September 19, 2007

Isaac on the CD. The thorny stalks are turning last week’s rain into roses, and I thank them.

Two copies of A Dream of Adonis arrived by Fed Ex yesterday. I’m very happy. I can’t decide whether the cover looks cheesy or striking (either one is entirely my fault), but I think striking enough that one might pick it up and open the cover, even if cheesy.

First read-through of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf at the quaint Junaluska Inn at Lake Junaluska. The directors I described before are Suzanne and Art. Suzanne keeps emphasizing that she’s "a director who directs," but I think her vehemence on that issue is the result of working with people with different habits and abilities than her present cast. Art was dating Melody when we did Gilgamesh, so we remember each other. The cast turns out to be four Ashevillians who are also involved in Crown of Shadows together: Trinity, Belve, Mickey, and I. Mickey was on fire at the read-through last night. I’ll have to work to keep up with her. Art anticipates backlash from the HART regulars when the cast is announced, because we’re all foreigners, and the roles in this play, especially Martha, are often conceived of as plummy rewards for actors who have come up through the ranks in the local system. I try not to think of the epic of memorization before me.

I looked at Belve sitting across from me in his green and brown, and I thought how lucky I was to be among such people, even part of the time.

A playwright calls–and then e-mails–to ask whether the deadline for the Jane Bingham indicates "received by" or "postmarked by." I don’t know why questions like that infuriate me so. How many pages? What font should I use? Should I number the bottom center of the page or the bottom right? Or the top? Should I number the title page? When people have energy left to worry about that they can have created nothing.

There was one point yesterday, between getting out of my car in the YMCA parking lot and the starting of aerobics class, when I felt as great a physical well-being as I ever have in my life.