Where I Work

I look up and see out of the corner of my eye (to the left) a grand piano, covered, sitting on a stage. My stage. My piano. For all intensive purposes. A 9' Steinway Concert D Grand Piano. Freshly tuned. Jealous? I have a colour monitor which is constantly on showing me what is going on on the stage. Behind me, I have wired up speakers. I can choose to have them on or off. They are off now. There is no one on stage. No one to listen to. I'm a part time voyeur. To the left of my computer monitor (I have, at present, a 19" flat screen) there is a page scotch taped to the wall which has my daughter's first full attempt at writing out the alphabet. It's very good. She ran out of room at the bottom so switched colours from orange to blue and wrote out 'w x y and z' at the top. My daughter is very smart. She doesn't suffer fools gently either. Above the alphabet is a poem from a friend...I thought she wrote it...that she didn't doesn't really matter since whenever I look at it, I think of her -- A Woman Should Have... and Every Woman Should Know... Directly in front of me I have a large cork board filled with thank you cards and clippings. Interesting clippings. To me, anyway. One is a news item talking about a 'lost' Amazon tribe that re-emerges from the jungle just in time to be ordered off the land. I also have a fire safety notice. I accidently set off a fire alarm in the theatre a couple months back and got my wrist slapped by the powers that be. They gave me a notice. I put the notice on my wall. Soon, it will be covered by other cards/papers/notices. Like vines covering cottage walls. I also have requisite pictures of kids and J. To my right is an ancient speaker. Ok, not ancient but, was new probably in the 1960's. I used to have my computer wired to it through the ancient amp that sits on top of it. Both sound like crap. I keep them because they are cool, the right height to act as additional file storage space and, I really couldn't be bothered with disposing of them. On top of the amp is an old heat shield from a follow spot. At the moment, it is storage for old show reports. One day, it, and it's partner that resides on another desk, will be transformed into herb boxes. I have a book shelf filled with old log books and industry mags as well as holding a magnetic tape eraser. It's cool so I keep it. I have a cabinet filled with old audio reels and albums. Ancient artifacts. Behind me to the right is a drafting table. It has shelves underneath that house rolls of old and current plots. More pieces of equipment replaced by my computer drafting program. Behind me is another desk. Also mine. On it sits a stuffed gorilla. I worked a show wherein the set designer asked if I would rig a monkey up out of sight lines. I did. In gratitude, I got the gorilla. On the walls, I have taped some show posters and cool industry articles. My actual work surface desk tends to fill quickly with industry mags, current and future show notes, gear gak and coffee cups. I try to keep a number of pens scattered around because I always find it difficult to find them when needed. Although I have a number of note pads on the go, more often then not, I end up writing important information on the back of scrap paper. I like my office. It's a hole. It's a dive. It's mine. For now. It's the type of office that, when I go, will be used by a person who will add to the decor but, will essentially leave it as it is. This office belongs to the theatre. I'm here cuz I fit.

The Real Poop

I couldn't even dream about posting today without talking about poop. Things happen in 3's and shit talk on the blog is no exception. The family and I got some bags of cow manure -- it now comes in unscented varieties! -- and I spread it over the back garden. I'm loving this garden. The earth is filled with worms. Even though it's still too early to plant, I love just being in the dirt. When I first started digging, the neighbours came out and started to help. Yay I thought. We'll have a communal garden. Crap, I thought. We'll have a communal garden. I like my neighbours. Working together is fine. But...well...it's my garden. I'm a competitive, territorial bitch when it comes down to it. I didn't let any of this animosity show, however. As I said, I kinda like the idea of everyone working together. As well, it seemed that they were really enjoying themselves too. To be perfectly honest, so was I. Today was the perfect day to spread the manure however. It was raining. No one came to help. I dug in perfect harmony with my surroundings. I know that one day, I'll have to share. Just not today. Today, it was just me, my garden and a couple bags of poop.

Flower Dreams and Other Poop

I am a much relieved person today. I've been having the weirdest violent sort of dreams. I'm not sure why. I finished The DaVinci Code but, I don't recall any bloody monks in my dreams. Some friends of mine were smack dab in the middle of the 'civil' conflict in Nepal. They are safe and sound (thankfully and welcome back!) but, even the image of gun toting anti monarchists weren't the main players of my dreams. To be honest, I'm not sure what my dreams have been about. I have woken up tired and vaguely aware of being uncomfortable all night with violent movies playing out inside my head. Last night I finally was able to sleep. Well. I woke up shortly after 9am feeling foggy but refreshed. I still dreamed last night but I don't think the violence was there. My son, on the other hand was awake when J went into his bedroom this morning. He told J that he had had a nightmare. Apparently, among other things, the flowers that he had been dreaming about turned into poo. He then informed J that that part of his dream had been kinda funny. Dreams are funny things. I believe that some dreams are portents but most, in my case anyway, are poorly shot video images depicting the clutter that has accumulated in my brain.

