I just have to say that while fulfilling and prosperous...my job is really exhausting. This whole wake up at 6am get home at 7pm or later thing is KILLING ME. And my voice. I barely have the energy to sing above the staff, so I usually just mark. How I'm ever going to master "Glitter and be Gay" on this schedule is beyond me.
Make money to make time for the things you love...
In the meantime, the great mezzo, Cecilia Bartoli as Despina.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
What me worry?
Why are you so anxious?
Ah. Well that's really the billion dollar question, isn't it? Today it was asked by a very cool gentleman who runs a Thai kickboxing gym, from a new account I opened for my new sales job (more on that later).
If you're an actress, shouldn't you be relaxed?
Oh, I wish. I ask myself all the time why I'm this way. Why can't I just relax and be like everyone else? Is it genetic? Am I supposed to be so tightly wound because DNA makes me that way? Is because I always hold myself up to the highest standards? I want to succeed so badly in everything I pursue...is it that drive for life and success that make me soar into a tailspin? I don't want to be anxious. In my heart of hearts, I want to interact with people like I interact with Braden and not be on edge. I don't want to be the odd, shy girl that I was in college, which was a stereotype until I graduated.
Fear of failure? Fear of loneliness? Fear of...WHAT?!?!
So these are the cards I'm dealt. Every day I deal with it.
Voice lessons were MUCH better this week. I felt like I wasn't fighting the exercises for once. Everything just started to come in bits and pieces. The height, the roundness of the vowels, the Italian diction, even the dreaded whistle register. I am going to have to practice my butt off this week and make myself be diligent. It has been hard when I've been waking up at 6:30am and focusing on my new job as Field Rep.
Last weekend, Rebecca gave me all this stern advice about what I have to do to get into grad school and how I am sort of at a disadvantage being away from the opera world in NC. It's true...there aren't as many classical opportunities here. And despite the fact that I keep having good auditions, I can't seem to land a role. (Does my personal anxiety factor into all this?? I don't know!) She suggested I go to a summer program, but those cost money and I just can't get up and leave. And how grad school in New York would be simply paying for lessons, coaching and rent. And that's all I'd be doing. And it wouldn't be glamorous and it would be hard and OF COURSE I KNOW THAT. It's hard enough working full-time here. And I have Braden. And being with here with Braden, having him as my support system, is SO important to me.
I went to Memphis for UPTA, the big professional auditions. I sang and did my monologue fine. I did not get a single callback. It's not like I cried or anything, but I can tell you that being the only one in the shuttle riding from the callback space to the theater in the pouring cold rain is a pretty shitty feeling.
BUT, there's more: they grade the auditioners. If companies think they are not professional and talented enough to attend, they can be flagged and asked not to come back. I did NOT get flagged. So basically I am professional and talented...but no one wants to hire me. It's a real mindfuck. All sorts of things go through my head; "Is it my weight? My song? My hair? My voice? My speaking voice? My reputation?" Yes it's a lot of people saying NO, but at the end of the day, I just had to fly home and continue my job here. No running off around the country for some theater career.
As for opera, I am loving "In Uomini...", more so than "Kommt". I keep watching that video and noticing all my mistakes. God, I was so under-rehearsed. It makes me mad. I've always had trouble watching myself and at least now I know to practice more more MORE. I know I was decent, but I should have been better. I know, still too hard on myself.
So all these feelings and advantages and disadvantages seem to weave their way into my job as an office supply sales rep. I don't want to say too much because I don't want to get fired. HA. It's challenging, to say the least. It's nearly all on commission and you have to work your ass off to earn that salary position. And it's all numbers...sometimes I can work all day and not make a sale and I feel like shit. Because it's not based on merit, it's based on $$$. There are other days where it feels like a breeze. But my drive and work ethic from theater work to my advantage...and unfortunately cold calling certainly plays on my anxiety disadvantage.
I'm learning to accept life for what it is; not a roadmap to a dream...but a journey. The journey is so cyclical and intertwined
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Marry Him -- because you love him and he's worth it!!
http://www.newsweek.com/id/233381
There's a book out that I read on the plane back from Memphis called "Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough" by Lori Gottlieb. Basically the synopsis is as follows:
"Expanding on her 2008 Atlantic essay , Gottlieb, a 42-year-old mother who's never been married, says that young women today—herself a prime example—are too willing to give up a guy who's an 8 in search of a 10, only to find themselves middle-aged, alone, and no longer able to attract even a 6. Better, she argues, to settle for the kind, loyal guy with some flaws when you're still young enough to snag 'em."
In the book, Ms. Gottlieb goes on to whine about how at 41, single with a sperm-donor child, she has yet to find a husband and so do so many other "perfectionist" women. Excuse me, but when was the ultimate goal to find someone with movie star looks, a Plantinum credit card who will constantly dote on us financially, emotionally and sexually? Aren't you supposed to find someone that...um, LOVES YOU?
