Putting it together; or, BS reassembles her jigsaw life

After the accident.

It took about five days for the initial shock to pass. Christmas night I watched the Doctor Who Christmas special (of course) and then went to do something else around the house, and happened to pass the television just as BBC America aired the very end of "The Angels Take Manhattan" which is, as anyone who watches Doctor Who knows, soul-crushing. This was the thing that broke through the post-accident brain-fog, and the thing that broke me down. After five days, I finally cried--a lot. It was, I think, a reaction to the realization of just how bad the accident was, and how much worse it could have been. The car that hit my Camry was a Hyundai Sonata, going between 35 and 40 miles an hour; a larger vehicle, or one traveling faster, could have seriously injured or even killed me. My airbags didn't deploy. Somehow, no glass was broken, I didn't hit my head, the most serious injury was the bruising from where I slammed into the driver's-side door.

I've been back in the city now for a little over a week, and it's beginning to feel as if I'm coming out of the stasis I was in during my visit to my parents' house. The holiday season, usually stressful, had a little extra kick this year, because in addition to the fallout of the accident, we also made the decision to say goodbye to Macavity, who had been a member of our family for seventeen years and nine months, after  taking a sharp turn for the worse between Christmas and the New Year. All in all, I have decided to consider this holiday season to be the lowest possible point, from which things can only improve. And, I have to admit, it's impressive that this holiday season finally edged out the year I was seven or eight and Mom had to take me to the hospital on Christmas Eve because of a high fever, after which I projectile-vomited the fluorescent pink medicine the doctor had prescribed all over my grandmother's house. That year, I opened gifts with the family while lying on the floor. That was the year my grandmother bought me a copy of Monica Furlong's book Wise Child and a collection of female-centric fairy stories called Tatterhood, which is, it is possible, are the books which first gave me an awareness of feminism.

Now that I think of it, I don't have that many memories of childhood, but the ones I do have are vivid.

So. I'm piecing my life back together after re-entering the world of the living. My re-entry was, it must be noted, not half-assed in any way: I arrived in town on Tuesday morning, and on Tuesday night a friend and I went to Hansel and Gretel at the Lyric, after which I attended an opera-affiliated networking event at a swanky bar. The next night, I went out with a friend in Wicker Park. And then I didn't leave the house for two days, because being social is work, man.

Speaking of work, I have been doing a lot of it. In fact, work takes up approximately 50% of my life (the remaining 50% is split between sleeping, drinking coffee, and reading books I hated or avoided reading in high school). I will not talk about work here, because work takes up too much of my life already without infiltrating my blog.

I taught at a high school yesterday, which was a nice change of pace from the everyday grind of making phone calls to musicians to talk about other musicians. This time it was sophomores, and the subject was chemistry (a class that, for the record, I somehow avoided in high school). Thankfully, the teacher left a worksheet for the class to do, and the subject matter basic enough that answering questions wasn't too difficult. During my planning period, I read Of Mice and Men because I had finished The Jungle while the students were working on homework during academic lab. The Jungle is an excellent book, and Of Mice and Men kind of made me hate everything. I guess one could argue that both books involve terrible people doing terrible things to other terrible people, but at least the over-the-top call to action at the end of Sinclair's book reminded me of the over-the-top choral endings of Shostakovich's 2nd and 3rd Symphonies, and those always made me smile.

This entry is terribly scattered. I suppose that's the result of my brain being shocked into almost-frantic action after doing so little during the holiday. Well, we'll just have to go with that, I suppose. I have more to say than I had expected.

A student in one of my classes yesterday had a birthday. He turned sixteen, and I realized that there are students in high school, which is damned near adulthood, who were born either the year Monicagate happened or the one before it. This is the first time I have been aware of a group of people who, for the most part, have their own thoughts and ideas and are well on their way to being independent human beings, who are too young to remember a major cultural event I remember reacting to (and, for the record, my reaction at the time was, "Really? You're calling his leadership into abilities into question because of that? Really?!" I was a precocious twelve-year old). It occurred to me, as it sometimes does: I am nearer to thirty than twenty, and I don't feel any older than 22. Is this a thing that happens to everyone, the feeling that there is a huge discrepancy between the age one is and the age one perceives oneself to be? Either way, it's a strange moment of self-awareness for someone who still occasionally gets carded while buying tickets for R-rated movies (which did happen in November, when I bought a ticket for Lincoln).

Speaking of R-rated movies, I am currently half-watching a pre-rehab Robert Downey, Jr. movie called In Dreams and I have no idea what's going on. I'm less lost than I was during The Expendables, but still . . . 

I think I've said about all I want to say for now, though. In the future, there will be book talk! There is a truly terrible book I've been meaning to write about but I needed to take a couple of months before going back to it, because it may be the worst thing I have ever read. Hilariously so. More on that later.

I just move on; or, BS Lives And Dies by Google Calendar

I run so fast
a shotgun blast
can hurt me not one bit.
I'm on my toes
'cause Heaven knows
a moving target's hard to hit.
-"I Move On," Chicago

Very, very suddenly, there has been an extreme uptick in the number of calls I get asking me to substitute teach. And by "extreme," I mean "at least one call every day for the past three weeks." This is, at least, a much-needed additional source of income, even if I feel guilty every time I have to turn down a call. Now I'm slightly less hesitant to turn on the heat in my apartment, meaning I don't have to work morning shifts at my other job wearing a scarf, hat, sweater, and fingerless mittens. Si, mi chiamano Mimi, indeed.