Ok. A short book review. The DaVinci Code was a quick read. A pretty good read. I think the controversies surrounding the book are a bit over the top. Mind you, I don't see a problem with the idea that Jesus was married and had kids and his blood line survives today. It doesn't cripple my faith. Mind you, I believe that my family can be linked back to the great Genghis Khan. Virility has a power all its own. The predominance of the female goddess idea and the links between modern day Christianity and past pagan practices was refreshing but nothing really new. The book has a few characters who belong to Opus Dei. From the media accounts, I was expecting to see all the Opus Dei folk lumped together as crazy catholic fundamentalists. Seems there was only one. And what group of folks out there can't claim to have at least one crazy fundamentalist among them? The book was clever. Not mind blowing. Not overly deep. A good beach book.

Blog Response. I've been thinking about Canadian troops in Afghanistan. I'm against it. I've been trying to work out why. Yes the Taliban is bad. Yes, western powers have screwed things up over there and things need to be put right. But. It's the but that I have not been able to elaborate on ... I'll try now. Bear with me...this is off the cuff:

Ok. I can't think of any cases wherein a foreign army has been able to successfully move in and 'fix' things in a country. The only successful 'fixes' come from within. Sometimes it takes a civil war but, if the people want change, change will come. It might take a while but it will come. If a foreign army comes in, there will be some people who will welcome it thinking that the change they were hoping for will come faster. There will be others, however, who will be against the change and will fight the foreign forces. The foreign forces will fight back. People will die. Occasionally, civilians will be caught in the crossfire. Eventually, one of these civilians will be a child. Ok. Some of those people who had welcomed the foreign army will begin to rethink their position and start to criticize the foreign army. The foreign army will start to think 'why the hell are we here?' Depending on how long they've been there and how much is invested it becomes increasingly difficult to extricate the foreign army from the position. If they stay, morale will drop, more people will die and support from home will drop. If they go, they will be leaving the country in a worse position than when they started and, chances are, the conservative anti change factions will be able to garner more support.

Let's see what would happen if the foreign army stayed away...would the Taliban lose control? Yup. Eventually. Will people die? Yes. But, the people fighting for change will know that they are fighting for their lives and the lives of their children. They aren't foreign collaborators. They are Afghani people fighting for a better future for themselves. But, there are those who welcome foreign intervention because they know that they aren't alone...the world is watching. This is a good thing but...only if the intervention works--works in a timely, not too costly fashion. When has this ever happened?

But, is the Canadian army over there to help the Afghani people? Really? Is that its primary purpose? Or, was this the safest perceived option for Canada to show the U.S. that it stood behind the American war on terror without actually having to stand behind the U.S.? The games some folks play eh? Although I believe that a military option is sometimes necessary, I do not believe that it needs to be used as much as it has been over the years. Although, come to think of it, could early troop intervention lessoned the carnage of Rwanda? Hmmm... but Africa is a different thing altogether isn't it.

The feeling that 'if we do nothing bad things will happen' persists. Does 'doing something' always need to involve guns? I guess so. When things like oil and American interests are in play anyway huh? I know I'm being unfair. I'm proud of the Canadian troops. They do good things, work hard and literally stick their necks out so that others can feel safer. Afghanistan, however, is a non starter. History shows over and over again that foreign invasion forces don't win there. Is there, perhaps another way to help?

I just figured out my son's dream! We are starting a garden and I told him that we needed to fertilize the soil with poop. Sometimes beautiful things come out of shit. I guess his dream could be seen as a warning that sometimes, beautiful intentions can turn into shit as well. Or, instead, to paraphrase Freud, sometimes a pile of poop is a pile of poop.

Bunny Poop

Happy Easter Weekend everyone. Yes, it's a Christian holiday but, has enough of the pagan in it that the Christian overtones seem to have been watered down somewhat. Perhaps that's the real effect of commercialism. Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny have eroded the importance of Christ as an ultimate symbol of good. Mind, we all become complicit don't we. Those of us who partake in these rituals know that we are all Santa and the Bunny. We do our bit. We shop for gifts and chocolate. We give as good as we get. Wonder if that's what gives some of us a god complex? Yes, the evils of pride, ownership, greed and gluttony come out and are promoted by the corporations from which we make our purchases. Jesus himself was shown to have a meltdown in a church once when he saw traders and merchants making profits from faith. Seems we all have a bit of a problem with folks gaining profit from our best wishes. We see it as a bit on the evil side of things don't we? Yet, overall, despite our collective misgivings, stores continue to stock little foil wrapped chocolate eggs resembling bunny poop this time of year and little chocolate eggs get sold. And on Sunday morning when my kids search the house for the eggs that have been hidden the night before by my own incarnation of bunny spirit, I hope that they gain a bit of this idea...sometimes, the good that you are searching for is right here at home. And, maybe if we all concentrate a bit on being good? Our homes will get that much bigger.

