Reflections

So guess what I did...



I got a haircut.

You know how I've been talking about cutting my hair since, oh, the beginning of September? Remember when I got permission from the head of my program and the head of the costume department? Remember how I even had a poll on here a while back to see what my readers thought?

And how I kept pushing it back, questioning it, over-analyzing it, and backing out?

Well, I cut it. Finally.

Not the "Audrey Hepburn Roman Holiday" style that I was originally considering. Not that drastic, no. But if you take into account how much of my life has been spent with long hair, this is still a significant transformation for me. Far more than dying my hair last March.

I needed a change. I needed something different. Maybe to reflect that the person on the inside isn't the same.

More than anything, I think I just needed to stop being afraid.

I got it cut yesterday. My head feels lighter. I think my face and neck look even heavier than they did before. But in general, I think I like it. I still look like me. I just look like a new version of me. Maybe a more serious version. Maybe one who has matured.

Maybe it's just that for the first time in a long time I'm looking in the mirror and having to really take myself in.

Have you ever noticed that after awhile, you stop seeing the people you're around regularly? You look at them, but you don't really see who they are or how they've changed. But if you go a year without seeing them, they look so different.

I think that's how things started to go with me. I stopped seeing myself. My progress. My metamorphosis. The fact that who I am now is not who I was a year ago. The fact that although my hair has been the same length since college, I have not been the same me.

I am not the girl in my headshots. I am not the girl fretting about graduate school. I am not the girl who was so obsessed with completing her mediocre NaNoWriMo novel. I am not the girl who Brian said he was in love with. And I am not the girl who sat by waiting for life to come find her.

I guess in some ways I'm that girl. I will always be her a little. For after all, though I've changed, I am still fundamentally me. But I'm so much more now than I was before.

And when I looked in the mirror this morning, I think I finally saw a change in what was reflecting back at me. Something was different enough that I finally stopped and paid attention.

I don't look like a college girl anymore. I almost look like an adult. I'm not sure how I feel about that yet. I think I'm okay with it.

I don't look the way I want to, but at least I'm not trying to hide that from myself anymore. I'm not looking in the mirror and pretending that I see myself as I once was. I can't hide behind my hair the way I've been doing for the last 2 years.

And you know what? That's fine. Unlike Jo in Little Women, my hair was not my only beauty.

I can be beautiful without it. And I don't need other people to tell me that in order for me to believe it.



So without further ado, I present to you the new me. Not as I want you to think of me, but as I truly am.









(Me, my Aunt, and my Mom. This is the first time we can remember that I've had shorter hair than either of them. 11/29/08)


May you have the guts to see yourself as you are.
And may the person that you are be similar to the person you want to be.


~A~

The Engineer

(Me and Two-Shots-Up at karaoke, 11/23/08)

I haven't been posting on a regular basis. And I will continue that trend, just so you know. They keep us hopping, and my free-time is sporadic. Not to mention all the guilt I feel whenever I'm working on ANYTHING that isn't centered around making myself a better actor. Blogging seems like a distraction from my REAL purpose (my other blog seems more in the correct vein, hence why I'm better at keeping up with that).

The only truly consistent thing about my schedule down here is that I get Mondays off. So naturally, Sunday night is party night.

Y2K led the initial movement to hit karaoke up on a Sunday, and people followed. But now, it's become even more important to Two-Shots-Up and me than it is to him. We go every week. And we love it.

We dance like maniacs. Seriously. MANIACS. And we've done our "Viewpoints" movement homework on the dancefloor more than once. In fact, now it's part of what we do there, regardless of whether it's required for class. We think it's funny.

I usually sing a song or two, and I'll do a duet with Two-Shots-Up, because she's not confident enough to hit the mic on her own.

A couple of weeks ago, Two-Shots-Up and I were the only people from our group in attendance. We made fools of ourselves, and we met a lot of interesting people in the process. Like the guy who says he's a band with two former members of The Allman Brothers, and the former drummer from Bad Company. And a creepy drunk guy who asked for my number, and when I said I didn't give it out ("for safety reasons"), responded with, "What? I'm not dangerous!"