It seems unthinkable these days that there was ever a point in my life where I eschewed the use of Google Calendar; now, with my life simultaneously so packed with things to do and so up-in-the-air, I can't imagine keeping track of everything without being able to switch appointments around on my phone as-needed. Also, those half-hour empty blocks that appear periodically in my schedule? That's a friendly reminder: Eat something. Because otherwise I'd forget.

(Penny is rolling around on the floor, playing with a catnip mouse and occasionally getting distracted by the texture of the fireplace bricks. What a stoner.)

As I write this, I am planning for my first real audition season. Quelle aventure! Already there are two lined up in two weeks, with the very real possibility of a third to be scheduled in the near future. Among the other singers I know, I am late to this particular party, but, as a very wise woman once told me, it is the responsibility of every working musician to find a path that works for them, and not to bind herself to any predetermined idea of what one should have accomplished by a certain age. Finally, at 26, I find myself vocally and emotionally prepared to deal with the insanity associated with this process. So, come on, Audition Season 2012: let's do this.

For a Few Dollars More is on television, and I am left thinking how incredibly weird I find the entire concept of Spaghetti Westerns. Obviously I don't have much experience watching them, but it's so strange to see a movie where all of the dialogue is dubbed, and even more so one in which one or two of the characters are obviously speaking English and the rest are obviously not. Watching someone's mouth moving out of sync with his words jars me in the same way as a movie string quartet composed of people who have obviously never played a string instrument: the incongruity is shudder-inducing if I pay too much attention. (Also, why is there nudity in this film, but no blood when someone is shot?)

So, that's life at the moment: running. So much running. Last-minute changes to plans and lots of narrowly-averted disaster. And, in the end, I guess that's where I feel most content.

My life goes on in endless song; or, BS takes a moment to breathe

Tonight, on the way back from rehearsal, I stopped by CVS to pick up a soda for my roommate, who is exhausted by unpacking and was craving. I grabbed one for myself, and only noticed when I took a sip a half hour later that it was Diet Wild Cherry Pepsi. 

Then, I went to make a salad (my one meal today was consumed at the family-owned Italian restaurant down the street as I sat with the staff, watching the Euro 2012 Final and exclaiming rude things in Italian at the screen). As I cut into the avocado I had bought earlier today, I noticed that its flesh had gone brown.

The fact that these are the two biggest disappointments  I faced today may be a sign that, for the moment, my mood is in an upswing. 

That's not to say that life is not completely overwhelming. Having finally found a roommate to share the (relatively inexpensive, but still inconvenient when paid out of one's minimal income) rent and bills, I cleaned the apartment to allow her some space to move her things in. Moving is always messy, and one always seems to have so many more belongings than one needs until they are removed from their cardboard boxes and put away. Movers are also very messy--the amount of dirt tracked in as they unloaded box after box after box actually rendered one floor-runner basically unusable (bought at Goodwill and easily replaceable but still, gentlemen, wipe your damn feet) and left me itching to vacuum the floor. My knee-jerk reaction was panic. However, after 24 hours or so had elapsed, it became clear to me that my new roommate is potentially the most organized person I have ever met, in addition to having more energy for unpacking and sorting than I had ever imagined possible, and is getting on admirably in a situation that would have reduced me to a useless puddle of anxious tears within half an hour. I expect that my previously-spartan little apartment will look considerably more lived-in (in a good way, a way that says "people actually live here and have real-people lives" rather than messy) by week's end. Even in my room I have managed to set up a small workspace that doubles as a sewing table and home office. 

And, oh, am I sewing. A shop in my hometown, owned by a high school friend, has agreed to sell some of the purses I make, so I have very suddenly found myself needing to treat sewing as a Real (very-part-time) Job. As things are still being unpacked however, there is no place at present to set up an ironing board. Tomorrow I ship out my first two bags, with plans to make as many more as possible during our five-day break from Don Giovanni rehearsals and send them home with Mom when she visits.

Don Giovanni is also taking up significant brain-space at the moment. I blame the combination of Mozart writing obnoxiously catchy melodies and having to repeat those melodies so frequently in rehearsal. I've always had an affinity for this opera over all of the others Mozart wrote, mostly because it gives me so many Feelings--I've got a whole other blog entry locked away in my brain concerning the characters and how the trap with Giovanni is to fall back on convention when it comes to characterization rather than letting the characters sort of develop themselves--and, to be honest, I would say that characters like Leporello or Elvira or Zerlina or even Giovanni do a fair job of asserting their own personalities, desires, motivations, quirks, &c., and the best thing to do when portraying one of those roles is not to try and impose your own limitations on them. There are so many angles from which to consider Don Giovanni, and even twelve years after the first time I watched it, I am still fascinated by the intricate ways in which the characters interact (but mostly Elvira and Leporello, who put up with more of Giovanni's shit than anyone else in the show), and I still start shuddering when the statue begins speaking. Every. Single. Time. Because a damn statue comes to life. And that statue is vindictive as hell (uh, literally). And that is terrifying.

"So why then, Bee," you may be asking, "when your life is hectic and full of crazy, did you take an interview for a part-time barista position?" 

The answer: masochism. Obviously.

But--and this is the strangest thing--I know that I am busy. Intellectually, I am able to look at my GoogleCalendar (the fact that I rely on GoogleCalendar to remind me that I must, twice a day, eat something, Bee, you are not capable of photosynthesis, is probably a good indication of just how busy I am) and say to myself, "Damn, there's not a lot of free time there." But, as I experience everyday life, it is the busiest days and weeks when I feel the most free and easygoing. I suppose this can be chalked up to momentum, to the fact that when I have so much to do my thought process speeds up and it is as if the events of my day go by in slow-motion. With that in mind, knowing that I feel the most centered and comfortable when I have a set of goals to achieve in a specified amount of time, why the hell not try to find a second job, one that can keep me from having too much time to think (which inevitably leads to overanalyzing, which often leads to panicking about Who am I and what am I going to do with my life?!) after this show wraps?

