play – The View from a Drawbridge

A Heartwarming Holiday Play

Mr. Dickens and His Carol

‘Twas a dark and stormy night.

Seriously. ‘Twas. Would I lie to you?

Big, spongy globs of snow were flying at us sideways, and hitting our coats with a splash. As this weird snow hit the ground, it immediately intermingled with the blanket of previously accumulated powdery snow, resulting in a mélange of wet, muddy, slippery slush pies. The winter wonderland of the morning was quickly turning into an evening winter wasteland.

Our feet made squelching noises as we walked. We were drenched through and through. And it was cold and raw in the way it can only be in the Pacific Northwest. I could feel it in the very marrow of my bones. No sane person would be out in this crap. Oh, but we had theater tickets.

On a night like that, I’d much rather be snuggled up with my dog in front of a warm fire, clad in flannel pajamas and bunny slippers (me, not the dog or the fire) and wrapped in a fuzzy blanket (both me and the dog, but definitely not the fire). It is the kind of weather that calls out for one to stay home, engrossed in a good book. There are very few things that would make me shed those jammies and venture out into a slushy hellscape.

I will admit that I have been known to run down the street and pick up some pho on a night light that. It’s the ultimate comfort food. But then I’d run back home to enjoy it before the fire, with the dog and the bunny slippers. The only other thing I can think of that would make me face soggy misery, short of an urgent need for an emergency room, is a play.

Plays, when done well, are magical things. They allow you to get all cozy in your seat and be transported to another world. You don’t even need bunny slippers. You just need some imagination.

A wonderful play can feel all the more decadent when you know that the weather outside is frightful. You are one of an exclusive group of people who get to leave that place where one uses the words “trudge” and “galoshes”, and instead sit back, warm and dry, while passively observing a marvelous adventure. Sign me up.

The play in question on this night was Mr. Dickens and His Carol, based on the book of the same name by Samantha Silva. It’s a fictionalized literary cloak draped over a non-fiction skeleton of Charles Dickens‘ true circumstances as he wrote A Christmas Carol.

At the time, Dickens was partway through his latest serial novel, Martin Chuzzlewit, and it was turning out to be a shocking failure after his huge success with The Pickwick Papers, Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby, and The Old Curiosity Shop. This was extremely bad news as he was already under a great deal of financial pressure.

His wife just had the fifth of their ten children, and there were a whole host of people counting on him for their livings as well, including agents, publishers, newspapermen, and household staff, in addition to a father who was so financially irresponsible that growing up, Dickens was able to see for himself what life was like for a patriarch in a debtor’s prison.

Based on that information, Samantha Silva weaved a story about what it must have been like for the author to desperately write A Christmas Carol simply to keep his financial head above water. She turned Dickens into a Scrooge himself, bitter at all the hangers on who were intent on draining him of all his money. She allows Dickens to transform in the end, just like Scrooge did, and that is what inspires him to write A Christmas Carol as we know and love it today. God bless us, every one.

This preview performance of the world premier of the play took place in Seattle Rep’s Bagley Wright Theater. We had never been to this venue. It felt intimate. It gave me the same kind of butterflies I feel when I burrow deep into the stacks of a dusty old library filled with mahogany and possibilities. And the play would soon follow suit with its own inner flutter of butterflies.

The director announced that this was a preview performance to work out the kinks, but I saw no kinks whatsoever. Not only were the actors amazing, but the costume and set design were superb as well. I love how the actors seamlessly moved the furniture on and off the stage as the play was going on. They also provided the sound effects from just off stage.

The stage itself had a rotating floor, which allowed elements of the set to be used for different purposes as they were turned to different angles. I’m impressed when actors remember their lines and move and emote at the same time, so it’s a thousand times more impressive when they do all of that along with walking on a moving floor, keeping time with the other characters, and always managing to orient themselves to the audience, along with keeping track of what furniture needs to go where for any given scene.