We also met a nice guy wearing a Bayside Tigers shirt (a clear sign that he was friend-able). He's an engineering student, and the drummer in a not-yet-named band (I remind you all that I have a thing for drummers). He seemed cool, and it was right around the time that 2SU and I were looking to find friends outside the program, so we both got his number and said our friends and his friends should hang out sometime.

He's been text messaging me ever since. But it was hard to think too far into that, as he was CALLING 2SU. One day she came into class and said they'd talked for an hour the night before.

And where did that take my mind?

Shockingly, not to the bad place. I never crossed into the land of, "He wants her and not me. Just another guy picking another girl over me. What's wrong with me?"

No. Perhaps my self-esteem level is improving, because where I HONESTLY went was, "Oooh! I hope they date, and then we can hang out with his friends! I bet he has cool friends, and then I'll know people outside the program! Wouldn't that be awesome?"

Last week, The Engineer was in L.A. (which happens to be the home of 2SU, giving them even more to talk about), so he missed karaoke.

We had several people from our group there. And at one point, Y2K tried to confess his feelings for me. OVER THE MICROPHONE. He started a song that had a "let's get together" vibe by saying, "Angela? Let's cut through the s***..." He walked off the stage platform and over to me on the dancefloor (cut to me, looking terrified), and then said, "And, um, you too, [Two-Shots-Up]." Crisis narrowly averted.

Later in the evening, 2SU and I sort of hinted that we were a couple in front of Y2K... Which we're not. And it seems cruel in retrospect. But in that moment, I felt like it had to be done. I didn't want to have to hurt him by turning him down. It seemed like a better choice to convince him not to take the risk.

As a side note, it's really too bad that neither 2SU nor I are interested in women. Because we would make such a great couple. And I'm pretty sure it'd be hot. We have a lot of chemistry (which is probably why we keep getting paired together in exercises with vaguely lesbian undertones in Acting class).

(Tangent: There's a part of me that always worries that being straight makes me sexist. Like I'm making a statement that men are better than women somehow... But then if I say that being straight is a sexist choice, then I'd have to say that being gay is as well... And since I don't believe that being gay is a choice, then I guess I have to admit that I was probably just born this way.)

Anyway.

A few days ago, I got a text from The Engineer:

"I really want to take you out sometime, if you have time! :)"

Wait, wait, wait... Is that... a date?

I thought he wanted 2SU. I was pretty certain of it, actually. Which made me unsure as to whether I should bring it up to her. On the one hand, I wanted to know if he was trying to hook both of us. On the other, I didn't want to rub her face in it if she wanted him...

I decided it would work itself out.

Last night we went back to karaoke. Me, 2SU, Y2K, and a handful of others. I sang "Whatta Man" by En Vogue & Salt n' Pepa. (note: the words are NOT on the right beat for that song... you have to ignore when they come on the screen). I sang "Killing Me Softly" by The Fugees (with a friend doing all the "one time/two times" bits). 2SU and I did "Love Is Strange" by Mickey & Sylvia (from Dirty Dancing).

The Engineer showed up. He bought me a cherry coke. And he made it quite clear that he wasn't chasing after 2SU. He wanted me.

After all of us did a rousing rendition of "The Y.M.C.A.", the bar closed and we were shoved out into the parking lot, where we hung around discussing constellations.

He asked if he could walk me to my car, which was all of about 20 feet away. I let him. He kissed me. I stopped him. I felt weird about it happening with Y2K right there. Not that I had been hiding the fact that I was flirting with The Engineer all night... But making out with him in front of Y2K in a parking lot just seemed wrong. Mean, in fact.

We discussed going out for coffee, but then admitted that neither of us drinks coffee. We said in unison that we normally get hot chocolate. But then he said that he's trying to cut carbs and sugar out of his diet, which is EXACTLY what my Movement Professor told me I should be doing. We laughed. And then he proposed taking me out for water sometime.