And, of course, all this positive thinking could go to hell tomorrow. This is another thing I know intellectually. But right now my cat is ridiculous (especially when she tries to intimidate my roommate's cat by hissing, which is more adorable than menacing), there is someone to talk to, my monthly financial burden has just been slashed in half, Dave Eggers just released a new book, and it is thunderstorm season in Chicago. Yes, life could definitely be worse.

And after the earthquake there came a fire!; or, BS's continued adventures in calamity

I truly did mean to write a follow-up to my most recent post. And, then, of course, life delivered me a swift kick in the ass. Because that is what life does.

It is a running joke between my friends and myself that my life is infinitely blog-about-able. And, more or less, that is true. The trouble, however, with having the sort of life which is continually filled with adventure is that there never seems to be enough time to write any of it down. The only solution seems to be to jot things down quickly as they are happening, and move past the stories that pass to quickly to be recorded. That being said, I do tell a lot of stories to my friends and family, and most of them are the sort that are too strange to have been made up. For example: on St. Patrick's Day I met some friends at a bar and was propositioned by a young man in the most ungraceful way possible (Do people really say "DTF" outside of the Jersey Shore? Really? And does it ever work?) before going home with his gay brother-slash-temporary-roommate, who cut my hair. Upon telling my father this story, he informed me that "I've come to expect that this is the sort of thing that happens on a regular basis in your life, so I've stopped worrying about it."

The fact is that, for about two weeks, it was hot in Chicago, the kind of hot that makes me nostalgic for Italy in June (with or without the infected mosquito bites). It may not be a big deal to people in Texas or Florida or below the Mason-Dixon Line in general, but those of us up in the frozen North generally expect to be shivering in our winter coats until well into April. Those two weeks of 80-plus-degree weather caught the entire city by surprise and between the weather and the impending holiday (St. Patrick's Day, during which the whole of reality shifts sideways and drunk becomes the standard, sober the exception), people did some crazy things.

My roommate, for example, informed me that she was moving out two months before our lease expired.

Without going too far into the situation--about which I am still fairly emotional--I will say that my roommate's sudden departure forced me to make a lot of plans very quickly. With rehearsals for Elijah increasing in frequency and free time becoming more and more scarce, my life devolved into chaos in a hurry. This past weekend, that chaos reached a climax: we gave four performances of the show, I competed at the National Association of Teachers of Singing competition, and most of the furniture in my house was packed up into a moving truck and driven back to Michigan. And then I came down with the epic cold virus making its way through the Elijah cast.

One of the most important things I continually forget about performing, particularly with a small cast, is that if one person in the cast gets sick, no matter how many precautions you take (handwashing, Vitamin C, sleep, fluids), you. will. catch. that. virus. I woke up Monday morning feeling as if I had swallowed a handful of razorblades. I have been sleeping on the couch because it takes too much effort to climb the stepladder up into my loft bed. Because I have a loft bed. Because I am an adult and because I can. I have also gone through nearly an entire box of Kleenex over the past three days, which is making me very glad that I decided to buy the three-pack of Kleenex boxes the last time I got groceries, before I got sick. As previously stated: I am a grown-up. BOOM.

So, given the chaos of the past month, my current task is to put my life back together. But, hell, at least I have a plan. The gas bill has been switched over to my name; cable service has been cancelled, since I haven't watched TV in almost a month, and I am now paying only for internet. Tomorrow I will switch over the electric bill to my name, and then the apartment is all mine. I am looking for a roommate to take the small bedroom for the summer. If I can set up a voice studio with 8-10 students during those three months, I can afford the place all by myself. And that would be something really amazing.

And I don't feel any different; or, BS does New Years

First of all: I am not going to make any jokes about the Apocalypse. I am sick to death of the word "Apocalypse" at this point. Since I am, in general, very interested in eschatological scenarios, this is a clear sign of how saturated our culture has become with end-of-world predictions of late. The world will not end in December 2012, and if it does, at least people will stop talking about how this is the year the Apocalypse is going to happen. Finally.

The New Year was rung in quietly at the BS household (that is, in my apartment): Mom drove me back to Chicago, since I refused to celebrate another New Year's Eve in my tiny hometown, and, since my roommate was working late for the holiday, we sat on the couch and snacked on apples and cheese and watched the 2009 BBC Emma. All four hours of it. I didn't get blitzed at some divey bar and I didn't watch the ball drop in Times Square--although at midnight someone in my neighborhood began setting off fireworks--because with every year that passes, New Year's Eve just makes me feel increasingly old. I mean, obviously, in terms of years spent on this earth, of course I get older every year, but now, where I used to be able to stay up till all hours drinking bottles of cheap red wine with friends and talking about which composers we'd most like to invite to a dinner party (Schubert, obviously, and maybe Puccini but definitely not Wagner), now just the merest idea of getting dressed up and going to some club to dance exhausts me. Graduate school, you have robbed me of my youth!

I have made a few New Year's resolutions, for once:

• Aided by Wii Fit, Zumba for Wii, and living in city of pedestrians, work out at least 4 times a week.
• Eat meals. Actual meals. Made of actual food. A spoonful of peanut butter does not count.
• And, most importantly--in the immortal words of The Specials (and Prince Buster before them, and Guy Lombardo first): "Enjoy yourself, it's later than you think."

