Filed under: My Day, Random Thoughts | Tags: acted, acting out, addling, adore, adoring, adventures, age, agreed, alive, angry, anna netrebko, ass, avett, avett brothers, aware, away, ball, barn, behavior, belligerent, blanket, brain, brain tissue, brain tumor, breathe, called, cancer, care, cheat, cheating, chest, chest hair, chicky, child, chime, churning, clear, clue, collect, collected, collecting, college, compare, comparing, control, corinne bailey rae, cranky, dad, day, dead, death, debris, depressing, deprived, die, difference, different, disease, disposition, doc boy, doctor glazier, dumb, dumb racist ass, dust, eight, eighteen, emma, emma steever, end, enough, evelyn, evelyn merrill, ever, every second, eye, eyes, fact, feeling, feelings, finish, five, florida, fluffy, flute, focus, forest, fresh, fricken phenomenal, george, george merrill, girl, glowing, good, good man, gorgeous, grandchild, granddaughter, grandfather, grandkids, grandma, grandmother, grandpa, grandparent, grandparents, great, hair, happy, hayloft, heart, heat, heavy, hello, homebody, hours, house, humidity, hundreds, inoperable, instrument, jump, just die, kim, know, know or care, known, lamp, lantern, lanterns, laugh, life, little girl, live, lobotomy, love, loving, major, majoring, man, marriage, master, mechanic, merrill, michelle, midget, mind, moon, move, move away, moves, moving, music, myself, new york, next door, no comparison, not himself, obviously, old, operate, oppressive, out of his mind, paint, painting, perfect, phenomenal, piano, piano master, playlist, poke, possible, purchase, purely, purpose, quick, racist, railroad, rather, riddled, rr, satisfaction, satisfied, savor, scattered, second, self-control, selfish, sell, sexy, sick, since when, sing, singing, skull, skulls, sky, smile, soft, softball, softballs, sold, solid, someone else, songs, sore, space, speckled, stain, staining, star, stars, state, sting, stolen, storage, storage space, strange, sure, surgeons, surgery, talent, talented, tamper, the avett brothers, three, three and a half, time, tissue, today, tonight, treatment, trombone, tumor, twist, ump, umpire, up, violet, weird, white, wonder, woods, work, working, would have, years, yesterday
The sky is a heavy, soft blanket, speckled with stars and a glowing violet moon. After such a gorgeous day, it’s an entirely perfect finish.
I completed the staining of the barn today. I didn’t know it was possible to not repeat Avett Brothers songs after five hours, but mixed in with Corinne Bailey Rae, Heart, and Anna Netrebko, I had a steadily churning playlist from three thirty until eight.
I’m a little sore from all of the painting but satisfied. I think my grandpa would have been pleased to see the barn looking new and solid again, as opposed to the faded, sad state it had been in before.
I had never known my grandfather collected railroad lanterns. The day I clambered up to the storage space up top, I counted eighteen, and a little midget lamp.
There were tens of softballs up there, too: he’d been an umpire. I’d known that of course, but until I was working in the barn I hadn’t been aware of the items in it. He was a mechanic; there were hundreds of items that I wouldn’t have a clue what to do with scattered in that old barn, collected dust and debris and age. He’d known what all of them were for, though.
All I ever hear about my grandfather was that he was a good man. He was solid, he was loving, he lived a good life until the brain tumor got him. I wish I’d known him! I had years with him, but I was a little girl and had seen him with the adoring eyes of a granddaughter. I will never know for myself how great a man he was. Since I was three his mind had been riddled with cancer.
With the thoughts of lobotomy fresh in my mind, I can’t help but wonder: did the tampering the surgeons do with my grandpa’s brain affect him? I mean, obviously brain surgery would affect anyone, but did it mess with his brain function?
My grandma told me yesterday that he was belligerent toward her near the end. He’d acted… not like himself.
Grandma and I agreed that any addling of the brain tissue was bound to make someone a great deal out of it, and that we would rather just die than have anyone poke around inside our skulls.