So she goes on to interview women that have dumped various men because they were "not into the exact same interests" or "wasn't that fashionable", "had facial hair". So accepting these things about someone who cares about you and loves you is SETTLING? Because he's not a clone of Brad Pitt...it's settling? I understand that as single women who have been dumped or dumped in the past, we often make lists on what we want in a partner, aka "shopping at the Husband Store". I made a list. There are 20 "wants". Lucky for me, Braden fits 18 of them. But as many as you know, Braden is completely ideologically and aesthetically different than me in SO MANY ways. Had I had written him off due to his ever growing collection of computer parts, raw building materials and flea market-meets-junkyard decor...or his interesting (when we first started dating, his VERY UNIQUE) facial hair, well I would have missed out on the most sincere, loving, giving man I have ever met.
And it goes both ways: he could have just have easily shunned me for my creative lifestyle or the fact that I leave cabinets open all over the house. I KNOW I'm not perfect...sure Hotornot rates me an 8.2 (whoo!) but does that give me the right to dump a guy because he doesn't have an Ivy League degree or a million facebook friends (answer: no.)
A passage that grates on me the most was that in her 20s the author dumped a guy who was "cute, funny, ambitious BUT into sci-fi," and this was considered acceptable by her peers. So he liked Star Wars or Firefly...what guy doesn't? Oooo...he's different than your ideal fantasy man. DEALBREAKER!! NEXT!! Who are these women and when did this become the acceptable post-20th century feminist status quo?
Clearly if someone isn't meeting your core value needs, like being a good father or husband, or has a job and desires to provide for you and him...okay, move on to the next one. But don't just turn someone off because they wear a bow-tie (like the author initally does.)
It just goes to show that self-absorption and superficiality will, more often than not, leave you all by your lonesome, ladies. He's not Brad Pitt, but you aren't Angelina either. We all deserved to be loved...so find someone worth loving and trusting who's sincere and ambitious and embraces you, flaws and all as a partner...just as you embrace them. Entitlement to a fantasy is a one-way ticket to cat lady town.
Sometimes sincerity and mutual love and core values make the RELATIONSHIP a 10.
There's a book out that I read on the plane back from Memphis called "Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough" by Lori Gottlieb. Basically the synopsis is as follows:
"Expanding on her 2008 Atlantic essay , Gottlieb, a 42-year-old mother who's never been married, says that young women today—herself a prime example—are too willing to give up a guy who's an 8 in search of a 10, only to find themselves middle-aged, alone, and no longer able to attract even a 6. Better, she argues, to settle for the kind, loyal guy with some flaws when you're still young enough to snag 'em."
In the book, Ms. Gottlieb goes on to whine about how at 41, single with a sperm-donor child, she has yet to find a husband and so do so many other "perfectionist" women. Excuse me, but when was the ultimate goal to find someone with movie star looks, a Plantinum credit card who will constantly dote on us financially, emotionally and sexually? Aren't you supposed to find someone that...um, LOVES YOU?
So she goes on to interview women that have dumped various men because they were "not into the exact same interests" or "wasn't that fashionable", "had facial hair". So accepting these things about someone who cares about you and loves you is SETTLING? Because he's not a clone of Brad Pitt...it's settling? I understand that as single women who have been dumped or dumped in the past, we often make lists on what we want in a partner, aka "shopping at the Husband Store". I made a list. There are 20 "wants". Lucky for me, Braden fits 18 of them. But as many as you know, Braden is completely ideologically and aesthetically different than me in SO MANY ways. Had I had written him off due to his ever growing collection of computer parts, raw building materials and flea market-meets-junkyard decor...or his interesting (when we first started dating, his VERY UNIQUE) facial hair, well I would have missed out on the most sincere, loving, giving man I have ever met.
And it goes both ways: he could have just have easily shunned me for my creative lifestyle or the fact that I leave cabinets open all over the house. I KNOW I'm not perfect...sure Hotornot rates me an 8.2 (whoo!) but does that give me the right to dump a guy because he doesn't have an Ivy League degree or a million facebook friends (answer: no.)
A passage that grates on me the most was that in her 20s the author dumped a guy who was "cute, funny, ambitious BUT into sci-fi," and this was considered acceptable by her peers. So he liked Star Wars or Firefly...what guy doesn't? Oooo...he's different than your ideal fantasy man. DEALBREAKER!! NEXT!! Who are these women and when did this become the acceptable post-20th century feminist status quo?
Clearly if someone isn't meeting your core value needs, like being a good father or husband, or has a job and desires to provide for you and him...okay, move on to the next one. But don't just turn someone off because they wear a bow-tie (like the author initally does.)
It just goes to show that self-absorption and superficiality will, more often than not, leave you all by your lonesome, ladies. He's not Brad Pitt, but you aren't Angelina either. We all deserved to be loved...so find someone worth loving and trusting who's sincere and ambitious and embraces you, flaws and all as a partner...just as you embrace them. Entitlement to a fantasy is a one-way ticket to cat lady town.
Sometimes sincerity and mutual love and core values make the RELATIONSHIP a 10.
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