There is a harsh truth to face. No way I'm gonna make it on the outside. All I do anymore is think of ways to break my parole. Terrible thing, to live in fear. Brooks Hatlen knew it. Knew it all too well. All I want is to be back where things make sense. Where I won't have to be afraid all the time. Only one thing stops me. A promise I made to Jason Robert Brown.
I told him I was going back to my home state for my next job, and I'd be working for a real theatre again, doing a real show, so he couldn't mock me like he had been doing for some time now.
But now, friends, I must admit I don't quite know how to handle this life.
I'm starting a new show @ Temple Theatre, yes, in my home state of North Carolina, located in a small town called Sanford. The show is a 1960s-themed Christmas show, four girls singing in harmony, think Plaid Tidings with girls...called The Winter Wonderettes. The theatre isn't a full-on Equit
y house, but they usually have a couple of guest artist contracts per show...we only have one since there are only four of us in the show, but we live under all Equity rules.We take rehearsal breaks at regular intervals. We don't have to ask to use the restroom. There is a stage manager, a set designer, a costume designer, and the dressing rooms are climate-controlled.
The water IS potable. Right out of the kitchen sink.
I took a shower this morning in the house where we live....it was hot, the shower was clean, and the shampoo rinsed clean out of my hair. I was actually cleaner when I got out of the shower than I was when I got into it.
The housing is not only insulated and also climate-controlled, but it's this enormous old Southe
rn house where we each have our own huge bedroom with cable TV and wireless internet. I have a double bed...one big mattress, with box springs under the mattress, not just a big block of solid wood.Board members brought over food for us to our house last night after we moved in. Just-baked lasagna, french bread, apples, cookies....where are the mashed potatoes? The fried chicken? The vegetables with nutrients replaced with fat from butter and gravy?
We were released from rehearsal because we'd been working so hard today in music rehearsals. Wasn't there laundry to be done? Didn't anyone need me to call Elvis Bingo somewhere? Should I go run club with the big awkward guy who stares at me? I would've just wandered the streets looking for cows and Amish if I wasn't already carpooling with one of the other girls in the cast.
I don't know who I am anymore. The orange is disappearing from under my nails. The bloating from the Homestead food is going away. I walked with Louis for an hour today and the air didn't smell of sulphur OR sewage. My voice feels relaxed and healthy; I'm singing in my real range, and we are asked to be safe and careful instead of running things that we're getting right 30 times. I think we'll be paid before we've been here for about five weeks. The stage manager mentioned driving me to the astronomically-discounted gym in the mornings.
I'm gonna crawl into my giant bed now and pull the covers over my and Louis's heads. They were all right
of the dryer waiting for me when I got here yesterday. I don't have rehearsal until noon tomorrow, I was going to get up in the morning and do yoga, but it's gonna be way too weird to actually have the space to do it on the floor of my bedroom, and I won't be surrounded by dustbunnies and dead insects.Help!
Love,
ME