Inwardly I was thinking, I’m sure he would have rather just died, too. And his angry behavior toward her when he was completely out of his mind might have been the reaction of a man with self-control stolen away from him by disease. He may have acted so “belligerently,” as she put it, because she’d treated him like a child throughout their marriage– at least while I was alive, and old enough to know the difference. He may have acted so out of turn because she may have been cheating on him while he was so, so sick with the dumb racist ass she’s with now.
I’ll be happy if they sell the barn I just painted and move away to Florida. If someone else moves in next door, the house I will always remember as Grandma’s, good on them.
But if the woods that I know as Grandpa’s is sold, before my dad can purchase it, I’ll have different feelings on it.
My strange, selfish grandmother can have her sexy man with white fluffy chest hair (kinky?) and move away. She doesn’t even know or care what I’m majoring in or whether or not I want to go away for college (she thought I was a homebody). She doesn’t know or care what Michelle likes to be called, or what instrument she plays. The other day, when I mentioned to her that Emma (Steever) is extremely talented, she was quick to jump in with, “Well you are too, chicky, you play the flute very well.” Because obviously I was comparing myself to Emma? (Um, no… there is no comparision to a piano master who lives and breathes music every second. The fact that she’s fricken phenomenal is just that: purely fact.)
And, hello, since when do I play the flute?!
I just have to smile and laugh and savor the time she does have with me. I’ve never been deprived of love–ever–in my life. So it’s a weird, twisting and stinging kind of feeling when a grandmother who once babysat me and loved my grandfather (or I’d thought she did) is so absorbed in her own adventures that she doesn’t even bother to know her only grandkids who live in the same state.
But the moon is lovely, tonight, anyway, so I’ll focus on that and not the cranky disposition this muggy heat has brought out in me. I don’t like the humidity in this house right now. Too oppressive, and depressing.
Filed under: Dreams, music, My Day, Random Thoughts | Tags: "elaborate lives", "written in the stars", 180, 2008, 2009, accompanied, accompany, act, acted, acting, acts, actual, adam, adam pascal, after, afterward, aida, aida's, air, air-headed, allow, allowed, although, amneris, anderson, around, aud, audition, auditions, belt, belting, belting out, best, better, breakup, broadway, broken, bs, bullshit, cast, cat, cats, center, center stage, change, changes, changing, character, characterization, characters, chill, chilled, chills, coach, coached, coaches, coaching, control, convey, copy, costume, costumes, could, country, crave, cry, crying, danger, dangerous, dead-set, deck, decked, degree, degrees, dignity, discovery, diva, dumped, ears, egypt, egyptian, eight, eighteen, elaborate, elton, elton john, endangering, envision, envisioned, ever, experience, experienced, experiences, eyes, face, fashion, february, february 2008, feel, feeling, feline, fell, felt, fiance, fingernail, fingernails, first, friend, friends, funny, general, generally, gowanda, guy, ha, happiness, happy, head, head-over-heels, headed, headley, headstrong, heart, heartbroken, hearted, heather, heather headly, heels, help, helped, high, high school, hit, hits, home, hopeless, hopeless romantic, hung, hung out, immeasurably, immeasure, immesurable, individual, individuality, injustice, inspirational, inspire, inspired, january 2009, john, kellie, knew, know, knowledge, later, lead, leader, leading, leads, lerew, lesson, life, life lesson, life-changing, light, light-hearted, lights, listen, listened, listener, listening, lives, loss, love, loved, lover, maybe, me, mereb, middle, million, million and one, mind, month, months, move, moved, moving, mr. bett, music, musical, my life, naive, nation, need, nehebka, never, november, november 2008, now, nubia, nubian, observed, observer, one, one-eighty, onstage, opinion, opinionated, original, originally, out, over, overcame, overcome, own, pain, part, pascal, passion, people, perfect, perform, performance, performed, performing, pharaoh, phenomenal, place, point, possess, possession, pour, power, powerful, princess, queen, radames, really really, recording, recover, recovering, regain, relationship, relationships, remember, represent, representative, represents, rest, role, rolled, romance, romantic, ruler, sang, saw, school, scott, self, self-possession, serious, shatter, shattered, sherie renee, sherie renee scott, show, shunt, shunted, sing, singing, situation, sixteen, slave, slavery, slaves, smaller, so sweet, sojourn, sojourned, sojourning, somtimes, song, songs, soul, spot, spotlight, stage, stage left, star, stars, stood, story, strong, success, sucks, sung, survival, survive, survived, sweet, talent, talents, taylor, taylor anderson, tear, tears, the observer, thigh, thigh-high, think, thought, together, true, turn, turnaround, undergo, undergoes, undergone, unexpected, vision, vivid, vividly, wade, waded, wading, want, wanted, wash, waste, wet, when, withstand, withstood, woman, worthless, worthlessness, written, year, zoser
I was just listening to “Written in the Stars,” from “AIDA.”