One thing I have been enjoying, and immensely, is reading. A good friend of mine, Lindsey, occasionally lends me a paper bag full of books she has read and enjoyed, and while in college/grad school I never got around to reading as many of those books as I meant to--although, through Lindsey's recommendations, I discovered several wonderful books I might have otherwise not looked twice at, like Neil Gaiman's American Gods or The Time Traveller's Wife (which was gorgeous, but terribly sad). At the moment, she has me reading The Elegance of the Hedgehog and it is SO FRENCH: the two main characters, whose shared occupation seems to be musing about the meaninglessness of life and the beauty found in simple things, have just had their first face-to-face interaction--nearly two hundred pages in. And I love it! It is a translation, albeit a very good one, and I would like to one day read it in the original French, as well as Muriel Barbery's first book, Gourmet Rhapsody (I have just looked up the book on Wikipedia to determine the correct spelling of Mme. Barbery's name, and, of course, she is a professor of philosophy, which is unsurprising, given the content and tone of the novel). A couple of reviews I came across dismissed The Elegance of the Hedgehog as "pretentious," or of being devoid of actual plot, but I, for one, don't find this problematic, especially when considering the alternative; Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons certainly have a lot going on but, when you get down to it, they are basically glorified self-insert fan fiction, where Dan Brown invents for his alter ego the discipline of "Symbology" (I always think of The Boondock Saints and Willem Dafoe here: "I think the word you're looking for is symbolism. What is the ssssssymbolism here?") and concocts improbable, if readable, stories in which he traipses across the globe with attractive women in whose presence he can display his considerable . . . ahem . . . knowledge. So, yes, with that in mind, I have no issue with reading an introspective, philosophical novel every now and again, between my re-readings of the Song of Ice And Fire series and Jane Austen's comedies of manners. And besides, what semi-intelligent person who paid attention in college writing classes doesn't cringe when someone grossly abuses grammar or selects the wrong your/you're, even when jotting a brief note?

I'm not a snob, really, I promise. I just love words, and I paid attention in school for twenty-one years, even when my grades (Music Theory) didn't reflect it.

But what else? I have been knitting and sewing like a fiend; during the month of December break I finished six projects, and an seventh upon returning to Chicago in the New Year. I have just cast on for a hat that I don't need, and will probably frog in the morning, but I need something to do with my hands to burn off all of this nervous energy. I finished a purse whose main panel features a tsunami print, of which I am immensely proud. It holds, at the very least, two books, my wallet and checkbook, a knitting project, and a bottle of wine, all without becoming unbearably heavy. Soon I plan to begin making headbands/earwarmers like the ones I have seen everyone wearing this season, with a knitted flower (I can't crochet, I'm sorry, it's a personality defect or something) and a button in the back. I do have those buttons I never managed to use in any of my projects . . .

So that's my life. I am busy. The things going on around me often seem surreal, but this is probably due to the fact that grown-up life moves so quickly, and, to keep up, I always seem to be running, running, running, phoning orchestras in Europe and putting the kettle on for another cup of tea before dashing off to a voice lesson or opera rehearsal. After four months of what felt like complete stasis, it is comforting to have settled into a routine and gained momentum. Life is good, for now.

Living la vie boheme; or, Life imitates art

At last! After two weeks of sitting shivering in my makeshift home-office in front of the heating vent, fingerless mittens on, a scarf wrapped twice around my neck, and a blanket over my lap, I have located the source of the draft in our apartment. Unfortunately, all this gets me is a sense of accomplishment, since the draft is coming from our laundry room and I can't actually do anything about it. Later this week, I may stop by JoAnn to pick up some fleece to block the space between the door and the floor, because this is going to be ridiculous come Thursday.

A slew of knitting commissions rolled in suddenly a couple of weeks ago, and now I'm rushing to finish them all before Christmas. So far, the benefit of living in a cold climate seems to be an increased appreciation of warm hand-knit goods. In addition, there are two finished pairs of fingerless mittens about to be listed on my Etsy shop, and several purses worth of fabric to cut and construct. The sense of productivity helps my mood during the holiday season which, as usual, has its difficulties.

Here's the thing about the holiday season: every year, it seems as if society is scheming to make us all self-loathing between Thanksgiving and Valentine's Day. It's clearly no accident that the holiday season inevitably marks a sharp uptick in the amount of advertising money handed over to every major television channel by online dating services and weight-loss companies. The strategy is brilliant: as we head into a holiday characterized by gift-giving, we are told, as individuals, that we are somehow less complete because of our lack of material possessions. How do we regain our feeling of self-worth? By seeking out romantic relationships. What do we feel makes us more desirable to others? Weight loss. The  extreme self-denial required by most fad diets advertised on television leads to a feeling of physical emptiness, and to fill that void we purchase more material things, and so forth.

This is, of course, a long-winded explanation of (although certainly not a justification for) the utter Grinchiness I have been dealing with at work in recent days. Listen, I understand that most people don't have home phones any more, that text messaging has made us a more casual society, that fewer people are aware of the basic rules of etiquette, blah blah blah kids these days and their haircuts and their rock music, but there are a few important things to remember when working in an administrative setting and dealing with telephones. The doctor is in:

• When answering a telephone at your place of employment, please state its name, as well as your own name. This eliminates the need for the inevitable awkward "Have I reached the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry? May I please speak with Albus Dumbledore?" exchange, in which the caller has not reached Hogwarts, but instead the Royal Philharmonic of Durmstrang.
• If you have questions, please ask them one at a time and allow a reasonable amount of time for a response between them.
• Never start a sentence with "I'm sure you're a lovely person, but . . . " because the second half of that sentence is rarely anything short of a thinly-veiled insult.
• It is rude to hang up on someone. It is rude to hang up on someone. Even if you said goodbye, if you cut the other person mid-sentence and did not hear them say "Goodbye" as well, you have still just hung up on someone. And you may just be a terrible person.

