January 28, 2009

Irish music on the CD.

Monday the Egypt lecture went well, and my playwrights, meeting for the first time, were good-looking and eager. If I look at the right things in my life, I conclude I am the luckiest man in the world. I midwife the imagination of the young.

At Tuesday’s Titus rehearsal we did real work and made real progress. It is still, distressingly, a cacophony of Herods, each trying to top the other in sheer volume. Gregory dropped out of the loudness race by deciding the make his Saturninus a whining brat-- a stroke of genius. I can’t tell if J’s vision is aided or hindered by his kindness. Certainly he puts up with things I would not, but perhaps he is confident that all will come to the straight and harmonious when it must. When Tamora is passionate, not a single syllable is intelligible.

A very strange thing happened at the Y today. When I’m on the treadmill or the cross-trainer, I usually watch one of the TVs or scope out the other people in the gym, but this time I closed my eyes and meditated, running lines for a while, but mostly trying to concentrate on breath of rhythm, or whatever image came into my head. When I opened my eyes I had run the fastest mile of my life. Though still in tortoise range for the world at large, it was blinding speed for me, better than when I was a kid, better than when I was in Syracuse and actually dared to call myself a runner. Nor did I feel spent afterwards, as I usually do, but exhilarated, and ready for the weights. I don’t know what kind of phenomenon this was, one-of-a-kind or the beginning of a new era for me. I suppose I won’t know until I return to the gym and give it another try. I still feel good now, as though I had just left the Y shower, steamy and pumped. And righteously drowsy.

Wore a tie-dye shirt to senior seminar. I was surprised by the sensation it caused. Zack said, “We just didn’t think you were a tie-dye kind of guy.” I’ve already spent too much time wondering what on earth that could mean.

I think the sky this evening was among the most beautiful I have ever seen. It was stormy, and ribbons of multi-colored clouds streamed like banners from the north. The hill opposite my window was lit shimmering gold, while the sky above was pale blue and sapphire blue and agate and flamingo. The richness of it escapes description. That something escapes description is a thing I almost never admit.