I got chills and felt like crying. The music. The characters. The loss of the part I thought I was perfect for, the discovery of my true talents, plus actually performing the show. All of these made it a life-changing experience for me.
It’s funny that it all hits me now, months and months afterward.
I originally received a copy of the Broadway cast recording in February 2008. I was just recovering from my first “real” breakup from a “serious” relationship, and the music helped me regain some sense of power, control, individuality and self-possession. It also allowed me to regain my dignity.
Later that year, I “hung out” with the same guy, and when he acted like a dickhead, I put up with it, then went home and listened to Heather Headley pour Aida’s soul into my ears, and into my heart. The character is so powerful– a strong woman, a queen. Very headstrong and opinionated, but she fell in love. As star-crossed as they were, they found happiness together.
It really sucks being a headstrong, opinionated, hopeless romantic. Despite the bullshit I had waded thigh-high into in my actual life, I could listen to “Elaborate Lives” and feel Radames’ and Aida’s love wash over me. Sometimes those songs made me think that my own relationships could be so sweet. Ha, at that point in time, I was really, really naive. But that’s not the point.
When auditions rolled around, I was dead-set on getting Aida. I felt like I KNEW her, I wanted to be her. I knew I could convey the passion I felt for her situation on stage. In my mind I saw Observer headlines, envisioned Heather Headley and Elton John sojourning to Gowanda. I vividly pictured a stage decked out in Egyptian finery, with myself in the center, belting out the injustice of slavery and the guilt I felt for endangering my people.
One of my best friends got the part.
I was shunted (in my mind) to the role of Amneris, the Egyptian princess head-over-heels for fashion and for her fiance Radames. Amneris is really shunted in the musical– Radames would rather be with Aida. Amneris undergoes a one-eighty degree turnaround from light-hearted and air-headed diva to heartbroken, powerful ruler.
I fell in love with Amneris’ character, too. It was unexpected, and it was a smaller role. But I had a million and one costume changes, some phenomenal singing and acting coaching…
And when I sang, when I stood in the middle of the stage with tears wet on my face and sang about love and loss, worthlessness, waste and a shattered heart, I felt Amneris. Her story became a part of me, as much as my eyes or my fingernails. It’s generally observed that Aida was the strong one. And she was strong.
But Amneris was strong, too. Immeasurably so. She withstood her pain, overcame it, survived. And made her life a success. Maybe she knew love later, maybe she never did. But she made her country a better place and she held a life lesson in her heart for the rest of her life.
“Aida,” and the life lessons that accompanied the show (from February to November to now) will stay with me for the rest of my life. When I’m eighteen or eighty with my own lover or sixteen cats, I will remember “Aida” as the most moving show I have ever performed in high school; I will remember it for its powerful and inspirational leads. I will remember it because Aida and Amneris represent both sides of love, and of life. And since I intend to love, and live, they represent me.
Kick Drum Heart 