That the cast and crew managed to pull all that off without a hitch was quite a feat. In the end, we were treated to a deliciously deep dive into Victorian London, with all its struggles and triumphs. And I’m pleased to say there was no slush involved.

The good news is that you can still get tickets to see this play as it will be here in Seattle until December 23^rd. I hope it does, indeed, catch on and travel the world. I can imagine it becoming a delightful Christmas tradition. It was well worth a slog through the winter wickedness of the streets of Seattle to get there. For a delightful 40 second taste of this play that will leave you wanting more, check out this YouTube video.

I’ll leave you with a few photos I took while the actors were off stage. Even without people, it looks like a wonderful place, well worth exploring, doesn’t it? I highly recommend that you do so.

I’m no Dickens, but I wrote a book, too, and you can own it! How cool is that? http://amzn.to/2mlPVh5

Do Animals Have a Sense of Humor?

I cannot imagine going through life without being able to laugh.

The other day I was lying in bed, giggling helplessly at the memory of something funny my husband had said hours earlier. It still makes me laugh. Giggling is the best feeling in the world. I looked at my dachshund, who was eyeing me curiously, and I thought about the fact that he doesn’t get to laugh. He’s really missing out.

Do dogs have a sense of humor? I’ve had a few that definitely showed subtle signs of it. One liked to run his cold wet nose down my spine at moments when I’d least expect it, causing me to screech. Another hopped up on the bed while I was taking a nap and sat on my face. And refused to move. That’s a heck of a way to wake up. I could picture both of those dogs laughing inwardly.

Primates can laugh in their own way. And now that we all have video capabilities on our phones, we are capturing more and more evidence that animals like to play. Even the grown ups. There’s a crow here on my drawbridge that enjoys riding the bridge up and down, and spinning on the weather vane. If animals can play, they have a sense of fun. If they have a sense of fun, a sense of humor must not be that far away.

I cannot imagine going through life without being able to laugh. I’d feel like something really significant was missing. It’s a quality of life thing.

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Hadestown and Why We Build the Wall

Walls don’t just keep people out. They keep us in. In fear.

A friend of mine sent me a link to a song called Why We Build the Wall, and it is so apropos that it sent chills up my spine. But the irony is that the singer/songwriter, Anaïs Mitchell, didn’t write it recently. In fact, she said, “This song is ten years old… Any resemblance of any contemporary political figures to the King of the Underworld is purely coincidental.”

She wrote the song to be included in a musical called Hadestown, and that play has gotten a bit of a revival of late. It will be playing Broadway in 2019, and they’ve announced a London run as well. If it ever tours this country and comes anywhere near Seattle, I definitely want to see it.

What I find most amusing about this song is that Trump supporters think it’s pro-wall, and that building a wall actually makes us free. So they tend to like the song, too. But in fact, if you listen to the lyrics closely, and actually know the background story of the play, you know that this is Hades attempt to distract the people of Hadestown. He wants to keep them busy, so he can maintain control. He gives them convenient sound bites to repeat until they believe what they’re doing is the right thing. Sound familiar?

Here are the lyrics, but I hope you’ll click on the link to the song above and actually hear it. Only then will you experience it fully, and hopefully realize that walls don’t just keep people out, they keep us in. In fear.

It makes me wonder why we’re being distracted. I mean, we all kind of know. But what don’t we know?

Why We Build the Wall by Anaïs Mitchell

HADES
Why do we build the wall?
My children, my children,
Why do we build the wall?

CERBERUS
Why do we build the wall?
We build the wall to keep us free.
That’s why we build the wall;
We build the wall to keep us free.

HADES
How does the wall keep us free?
My children, my children,
How does the wall keep us free?

CERBERUS
How does the wall keep us free?
The wall keeps out the enemy
And we build the wall to keep us free.
That’s why we build the wall;
We build the wall to keep us free.

HADES
Who do we call the enemy?
My children, my children,
Who do we call the enemy?

CERBERUS
Who do we call the enemy?
The enemy is poverty,
And the wall keeps out the enemy,
And we build the wall to keep us free.
That’s why we build the wall;
We build the wall to keep us free.

