Poetry & Blindfolds

It’s been nearly three weeks since we bought and moved into our house and I find my feelings continue to vacillate between being awed and not being awed.  On one hand, it’s remarkable to be able to walk through the backyard at night (though the “yard” part of “backyard” is extremely wanting at this stage), yet it is another feeling altogether to look up at this vast building, standing in the middle of other vast buildings lined up like cruise ships that never leave port, and wonder what I’m doing with such a thing.

Conversations at work have changed just as violently as my living arrangements.  Gone are the days of casual conversation about weekends and whether the day in which we chat was worth thanking God for; instead, I am inundated with good-natured yet baffling advice about what to do now that I’ve joined the ranks of being a homeowner.  It is like going to a foreign country and being advised to make sure I go to this restaurant in that town and ask for the chef special; by the time the conversation is over, I have forgotten everything except for the “you will want to make you that you…” part.

I keep on trying to lure people over to see the damn thing to gage how far I have to go in improving it.  This weekend, I had my ex-brother-in-law-to-be Keith Lamb over (I was engaged to his sister long ago, but he and I – and she and I – have remained friends) and gave him a tour.  He nodded a couple of times and said, “cool”.  This says to me that there’s a great deal more work to be done.  I want a “wow” or “awesome” or even an enthusiastic “neat.”

My office is wide and spacious and is plonked down in the basement, although it is not dingy or dank.  The carpet is relatively fresh and there is a 3 foot by 6 foot window beyond my computer where I can gaze out onto a limited yet happy slice of sky.  If I am to write a Great American Novel, I can think of no more suitable place than one that is permanently subterranean. 

Thinking of writing has, after a long respite, finally worked its way back into my mind.  Should I direct another sketch show?  Perhaps some improv?   Perhaps a drama or tragedy?   Perhaps I should see about licensing Albee’s “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” or  Aykbourn’s “The Norman Conquests”?  Should I just direct?  Should I just produce and let others direct?  I confess, as I inch a bit older, the idea of producing and letting others get on with the directing and acting is increasingly attractive.  As I have said often, I adore live theater, if it weren’t for those fucking actors.

I can’t really blame actors for being the emotionally needy, painfully damaged egomaniacs that they are.  After all, in the legal profession, law is the common language.  In design, complex mathematical theory is the common language.  In theater, emotion is the common language.  So it’s no wonder there’s so many actors who proclaim their friends are the best friends ever, their significant other is the best significant other ever and their shows are the best shows ever.  They are constantly auditioning.  They are only dangerous when they get the role.  There hasn’t been a show I’ve produced in 17 odd years that hasn’t been infected by a Problem Child, who either feels compelled to fuck around on the set or, worse, fuck someone else in the cast.  Dealing with that once more – and usually getting some blowback from said Problem Child when I try and say, “maybe this isn’t the way you ought to be doing things” – is one of the core reasons I have avoided diving back into the craft.

Still, I am heartened by my little office and like the echoey clickity-click of the computer keyboard as I type.  I just have to figure out which of the bits on the creative buffet to put on the plate first.