work on here and there. Then I gave myself the rest of the afternoon off. It takes a lot out of me to do that many in a row (12) and just enjoyed the rest of the day. I really feel much more at ease now. I'll work on them again on Thursday night and a bit Saturday. J and I work again on Sunday morning and then Sunday night I'll be doing the prepared set for his class. I anticipate I'll be at least a little nervous for that. Actually, if I'm not I think that would be just plain weird. Hopefully that will go well. I'm mostly doing them for his class just to do them in front of more people, but there are a few people who I want to get feedback from, and they have a way of making me very nervous. I don't know why. Oh well. There will always be people like that, I guess.

I called Jeff Z. tonight to see if I could arrange a time to work on a song with him. I really have kind of put this whole song business off but it just hasn't been much of a priority. Hopefully he'll have time. If worse comes to worse, I guess I'll just go buy an accompaniment tape and work on my own. Katja reminded me that if Yale asks me to sing at a callback, then they're already really interested and they just want to see if I have the guts to belt out a tune whether I suck or not. Makes sense. They wanna see passion, talent and courage. The courage is what can get in my way if I'm not relaxed. Tomorrow night I am going to see the new movie version of Chicago. I can't wait! I'm sure it will inspire me to put a little number together.

Tomorrow I am working at home, which means I can take one of my new long runs at lunch. They are going so well I think I might start training for a half marathon. I never really thought I would ever be able to run that far but now that I've been using my monologues as a way to keep my mind occupied while I run, I've been running further than ever and I really think I could run that far. This whole process has affected so many aspects of my life - it's really bizarre.

This was a great week. I was a total ball of nerves after this weekend. I had hit an emotional wall and ran into some timing issues with one of my monologues and was starting to freak out again. It made me wonder if I am, in fact, still just telling myself that it doesn't matter if I don't get into school this year because I have plenty of other other things to still do as an artists. Well who the hell cares if I'm just telling myself that! At least it's a good thing to know. And if I'm a mess if I don't get in then I just have to start doing everything I was going to do anyway and I'll be fine. God! I really need to shut my brain off and leave myself alone already. Jeez...

But this week I feel good. I performed my monologues for a group of friends Tuesday night and then another friend on Thursday. I think that helped tremendously. I needed to do these for other people. I was like a caged bird or something, I think. It diffused my nerves just to give me the confidence of knowing that yes, I CAN get up in front of other people and do these things. I did all 12 monologues I know. They went pretty well, overall. But on Tuesday I was really tense and I had not done a physical warmup and that really showed. It was a big lesson learned. That was their only major comment - the physical tension. Katja gave me some excellent comments last night and we did a pretend interview as well, which was helpful. I think I will work through a few things tonight. I might do them for Patty this weekend and then J and I work again on Sunday morning. I still have not decided for sure whether to do the Merchant of Venice or the Precious Damsels piece for the classical for URTA. I think I've worked out the time problem so that either one of them would work. The girls on Tuesday liked Precious Damsels more, and Katja LOVED the Portia piece. So that doesn't help, obviously. Why does art have to be so damn subjective?!

I still need to get a song together in case anyone asks me to sing. I don't have long to do it. But it's not the biggest priority either. I'll call Jeff this weekend to see if he can help me out.

I got an email from this guy who is giving me his place to stay at in Chicago. I can't believe how unbelievably nice he is. He offered to pick me up at the airport, show me around, wanted to know what I like to do so he could plan some activities if I had time to do some fun stuff... I could hardly believe it, coming from this total stranger. Now I'm really starting to look forward to the trip as a trip, not just a bunch of auditions. It really helps that this guy is making me feel so welcome. Too bad he's gay. Sigh.