His schedule is as chaotic as mine (he has work, school, and band practice), so we haven't figured out a time that we can meet... And I'm going to see my family in Connecticut for Thanksgiving, which cuts out a chunk of time. But I know we'll be seeing each other again at some point. And I'm a little excited about it.


May you find someone to drink water with.

~A~

I Get It

(My roommate and me at an opening for a show. 11/15/08)

I'm doing well.

I've started kicking booty in my acting class in the last couple of weeks. We had an exam on Friday, and I was really proud of the work I did. And my classmates seem to be excited for me and impressed with my progress. I'm stoked.

Some of my classmates meet with our professors for long periods of time to discuss process and technique one-on-one, but that's really not my style. I let them know where I'm at every so often. I'll stay after class for a couple of minutes to tell my Movement Professor that my knee is out of whack. I'll go to Voice class early to ask my professor's advice on things. I email my professors when I come to realizations on my own outside of class. That sort of thing.

After our test, I walked by my Acting Professor's office, and his door was ajar. I knocked. He invited me in, but I didn't need to sit down and talk. All I needed to say was, "I get it." He nodded, smiled approvingly, and in his delightful Russian accent responded with, "Good." And that was all that needed to be said.



I thought that when I got to grad school, I'd magically get skinny. I thought that the weight I'd put on in the previous year and a half would just fall off. But it didn't. Quite the opposite, actually. I've put on 15 pounds since I've started classes.

Jamie once wrote about that number on the scale that makes you think to yourself, "I'm heavier than I'd like, but at least I haven't hit ___." That dreaded number that seems so detrimental and intimidating. Yeah, I passed that number by 3 pounds. And it was upsetting.

I can see it in my face, neck, and midsection. And I'm pretty self-conscious about it.

I thought my Movement class would be more active than it is. But it turns out I was actually getting more exercise when I was in Chicago, walking all over the place and taking 14 flights of stairs up and down twice a day at work, and another 5 flights in my apartment building. Here, I jump rope for 5 minutes 4 days a week, and walk on a treadmill (with no resistance at a low speed -- professor's orders) daily. And that's pretty much it.

I talked with my Movement professor about it, and she said she wants me to keep a food journal, so I've been tracking everything I eat all week. And I eat a TON. I'm so busy here that I've begun mentally associating "food" with "break time". Not good. And it's mostly healthy stuff, but it's just too much.

My professor also wants me to eat my biggest meal at breakfast, and my smallest meal at dinner. And she wants me to stop eating after 7pm (she originally said 6pm, but I pointed out that I often don't get home from school until after 6). This has been virtually impossible for me because of how long my days are. There was literally a day this week where I got to school at 8am, left for about 45 minutes for dinner, and then was back at school until 12:15am. So I basically went from 6:45pm to 12:30am without eating, and then got home and felt ravenous. I just can't do it.



Speaking of food, I hit the year mark for being a vegetarian, and have now been adding meat back into my diet (which I know disappoints Jessica and Heidi). And I'm so glad I did. For one thing, meat is way more delicious now than it has EVER been before. Also, I'm hoping that this might help me lose some weight, as I can get protein from meat instead of peanut butter and cheese like I've been doing for the last year. We'll see.

To be honest, I don't think I'm ever going to eat as much meat as I used to. As frustrating as being a vegetarian has been, I've discovered that it's POSSIBLE. I can do it and be relatively healthy. And I'm sure there will be days now when I don't eat meat and don't even realize it. I'm just glad that it doesn't have to be every day.

I'm really proud of myself for doing it for a year. Last November, I was in the middle of doing both NaNoWriMo and NaBloPoMo. And when I finished, I felt an enormous sense of pride because I'd stuck to my goals for a month. But now I've stuck to something that was really hard for me for a full year. I have more will power than I thought I did.



Anyway. I'm growing as a person. And while many days feel like battles, I'm finding myself, one piece at a time.


May you get it.

~A~

Secret Praise

I could've put this on my grad school blog, but a bunch of my classmates read it... and I don't want them to see this.

