A sense of accomplishment; or, BS attempts productivity

I baked tonight, as anyone who has interacted with me at all via social media can tell you. And the thing about me is, when I decide to do something, it's rarely half-assed. In this case, a decision to bake in celebration of the completion of Boheme's iTunes recording and imminent opening (Saturday night! Saint John Cantius! Get yer tickets!) turned into nearly four dozen cookies and fifteen blueberry muffins. Another (little-known?) BS fact: I don't often eat much of my own baking. With the exception of loaves of bread, I generally make things for the sense of accomplishment it gives me, have two or three, and give the rest away. This was especially true during the rehearsal period of Hansel and Gretel last fall, when I lived alone and suffered from a significant amount of character bleed that led to much baking experimentation.

It's been a long time since I've shown my face here. Depression (in retrospect, probably circumstantial and due in large part to my state of unemployment) is to blame, of course, but I'm not going to go into that in any depth, as the brilliant Allie Brosh of Hyperbole and a Half recently dealt with the same thing and addressed it more brilliantly than I could ever hope to.

Very suddenly, though, I'm feeling all right. Last week I visited my parents--which is, let's face it, an excuse to see my grouchy sixteen-year-old cat rather than an expression of my desire to return to the small town where I attended high school--and it was nice to get out of the apartment for a while, however nice said apartment is (and it is--Stephanie just decorated for Christmas, so it's all very homey). I drank coffee and read a book and considered going to see a high school production of Phantom of the Opera before experiencing a return to sanity and subsequent decision to not see Phantom after all.

Oh, Phantom of the Opera. My relationship with that musical is fairly complex. Here's the thing--despite the fact that it is the bane of every single opera singer's existence ("What do you do?" "I sing opera." "Oh, like Phantom of the Opera?" "No. Not even."), I actually sort of enjoy it. The music is pretty and easy to listen to in the first half and, given half the chance, I would play Carlotta in a second because she's hilarious. The whole thing is written to be a complete spectacle, which is why I would have loved to see it in Las Vegas last spring had I not gotten so sick during my time there. But the writing is just cruel, especially to the Phantom and Christine--the approach to the Eb in the title song is about as difficult to sing as anything. Never mind the fact that I worry about a seventeen-year-old soprano singing a high E in the first place, even if it is within the reaches of her range. So I thought better of it. Also, my mom didn't feel like going, so we went to dinner instead.

To get to my hometown and back, I took Amtrak, and had the wildest of all possible times on both trips--at least as far as train travel is concerned. On the way there, I sat a few seats away from a toothless and possibly drunk man who had apparently fainted in Union Station while waiting to board the train, and who spent a good deal of the hours-long trip attempting to engage those of us around him in awkward conversation and having a very loud and vulgar conversation with someone who I believe to be his . . . girlfriend? wife? I know it isn't polite to eavesdrop, but, honestly, even with my iPod in I couldn't help but overhear him as he shouted down the phone about how, yes, he loved her more than his previous what-have-you, and that's why he was going to get a tattoo with her name, and he was going to get the tattoo of his ex-wife's name removed as soon as he had the money.

And then on the train ride back, I contracted what might have been food-poisoning and vomited in the train car's restroom. There are some places where no one wants to worship at the porcelain altar, and the Amtrak train's restroom definitely makes the top three. The girl sitting next to me on the train was extremely nice about the fact that I repeatedly had to get up and go to the restroom, and after we finally arrived in Chicago, a very nice man saw that I was exhausted to the point that I was completely unable to lift my suitcase and did it for me, asking me if I was feeling all right, but none of this makes up for the fact that a pair of nice-looking Amish (or possibly Mennonite, given where I was coming from) gentlemen undoubtably heard me performing reverse peristalsis and probably assumed I was some drunken young English suffering the earthly consequences of the previous evening's sinful behaviors.

And I would most definitely be asleep by now, but while baking I forgot that I was also doing laundry, so the dry cycle began much, much later than I had intended and now I'm waiting until I hear it finish so the sneaky Polish dental students upstairs don't steal my socks or, whatever, I know they actually would never do that, but I like to know where my panties are. There's so much more to tell, such as why I am actually paying attention to when I go to bed--which is that I am employed and it's a Guy Fawkes Day miracle. I won't say just now what it is I'm doing, but needless to say, it involves phoning both Russia and Italy on a semi-regular basis and, no, I'm not in the Mob.

I think I'll just let (those of) you (who don't know me in Real Life) wonder about that for now.

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.

Promise I'm not dead; or, This is mostly a list

I rode the Red Line back north from rehearsal tonight before taking a cab the rest of the way home and had a nice chat with one of the Boheme chorus baritones--I was telling him about how I spend so much time alone, and how for a couple of weeks I was insanely productive, baking bread and cleaning all the things and basically being very housewifely for someone who is neither married nor planning to be, but at some point I was just bored with no one to share ideas with.

Anyway, here are a few unremarkable things that have happened to me since I last wrote anything here:

1. I have knitted two pairs of fingerless mittens and started on a third, which are pink. Pink.
2. As an experiment, I tried Greek yogurt with honey, because I wanted to know what all the fuss is about. And the verdict is: acceptable. It certainly breaks up the monotony of a diet composed primarily of granola and prunes. I am an old woman at 25.
3. I have gotten my roommate addicted to Doctor Who. I started her on the first episode of the fifth series, and she likes Matt Smith. The Weeping Angels episodes gave her a nightmare, which means she is human. In related news, I have cried watching the two most recent episodes of Doctor Who.
4. The Tigers clinched the AL Central Division. I bought two bottles of wine, because it is going to be a long postseason.
5. My mother visited me today--yesterday? Saturday--and took me grocery shopping, because I am, if not destitute, then at least underemployed. At the deli counter, I asked for provolone and the man working there asked me how I wanted it sliced. I was very confused. Um, with something sharp? Into slices? Then he clarified that he was referring to the thickness of the slices. I have never been asked that question at a deli before. It made my whole day feel surreal.
6. While my mother was here, we ate lunch at a diner in Boystown, where we were served by a very friendly waiter who showed me his tattoos (I was impressed) and gave me Halloween costume advice (I was grateful).
7. I spend a lot of time reading in the Starbucks near my apartment because it is one alternative to sitting in my apartment all day watching trashy reality TV. Recently, a barista's name and phone number were written on the side of my cup--I don't even know, I'm pretty sure it was a prank played on the owner of said cell phone. I sent a text to the number pretending to be an undercover CIA agent, because I am a Grown Up and that is what I do when I receive an unsolicited phone number. If anybody knows what "The mongoose has left the henhouse" means, there is probably something very wrong with you, because I made it up.
8. I have never seen a mongoose, or even a picture of one. I only know they exist because of a 1980s cartoon adaptation of Rikki-Tikki Tavi my family had on VHS when I was a kid.

That's all for now, I think. It's almost 4:30 a.m. now, so clearly I can't be bothered with being witty. I just wanted to put it out there: "I am alive! I am not dead! I hope life gets easier soon!"

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.