Do you know who I love so far, though? Every single person with whom I have spoken in Scandinavia, and most in Switzerland and Belgium. Attention, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, and Belgium: the next time I have a party, you are all invited. Germany, you can swing by, too, but try not to start any fights--I've got my eye on you.

This new life as an Employed Person/Actual Productive Member of Society (as opposed to my previous state of Embarrassing Drain on Society) is nice, though. I'm tired almost all the time, but I'm insanely productive most of the time while still managing to cut down majorly on my coffee intake and sleeping the recommended number of hours per night. As a pleasant side-effect to getting enough sleep, the desire to punch someone in the face occurs far less frequently, which is important for reasons of I Don't Need An Assault Charge On My Record Right Now. At the moment, life feels a little bit like an indie comedy film, something between Garden State and Harold and Maude. And maybe a little bit like La Boheme, since I can't really afford to turn up the heating much above 65 degrees and, sometimes in my knitting, I make flowers that "ahimè, non hanno odore." My voice teacher said in my last lesson, "My God, so you're actually Mimi, huh?" Yes. Pretty much.

Tick-tock goes the clock; or, BS gives an update on the state of BS

I just took two Chlorpheniramine Maleate pills and a Tylenol PM, so this post is a bit of a race against the clock--how many words can BS manage before she loses consciousness? Coherent thinking is already a bit of a challenge (but isn't it always, really?), but if nothing else, there's a possibility I'll get a laugh out of this in the morning.

(That makes one of us.)

The last time I sat down and wrote an entry here, I was finishing up my first temp position. Tomorrow, as a matter of fact, I am headed off to start a second position--underemployment is a sad, sad, way to live when you're in your twenties--and this time I will be taking inventory of public parking spaces for the company that manages the city's parking meters. What this means, as I have been led to understand it, is that I'm basically being paid to take a long walk on my own while occasionally writing things down, and, what's more, during my favorite season. The ungodliness of the hour aside (because, really, 7am is cruel), I'm actually pretty excited about this assignment, given that the four days I work are nonconsecutive. As long as no one mistakes me for someone who writes parking tickets, this should be just fine.

What else, what else? I learned that my upstairs neighbors are Polish dental students at the nearby university, and that they occasionally have get-togethers in our house's back yard with their Polish dental student friends, where they sit around speaking Polish and doing Polish things, like cooking sausages and drinking vodka. I had made a batch of cookies on Friday evening, which I brought out to share with them since it's good to get to know one's neighbors, in my opinion, and to reassure them that you are not some weird recluse who sings opera at inappropriate hours of the night and barely leaves the house except to buy coffee to enjoy while reading biographies about manic-depressive Dutch painters, of course you are not. In fact, I had meant to bring some of those cookies to a friend's house the next day, since she was doing a Mary Kay product demonstration, but the baked goods were, it must be said, annexed by Poland. On the whole, though, I must say, well done, Polish-speaking, vodka-drinking, potluck-having housemates, you kids definitely know how to throw a party, and the back yard wasn't even too disastrous-looking the next day. Although--it must be said--there has been a charred hamburger sitting on one of the multiple outdoor grills back there for probably three weeks, and I have no idea where the cover that goes to that grill has got to, and frankly, I'm a little afraid to ask.

It's autumn, so of course I'm baking again. Some day I will branch out from chocolate-and-butterscotch-chip cookies, but for now they're pretty delicious. I have some ideas about cinnamon-raisin bread, and there's got to be a recipe in one of the four zillion cookbooks we have sitting around the apartment. The Roommate and I obviously can't manage to eat six dozen cookies on our own--or, I guess, we could, but it wouldn't be very good for us--so I have been bagging them up and bringing them to the baristas at the Starbucks near my apartment. As it turns out, giving people baked goods is generally a good way to make them like you--at least temporarily, and only as long as you're actually okay at baking.

Aaaaaand I've started to go a little cross-eyed, so that plus the knowledge that my alarm is set for six means that I should probably climb up into my bed and wait for sleep. It figures, I guess, that the one night I actually have things to talk about--the show I'm in, the production of Lucia di Lammermoor I saw last night, how much it warms my cold black heart to see protestors carrying their homemade signs to Occupy Chicago on the Blue Line train--also happens to be the night I'm teetering on the edge of unconsciousness. Well done, universe. I salute you.

- - -

E.T.A., four minutes later
Tagging these things is always such an adventure. I briefly considered adding a tag called productive member of society, but after about forty-five seconds of deep thought, I decided that anything I could discuss there could also probably be filed under the heading of grown-upitude. So there you go. I have also added a tag called almost unconscious, which I suspect will see a lot of action in the coming weeks/months/LIFETIME.

I'll get you a copy of that memo; or, BS's long-standing affair with office supplies

It's nice to know that, if this music thing doesn't work out, or if it at some point becomes something which no longer makes me happy, I have a promising and enjoyable career option in office work. Because I've been temping for a nonprofit this week, and, you guys, the love for alphabetizing which emerged when, as an eight-year-old, I categorized and alphabetized my parents' VHS collection (and then alphabetized the categories), has not diminished with age. As a temp, I have basically been given free run of the office supplies, so since Monday I have been merrily filing invoices and collating documents and making piles and putting sticky notes on things.

The four or so of you reading this, I'm sure, are probably thinking, "God, what an unrepentant dweeb this BS character is. Who actually looks forward to arranging things in alphabetical order?" Answer: I do. Also, sticky notes are the best.