Yesterday, on New Year's Eve, an interesting thing happened. I had an overwhelming sense of peace come over me about - about many things, of others I'll elaborate in the non-public section of this journal :-) - but specifically about this whole grad school thing. For awhile now I've been telling myself that I'm not going to put all my thoughts and hopes into getting into grad school this year. But a lot of that has just been telling myself that, as in, I know that's how I SHOULD feel and so maybe if I tell myself that often enough all the other possibilities will begin to seem equally attractive and I really won't be so nervous about the auditions, etc., etc. It's one thing to say it as a mantra, it's entirely another thing to really believe and feel it. And yesterday I suddenly stopped just saying it and really felt it. I really feel absolutely fine either way it goes. If I get in or if I don't get in it's going to be hard. It will be hard to leave the family and friends and activities I have here; on the other hand, it will be hard to deal with rejection. But no matter what happens I know that this experience has made me a better actor and that's all I care about right now. I feel so relieved all of a sudden, it's almost overwhelming. I had such a wonderful time at Marnie's party last night because I just felt so weightless. I was trying to think what brought the feeling on... I was talking to another friend about how so many people wait for the next THING, the next act, the next lover, the next job, the next WHATEVER, to say, "ok, NOW I'm living my life and NOW I can be happy." But I have to realize that I am living my life now and everything I'm doing now is what I want to be doing with my life and going to grad school and getting more training is just a step to take to be doing more of what I really want and less of what is just a necessity. And that can come this year or next year or whenever. Last week I had made up this ridiculously gruelling schedule of about eight more monologues to learn in the next five weeks, in addition to rehearsing the ones i already know. Yesterday I ripped it up and threw it away. Sure, I have to keep tabs on how much time I have left before auditions, but I don't want to turn this into a chore, and therefore, something that's no fun anymore. That's not why I'm doing this. Marnie and I were talking last night and she was saying that it's so wonderful when you know, despite the odds of getting into a great program, that you're doing it because it's what you love and for the experience. And that's exactly it and I don't want the next five weeks to be a chore that keeps me from remembering why I love this in the first place.

So today I slept a little late and then I crossed off my list all the monologues that I felt I SHOULD do just to have a huge number of them prepared ... and then I went for a coffee and memorized two short monologues that I'm looking forward to working on... this afternoon after I go for a run and don't rush because I'm worried about how much time I left in the day and my schedule. 2003 has plenty of potential for me, whether I get into school or not.

...is hard. I've started on my other monologues. So far I have worked up two: A Doll's House and Life is a Dream. A Doll's House is going much better, I think. The language in Life is a Dream is hard. I keep stumbling over some of the words when I actually do it even thought I spent nearly ALL DAY yesterday reciting the damn thing and I know I knew it perfect. I guess not. Anyway, I think A Doll's House is pretty good, though. So I'll have an Ibsen, another verse peice, a Chekhov and a few other modern pieces to pull from if asked. It's really hard working alone right from the beginning and not having another person. You have to imagine the responses from the other person rather than working off another person to beging with so they become set without you having to think about them. It's a challenge to not get in your head and just do what you're doing. The more I did it, the easier it gets, though, and they did seem to be a little different and spontaneous. I found that I could sort of anticipate the responses based on relating the character to someone I know and just use them. But it takes practice. I think the Doll's House one is going better because I can relate the opposite character very clearly to someone in my life and I know just how they would respond. The relationship in Life is a Dream isn't as easy.

Tomorrow is New Year's Day and I have the day off. So I'll be reviewing all the pieces I've done so far and working on the Chekhov and another modern piece. Becky is coming to visit Thursday - Sunday so I need to get a lot done before she gets here. And next Tuesday I'm going to be doing all these monologues for some friends so I want to feel confident about them by then.

I also decided to go ahead and apply to the Harvard/Moscow Art Theatre School program. So I need to get that application done next week and get the reommendation letters signed again. The application is not complicated, though, so it shouldn't take too long. The program takes more people than most - 23. And it's two years instead of 3, with a 3-month residency in Moscow. All very attractive features! They are also auditioning in Chicago, so I figure, what the hell. I might as well cast a wide net.

I am procrastinating. Today is Saturday and I have all day to work on monologues. What have I done so far? Drink a lot of coffee and watch some despicable entertainment show on television. I have worked on the monologues inasmuch as I've typed a few alternate ones out that I want to work on but the point is I haven't actually started working on the yet. For some reason working on monologues by myself takes every ounce of motivation I can muster. I hope I'm not alone in that. I need to be able to show these things to some other people by next weekend, though, so that oughta get my ass in gear.

J and I worked on Thursday and I made a big decision: To do the Brilliant Traces and Merchant of Venice Monologues for DePaul and to do BT and the Moliere piece for all the other auditions. Now that the decision is made I feel much better and much more committed to them. I think that will help immenseley. I ran through the BT and Merchant pieces and they went pretty well. I need to run through them a few more times today and work on personalizing the Moliere text.