After a couple of weeks of shaky work in my Acting class, I finally got my courage back on Friday. And on Saturday, I got an email from my professor (something that I understand to be pretty rare from him).


Subject: Keep up the good work!


Hello Angela,

Excellent work in class yesterday. Most importantly - consistent work. Three etudes in a row - not bad. Keep exercising at home - it is paying off.

Sincerely,

[Acting Professor]



That makes me want to scream and shout. :)



May you get all the encouragement you need.

~A~

The Missing Piece

(Me as a Jackson Pollack painting and D-Train as Edward Scissorhands at a Halloween party)

On Thursday, I headed over to CCM's house after class. We went to a nearby restaurant and got a take-out veggie pizza (he ordered it ahead of time, and he paid). He drove us to the bay.

We sat next to the water having a great conversation. It flowed without much effort. And it was lovely. We sat there talking and eating as we watched the sunset.

It was a wonderful dinner. In many ways, it was exactly what I needed. An in-person conversation with someone who understood, but wasn't in the middle of all the problems in this place.

I had to get to the theatre for tech, so he drove me back to his place.

As he walked me to my car, he said, "I'm really glad we got to do this. I've been looking forward to having an opportunity to talk with you one-on-one."

"Me too," I said.

And as he gave me a hug goodbye, he said, "I just wanted to make sure things weren't awkward between us."




Ah. I understand now. It wasn't meant to be a date at all. It was meant to be a "let's see if we can still be friends, even though some weird stuff went down" outing.

What a misguided act. Calling a girl up several days in advance to ask her out to dinner in an attempt to bring your relationship with her away from the dating realm.

People confuse me. Especially this guy.



Last night after the show, I took D-Train to the same spot on the water. He and I sat there talking for hours. We talked about things that I didn't think I'd ever say to people down here. He told me things that he doesn't feel like he can talk about with anyone else in his life. Things about his relationship with his girlfriend, about his past, about his progress here. I became more myself and less alone as I sat with him, watching the moonlight dance on the water.



After these two conversations, I realized that dating someone is not what's missing in my life. It was the other role that Brian played for me. It's the confidant that I can allow in deeply. It's a person that I can say things to without judgment. It's a person who I feel I know on more than just a superficial level, who will tell me more than just how they feel on a given day.

I tell a lot to my roommates, and I've shared things with All-The-Way, Two-Shots-Up, Wifey, O.D., and Iceman... I appreciate having all of them to vent to, and I know that they all care about me. But it's not really the same. I still feel somewhat guarded with them.

I'm pretty sure that CCM can't be that person for me. And honestly, I'm still not sure that D-Train can be. There are times when he is, and other times when he's very clearly frustrated by my presence (or maybe just frustrated by the fact that he doesn't know how to help me).



May you figure out what's missing.

~A~

Debatably a Date

(Me as a Jackson Pollack painting. Iceman as a stripper pole, which was my favorite costume at the party. This has nothing whatsoever to do with this post; I just liked the photo.)

CCM called me on Monday night. He's had my number for weeks. I had wondered if he'd ever use it.

He called from a laundromat. We briefly discussed the connection to Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog (Dr. Horrible knows the girl of his dreams from the laundromat). He said something about how he never properly thanked me for introducing him to it. He also lamented the fact that we haven't had a chance to talk without about thirty other people around (which is perhaps an exaggeration, but it's true that we only see each other in group settings). And he said we should rectify that.

He asked me out to dinner. For Thursday.

Wait, WHAT?! WTF??? Didn't he JUST choose another girl over me? On FRIDAY??? This came out of NOWHERE.

I said yes.

I'm not sure whether it was the right decision. After what happened at that Halloween party, I'd decided to forget about him.

But I didn't want to say no. So I didn't. I followed the impulse, just as I've been learning to do in my acting.

I'm meeting him at his place after class, and then I have to go crew a performance like 90 minutes later. No idea what we're doing or where we're going. He said something about "exploring" the area. *shrugs*

This is a date, right? It seems like a date. Weird.

In other news, our nation has elected a new president. And I'm pretty excited about it. May he be the person we need to help put this country on a better path.