In all seriousness, though, the best part of finally being assigned to a temp position is that I feel less like a useless drain on society and more like a Competent Grown-Up Human Being who pays bills! and wears trousers! and goes on coffee runs while her superiors are in meetings! One day I did wear a skirt to work, but after a particularly harrowing lunchtime venture to the staffing agency to drop off my tax documents in which the wind repeatedly blew my skirt up above my knees and I traversed the sidewalks of the Chicago Loop clutching at its hem like Paranoid Marilyn Monroe, I thought better of that decision and went back to slacks the next day.

It has been nice this week having some occupation to take my mind off things going on in the rest of the country, which, frankly, terrify and confuse me. On Wednesday night I sat wrapped in a blanket watching the DemocracyNow live broadcast of the nonviolent demonstration against the execution of Troy Davis (the link, as if any of you were unaware of the case after its coverage this week), wondering exactly when we as a country began executing prisoners whose guilt could not be proven beyond a reasonable doubt--and before the question is asked, yes, I am aware that a second man was executed that same night in Texas, but although I believe that the death penalty is heinous and immoral no matter what crime it punishes, I cannot find myself feeling upset over the death of a man who confessed to a hate crime and, just prior to his death, admitted that he would do it all again if given the chance. I have also been, in my spare moments, following the protest on Wall Street, of which I have seen almost no media coverage, which surprises me, given the extreme importance of its message: that it is wrong for the government to grant tax breaks to the richest 1% of Americans while offering no such amnesty to those living at or below the poverty line. Sometimes I check the status of bills which would affect educators in my home state (including my parents and sister) on the Michigan Educator's Association website, but mostly that breaks my heart. I am ignoring the Republican Presidential Debates as much as is possible in a 24-hour-TV-news culture, and not just because I burst into hysterical giggles whenever anyone says "Santorum" (if you don't understand why that name brings out my inner thirteen-year-old boy, and if you have a strong stomach, Google it).

The world is disappointing, I'm realizing a little bit more every day. Is this what growing up means? As we get older, do we just gradually accept that the world isn't as shiny or logical as we thought it was? And my response to this overwhelming sense of disappointment is, I'm finding, to find joy in small things: sticky notes, opinionated kittens, pretending to be a secret agent, pluots, fingerless mittens.

More of the same; or, Yeah, whatever, I guess

My recent neglect of this blog has been pretty shameful, I'll admit.

But, in all honesty, nothing much has been going on here, so there wasn't a whole lot to report, apart from my newly rediscovered love of formulaic dance films (Step Up 3, you gorgeous thing, I am looking at you) and my continued unemployment, so there you have it.

I've sent out resumé after resumé after resumé over the past few weeks with very little response, although I do have one "recruitment seminar" on the retail end of an incredibly successful company tomorrow afternoon, so fingers crossed that I don't get lost in the shuffle of potential employees. I'm sending out about seven more resumés and cover letters tonight for administrative positions, and hoping that this dry spell of mine (in many aspects of my life, not just professionally) is winding down, because--here's an unsurprising revelation--housewifery is not really my bag. That's why I was never really showed much interest in the "wife" part of it. But lately my life has involved emptying the dishwasher, doing laundry, baking bread (which, actually, I haven't done in a week or so, so I'll make that a weekend project), and watching a lot of trashy reality television--and to that end, why has no one told me about Dance Moms before now? It's like Toddlers and Tiaras except infinitely more horrifying, and it absolutely exemplifies everything I hate about whitewashed upper-middle-class suburbia--so obviously I can't stop watching.

A recent upper respiratory virus managed to coincide with a bout of fairly severe depression, which, if I'm being fair, is probably caused at least in part by this feeling of not having anything to do during the day, so at least depression hasn't hampered my fast and furious distribution of resumés. If anything, it has caused me to send out more applications, since the resulting insomnia gives me more time to do so. Insomnia, by the way? Also not my bag. So I've got my fingers crossed that something will turn up, even if it's part-time and for minimum wage, because I'm pretty much over this constant feeling of ennui.

It occurs to me now that if I had both a) more money, and b) more patience, I could take up playing video games. The patience part has historically been my problem, though, especially when there are zombies, constrictive time limits, or jumping puzzles involved.

(The Oxford commas just keep on coming)

I'm going to be honest, I really just want to add to my "dreams" tag, so I'll mention that the other night I made the mistake of drinking alcohol and then taking cold medicine, which resulted in a pretty spectacular and unsettling drug-dream in which Draco Malfoy and I were told we were staying in a nice hotel somewhere in the continental United States with a bunch of other students (in this dream I was still a student, but I'm not sure of what, or from where), but soon realized that we had instead been tricked into participating in some sort of experiment where we were kept in a full-scale replica of Rome's Ancient City, given cannons and gunpowder, and watched to see how quickly the group could create its own society from nothing and then how quickly that society would unmake itself. So, yeah. That happened.

But returning to the subject of things that are Actually Happening in my Real Life, and on a more positive note, the newest man in my life is a potted rhododendron named Irving, who, despite my complete lack of a nurturing instinct, seems to be thriving in his little spot on my bedroom windowsill, right beside the Waldorf and Statler beanies I bought at Disney World forever ago. I don't know how he does it, but he seems to have figured out a way to not only reach toward the sunlight, but even grow, even though I continually forget to water him. So there's one thing I'm doing well right now--Irving. Irving is all right.

Things to never say to a musician; or, BS has had enough

After another weekend at home (prescriptions to refill, cats' medical appointments to attend, &c., &c.), and another round of, "You are 25 and still don't have a real job, what are you doing with your wasted life?", I think it's about time for a nice little fireside chat.

