All In The Timing
Well, I worked for a bit last Saturday. I probably didn't need to, as I got done much faster than I expected, and decided I didn't need to come in on Sunday. It was kind of a lazy day. I was watching Children of Men and sorting through old mail, giving the shredder a real workout.
My gut was feeling a bit queasy, like something I had on Thursday or Friday was trying to make a statement. I was beginning to think I was going to dodge that bullet.
Rachel called on Sunday and would I be interested in dinner? Of course, and we had a great session. Good food (Desert Fire) and terrific conversation and writing. Rachel has great writing exercises she likes to do and we added some of our own. For the warm up I wrote in unrhymed verse, pentameter, but not very iambic. I hadn't planned to ahead of time, I just did. We followed that up with a longish rhyming scheme Rachel suggested (ababab cdcdcd efefef gg), using ten syllables per line. We found it forces us to get out what we want to say. Denser and deeper. Using a constriction in form, you tend to loosen the personal constrictions more easily. Both of us having worked a bit with classical text helped too. Syntax and meanings not in everyday life make you both much more deliberate and liberated. Figure that one out.
It was a beautiful evening, but too chilly for a walk so we went for a drive in the Prius. I'd recited Ulysses and some Shakespeare in the restaurant. It's great to have an enthusiastic audience, and great practice as reciting things for friends is great audition practice for me. First when clarification is asked for it helps focus intention and enunciation, even if you are using a much lower volume voice. And even more helpful is it creates the same internal atmosphere for me. Get past being wooden for a friend/relative or two and it translates directly into less wooden (and of course, better) auditions. On the drive Robert Service and Shakespeare joined us. It sure is nice to have an easy driving and quiet car. Especially fun as the MacBeth monologue and the Service poems I just refreshed myself on the last week. I think I ran through The Shooting of Dan McGrew and The Cremation of Sam McGee, about half of the Service stuff I know. I just started on some of the Kipling stuff, but one of those is pretty long, so it will take a few more days to get that one going again. I'm taking a few trips this Summer, and when I'm driving I like doing monologues and poetry a good deal of the time instead of listening to the radio the whole time.
Check Rachel's blog for her entry last week. I might visit the theatre under construction on Sunday. It sounds fun and interesting.
This week has been very busy at work, and whatever I tangled with last week finally got to me late Sunday. I've decided if you're going to feel a little peaked it's much nicer after a nice weekend finishing with a nice dinner.
My gut was feeling a bit queasy, like something I had on Thursday or Friday was trying to make a statement. I was beginning to think I was going to dodge that bullet.
Rachel called on Sunday and would I be interested in dinner? Of course, and we had a great session. Good food (Desert Fire) and terrific conversation and writing. Rachel has great writing exercises she likes to do and we added some of our own. For the warm up I wrote in unrhymed verse, pentameter, but not very iambic. I hadn't planned to ahead of time, I just did. We followed that up with a longish rhyming scheme Rachel suggested (ababab cdcdcd efefef gg), using ten syllables per line. We found it forces us to get out what we want to say. Denser and deeper. Using a constriction in form, you tend to loosen the personal constrictions more easily. Both of us having worked a bit with classical text helped too. Syntax and meanings not in everyday life make you both much more deliberate and liberated. Figure that one out.
It was a beautiful evening, but too chilly for a walk so we went for a drive in the Prius. I'd recited Ulysses and some Shakespeare in the restaurant. It's great to have an enthusiastic audience, and great practice as reciting things for friends is great audition practice for me. First when clarification is asked for it helps focus intention and enunciation, even if you are using a much lower volume voice. And even more helpful is it creates the same internal atmosphere for me. Get past being wooden for a friend/relative or two and it translates directly into less wooden (and of course, better) auditions. On the drive Robert Service and Shakespeare joined us. It sure is nice to have an easy driving and quiet car. Especially fun as the MacBeth monologue and the Service poems I just refreshed myself on the last week. I think I ran through The Shooting of Dan McGrew and The Cremation of Sam McGee, about half of the Service stuff I know. I just started on some of the Kipling stuff, but one of those is pretty long, so it will take a few more days to get that one going again. I'm taking a few trips this Summer, and when I'm driving I like doing monologues and poetry a good deal of the time instead of listening to the radio the whole time.
Check Rachel's blog for her entry last week. I might visit the theatre under construction on Sunday. It sounds fun and interesting.
This week has been very busy at work, and whatever I tangled with last week finally got to me late Sunday. I've decided if you're going to feel a little peaked it's much nicer after a nice weekend finishing with a nice dinner.
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