This weekend is flying by. Fortunately, I don't really have to work much this week. Yesterday I spent the better part of the day working on my monologues and it was rather exhausting. Then I went to see Gangs of New York last night and was completely disillusioned, once again, by Hollywood's completely warped priorities. Daniel Day Lewis was amazing and Cameron Diaz was also quite good, but if it hadn't been for them, the movie would have been completely unwatchable. Only about 45 minutes of the 3 hour movie was at all dramatically compelling but even that got lost in all the scenery and crap that they spent billions of dollars on in order to make this grand sweeping epic - none of it was anything that people care about. The story took a back seat to the scenery and they could have told the story twice as well with half the cast, half the money in half the time.

J and I spent the first part of this morning talking about that over breakfast and then set to work on the Memory of Water monologue. He still struggles with the fact that it's an overly dramatic character, but at the same time really likes the piece. There's a fine line between the actress being presentational and the actress being truthful in playing a presentational, or melodramatic, character. I need to make sure I'm always doing the latter. But it's quite true that there are plenty of people out there who are over-dramatic like that and she's definitely one of them. We got a lot of really good work done, though. It's a tricky piece but a good one.

We're meeting again on Thursday, so I have several days I can practice between now and then. Next time we'll be going over all three I've worked on so far, and start working on the final one, the Helena monologue from All's Well that Ends Well. I can't help but start to have second thoughts about my choices of monologues, though. I guess it's sort of like getting cold feet. The Brilliant Traces monologue can be very good and very powerful, but it is climactic, which is something URTA advises againt. On the other hand, DePaul puts Brilliant Traces on its list of good plays to pull monologues from. I like the monologue, but in a way I feel like it's dangerous, if that makes any sense. That's really the only one that I feel nervous about - and probably because it requires so much emotion right out of the gate. I don't know. I have very mixed emotions about the whole thing right now. I'm irritated that in looking for other monologues to work on to have ready "just in case" I'm finding other stuff that I really like and might have considered for on the the two primary pieces had I found them earlier. And if I do work them up and show them to J, if by some chance one of two of those ends up being stronger that the ones I've been working on with him, then what do I do? I assume he would be honest with me about it and perhaps give me a little time to flesh it out and see if I might possibly substitute it. But at the same time I know a lot of this is nerves and in a way it parallels my relationship commitment problems. If I can't even commit to doing a damn monologue, of course I couldn't commit to a relationship! Sometimes I treat monologues the same way I treat men. I'm an interesting case, for sure. I find these monologues that I love to start with but I think I fail to really recognize what's so great about them other than the fact that I'm simply drawn to them. And when the initial attraction has worn off, I've grown tired of them because I haven't really stopped to look at what's so wonderful about the pieces. The same thing with men.... huh. I think I just had what somebody, probably Oprah, calls one of those lightbulb moments. Ding! But, I digress. One thing's for sure: if I'm going to do that Brilliant Traces monologue I've just got to know that I'm doing it and really commit to it. And that goes for all of them. One of the reasons I probably feel this way about that one is because I've been working on it the longest. It's like a boyfriend I'm tired of. When I came back to it yesterday after a two or three week break it was new and exciting again. But I know if I beat it to death that will wear away again. I'll lose the painting, like that guy says in that monologue from Six Degrees of Separation. So maybe a lesson learned here is that there is such a thing as working on something too long. Or maybe not too long, but too hard and too long. Eventually you grow tired of it, you push it and it's no longer fresh. It gets stale. Like Gangs of New York. Martin Scorsese was conceiving that for 25 years and look at the boring 3 hours that came out of it. So it's good to walk away from it for awhile and then go back. This week I'm going to start practice Memory of Water and start of the next Shakespeare and maybe work up a few of the others. That will be fun I think. Maybe some day I should write a book about all this. Although, most of this is probably just common sense that most people intuitively know and I just don't because I always make things harder than they should be.