But somehow, at this moment, I'm thinking more about whether this is a date. That seems so egocentric, pathetic, and shallow...

What the hell am I going to wear?


May you feel the good kind of nervous.

~A~


P.S. This is totally distracting me from all of my other stressors. So that's good, right?

P.P.S. Thank you all for the outpouring of support after my last post. I think you know how much I needed it. And I want you to also know how much I appreciated it. This is a brand new week, and I have a feeling that things are about to turn around. :)

Compromised

This is no longer the safe space for me that it once was.

Actually, it hasn't been for awhile. I just didn't know that.

I don't know who's reading; I just know that they're in my city, and it seems from my StatCounter that my blog address is being passed around.

And I do know someone else who's reading. He admitted it freely. He showed up once, and it didn't even register as a threat. But RSS feeds are sneaky things, and in a blink, he became a regular reader without me knowing it.

Actually, I don't mind so much about him (although it's so strange to me that he knows more about me than anyone else down here, as I've barely talked with him). I'm more bothered by the possibility that he's not the only one.

I feel like my security has been compromised. But can you really have privacy when you put your life onto the internet?

I've been dealing with so many things, and so afraid to write them here for fear of who might read them. But they just keep piling up, and there are so few people here that I'm willing to discuss them with.


I'll give you the short versions:

- I got into an argument with a classmate during our group therapy (my whole class has therapy together once every two weeks to work out our problems... it is NOT frequently enough). I mentioned that I think he's racist against me, and he responded by saying that I'm a "stereotypical white girl who can't dance". (Ouch.) He also then spent a fair amount of time saying that I'm not "real" and he doesn't understand me. Some members of my class seemed to silently agree. I realized that I'm the resident alien of my class. I'm the freak. I'm the one that no one understands. And I felt so hurt and upset. And so very, very lonely.

- I met with my acting professor a week ago Friday. He thinks that my heart isn't in the work, that I'm not working hard enough outside of class, and that I don't trust myself enough. You have no idea how hard that was to hear. I put my heart into everything I do, especially theatre. And I have been working. The trust thing is true, but I'm working on it.

- My entire class got yelled at because of our lack of a sense of ensemble. We can't do anything together. And I resent some of my classmates. When I got here, being part of an ensemble was in my given circumstances. I just accepted that we were one. We were going to work with each other through thick and thin for the next three years. But not all my classmates felt that way. Some of them are still questioning whether they're going to stick it out for the three years. And I gave up.

- That night (after the bad meeting AND the ensemble speech), I was at a bar with a group of about 20 people, and I was being ignored by all of them. We crossed the mark of midnight, so it was technically my birthday. At one point they sang Happy Birthday to me, but CCM was flirting with a random girl and barely looked up. When I tried to join in on conversations, I apparently chose the wrong ones where people were discussing serious things, and people gave me dirty looks and brushed me off. (In my defense, I was intoxicated, lonely, had a painful day, and it was my f***ing birthday.) I ended up sitting by myself in the corner crying.

- On my birthday, I decided to have a gathering in my own honor. I bought a bunch of alcohol, mixers, and food, and told people to come at 9:00. So it was a little upsetting that no one was there at 9:00. Or by 9:30. Or by 10:00. Or by 10:15. I felt so lonely and unwanted. I knew that my roommates would be home around 11:00, so I took some comfort in that. My first guest showed up at 10:20, and then more came after that. It ended up being a fun night (you may have seen this video), but it was a rough start.

- I went to a Halloween party last Sunday. One of my (drunk and high) classmates spent HOURS attacking me, saying I was a weak link in the class, that I was bringing too many of my personal problems into the ensemble, and that I wasn't working hard enough for the good of the group. He said I cry too much, and it's pathetic and he thinks I'm a whiny attention-whore. He laid into me, shouting all the things he thinks I'm doing wrong, and I just sat there crying. I was too drunk to know how to get out of the situation. A few of our other classmates tried to break it up, but were unsuccessful. At one point, he got physically violent, and threw me into a sliding glass door. Somehow we ended up leaving the party and going to another classmate's apartment to finish the discussion. Which was so stupid and I should've just left, but in my intoxicated state, I didn't want to leave with things unresolved. It was unbearable.