HADES
Because we have and they have not!
My children, my children,
Because they want what we have got!

CERBERUS
Because we have and they have not!
Because they want what we have got!
The enemy is poverty,
And the wall keeps out the enemy,
And we build the wall to keep us free.
That’s why we build the wall;
We build the wall to keep us free.

HADES
What do we have that they should want?
My children, my children,
What do we have that they should want?

CERBERUS
What do we have that they should want?
We have a wall to work upon!
We have work and they have none,
And our work is never done,
My children, my children,
And the war is never won.
The enemy is poverty,
And the wall keeps out the enemy,
And we build the wall to keep us free;
That’s why we build the wall.
We build the wall to keep us free.
We build the wall to keep us free.

Special thanks to M for inspiring this post!

hadestown

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Uni the Crow

I have a healthy respect for crows, especially since I was once stalked by one. They are highly intelligent creatures. They’re survivors. They’re not afraid to speak up. I kind of admire the fact that they show absolutely no remorse when they’re in a foul (fowl?) mood.

This past year I’ve been enjoying observing one crow in particular. I’ve named him Uni, because he likes to hang out with me while I’m working on University Bridge here in Seattle. The first time I saw him, he was chewing on the electrical wires that are attached to our wind gauge. I’m surprised he survived that, but it probably explains quite a bit about his mental state.

After that, he hopped up on the wind gauge itself and spun around and around and around. Eventually, he’d get dizzy, hop off for a bit until he got re-oriented, and then he’d do it again. A crow with a sense of fun. It made me smile.

Since then, I’ve noticed that he likes to ride the drawbridge up when I’m doing an opening. He’ll sit on one of the I-beams near the center of the span, and lean increasingly forward as the bridge rises. He seems rather proud of his sense of balance. He can’t quite make it for a full opening. Eventually he flies off, but I suspect he’ll figure it out one of these days.

Uni has also learned that when I blow the horn, an opening is about to commence. He squawks excitedly and gets into position for his ride. This is a crow that seems to really love life.

I enjoy his company quite a bit. You just never know when you’re going to make a friend. Sadly, I suspect I won’t be seeing as much of him in the next few months, as a pair of peregrine falcons is once again nesting beneath the bridge. Uni is smart enough to know it’s a good idea to keep a low profile for now.

Crow-head-from-Mangalore

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DO Be Silly

I was treating myself to a Chinese buffet the other day, because I had managed to make it through the holidays with my sanity intact. Any excuse will do. Any excuse at all.

I couldn’t help but overhear a conversation between a mother and her son. He looked to be about fourteen, and he was talking about the kind of things that 14-year-olds talk about. Drama at school, I think.

The mother was trying to talk sense into the kid, and at one point she said, “Don’t be silly.”

My first thought was, “Ah, that’s how it all starts…”

It’s true. At some point in life most of us seem to lose our ability to be silly. We stop jumping on the bed, making snow angels, and having water fights while washing the family car. We start worrying more and more about what other people will think. We place too high a price on our own dignity and reputation. We stop playing.

I think this is tragic. How can one feed one’s spirit without clowning around? How many years do we trim off our lives by depriving ourselves of laughter and joy?

I suppose it’s better that that mother said, “Don’t be silly,” as opposed to “Don’t be an idiot,” but still… I hope she takes a little time to be silly with her son. Because it shouldn’t be such a dying art.

silly

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Dog Humor

Do you ever get the feeling that your dog is laughing at you? I do. All too frequently.

Back when I still kept larger dogs, I had a Chow that liked to quietly sneak up behind me and let out one loud woof. It always made me jump out of my skin. When I would whirl around, he’d just be standing there, smirking at me.

My little dog Devo likes to play fetch with a twist. He’ll retrieve the ball, but stay just out of arm’s reach. He’ll then place the ball on the ground and back away a step or two. When I reach for the ball to throw it again, he’ll snatch it away and run a victory lap around the yard. Psych!