J and I started working on the third monologue last night, the one from Memory of Water. Since I've done the play before it's a little bit of a hurdle to discard the old and start fresh, but he gave me some really good notes, particularly for the beginng of the monologue, that I think will really help a lot. I have a lot of concrete notes to work from for our next meeting on Sunday. Interestingly, we've spent the least amount of time with me working off of him for this one so I'll be interested to see how it goes in comparison to the others. But the internal work and personalization, prepartation, etc., is also important and for this one my preparation is the get cold and scared to start the monologue. It's also challenging in that the character is purposely being melodramatic - but it needs to be clear to the auditors that the character is that way, and not the actress. But I think it will be clear, especially because the language in the monologue is pretty clearly melodramatic and exagerrated. I'm happy with the pace we're working at now, even though it's quick. I still have other monologues to work up and so we kind of need to work quickly at this point.

This next week is Christmas and I don't have much to do for work, so I'm planning on also working hard on running the monologues I've already worked on and starting work on the "just in case" monologues. But in keeping with my earlier resolution about focusing on what I will look forward to if I don't get into school, I want to keep things in perspective. I want to make a list of great things and think about them just as much as I think about my monologues so this doesn't become something I tell myself, but something that I actually believe. So, if I don't get into school, I will look forward to:
1. Saving a ton of money because I will be totally debt-free by August (in theory!)
2. Cleaning up some of the plays I've written and sending them off to contests
3. Applying to some apprenticeship programs like Actors Theatre of Louisville and The Warehouse Theatre
4. Enjoying the freedom I'll have to go do summer work somewhere else since my job here is flexible enough to let me work from anywhere.
5. Spending more time with the wonderful friends and family I have here.
6. Being around to help my friend Patty with her wedding plans for October.
7. Taking the refresher photography class I've been wanting to take for awhile but haven't had time to finish.
8. Finishing the compilation of photography and poetry about performers and performance spaces that I've been working on.
9. Pursuing some more journalistic-style writing opportunities.
10. Having another year to get even more theatre experience that could help me get into school the following year.

Yeah, so that all sounds pretty good.

The last three days have been a bit unproductive in terms of getting much work done on my monologues. The holidays have a dastardly way of sucking up one's time. But I finally got those darn Christmas cards addressed and in the mail, and found time to get my expired registration and inspection renewed on my car before I get pulled over and have to pay a $250 fine.

And the good news is, the applications are done! I just need to get them all in the envelopes and send them on their way. I was hoping to mail them today, but got home too late last night, so they will probably go out tomorrow.

I also got good news about my trip to Chicago. My office mate, who has many theatre friends in Chicago, found fice people who are willing to basically let me have their apartments for four days while I am there while they stay with significant others to give me my own space. And these people don't even know me! Unreal! I am almost suspicious of such random acts of kindness, but Lauren (my office mate) says they are all super nice drama geeks who can totally sympathize with my position and that's why they are so willing to help me out. I couldn't be happier - it's going to save me hundreds of dollars in hotel bills!

Things are not too busy at work today so I hope to spend some time thinking about my preparations for the third monologue that J and I will be working on tonight. I hope to be at a point where I can show all four of the main monologues to some people by the beginning of January. I want to get feedback from other people, but I also want to make sure I have enough time to do something with the feedback I find valid and plenty of time to discard BS feedback so it doesn't put me in my head and mess me up.

I went to J's open Meisner class last night. I knew a lot of the students performing and they were doing scenes in progress. I was amazed at how nervous I was all day. My stomach was all in knots. I really get major sympathy nervousness sometimes for people I know. I must have inherited that from my mom. It's a big thing with her. She gets more nervous when I'm auditioning that I do, I think! Anyway, there was some strong work and it was interesting overall to see how people are doing with it. But I realized something this morning about what I saw in the class that really made me think: the students that had the strongest work (in my opinion), those that had the highest stakes and seemed to personalize the material the most, were the student who (as far as I know) are only taking the class because they want to and they find it artistically interesting, etc. They aren't really interesting in being actors. So, it makes me wonder if they are more willing to take risks, throw themselves into and really put themselves out there because they have nothing to lose. Regardless of whether that's true, I think it's a good think for me to think about. The more I think about my grad school auditions the more I know that I have to focus on the wonderful opportunities I can pursue if I DON'T get in. That way, I don't have anything to lose. Thinking about this made me recall why I felt like I did so well in my audition for The Memory of Water last Spring. I really wanted the part, yes, but at the same time I had it very much in perspective. There were a lot of other things that I was very much looking forward to working on if I didn't get the part. So in essence, I had nothing to lose and I gave a great audition. I really think that may be the most important thing for me to know going into these grad school auditions.