- This entire week, I have sucked as an actor. It's been horrible. I completely lost all the courage I had because of that classmate. My acting professor called me out on it. I went up to him during our 10-minute break and told him that I had broken because a classmate had criticized my work. He told me that I have everything that I need to become a great actor, except the self-confidence to bounce back from things like that. I told him I'd work on it.

- A 2nd-year wrote a long, venting, angry blog post about how angry she is with my class not being supportive enough of them. She then specifically quoted something that I wrote in my Grad School Blog as an example, and turned it into a "How dare you" prompt. What I wrote was something that I wrote with good intentions, and I felt terribly about making her so upset. I thought I HAD been being supportive. I've loved the work that class has done. I bawled my eyes out during the show that she felt I criticized. And now I feel like a horrible person. I called her and apologized (somewhat emotionally), and we talked it out for awhile. I think it ended on a positive note, but I'm still carrying around a lot of guilt.

- I went to another Halloween party on Friday night. The short version of that? I stuck around for a long time to give CCM a ride home, but then he ended up hooking up with the host and staying over there. Let's just say that it didn't improve my insufficient self-esteem. Of course, that didn't stop him from flirting with me yesterday as though nothing had changed. Maybe he's the kind of guy who always keeps his eyes open, looking for better prospects. Whatever.

- I've been in tech rehearsals for the last several days for a show that the 2nd-years are doing. I'm typing this on my dinner break. I'm on stage crew, but I'm also helping costume crew with some fast changes. There's surprisingly little for me to do, which makes the tech process even more exhausting.

- I'm considering going back on my medication for ADHD. I've been off of it for a year and a half. Going on the drugs makes me a better student (I can write papers like nobody's business), but a worse actor (I get stuck in my head and can't tap into my vulnerability). In the past, they've also screwed up my sleeping habits and my appetite. I think it might help me socially, but I feel like I'm compromising who I am if I'm using them to make people like me (shouldn't they accept me for who I am, regardless?). I asked my voice professor for a recommendation of a doctor, but I haven't gotten brave enough to make an appointment.


So there you are. That's why I haven't been giving real posts. I'm so stressed, so emotional, and so... broken. I don't feel good enough as a romantic interest, as an actor, or as a person. I'm trying to keep my problems out of the classroom, but in order to do that I feel like I need to hide them from my classmates in general.

All-The-Way has been a really great friend and listener. She's probably my closest friend down here, but I'm in perpetual fear that she's only my friend because my freakishness amuses her. I don't trust her enough to tell her everything. Heck, I haven't even written everything here. There are some issues that I can't discuss here anymore. And there are details of some of the other issues that shouldn't be put on the internet. And there are some things that I don't want to discuss.

I was hesitant to tell anyone about considering medication (you have no idea how painful it becomes when people relate your good days and bad days to drugs, and make accusations of "did you forget your medication?". It gives them power over me that I don't want them to have.). I told Iceman last night, and he was so caring and loving in his responses.

It would be easier if I had friends down here who weren't in the program, but there's no good way to get them. These are the people I'm perpetually surrounded by, for better or for worse. I tried to become one of them, but it never seemed to really take hold in the way I wanted it to.

I have to stop. I have another rehearsal from 7pm to midnight.

But my life isn't all misery. I'll leave you with pictures of my sensational Halloween costumes.

(Me as a Freudian slip. The top ones say "Please pass the boobs... I mean mustard." The others include a drawing of Freud, several Freud quotes, and phrases like, "What are you suppressing?")


(Me with D-Train, who went as James Dean)


(Me as a Jackson Pollack Painting. I made the dress myself over a few weeks. The white tag said something like "Pollack, Jackson; #55, Tulip paint on cotton; Ringling Museum; Anonymous Donation". My hair and makeup became extensions of the art)


May you learn to compromise.

~A~