We're Human. Again.

Well. Here it is, October, and despite my best intentions, it has been over a month since my last post. Life has been busy...and I have been rather lazy about getting round to writing about it.

To summarize:
Have started classes at The New School.
Boxes from California have finally arrived, thought still unpacked in the living room.
Am contemplating donating them because I've been able to survive with out them for the past five months.
Have joined a climbing gym, and experienced the immense pleasure of sore climbing muscles after a month's respite.
Am re-learning how to be human.

It's true. The classwork I do and the homework I'm assigned all falls under the existential title of "Learning How To Be A Human."
I will take you through it, because it really has consumed my life and I think most of you will find it most interesting, even perhaps ridiculous, but mostly you will envy it.

A typical day at school. (Grab something to drink while you read. I'll wait.)



You ready?




Okay....

8:30am. We arrive at the building and go upstairs to learn Neutral American Speech. NAS, as we commonly refer to it, consists of a new alphabet (called the International Phonetic Alphabet) and very specific, and detailed instruction in the use of articulators and breath control. Ever wonder how we make sounds? That's our area of study. If you are holding a drink at the moment, take a sip. What happens? You swallow it. Yes, and the liquid also passes through several different areas of your mouth, which we refer to as articulators: the lips, teeth, alveolar ridge, tip, blade, front, middle, and back of tongue (yes, your tongue has five areas), the soft palate, the hard palate, and finally past your uvula down into your esophagus and past your larynx. Wave hello to your vocal folds on the way to the stomach. Don't forget to let out a nasal "mmmmm" that will reverberate in your turbinates as you enjoy the sensation of quenching your thirst.
Armed with the knowledge of how each sound is placed in the mouth, we learn how to speak in a neutral pattern and how to write out words as they sound so that we can imitate any speech pattern of any person in the world. Ask me to write you a secret note in IPA sometime. Not only will I write one, I'll write it out in an Australian dialect.

10:00am. We change into movement clothes and head downstairs for Alexander Technique. This class consists of the study of how your body moves and whether or not you should trust how you move. The primary area of study is the spine, and how we can prevent compression. Imagine coming into this class and learning that you've been creating lower back pain for yourself for years without knowing it. When you inquire about how you can correct it, there is no simple solution, because one of the tenants of this area of study is to not focus on the end result. The answer lies in a three-fold tier of awareness: sensory appreciation, directing, and primary control. I could get into it, but then you would be worrying about the cup in your hand and how it's creating compression in the thoracic region of the spine when you lift it to your lips to take that next sip.

11:35am. We float out of Alexander class and across the hall into Vocal Production. Let us not confuse this class with the earlier sound-as-speech class (NAS). Vocal Production is the study of how to maximize your vocal registers. Everyone has two registers: chest voice, and head voice. Those high notes that come out of Mariah Carey's vocal chords? Head voice. The rumbling bass voice of James Earl Jones? Chest register. And by the year's end, we will all be able to imitate both to an exciting and terrifying degree of accuracy. Currently, we are working on developing strength in the registers, which involves a daily ritual of intimating sirens and emitting primal calling. We make so much vibrational noise that were I in the room with you now and demonstrated a warm-up, the liquid in your cup would start sloshing around.

1:00pm. Lunch. A well needed break from the physical rigors we've worked on all morning. Lately, we've been eating outside, but the fall is beginning in New York, and soon it will be soup and scarf weather.

4:00pm. After an afternoon of practicing spelling in IPA and calling out to each other in low rumbling tones while staying relaxed through the cervic region of the spine, we travel upstairs yet again for the motherload of the day: Stanislavski Technique. Stan-iz-lav-ski, properly pronounced, was the father of acting who lived in Russia in the early 20th/late 19th century and developed a logic path of study which we all know and love and recognize today as "acting technique". His followers went on to develop many different branches of acting based on certain tenants of their own fused with his, which comprise the wide range of acting styles we have in America (and somewhat abroad) to this day. In this class, however, we are concerned with Stanislavski and one of his followers, Lee Strasberg. Strasberg is credited with founding what is referred to as "The Method" or "Method Acting", and the difference between Stan and Strasberg is not a topic I intend to visit today. Just know that Strasberg's technique involves an area we will refer to as "sense memory".

We take our seats in class and immediately assume "relaxation position" - sitting in the chair in such a way as to promote total relaxation of the body without falling asleep. This is somewhat difficult, given the comfort level of the chairs themselves, but our teacher assures us that we will not often have the luxury of even a chair, so we must plough through with the given circumstances.

Relaxation is harder than you imagine. The effect is stunning. Everyone holds tension in their bodies in different areas, and when we actually achieve a state of total relaxation, those tensions escape in varied ways. It is not uncommon to hear the person next to you start crying because she has relaxed her forehead, or the guy on your left let out a long scream because his jaw was clenched too tightly. Our instructor calls these effects "general emotion" - and he reminds us that not only is it okay to release these sentiments, but also that everyone carries general emotion around and we would all be better off if people learned to relax more often with deeper intention. I am inclined to agree with this. I am not suggesting that we go about screaming at random times, nor crying over our lunchtime bento box, but rather noticing in your day where and why and when you feel tense...and gently asking the tension to leave as you take a deep, satisfying breath.

