I just liked this when I saw it, and thought it was worth posting!

Okay! So the antibiotics are working, and I’m standing up without a fever! Whoohoo!

I did go to rehearsal last night – the actors and stage managers were great, and I mostly directed from the fourth row. We got out a bit early, but we accomplished everything we needed to so we’re back on track. It was definitely a good choice to NOT have rehearsal on Tuesday though!

Now, if I can get rid of my cough and raw throat I’ll be back in business. I think those will take a few more days, but I can at least function again. (I did have one moment last night where the actors made me laugh so hard – it’s a comedy, you know – that I started coughing and laughing and thought I was going to black out. That was fun! They’ll never admit it, but I think while one stage manager was running at me with cough drops the other was dialing 9-1 on her phone and watching with her finger poised over the final 1 to see how the whole thing played out!)

I cancelled rehearsal yesterday.
This was a rare thing.
For only the second time in my directing career, it was because I was too sick to go.

I’ve had a sinus infection the last few days that has knocked me flat on my back. Sore throat, coughs, aches, the whole nine yards. Right now, I’m not a good looking man. Fun.

I’m actually off the couch this morning. In front of the computer for a few minutes eating soup and drinking juice and trying to catch up on some of my Producing job via email. What I’ve been thinking about (when I’m lucid and conscious) is our work ethic, as artists/entertainers/etc… I just had a brief conversation with my friend Joey about this very topic: When is it brave to come to work sick, and when is it braver to sit it out?

I don’t know that I know the answer right now – especially since I can barely focus. But I do know that sometimes the choice is taken out of our hands, like this time for me. And I think, like in any rehearsal process, sometimes it’s not just the choice, but how you embrace the choice once it’s made.

Somewhere in there, between the lines, is a thoughtful point about theatre and life.
It’ll probably be a good point, if we can find it.
But I’m going back to my couch.

Dear Diary,

I’d like to be in better shape please. In the last 24 hours I’ve run up and down a bunch of steps, played some long, frenetic games of tapeball in rehearsal, wrestled with my son, and pushed my riding lawnmower over 1/2 an acre of wet leaves in the rain (it’s a long story – our mower broke – ok, I guess it’s actually a pretty short story.)

After all of these things, I found myself more winded than I want to be.

For Christmas, please bring me my metabolism from 1990.

Thanks.

My wife has had bronchitis lately, and she sleeps on the couch when she’s sick, so she can be better propped up. (She’s doing fine, by the way!)

After getting ready for bed, my 8 year-old son comes up to me, and we have this exchange:

Max: “Hey Dad, since Mom is sleeping on the couch tonight, can I sleep in your bed with you?”

Me: (jumping to conclusions) “How come, buddy? Something bothering you?”

Max: (very matter of factly) “No. I just like being with you!”

It was at that point that I may have gotten something in my eye and said “You bet” while hugging him really, really hard…

Today, we offer thanks.

To my father-in-law, who served in World War II.
To my grandfather, who was a radar operator at Pearl Harbor.
To my brother, who served in the first Gulf War.

To all of those men and women who fought, and are fighting, to defend this country – the country where I’m raising my children, and pray regularly that they are kept safe…

To all of those fine people – Thank You.

This afternoon we closed Leaving Iowa at Williamston Theatre.

I’m pleased to say that the show not only broke our previous “best selling” Box Office record, it also brought in a ton of first-time patrons to our theatre. Thanks to great reviews and great word of mouth, we’re continuing to build our audience!

It’s an odd thing, closing a show that you really love. You know it’s time to move on, but it’s hard to let it go – the familiar, the comfortable… especially if it’s been well received and the company enjoys doing it as much as the audience enjoys seeing it! When it works, you fall in love with it, with all of it: the people, the routine, the story.

But, the nature of our business is transition. There’s no celluloid, or digital video, to record what we’ve done for all time – it’s here today, and literally gone tomorrow.

For instance… we’ve run this show for 6 weeks. At 4pm today, our theatre was the home of Leaving Iowa, and our workspace looked like this:

At 6:30 today, our theatre was home of the upcoming Every Christmas Story Ever Told!!, and our workspace looked like this:

Always changing, our workspace.

That’s okay, though – because our stories are always changing too!

It’s funny, I was listening to some NPR interviews with people who like to hear themselves talk, and they were going on about how “Hope alone isn’t going to be good enough” and “Sure – Change will be good, but there’s so many expectations now that there will soon be an inevitable period of utter disappointment because there’s no way for him to live up to them” and it just made me A) annoyed at people who always want the glass 1/2 empty, B) annoyed at people who, to seem smart, love to contradict anything the “majority” embraces, C) annoyed at smug people who love to discuss “The Average American” in terms of how gullible and uneducated they are. (Yep, for those of you counting, I was annoyed x3!)

Don’t get me wrong, I love NPR. A lot! However, these “experts” on this particular panel seemed to enjoy being the doomsayers, the “Abandon all hope ye who enter here” bellringers who wanted to just help us all realize that “optimism is fine, but don’t expect your lives to get better cuz the world sucks”. That really rubbed me the wrong way.

I’m hopeful. I’m gonna stay that way. What’s the point of being anything else? I’m not a Pollyanna, I understand the complexity and difficulties ahead of us as individuals and as a country. However, wallowing will not solve anything, ever. Hopeful, and eager to work for the betterment of my situation – I’ve tried to embrace that attitude for years, and Obama’s election will only bolster my determination!

So – Hope. 4 out of 5 Artistic Directors agree, it’s a good thing.*

*this statistic is entirely fictional

I love voting. I love the whole election process, have since I started voting 20+ years ago.

This was just an incredible election.

The primaries, that felt incredibly long, really set the stage for a debate that many called “one of the nastiest” – I don’t know if I agree with that, there’s been a lot of sniping in every presidential election I can remember. Ultimately, though, an incredibly historic race was run.

That race was capped off by a decisive victory for President-Elect Obama, and I’m glad for that. The race was also wrapped up with, in my opinion, two very very fine speeches; one a moving concession, the other an inspirational call to action.

This is a very exciting time, in a lot of ways. Yes, it’s exciting to be around during this piece of history and, by voting, to feel like we’ve had a hand in it. It’s also exciting to be a parent right now – my kids are excited about voting, and we want to make sure that they remember when this moment in history occurred. At 8 and 10, they’re just barely beginning to understand what politics even IS, and that’s a good thing. I’m hoping that with his dedication and message of public service and cooperation, Barack Obama will be a good role model for my kids in the next 4 very formative years of their lives. And maybe an inspiration to me, as well, to be the best that I can be for them also.

What an exciting thing.