In looking through the recommendation letters I have so far (still waiting on one), I realized that one of them left something off one of the forms. Which means I'm going to have to track him down at some point in Chapel Hill this week before Thursday. Drat! Well I have to go to Chapel Hill anyway for the transcripts, so...

Last night I put together a notebook of all the monologues I'm working on, and about twenty more from which I could choose "just in case" monologues. I think I'll pick out 4 or 5.

I talked to the registrar at the National Theatre Conservatory today. She had emailed me personally to let me know she received my online application and I could call her to fork over my $50 fee via credit card. She answered on the first ring and was unbelievably nice. I know NTC only takes eight people a year, so I got the feeling it was a very tight-knit community over there. I like that idea a lot. I'm still trying to get over how expensive all of this is. Last week one of my friends asked me what I'll do if I don't get it this year. I told him I'll give myself until I'm 30 to try, and then enough is enough. That gives me a good four years! He was wondering why I'd stop at 30. "I mean, if you want an MFA, then you want an MFA, right? Who cares how old you are?' he said. Which is a very good point, but by that point I'll have spent five grand on applications and travel and will be even broker than I am now!

I was supposed to have dinner with an old co-worker tonight but she pushed it out til tomorrow night, so I'm going to address those xmas cards tonight and run through the monologues. I was so engrossed in putting this huge notebook together last night that I never did get to those blasted cards.

The applications are almost done. I should be getting my third recommendation letter from Jane Doe (name changed to protect the procrastinating yet inncent) any minute now. So all I have left to do is get some money orders for application fees (I guess Yale doesn't trust personal checks from starving artists. Go figure), and trek over to UNC to get eight copies of my undergrad transcripts where I'll have the oh-so-pleasant experience of dealing with the ladies who work in the thankless Registrar's Office. Ask them for a transcript and they look at you like you're asking for world peace on a platter. That should be a fun thing to do on my lunch break tomorrow. Sigh. But at least all this will be in the mail by Thursday and I won't have to worry about it any more.

This morning I worked with J on monologues again. We agreed to give the first two a break for awhile and focus on the third one I am working on. I'm working on both a long and short version of it. It's comic and quite funny. The character is completely neurotic and it has a lot of turns. I had already broken it down into beats and then we spent a good deal of time trying to narrow down the greater wish of the character, or the spine. This took much longer that it ought to have and in the end I once again arrived at the conclusion that I often think about things too much and make them more difficult than they need to be. Also, the nomenclature of acting is a confusing and controversial thing and a lot of times I think it makes people think to much about things that should be fairly simple. I didn't actually get on my feet with it because of all this going round in circles about exactly what the character wants and why, and that was a wee bit frustrating. I don't like sitting around and talking; I'd rather get up and do it. The good thing about doing it is sometimes if you're not exactly sure what the character should be doing, the actual doing can help you figure it out. Talking just puts me more in my head. I need to remember that for next time. I've also started to learn how to modify some of the preparation work with different pieces, as some require more and others less. I think I spent way too much time coming up with parallel personal circumstances for the first monologue when I was already in a place where I could completely understand the emotional circumstances of the situation. There are other pieces that I would need a circumstance that would put me in the same emotional place as the character, but for the first monologue I don't think it was necessary and in the end made me just think too much about something I already inherently understood and could relate to. I think it was an important thing to learn.

I met my friends Cynthia and Marnie in Carrboro today for a late lunch and Marnie was telling me about the scene work she's doing for a Meisner acting class she's in. They are having a public class this week and I asked her how she felt about it. She has a great outlook. Even though she knows the work is going to be rough, she said she feels good about it because if she looks at it as a journey and not just a result, she knows she's getting a lot out of it and she can't expect perfection with the first scene. I would love to look at my grad school auditions the same way. I think it would make me much less nervous. The only problem is, the whole point of doing it is to get in, so by it's very nature it's results-oriented. But I need to look at the whole process as an experience that is worthwhile no matter what the outcome.

Tonight I'm typing up all the alternative monologues I plan to work on. I might also finish my xmas cards.