Once we have achieved an acceptable level of relaxation, we begin the sense memory work. Take the cup in your hands, for example. Take your time in examining it. How does it feel? What is the texture? Weight, color? Temperature of the container? Is it hard, soft? Plastic, glass, metal? Does it smell? If you tap on it, does it make a sound? What about the perspiration on the outside of the cup? Is there a handle? What does it feel like to hold it in your left hand compared with your right hand? If you set it down near you, does it make a sound? Can you smell what's inside it? What does it taste like? What happens when you hold the liquid in your mouth without swallowing it? Can you feel anything leftover on your lips? What about the sensation in your chest as the liquid travels to your stomach? How about the tension in your arm or shoulder or back as you lift the cup to your face? Does the rim touch your forehead when you drink? How does your breath feel inside the cup?

These, and even more questions, are the questions we ask when we sit down to recall something from our memory within the sensory realm. Visual, visceral, aural, oral, tactile, pungency...they all are contained in any experience you have in your day. However, we rarely take the time to process the full sensation of any moment or any object. Can you imagine what would happen if you did? Can you imagine firing up every sense to its fullest capacity?

We concentrate on sense memory for over an hour during class. Just sitting there, recalling the senses and trying to feel what it's like to be in the shower, drinking coffee, feeling sunshine on your body. Putting on a sock, a shoe, taking off your coat. Little things. By the time we are finished, we have to take a mental break. We continue with this after the break even more, so that by the time we are finished at 7:00pm that evening, we're exercised our minds, bodies, and souls to exhaustion during the course of our day of studies.

And that's what it's like...at least on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Fridays are a whole bevy of three other, new classes. But that's another entry altogether. Right now, I'm going to go journal a little bit about the feeling of the keys under my fingers and the clackety-clack of the keyboard keys, while recalling the sounds of the park below my apartment and the slight chill incoming from the cracked window reminding me that the fall is coming and the light is fading into evening.
I hope you're enjoyed your cup of whatever it was as you read...and I hope that maybe you'll start paying more attention to relaxing and experiencing the moments of your day.

It's such a gift, learning to be human again.

The Place Where Nomads Go

My boxes are still in a storage unit in California.

I flew out to NYC last Saturday, and successfully moved into my apt, however. The boxes I shipped in July actually did not get sent. $500 to have them stored for two months, 20 minutes down the road from my house. Needless to say, there is some hell to pay.

Luckily, the past week has left me with a full heart - a heart full of joy, excitement, hope, and laughter. There were a few items on my brainworry list: roommates, weather, colleagues, administration, finances. These topics manifested themselves in various detailed form: Will my new roommate talk in her sleep as well? What am I going to do about running in the infamous NYC humidity? How does my loan refund get deposited? Where am I going to find a good burrito on the East Side?

Amazingly, all these questions were resolved in a matter of 48 hours. :)

As for starting in the program, I know I promised to write all about it, but there is too much to say about the experience of meeting your collective soulmates, after waiting for years to discover something you couldn't exactly define until you found it. You have to forgive me for the next portion of this blog, because I'm writing on the fumes of a residual life high. Ahh...actors.

I've come up with a little story that will best sum up the experience as a whole of this week's journeying:

A nomad wanders around in the desert by herself, meeting people along her various walks of life, scrounging for what she can, and surviving how she will. She lives her life from one adventure to the next, and though sometimes feels pressure to find a town and settle down, something in her soul tells her to keep searching.

She hears of a place where nomads go, and decides to venture forth to see what is there.

When she arrives, there is a group of people who have also wandered like she, scrounged for what they could, and survived how they had. They had lived from one adventure to the next, and though they too had felt the pressure to find a town and settle down, they knew they were to keep searching for something. They too had heard about the place where nomads go, and as these nomads suddenly find each other all in the same place, they recognize that they have found what they did not know they were looking for all this time. They cannot place the feeling, but something is happening. They know it by the heart's leaping, and by the spirit's trumpeting.

The first day they feast together, and there is an excitement in the air that cannot be satisfied, and as they look at each other, each nomad taking in the other's countenance, they see there reflected pieces of themselves. And the longer they stare, and the more stories they share, the harder it becomes to distinguish between the nomads and the self. (When one has been wandering like only a nomad can wander, it is quite unsettling to discover that there are others like yourself.)
They agree to feast again on the second day.

The second day arises and the feast they have then heralds a new sentiment: terror. Each nomad realizes that the life they knew is on the brink of extinction. Studying each other for a while, sensing bubbles of doubt in their throats and weights of fear in their hands, they discuss what to do. A passerby would find this scene most peculiar - a collective of nomands, standing close in a circle, not knowing if they should stay in this place or run for their lives.
Suddenly, a voice breaks through the thick fog of panic and it tells them to be kind, respectful.
Engage in a dialogue, it urges. Take care of each other, is the echo.

They set up camp, sharing what little they have, and exchanging each fear for a sprinkle of hope. Bit by bit, they begin to breath again, and the breath becomes a sigh, ebbing in with the new life of their collective. They talk long into the night, and under the twinkling smiles of the stars, they discover their home in each other. They fall asleep, side by side, and a dream hangs over their heads like the cool shade of a plum tree.

When they awake, they will see each other in the dawning, look happy, and say,

Good morning, I am excited and terrified.

Theatre and the Imagination

Julie Taymor is the director/designer of The Lion King, the musical. In this talk from TED, she speaks of "being aware of knowing that you've created a sacred space" - a phenomenon that makes theatre as necessary as religion. Theatre is, unlike some artistic forms, ephemeral and fleeting. There are a few chances to see certain performances, live and in the present moment. Yet the experience of a specific work is difficult to recreate, or even relate to a third party. Trying to converse about a specific theatrical moment usually ends with "you just had to be there." That difficulty however is what makes it so appealing, so eternal.