new beginnings

Hello, blog! Long time no see.

I'm now well into the 3rd year of my NYC experience.

It's time to rethink the way I've been approaching things.

"My goal has always been to have adventures. THAT'S why I moved to New York." This is what I would tell people, and myself, when asked about my career-related goals, and why I haven't made any steps forward with performance-related things. While this is a true statement in itself (I've always been restless and had a burning curiousity about what else is out there in the world), I'm now starting to think this might have been a cop-out. Something I would say to make me feel better about not living up to my full potential.

Lately I've been exploring other options (I thought about training to become a holistic nutritionist. I even thought about being a teacher, which I've always had such a huge block against). The reality of living life as an actor finally hit me full force. Growing up in Stephenville, Texas, I had such an idealistic romantic view of the struggling artist. But actually moving here and experiencing it is a different story. You see extremely talented people not getting work. You see people still wearing a poodle skirt at the diner in their 40s. Then you start thinking about aging. And realize you'll have a complete lack of security for the majority of your life, most likely, even if you are successful some of the time. It's scary.

So I think these three stagnant years have been me stalling, procrastinating, not making once decision or another. Too scared to jump right in, but not ready to give up the dream just yet. (Disclaimer: I HAVE made leaps forward in other areas of my life. I'm proud to have discovered veganism, which has changed the way I look at everything. I'm a million times healthier. I've made truly wonderful close friends. And I've done my fair share of living the NYC lifestyle.)

After considering so many other directions my life could go, I've finally realized that I DON'T want to do anything else. I have so much love for musical theatre. I still want to be a performer. A struggling artist. I'm ready to full commit to a life of uncertainty.

It's time to move forward and make things happen.

happy summer!

It's Saturday night. I'm drinking Coors Light and eating pizza, and pasta, and a lot of stuff that's really horrible for me. By myself. It's the best night I've had in a long time.

I'm watching Just Friends, that not-so-wonderful Ryan Reynolds movie where he loses all that weight. But can we take this moment to talk about the genius that is Anna Faris? This girl deserves every good thing coming her way. I think she's impossibly funny. She plays the best dumb blonde ever. I can't WAIT for House Bunny to come out.

So, I'm a vegetarian now and it's hard as hell. I find myself eating a lot of pasta and french fries, which is going to make me gain weight. Obviously. Anyway, the reason I'm trying this is because of the book Skinny Bitch. It was a complete accident. That book tricks you. It's a vegan lifestyle book but you don't find that out until you're about halfway through it! Then it starts talking about animal cruelty and all that good stuff. Before the book I was always able to pretend I wasn't eating dead animal flesh, and now I can't. I know I always start projects and never finish them, but I really think I might stick with this for awhile. It's been a month so far. It's just really tough.

All my friends are moving up to New York in August. I'm so excited. I'm glad I was here for a year by myself first, though. I got to know new people without a crutch.

i hit the jackpot, man

I won a year supply of Crystal Light and 300 bucks in Laser surgery!

(??)

Wow. I never win anything. But what am I going to do with all that Crystal Light?

a year of firsts

I've been in New York for almost 8 months now. Since October. That's so odd to me! People are graduating. This is the first year I haven't been in a classroom.

It's about to be summer again...this time last year I was starting my Kentucky adventure. I wonder what this summer will be like. A part of me wants to pretend like I'm still in college and do nothing but party. But I'm an adult now and my career doesn't allow summer vacations. Especially when I don't make the most of the rest of the year.

Gosh, I keep learning new things about myself. A lot of them are negative. But that's okay, because I'm learning how to fix it all. For example: I am a total lazy ass procrastinator. Well, I guess I knew that already. But I'm learning how to keep a schedule and keep myself motivated. Really. But also, this is the first time I've been completely on my own. I relied on my parents way too much growing up. And I had a group of best friends. Then I went off to college, met Grace, and we quickly became inseparable. This the first time I don't really have anybody at all, and it's kind of freeing. I'm having to adjust, and it's a good thing.

Despite everything, I'm very content right now. Everything seems to be okay.

I'm doing Bikram yoga (aka "hot" yoga)...it's teaching me discipline. It's just about the hardest thing I've ever done in my life, so when you get out of class you feel like you can do ANYTHING! Everything else in life seems so simple in comparison, and lovely. And you also sweat so much that it gets all the toxins out.

And I want a dog! Like, really bad.

mikah the composer

A recent blog by one of my college friends brought back a memory that makes me smile.

When I was in 2nd grade, Andrea and I were going to start a band. It was going to be called "BFF: Best Friends Forever." I remember parts of our first song. "The grass is green, the sky is blue. You like me, and I like you." So simple! Is that really how simple life was back then? Or were we just trying to put together any words that rhyme? I'm guessing a little of both. :)

The rest of the lyrics were various phrases like..."the dolphins swim", "the birds fly", and my personal favorite: "the ladybugs crawl." I don't really remember the rest: maybe she does? But we would dance around on the Chamberlin school playground coming up with this "song." The song had a tune that wasn't very melodic and changed almost every day, but still, we just knew it was going to make us famous.

In a way, I'm still this idealistic and naive. I still have this [sometimes ridiculous] hope for all these many projects I start. I still think that someday in the future something miraculously wonderful is going to happen to me. The difference is that now things get so complicated. When I focus on the future I see a lot of obstacles and hoops to jump through. Sometimes it all gets so complicated that I just want to go back to skipping around on the playground singing nonsensical rhymes.

inspiration

Thanks to Nina and Grace, I am once again motivated!

Here's the deal. Nina and I have the same days off of work. We are going to start going to dance classes next week. 4 a week (2 jazz, 1 tap, 1 musical theatre). We are also going to go jogging in Central Park at least once a week, as weather permits. We are also going to start volunteering with New York Cares. We have our first orientation set up for Thursday. All of this is in my planner so it's official and I can't back out. I am going to be a wonderful busy person.

That's all.

ooh, reality tv

I went to my first audition recently. It was for MTV's reality TV show "Find the Next Elle Woods!" I straightened my hair and then curled it into big soft curls, and then wore this pink and black kinda leopard print wrap dress thing. I looked so damn cute. I showed up 3 hours before the call is supposed to start, and there was already this line of about 80 little sorority girls in front of me. Then...it started snowing. It snowed hard. And didn't let up for a single minute of those 3 hours I waited. It was actually kind of funny in a not so funny way. When we finally got in, we had to wait longer. I finally get in the actual audition room. There were about 15 people in the audience. Kate Shindle, the dance captain for Legally Blonde, Bernie Telsey, the writers, the director, MTV folk, the list goes on and on. Everyone was really really nice. I got on stage and proceeded to embarrass myself beyond belief. The accompanist screwed up my song to where it was unrecognizable. I think she was even switching time signatures; I don't know what the hell she was doing. My voice wasn't it's best because I was out in the snow for 3 hours. And these factors shook me to where I mixed up the words. It was the worst audition I've ever given in my entire life. And in front of all these important people. I wanted to die.

Oh, and I forgot. Right after my audition I had to rush over to 51st and Broadway, throw on a poodle skirt, and sing and wait tables until midnight. What a fantastic way to end the day!