Profits

"Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labor that I had labored to do: and, behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun."

-- King Solomon (?), Ecclesiastes 2:11 (KJV)

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Back on the road today, we drove two hours north and then drove two hours back, and in the latter drive, we spoke of higher things: God, free will, rabbinic parables, the problems of pain and pleasure.

The rule is that you don't discuss politics, sex or religion at work. We mostly don't talk about the first two. But the last one, probably because one of us is the daughter of a pastor and the other two are uncloseted (kinky?) Christians, and mostly because the remaining actor is a sort of deistic agnostic devil's advocate, is unavoidable. But enjoyable, too. I sometimes feel like I'm back in classes with Jackson or Reist when these conversations happen, and I wish I had a doctorate mind to plumb; I'd return with ditties and jewels and words of worth, and the ensuing silence would be golden.

And it's always nice to be able to talk about C. S. Lewis with people who won't automatically worship him. "C. S. Lewis? More like C. S. Gay!" I remember. I remember the striking prose of the English scholar, too, those moments in reading when I feel like the monk who wrote The Cloud of Unknowing: the cloud parts, lightning hits when the sparks fly upward, and for a moment, a celestial, brilliant, terrifying moment, something makes a little bit of absolute sense.

A chip on the mosaic...and all that. I'm pretentious; I'm over it.

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Auditioned in Chicago this weekend with my girlfriend and old friends. Everyone approves of everyone. Got call-backs and hopefully will get more. Used the GPS to get around in the rental car, pigged out at Chili's downtown, brunched on Sunday--a warm, melting, bright and open-aired Sunday--in a sweet Swedish bistro.

It was a weekend of big meals: Giordano's deep dish on Friday, the biggest burger on the menu at Chili's on Saturday, and French toast and Swiss eggs in a pile the size of my head.

And the dance call was awful, because it was too fast, too furious, too fucking hard. Even seasoned dancers struggled to get through a third before blanking, slowing, stopping. Staring. My approach: Use the Elaine dance from "Seinfeld" as a default. So when I finished the first eight counts, which included three steps, two claps and one turn, I stuck out my thumbs, threw back my head, and kicked up a foot. Then did it again--a solid minute-and-a-half of Elaine moves.

And the result? A producer called my number, and asked me to come to yet another call-back. At which he told me, "You could sell your shit in a bag."

See this grin? I just ate shit; my shit; let me sell it to you. I'm an actor; I'm over it.

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My start on Teresa's blog (she has paid for three words so far):

I'm an actress.

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I don't know if she's over it yet. But her laughs add inspiration. So:

Between food and friends, trains and treks, monologues and dialogues, one thing was certain: Chicago was a good choice, could be a better choice, might be the best choice.

I don't talk like this. Some people write like this. Can you believe that shit? You shouldn't believe that shit.

Just because someone's good at selling it, doesn't mean you should buy it.

Hi ho.

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Anyways. What does all of this profit this man? Maybe a future job, maybe a future move. But you know, the children's theatre assures us of our job security, come what may. So with wind in your sails, so to speak, you at least feel like you can sail anywhere. And in a business where feeling and technique are only half the battle--the other portions are one-fourth luck, one-fourth smiles and ass-kissing--you want to sail as soon as possible.

The true doldrums, after all, are not in the center of the ocean, but on the shore.