I'm sure, of course, that the few people reading this who know me in Real Life (I am thinking first and foremost of my parents, who are unwavering in their support, for which I am intensely grateful) are, for the most part, those who are, if not flag-waving fans of my decision to pursue an unconventional career path--that is, music, the performance of--at least tolerant and supportive of said choice. The thing is, it is a choice. It is, in fact, my choice, and as a card-carrying, 100% certified rational adult capable of weighing the multiple possible outcomes of a given situation and making a decision based on the various pros and cons of each possibility. Keeping that in mind, I would like to remind those of you who have a professional musician/artist/writer/haver-of-creative-thoughts-and-not-necessarily-steady-income in your life, of a few simple things.

First of all, it is never, under any circumstances, appropriate to make comments to someone who is embarking on a less-than-conventional career path what their "real job" is. It is also not okay to ask someone who has recently received a graduate degree in an artistic field something along the lines of, "If your degree is in art/music/creative writing/whatever, why aren't you looking for a job in art/music/creative writing/whatever instead of temping as a receptionist?" Statements and questions implying that a musician or artist's career is somehow invalid, and that the pursuer of said career is either immature or naive for choosing to perform or create rather than, for example, manufacturing No. 2 pencils or packing shipping crates, is widely regarded to be incredibly rude.

I don't presume to be an expert on other people's lives, either personal or professional, but I am most definitely an authority on the subject of my own, which is why I take offense when, say, a family member laments that I wasted money going to graduate school, and that I don't have a "real education." Because here's the thing--although it is true that my B.A. and M.M. are in music performance, which is not a field of study out of one emerges ready to take a six-figure job, and attain the American Dream of a house, a mortgage, and a white picket fence, I did, during that time, attend classes covering subjects other than music, thus expanding my range of knowledge. Furthermore, while studying I was also working to help pay for my education, and the experience I gained in those positions, particularly in the field of administrative and clerical work, has provided me with a skill-set which will help me pay rent and bills while I pursue my actual goal of making a living doing what I love.

And here's the thing--it's not as if my ambition is to become the next Lady GaGa or whoever, or to make a zillion dollars and retire to my own private island. The fact is that there are plenty of other people out there, although you may not have heard of them, who are supporting themselves through classical music performance. I don't necessarily want to be rich or well-known or glamorous; what I really want is to not spend the rest of my life working fifty to sixty hours a week, fifty weeks a year, at minimum wage, and hating myself because I've chosen financial security over what I truly believe to be my vocation.

And if, in the service of that ambition, I end up needing to pull a few odd jobs to pay the rent, well, I'm not too proud to do that, either. The thing is, although it's not what I see myself doing for the rest of my life, I really do like administrative assisting, I like the smell of office supplies and the feel of paper, and good God, do I like to alphabetize things (everyone has a hobby). I don't mind temping during the week while I'm auditioning on the weekends, and I actually sort of enjoyed waiting tables and working as a barista. Performing may be intellectually and spiritually fulfilling, and without that I would most definitely shrivel and die--but there is something immensely satisfying about spending eight hours at work before leaving smelling of sweat and barbecue sauce or coffee, skin greasy from perspiration but at least knowing that you did something that day.

So, yes, until I either reach the point at which endless auditions begin to pay off with actual jobs on a semi-regular basis, or performing no longer makes me happy, I am going to continue to pursue the things which give meaning to my life, and do whatever I need to in order to make that possible.

Tripping hither, tripping thither; or, BS explores

I stayed up past 1 a.m. last night baking my first-ever loaf of bread. And it was . . . my first loaf of bread.  As can be seen in the photograph above, she is not the prettiest girl at the dance, but, despite being dense and a little crumbly, this loaf tastes pretty good with a little bit of peanut butter spread over the top. I'm going home this weekend to attend a baby shower, and plan on returning with gluten flour (in addition to the second bookshelf I need desperately), which will, I hope, assist in the rising process, as that proved to be my biggest setback as a baker-of-bread. Oh, and maybe the mix needs a little more water, since the dough felt a little dry when I was kneading it.

The Roommate came home early last night, so we actually had a chance to chat as I was working on my bread. It was at this point that I realized that unemployment is turning me into a housewife. as she took off her shoes, I proudly exclaimed, "I did laundry and a load of dishes! And I'm baking!" I then proceeded to knit a baby blanket as I waited for my bread to rise.

In all fairness, my sudden retreat into extreme domesticity probably has something to do with the fact that I haven't made any actual friends (or acquaintances, or people at whom I nod when we pass on the street) in Chicago. Living with The Roommate is ideal--we operate on similar schedules, since she's a chef and I'm an insomniac, but keep opposing shower schedules, so there's never a race to the restroom in the morning. However, this also means that I spend a lot of time by myself--knitting, watching old episodes of Kitchen Nightmares on YouTube, drinking iced chai while I finish the A Song of Ice and Fire series--and I'm beginning to get tired of myself.

The other day, I finally had my "Oh God, oh God, oh God, what have I done?!" moment, and although the same exact thing happened when I first moved to Seattle, I was completely blindsided when it happened in Chicago. Suddenly, I was unable to stop crying, even when I left the apartment to read the letters of Vincent Van Gogh in the nearby Starbucks--in fairness, Van Gogh probably wasn't the best choice when I was already feeling weepy, since I kept reading sentences that sounded as if I could have written them and beginning to choke up again. So, back to alternating between GRRM, Sherlock Holmes, and Jane Austen.

Also: I broke a shoe at IKEA last weekend. Time to look for a new pair of decent dress flats.

