To-Do List

Yesterday I was kvetching about my to-do list. At the time, I didn't realize that it would have another item thrown in there.
I got a text from Grace in the morning asking if she could borrow my wedding dress.
No, she isn't getting married, but her character, Elaine, in The Graduate is. The dress they had found for her buttoned up the back in those tiny, white, cloth-covered buttons. She couldn't possibly make a wardrobe change in that.
The problem with wearing my wedding dress -- I'm seven inches shorter than Grace.
I immediately sent texts to all my tall friends asking if they had their wedding dresses and whether they zipped up the back.
Luckily, I found one.
So added to my day, a drive over to my friend's house to pick up the dress. A drive up to Grace at school where she tried on the dress and felt so gorgeous in this dress with its full skirt of tulle.

I hope she feels this giddy when we go shopping for her actual wedding dress someday. 

I'm still getting through the rest of the things on my to-do list, like calling car insurance agents, but tonight, I get to go watch Grace perform.

Here's another photo she sent in her hips 60 wear.

Hope your Friday night is groovy, baby. 

The Calm of September?

I say throughout my life that things will calm down soon. And they should.
Many things on my plate have slid off, if you will.
Two kids back in college.
Revisions to my novel completed and off to be edited.
Classes begun at both colleges where I teach.
I should now fall into the rhythm of a nearly empty-nest life. My 17-year-old is a senior in high school, and he asks for very little, except enough junk food in the house to keep him full. And it suddenly seems very important to him that I attend things like "back to school" night.
I begin my mornings with luxurious runs that I actually look forward to. I think I'm finally back in shape so I don't dread it.
This morning, after five miles, I decided I'd run to Starbucks to get coffee for me and Tucker. So I ran that 6th mile along a busy road, feeling strong and hopefully looking peppy in case anyone I knew should drive past.
The run this morning convinced me that I've recovered from my running attempts in Florida, which is just too hot and humid for summer runs. No wonder I never ran while we lived there.
Driving 1000 miles to drop Spencer off at school last Thursday and driving 1000 miles back on Monday took its toll. But it was nice to meet his friends and see the hole that is a dorm room where he will live for the year. His roommate is a stand-up guy named Christian who comes from Atlanta, Georgia and spends a lot of time volunteering. I'm hoping that rubs off on Spencer who has already investigated volunteering at a nearby state park along the Sunshine Skyway Bridge. He just has to figure out how to get there since he doesn't have a car.
Grace's life has changed greatly since she started college three years ago as a biology major at a college 10 hours away in north country New York. Then she changed to a language major, learning French, Italian and German. Now she has switched again, landing only about 20 minutes away from home and majoring in theater.
She's a dance minor because when she auditioned, the professors decided she'd be a perfect Rockette. They dragged her down to the office of a professor who once worked as a Rockette and that professor agreed. Grace now starts her mornings each week day with a dance class: ballet, modern or tap.
But the professors had another suggestion that she major in theater with an emphasis in opera, so that happened. She loves opera and credits years of opera camp for giving her the love of languages that she has.
In addition to a new college and new majors, she also was cast in a show that runs the first three weeks of October. She plays a 25-year-old secretary who has an affair with her boss and gets pregnant, but that's not the main conflict, just one of many in this original play called "Coming Out." They hope to move the play to off-Broadway next. Will Grace go with them?
At this point, I can only hold on for the ride.
Did I say things were calm in September? I'd better enjoy this sunny afternoon and try not to think about it.

She's All That

For adults, our lives are fairly predictable. We go to work, do all the household chores, occasionally indulge in hobbies or vacations. Life is not like that for my daughter Grace.
Grace is 21 and in January she decided not to go back to her college in New York (10 hours away). Instead, she took some classes locally and applied to other colleges. She'll be going about 20 minutes away from home in August for a theater/broadcast journalism major.
But she's not sitting home waiting for August. She'll be appearing in two shows this summer. In Les Miserables, she's a prostitute in the first act and a barricade girl in the second act. She was so thrilled to come home and tell me she was a whore!
The other show is Emma by Jane Austen, the musical. And Grace is Emma.
I know!
Promotional photos for Emma came out the other night and I was wowed. What do you think?

Here she is striking a fierce pose with Mr. Knightley 

All innocence

Each time I choose one as my favorite, I look again and prefer another one. 

Slightly mischievous

What do you think?Which do you like best?
 I can't wait for the show.

Grace's Dilemma -- Hollywood or New York?

