Is this home?

So I’m back at school.

Logistics first, shall we? As I’m getting a lot of questions.

My non-studio classes are Intro to Jewish Mysticism and Face-to-Face: Philosophy, Ethics, and the Actor. I don’t think I need to explain to anyone reading this blog why I’m taking Intro to Jewish Mysticism, or how pleased I was reading a definition of mysticism aloud in class, or in general how much this class completes my life. (I’ll say that mysticism is my primary religious interest at this moment, and has been for at least a year. Never studied Jewish mysticism before, though have done a lot of delving into Christian and Islamic mysticism). Face-to-Face is a class that’s hard to give a good description of, but we got into a giant heated debate last class that was lots of fun, and the teacher is incredible. So I’ve heard. She wasn’t in class last week because she was in Norway, but every teacher I already love who has met her loves her, every student I know who has taken a class with her says she’s incredible, and she makes hats.

At studio (PHTS), I am doing design track. Design track is a strange little entity that hasn’t really existed until this year. One person did it last semester, two of us are doing it this semester, and all three of us are/have been doing it in different ways with different focuses. Talk about individualized education... this is it. My studio curriculum this semester comes from articulating what I want to do and that I want to work on to people who have been watching me, my interests, my progress, since the fall of 2007. It’s been enormously fun watching this semester come together. Class-wise, I’m taking everything. Two producing classes (which are the ‘oh no I’m about to leave and be out of the PHTS system how do I produce work in the real world?!’ panic classes). Colloquium, which you can read the description for here which is largely about expanding the world we think about and allowing us to intersect with different kinds of people. (I absolutely had a religious experience in this class last Monday. And today we had a backstage tour at the Metropolitan Opera and then saw the final dress of Nixon in China. WHAT.) And a class on Shakespeare, which seems largely about how to uncover and impulse based on a rich text. I’m taking three “support” classes, which are basically shorter elective classes, all in design: Lighting, Media, and Sound. I’ve always thought that lighting and I would get along but I’ve never really had the vocabulary to start that relationship, so I’m quite excited for the class. Media is about absolutely brand-new things that are happening in theater right now and is already going to be incredible about opening the mind. I’m also going to be looking for ways that media and sound can intersect, as the text we’re working on begs it and that’s probably going to be pretty important in upcoming years. Sound is one of three classes I’m taking this semester that I’ve already taken. Hah. But this semester the structure is different, the class is much smaller, and the teacher and I have sat down and discussed how I can use this class to move forward, what I want out of it, what I’m working on, and the fact that I’m going to have a lot more work to do because he’s holding me to a higher standard. Awesome. (I said, “I need to never be let off the hook.” He said, “Oh, you don’t have to worry about that.” I said, “I figured, I just wanted to say it.”)

The other two classes I’m taking again are also design classes. Design III, which is a (generally) third year class giving design support to the people working on 3rd year projects. Opportunities to ask questions, throw out concerns. Some guests are brought in. The primary reason I’m taking this class is for an opportunity to discuss design in a large group of peers. Since design track is so incredibly individualized (which is, of course, awesome), the thing that gets sacrificed is that kind of interaction and group problem solving. I have a weekly check-in with the other design track student and the teacher who’s our grand overseer at PHTS, but while they’re both very smart and we’re a strange trio, but there’s value to the large group, so I’m there.

And then I’m retaking first year Design. For a plethora of reasons. Looking back on it (I’m so ollllllllllld), Design I was the most useful class I’ve taken in college. The story of me and design is that I came into college thinking that I never wanted to do design. I looked on the PHTS website and, while I understood why I had to take Design I, I was convinced that I would fail and the teacher would hate me and I would never ever design a show of my own free will. (The only other class I was unenthused about was Voice and Speech. ...right.) Had I been given the option, I would not have taken Design I. This would have been the worst decision I possibly could have made and I am eternally grateful that I was not given a choice in the matter. What quickly became clear was that this class, and design in general, was asking the same question I’d been asking since one day my junior year of high school, Becker took a folding chair, placed it center stage, saying, “This means something different that this,” and moved the chair to the ustage right corner, “which means something different than this,” and knocked the chair over. I was floored, pounced on him, stole all his books on semiotics, read his thesis which was about musical staging, and spent hours upon hours in the black box or the auditorium coming up with blocking, obsessing over placement of rehearsal blocks. Design I tackled this idea not academically, which is how I’d largely been approaching it (because that’s what I knew), but by teaching us how to look, how to observe what a piece of art was doing, how it made you feel, and how it accomplished that. It’s also an incredible class to work through blocks, with a teacher who’s pushing you to become more and more articulate, skip the fear and CREATE, and, above all, CARE. It’s simultaneously a phenomenal class for theater makers and a safe room to help you become a more articulate, alive, passionate, caring human being. Also I want to steal from the first years, in the same way I like to hang out with people who aren’t necessarily Christian because they ask questions I wouldn’t think to ask. (How quickly our minds become conditioned...) So, I’m there again. Class on Friday was a giant workout, mentally, sensorially. Phenomenal.

This class load indicates a lack of care about “grades” and “credits”. Which are things invented by institutions, not actual measures of learning. I’m not on the roster for two classes I’m taking. I don’t care about being on said roster. I don’t need the “credits” and I don’t particularly care about getting a grade. I know that I’ll get feedback on what I do in the class - that’s what I need. A grade tells me nothing.