It's sort of ridiculous, actually, how I managed to ruin that pair of shoes. I was neither running nor jumping nor lifting anything heavy. Instead, I was eating a spinach-filled crepe at the third-floor cafe before Mom and I headed over to look at textiles when the strap snapped off. I cut the straps off both shoes, hoping to salvage them, but without the Mary-Jane buckles, the shoes were too big and my feet blistered. So I threw them out.

(Millionaire Matchmaker is currently reminding me why I neither want to live in New York City nor date a millionaire. So there you have it. Thanks, trash television! And, God, this show's so sleazy.)

Since my IKEA shoe mishap, I have been traipsing about the city in the running shoes I bought before running a 5K in 2008, and, while normally I would never wear sneakers in public (Italy and high-maintenance singers, what have you done to me?!), I have to admit that it's much more comfortable than teetering down the sidewalk in heels. A few nights ago I walked over to River North, where I ate deep-dish pizza among the families of tourists seeking the "authentic Chicago experience." And yesterday, I made the trek to Wicker Park, whose legions of hipsters made me feel as if I was back in Seattle. I told two separate Red Cross canvassers that I can barely afford rent this month (mostly a lie), and a pair of Greenpeace canvassers that I spoke no English, only Italian. I do love walking--it's probably my favorite solitary activity, especially once the temperature dips below 80 degrees, and in Chicago the neighborhoods are so close that it's easy to walk from one to the next.

So, that's that. Bring it, Chicago. And, if you've got the time, bring me a job, too, please. I'm ready to give you a chance.

03:45, No Sleep; or, BS Tries to Kick the Bean

An update regarding the thrilling adventure of my addiction to caffeine: today is my fourth day with no coffee, and I'm not dead. I decided last week that the extended holiday weekend, free of rehearsals and morning shifts at the library, would be the ideal time to cut out coffee entirely, limiting my caffeine intake to tea, and even drinking that no more than twice daily.

It went pretty much as expected.

I functioned more or less normally on Saturday--got up before noon to see Super 8 with a friend, walked the entire 2.5 miles home, then took a nap, did laundry, and had Paula over for movie-watching-and-YouTubing times. Sunday I slept in, went to a friend's place, and then--

How? How is it even possible that, just as I am giving up caffeine, I should be hit with a severe bout of anxiety-driven insomnia? No lie, I went to bed Sunday night (Monday morning) after the sun had risen, and then again last night, when I lay in bed until about 2:45, thinking, "Good grief, why am I not asleep?!" It really is the most irritating thing to be lying in one's wonderfully soft bed, one's apartment for once hovering at a comfortable ambient temperature, no noise apart from the distant dull thud of neighborhood children (teenagers?) setting off explosives in celebration of our nation's independence, and to not be able to sleep. This is particularly true when one has to be at work by 9 the next morning. The dreams are back, too, and I'm not sure what that means.

It's understandable, I suppose, considering that I'm under a bit of stress right now, but it's nothing compared to Autumn Quarter (Hansel and Gretel in three weeks!) or, for that matter, Spring Quarter (Topics and piano exam and no time for sleep!), but after the relative quiet of my convalescence following wisdom teeth extraction, it's probably the contrast that's getting to me. Finances are a major concert at the moment--obviously I'll pull through, but it does get tiring after a while to live from one (minuscule) paycheck to the next. I lay awake at night sometimes worrying about the year to come--between rent, voice lessons, paying on school loans, budgeting for groceries, and traveling for auditions, I worry that I will never be financially stable. This worries me primarily because I would like to be able to travel while I'm still unattached and young enough to enjoy myself, and because I would, despite my aversion to achieving the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant goal of a husband and a house and 2.5 children, someday like to own property--ideally a house with a library, because can you imagine me owning a home without a library? So I lay awake thinking, How am I going to make the amount of money I need to survive? and What will I have to sacrifice to do that? It's a terrifying prospect, and one that carries all the weight of grown-upitude, and I don't like it.

But I'm functioning reasonably well for someone with a fairly serious dependence on coffee who has recently given up said substance for a short time. The purpose of this abstention is not, obviously, to give up coffee forever and completely, but instead to manipulate my body/brain, through forced withdrawal from a chemical to which it has become at least somewhat desensitized, into having a greater reaction to less of said chemical at some point in the future, and thereby to save myself some money, because I am a musician/student (and therefore poor) and also, in at least one way, stereotypically Dutch-American (and therefore cheap). And, my, that was a lot of words, wasn't it?

The headaches haven't been nearly as severe as I had expected, which is a pleasant surprise--although yesterday I did have one which settled behind my eyes and lasted all day, even through a lengthy afternoon nap, increased water intake, and some painkillers (look, everyone! I've just used an Oxford comma without realizing it!). It started out dull and irritating and grew significantly exacerbated in part, I'm sure, by the most comically oversized dead raccoon which lay rotting on the side of the row near the bus stop where I finally caught the 65 after deciding not to walk the remaining mile and a half home (I had already walked a mile before coming to that decision). And that raccoon, you guys. It was bigger than a nine-month old baby, or the largest pug I have ever seen, maybe even the size of a bear cub. I almost laughed, but it smelled so terrible that I just stood there waiting for the bus and thinking, Please don't let the wind shift, please don't let the wind shift.

It's just noon and I've already reached my self-imposed daily limit of two cups of caffeinated tea. There is a headache beginning to creep in behind my left eye, more dull and irritating than sharp and throbbing. At some point, I should eat something--there's still that bit of spaghetti squash in the refrigerator at home. None of this forgetting-to-eat business these days, not when I'm under stress and limiting access to addictive substances.