One of my friends (Phyllis) complained that I never blog anymore -- not about the interesting stuff like embarrassing situations or my kids getting into trouble, etc... All I ever write about is books and book reviews and France. Of course, I am obsessed with books and France, but my kids are still a major part of my life. So here's a blog about one of my kids...
In January, Grace stayed home rather than going back to her college in far away New York. I want her to finish college, but having her home was so nice. She took classes at the local community college -- theater, ballet, communications, nothing too strenuous. She got a job at a local French restaurant and has learned that she gets bigger tips if she speaks English with a French accent. The tight black skirt also improves tips. She performed in the chorus of a local community theater production.
As April bloomed, it was time to find another college where she could attend and finish. She applied to four colleges and was accepted at all of them. We visited Ohio State where she could continue with her French and languages major. The campus and the program just didn't win her over.
She and I together visited one of the campuses about 15 minutes from home. As we walked onto campus, I commented that it reminded me a lot of her college in New York. She agreed.
"Why didn't we look here?" she asked.
Mostly, cause they don't have a swim team and at the time, Grace was planning to swim in college.
Grace, now 21, has decided to change her major to theater. That has been a big struggle for me -- not that I have that much say in it. But I think majoring in theater is like sowing dandelions in your green lawn. It's going to be a lot of work for something you may or may not succeed at. I have no idea whether Grace is a good actress. I have no idea whether she can succeed on Broadway or in Hollywood. But who am I to say don't go for your dreams?
I always wanted to be a writer, but  I can write after the bloom of youth has faded. For actors, youth is pretty much a necessity. So I gave Grace my blessing to major in theater but asked her to pick another major too, like communications. She agreed.
 My cousin, who was a successful actor, appearing in movies like Oh Brother Where Art Thou, and  television shows like Seinfeld and Malcolm in the Middle, cautioned that having a back up means that you won't throw your heart into acting.
I didn't change my mind about the double major though.
So as we toured the campus, they said the tour didn't include the Communications building which was a little way down the road. We said we'd like to see the building and they called ahead to alert the secretary we were coming.
The secretary took one look at Grace, 5-foot, 10-inches before her platform pumps, an insouciant scarf draped around her neck, her brown hair falling in a curtain down her back, and said, "Oh, I see you're here for Broadcast."
Grace and I both looked at each other.
Grace said afterwards that she felt like saying, "Well, I am now."
The chair of the department came out into the hallway to talk to Grace and was explaining some classes then said, "But that's really for the writing side of things, not Broadcast."
"Grace is a pretty good writer too," I threw in there. After all, Earl and I are both writers and pride ourselves on the fact that we may not have passed along math skills but our kids can write.
Then as we continued on the tour, one of the broadcast professors came into the hallway to meet us.
"I'll take over from here," he told the secretary. "I can see she's here for broadcast."
After we walked out of the building, we looked at each other and said, "Why didn't we ever think about this before?"
Theater and broadcast journalism seem like a perfect match. Grace will have to learn how to operate the cameras, to edit, to direct, to read the news, to covers sports and other stories. Hopefully she can find a fabulous internship in New York City that allows her to work on news during the day and try out for shows in the evening. The auditions alone would be hugely helpful.
So now Grace is registered to attend a new college only 15 minutes away and even closer to her work. She's still debating whether she'll live on campus or get an apartment for the school year. She's taking some more classes at the community college this summer, and I'm praying she can finish by the end of next summer, but in the fall of 2014, I'll have another kid headed off to college.

The Three Musketeers -- The Musical

Somehow, Grace manages to find theater wherever she goes.

From last year's production
 of Pride and Prejudice

Last summer she was in a community production of Pride and Prejudice, the musical. Those same people who adapted Pride and Prejudice wrote music and adapted The Three Musketeers this year, and they told Grace they'd written a part specifically for her. She felt flattered, but worried that she might be reaching above her abilities.
"I've never been the leading love interest," she wailed one night after a frustrating rehearsal.
She plays Constance, who in this version, is the love of D'Artagnan and who is unfortunately married to D'Artagnan's landlord. The D'Artagnan actor is a dashing blond who just graduated from high school and strides across the stage singing his love for Constance.
The landlord, Constance's husband, luckily is supposed to be a "silly man" because Grace's friend Leron plays him. He's a 6-foot, 4-inch, gay, African American man and he camps it up. He might just steal the show.
Grace is lovely and sincere in the part, trying to stay true to her husband, to withstand the affections of a Musketeer, and to support her queen. In the end, she even gets to kill someone to protect D'Artagnan.
I wish you all could sit with me in the theater to watch and to laugh and to clap. After a few more performances, I might even be singing along to some of these original numbers.

Pride and Prejudice - The Musical

This weekend was the culmination of 3 months of rehearsals for Grace and cast in the production of Pride and Prejudice -- The Musical.
Grace played Charlotte Lucas, Elizabeth Bennett's best friend who married Mr. Collins, the annoying man that Elizabeth turned down.
Here's a picture of Grace getting ready to go to the theater for the first show.


And here she is right after the show in one of her fabulous costumes.
In the book and the play, they constantly talk about how plain Charlotte is, but they didn't do anything to make Grace look less beautiful (in my opinion). They did make her act clumsy.
This production ate up a good part of Grace's summer and helped her gain some great new friends. It was the first time she's done a play that included adults in the cast, so that was a nice balance as she eases into the adult world. Some of them were creepy (Mr. Collins), some of them were parents of teenage friends, and some of them were college students.
Some of her former high school friends were in the play, which made it more fun. Here she is with Jeff who played a member of the regiment in the play, but is leaving to join the Navy this month.