Outside of specified class, I have support as well. I essentially have three people mentoring me in various capacities. There’s the teacher who’s overseeing this whole “design track” operation who has been one of my life mentors throughout college, especially the past two years. There’s my sound design teacher who’s going to be spending time with me outside of class going over equipment, programs, acoustics. (PHTS, in the time I’ve been away, has gotten new sound equipment and has an official “sound studio”. I’m elated. So glad this happened before I graduated.) And then there’s my mentor, who’s a sound designer/composer not affiliated with PHTS which gives me fabulous perspective and has already clued me in on exciting things happening in the sound world. (including 3D sound and touchable holograms. TOUCHABLE. HOLOGRAMS.) So I’ve got two sound designers willing to chat/listen/offer feedback and advice, and then someone who’s NOT a sound person who’s able to give me smart, articulate feedback from the other end of the spectrum.

The major development of today has been that there will be time for those of us in design track (you know, all two of us) to have access to the main theater at PHTS, its equipment, and the sound studio. Hours blocked out specifically for us to experiment and play in a space. In the space where 3 of my 4 designs this semester are going up, in fact. Sound studio equipment reserved specifically for me for a couple hours each week.

So, to review:

1. I have all the classes I want, and no classes I don’t want.

2. I have guaranteed access to equipment.

3. I have people who care and are smart letting me pick their brains and supporting me in what I do and pushing me really hard.

I would like to take this moment to loudly and publicly state that I realize I am so exceedingly lucky, blessed, and spoiled. I prostrate myself before all of you involved with this in sheer inexpressible gratitude. There are no words.

I mean, really. What else is there to ask for? A pony?

I am working, as usual, on an absurd number of shows. 4 sound designs in PHTS, though 6 PHTS shows total (some dramaturgy and dialect coaching thrown in), and a couple out-of-school shows, building my resume and even getting paid. I’ve done 6 shows the last 3 semesters I was at PHTS, and each of those times at least one of the shows I was working on I was there for every rehearsal (be it stage managing or directing). And last spring, if you included the shows I did outside of PHTS, I did 10 shows. So I actually feel pretty secure in my “balancing a million things" abilities.

Emotionally, I’ve been all over the place and I apologize to those who’ve had to deal with me. Talking to Gillian on the phone the night before school started, I realized that I would suddenly see lots of people I hadn’t seen for 8 months, all at once, and my response was dread. I wanted to see all of them, but in individual doses. Strange reaction involving feeling not at at all ready to return to the life I took a hiatus from for 8 months. And, of course, I wasn’t ready, but I never will be, so might as well jump in. The move back to New York was more stressful than I’d like it to have been, but I’m settled now, with a bed and some bookshelves. I like my room, I’ve used the space well, I like the fact that I have two bookshelves with things on them and organized. I feel settled here, which is nice. I like PHTS (duh). I like design meetings. But the moment I leave the apartment, or a meeting, or the PHTS building, I get confused and depressed for no apparent reason. I like my neighborhood. It’s my favorite neighborhood in New York, actually, I’m constantly amazed at how central my location is. I don’t really know what comes over me. I think it has to do with the fact that there are so many people everywhere and we all walk by each other without care, without curiosity over who else is sharing this street, this block, this building... because we have things to do. And those things we have to do are more important to us than people and honestly, I think that’s a grave mismanagement of priorities. There’s also just the readjustment of not feeling like I belong anywhere. I don’t belong in Ghana. I don’t belong here.

The one place that has been a constant relief has been church. Last Sunday these feelings hit a peak and I walked into that building and instantly felt like I belonged there. Such a relief. Then the psalm for that day was number 27:

One thing I ask from the Lord,

this only do I seek:

that I may dwell in the house of the Lord

all the days of my life,

to gaze on the beauty of the Lord

and to seek him in his temple.

...

at his sacred tent I will sacrifice with shouts of joy;

I will sing and make music to the Lord.

Hear my voice when I call, LORD;

be merciful to me and answer me.

My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”

Your face, LORD, I will seek.

Of course.

Went to church yesterday accompanied by two friends. I love it when people come to church with me. Of course, I’m more than happy and content to go alone, but it’s always a nice change when someone comes with, especially when they turn to me and ask, “Hey Colleen, what’s Epiphany?” which was a question I didn’t even think to ask until the answer was given to me a midday eucharist at St John the Divine a couple weeks ago. Phenomenal sermon which will probably be referenced in later blogs.

Went up to the Bronx with some people from NYU in Ghana last semester and discovered the Ghanaian community in New York. Spoke Twi, talked about places in Accra, ate jollof rice, found out where to get palm oil. There’s a Ghanaian restaurant and a Ghanaian market right by each other. It was so warm, so comfortable there. Surprising people by being an obroni asking about waakye and saying “Medaase paa!” Shortly thereafter, I met up with my friend Miriam, who was at PHTS with me for several years and sailed the world doing Semester at Sea last semester. Her boat stopped in Ghana and I visited her in Takoradi. We had the most delightful conversation about globalization, colonialism, and how last semester had changed us.

So, moving forward, I think. Finding places of release. Loving school--very, very strange, though. Like I should be over this already, even though that’s absurd. Spoke to someone recently who said that it was a year after she’d been abroad that she finally started to feel adjusted again. So I’m working to let up the pressure on myself to get through it quickly. It’s about patience. It’s always about patience. I got much more patient with others when I was in Ghana... now I have to learn how to be patient with myself. And I beg all of your patience as well.