I can't believe tomorrow is already Sunday. I have done nothing this weekend but work on my applications and clean my apartment. I did get sucked into watching a repeat episode of The Real World this afternoon, but fortunately did not get distracted for long. It's a great feeling to know that these applications are almost done, though. I finished all the essays. Now I have to go get all my transcripts on Monday and get my third recommendation letter. Everything should be ready to mail Thursday. Thank God. I'm working on monologues with J tomorrow morning. I'm really ready to dive into the second set and give the first set a little break. I'm also putting together a list of other monologues to have on hand in case any of the auditors wants me to do anything extra. I'd like to have 4 or 5 extra pieces ready to go if they ask. No pressure, right? I did buy some little Christmas candles at Target today to try to give my apartment some holiday spirit. Doubtful I'll have time to put up my other decorations this year and it's been so cold my power bill could probably use the break anyway.

OK, so I'm starting this handy dandy little journal to log my experience preparing for graduate theatre programs, and also to log the actual program experience (if, God willing I actually get into one). I suppose it's somewhat narcissistic to think that anyone else might actually be interested in these experiences, but at some point some other poor schmuck I know might be crazy enough to try to be an actor and want to read about what I went through. So here goes... My auditions are in February in Chicago. I will be there for eight days. Oy. First is DePaul, then the Denver Center, then URTA (in which I'll be auditioning for like 30 schools all at once) and finally Yale. Yeah, I aim high. But there's a lot of crap out there so you have to or it's just not worth it. So I'm knee deep in applications at this point and I can't wait to get them all in the mail. In addition to DePaul, Yale and Denver, I'm also applying to Northern Illinois University and Rutgers. So that's 3 letters of recommendation (X 5), plus about 20 copies of my transcripts (at $5 a pop), plus application fees ranging from $30 to $80 each. Then there's the flight to Chicago and food and lodging there. Fortunately I'll be able to stay with my dad in St. Louis part of the time during the 4-day lag with no auditions for free. But all in all, I figure it's going to cost me almost $1000 just to APPLY. But the most important this is to view this as an experience and a journey, not just a destination. I probably sound like Oprah, but it's true. While everyone I know has every confidence that I'm going to get in, not many of them understand how competitive these programs are. Most only accept 8-10 people, which means only about 4 women. And it's all subjective, so if I don't get in I have to be secure enough to know it has nothing to do with my talent. But they may not understand that. That puts a lot of pressure on me, and it's irritating. But best to put that out of my mind for now because I need to stay focused.... Two weeks til Christmas and I cannot get in the spirit at all. There's simply too much to do. I've got to get all these applications in the mail before Christmas - not for deadlines, but for my sanity. And then really buckle down on my monologues. I've been working with my acting coach and friend, J, on these things since September and we're just starting on the third one. I only need one classical and one modern, but I'm preparing two sets of two and then will pick the strongest one. Once I get a handle on those four, I hope to have time to prepare at least 4 others to have "in my back pocket" ready to pull out and perform in case any of the auditors asks to see something else. It's been known to happen and it's always a good idea. The work with J has been both artistically exhilarating and supremely frustrating. We started out very slow and are now picking up the pace quite a bit, mostly fueled by my anxiety over time. The process is very emotional and much of the preparatory work internal, so it's not like just rehearsing something by rote and doing it over and over and over again. Each time I do the monologues there are subtle changes and there is a sense of spontaneity and improvisation. It's great and exciting but scary as hell, because you don't always know where your emotions are going to take you. It's based in the Meisner process, and so riding your character's emotional life is the whole point. But when you don't have another person to respond off of (which is usually my life raft) it takes some getting used to. Another challenge with the work is that because I am also very good friends with my coach, we've had to be very disciplined. It's easy to let yourself sit around and talk for the first hour or so and just shoot the shit before you actually start working but then the work turns out like shit if you fall into that trap. We're going to have to buckle down and really be even more aware of that in these last two months of work. I will be very glad when all the apps are in the mail and I feel more confident about the 4 pieces. When I am practicing them and just making improvements. Right now, I still feel a bit like I am floundering. THe goal is to get the apps done by the beginning of next week and then focus focus focus on the monologues. I will have no life until mid-February. Fortunately, I have wonderful friends who understand. I went to Katja's last night to look through a bunch of her old monologue material for ideas of things I can work up to have on hand "just in case." She's been there and done that and totally understands what I'm going through. It's nice to have that support system. We also started talking about a satire we should write based on our romantic woes over the last year: it would be based on "Touched by an Angel" and we would call it "Touched by an Asshole." Sheer brilliance!