It's fun to see Grace, who tends to be quiet around strangers, blossom on stage. She even steps in to move the show along when someone forgets a line. She's become a real acting pro, along with applying makeup for the cast before hand.

Break a Leg!

The musical this past week was FABULOUS. I got to sit through it twice and a third time I was on costume repair duty so I scurried from backstage to the rear doors to watch various parts, especially Grace's scene which begins the second act.
When our French friend Marie came to visit this summer, she found it impossible to believe that Americans actually have "high school musicals."
"No, zhis must not be true!" she insisted. She also couldn't believe there were real marching bands. But, it's all true. These pieces of Americana make up the high school experience.
I'd never seen this musical before, so my expectations were low. But the music, the acting and the kids were amazing. The musical is called HONK! and it's based on the story of The Ugly Duckling. A number of the high school kids decided this was beneath them and didn't even try out. They apparently weren't aware of the sexual innuendo throughout the play. As Grace said, "Mom, what do you expect? It was created in England."
So no one should have been surprised when the duck mother was explaining to the Ugly Duckling that the island was too far away to swim. "Good gracious, no. It's farther than you'd think. I've only been out there once when your father and I were courting and I didn't mean to go that far then."
Grace, a hen, and Queenie, a cat, have a scene where the tom cat is chasing down the ugly duckling. The tom cat sees Queenie and a "love scene" ensues. She calls the tom cat a "scruff" but admits that when "you've had it easy, you like a bit of rough!"
So this was definitely no children's-only show.
Some of my favorite parts from the show: Grace was sick on Tuesday night so she stayed home while they were rehearsing. She was texting. I asked who she was texting.
"Carl."
"Isn't Carl rehearsing?" I asked. Carl played one of the ducklings.
"Yes, he's in his egg."
I loved the idea that Carl was on stage waiting to be hatched and busy texting.
On opening night, we were in the audience. The cat's goal throughout is to catch and eat the Ugly Duckling. A little boy a few rows behind us. Began to whisper in fear, "Oh no. He's going to eat him. He's going to get him."
His mother had to take him out of the theater. Then when the cat goes running out of the back door, as part of the play, the child and the mean cat came face to face. Kyle, who played the cat, scared children, and enthralled them every night.
In the final night, a little boy in the audience had the funniest laugh, kind of craggly. When Kyle the cat ripped open his yellow rain slicker (the one he'd been wearing to pretend he's a duck) the little boy laughed a big, raucous laugh. Everyone on stage had to freeze because the whole audience cracked up at the little boy's laugh.
At the end of the play Saturday night, Grace sobbed and sobbed. Theater and music made her high school experience worthwhile. Yes, she loved biology and she was an expert at English essays, but this was something she could not have gotten at home.

Bloomer Injury

I'm sitting here with a hot pack on my lower back which hurts whenever I stand up. The pain hit me in the middle of the night, approximately 2:37 a.m. when I got up with my youngest son to get him ibuprofen and Sudafed for his virus.
Within minutes I had diagnosed my lower back pain -- bloomer injury.
In my spare time, I've been helping with costumes for the fall play Little Women. Mostly I've had to take in pants, sew ribbons on collars and put velcro in place of buttons for quick changes. Then came the challenge. The four daughters in the play must have bloomers. Never mind that no one will ever see the bloomers. They help make the characters feel more authentic.
I was given an assortment of sheer white material and used bed sheets to cut bloomers from. So Wednesday morning, on my day off, I was bent over the table trying to cut around the pattern with dull scissors. My husband wandered out of bed and pushed me aside. He took over the cutting.
I moved to the armchair and the coffee table where my sewing machine was set up. I had not seen the sewing machine since we moved. As a matter of fact, this is the old sewing machine and I know that I have a newer one somewhere that I inherited from Earl's mom, but we can't find it. After two years of not running, the machine is complying, although an electrical short somewhere causes the needle not to move at all while I have my foot holding down the pedal then it will suddenly race. It's a little temperamental.
I completed one pair of bloomers while Earl cut out another pattern (winning big husband points).
Then I went about my day, grading papers, shopping at the thrift store for more costume needs, studying algebra with my 13-year-old. I was blissfully ignorant of the pending bloomer injury that had already taken place but was worming its way into my muscles.
Just as I diagnosed myself, I am also in charge of treatment. Heat. Cancelled run this morning and even called off trip to work out at the Y. I thought about going and if a weight machine hurt my back then I would stop, but since I didn't recognize the bloomer injury when it occurred, I might not recognize that a weight machine was exacerbating the problem. So I'm staying home, grading papers, and I might move the sewing maching to the dining room table so I can show those bloomers who is boss and finish the other three pairs.