Cry

Certain things make me angry. And incredibly sad. One of these things is when I hear/read/become aware of any type of child abuse. I sense my brain actually turn numb and a visceral reaction wells up inside of me. I've started to try to consciously channel this anger/sadness into energy...and send it out to somehow soothe the wounds of the stricken. Is this prayer? Otherwise, I feel so helpless. I don't want to do nothing. Neither do I want in any way to be a voyeur to someone else's pain. I turn away from the headlines. Not that I don't want to be aware that it's going on...it's that the one's who have suffered deserve respect. They are not a sideshow. I won't link to the article. Unfortunately, it's one of many. Justice is being done? Two more people have been accused and summarily convicted. Two people who held the title, in name only, of grandparents. But, a child with shining eyes and a gorgeous smile died 4 years ago. And I never met him. But I'm praying. Praying that he is in a good place. That he knows he is cherished. That human beings will get over themselves enough to know that we can't afford to be mean. We need each other. Each of us is precious. And when the laughter of a child is silenced, we are each of us, to blame.

Alternator Plans

For the first time in my life, I took the car and kids and drove towards Montreal. My brother lives in the outskirts and, although he bought a new house over a year ago, I had yet to set eyes on it. Normally, I am with J on any road trips. He likes driving. I like being a passenger. This particular morning, however, was different. J quit smoking. Well...this was his quit date. He had gone out after work the night before and, in a ritualistic manner incomprehensible to me, decided to say good bye to his vice by over doing it and indulging in excess. When I woke up in the morning, he was lying on the couch. Fetid fumes I once thought only existed in cartoons actually rose up from his non-Apollo like form. Staying home was not looking like a fun plan. I got the kids dressed. I packed up some pita bread and carrots. We jumped in the car and took off.

I haven't had much experience driving on heavy traffic highways. I've been doing more lately. Now that we live close to an on-ramp, it doesn't make much sense to avoid this route. It wasn't so bad. The kids travelled well. We made good time. Just as we arrived at my brother's exit, however, the check gauges light turned on on the dash. Hmmmm. This wasn't the first time this had happened so I wasn't too concerned. The last time it occured, I was informed by our mechanics that we should plan to bring the jeep in for a check up within a couple weeks but, not to worry too much unless the light started to flash.

Seeing my brother was nice. He's a bachelor. His house is a bachelor's house. Kids don't really fit in with the decor but, we managed the visit without anything getting broken. I decided that we would go out for lunch. Seemed safer. Driving to the restaurant, the gauge light would come on periodically and then go out again. It wasn't flashing tho' so we carried on. Driving away from the restaurant, I remembered that I had put the leftover pizza on top of the car. I stopped and had a look. No luck. I was seriously thinking of going back and looking for it. If I was with J, we would have. J's not known for pizza wasting. One look at my brother's face however was enough to dissuade me. We dropped him off and got on the highway again ready for home. A couple kilometers on the highway, I realized that we had left the kids hats in the restaurant. Oh well, I thought. No use going back.

As we were driving, I started to notice some disturbing things about the car. Was it my imagination or, were the windshield wipers disrupting the radio signal? I turned both off. Then, the dashboard lights began to fade. Oh crap. I had a sneaky feeling that if I stopped the car, it wouldn't start again. Ok. We were only 50km away from home. If I increased the speed, turned off all electrical extras and prayed, we should make it. I was beginning to feel a bit like Star Buck. Just then, my son, who was sitting directly behind me, began to choke. He and S had been munching on the carrots. Panic started to rise in me and then, just as quickly, the situation was somewhat resolved as A puked all over himself and the car seat. "I need a cloth!" he yelled. I told him that we were almost home and that I would clean him up then. He was a real trooper.

We managed to get into the city and, we were only had a couple exits left. We were going to make it! I turned off our exit and headed down the ramp. Oh No! There was a red light. No, it was ok, it just turned green. Thing is, the cars in front of us were slow to get started. I was forced to break just as I got down the ramp. The car then died. Kaput.

A couple of women stopped to ask us if we needed help. I met some more nice neighbours. One of them offered up her son's house in case it started raining. Very very nice. My son told her that he loved her. J came and we pushed the car to the curb and then walked home. I was a bit shaky buy, considering that we could have had the car die in the middle of the highway, we did quite well. I came back later and managed to get the car going enough to bring it home. I guess it had a bit of juice left in the battery after all.

Turns out it is the alternator. I hope that's it anyway. J is going out to buy one and hopefully will be able to swap it out this afternoon. At least, if J can stay a non smoker, we can afford break downs like this eh?