My dachshund, Quagmire, is quite the little clown. The other night I was trying to sleep but he kept fidgeting. After some time I decided to reach out in the dark and pat him on the head and tell him to settle down. That’s when I discovered he was trapped deep inside a pillow case and was wrestling with the pillow. I laughed so hard I gave up trying to sleep. (Another time my wake-up call was him sneezing decisively in my face. That makes for a harsh start to the day.)

I once had a dog that was a hound dog in every sense of the word. One time we were quietly standing in line at the vet’s office when he looked up at me, then gently peeled his lips away from his front teeth, and then reached out and nibbled the pantyhose of the woman in front of us. He pulled it, and then let it snap back into place without even causing a run, which I found fascinating. When she turned to us, he was gazing off in the middle distance, acting all innocent. I swear, if he could have whistled, he would have. All I could do was apologize.

My sheltie, Sugar, used to go in the back yard and howl whenever she heard a siren. For a while it broke my heart. I’d call her back inside and comfort her. Then one day I happened to be watching her out the kitchen window when an ambulance came by. She was howling, yes, but her tail was wagging and she was prancing around. She wasn’t crying. She was singing along!

The best dog I’ve ever had was an Australian Shepherd named Mocha. She was extremely intelligent and affectionate and very attuned to sound. She loved to dance to music, and she’d get very excited when you’d say particular words. Eventually I figured out that she loved any word with a hard k in it. Her favorite word was “infrastructure.” It still makes me giggle, thinking about how happy that word would make her.

So, when asked what qualities I look for in a dog, my first response will always be, “A sense of humor.” Most people are perplexed by this, but it makes perfect sense to me.

dog-using-laptop-computer

Flirting

I used to like to say that I couldn’t get through the day without at least one good flirtation. I’ve had to scale that back considerably in the past year, because now that I’ve moved to Seattle without knowing a soul, the vast majority of my human contact is with coworkers. Flirting with coworkers is a bear trap I absolutely refuse to step into.

But slowly, agonizingly slowly, I’m starting to meet people outside of the workplace. So the other day, I blew the dust off my flirty self and let her come out to play. What a rush. I was actually much more bold than I’ve ever been before. Making up for lost time? Dealing from a deck of frustration and boredom and loneliness? Nothing ventured, nothing gained? Probably some combination of all of the above.

Actually, ever since my recent epiphany about loneliness (which was yesterday’s blog entry), I haven’t really been feeling lonely at all. Maybe that has liberated me to flirt with impunity. If you don’t feel lonely when you flirt, you won’t be inhibited by fears of rejection. The flirt becomes the thing, rather than the other person’s reaction to that flirt. You can’t really go down in flames if you’re not that heavily invested.

So I just had fun being slightly wicked and playful. And I suspect the recipient of my attention was more than a little experienced with flirtation as well, because his response left me rather uncertain as to his thoughts on the subject. Positive, I think, but I’m not at all sure. That kind of makes it fun, too, because it means I might, or might not, have something to look forward to.

That makes me smile.

On Being Silly

From a recent conversation with a friend:

Me: “Why would anyone wash their hair with something that ends in ‘poo’?”

Her: “It’s a sham.”

Me: “I know, right? It’s not even real poo! It’s sham poo! If you’re going to do it, shouldn’t you go with the authentic stuff?”

Her: “Eeeew.”

I love conversations like this. Wordplay. Imagination. Humor.

Allowing yourself to be playful transports you to a different plane. For a brief, shining moment you get to remove yourself from the harsh realities of life and just have some fun. You also make someone else laugh, which is a delightful bonus. You can think back on the conversation during hard times and smile.

I’ve known people who couldn’t, refused to, or didn’t know how to be silly. I’ve always felt sorry for them. Silliness gives you opportunities to bond. Silliness makes for happy memories.

I was once washing a car with a guy and I squirted him with water. The way I was expecting it to go was that he’d chase me around the car, splash me with water, and a full on explosion of soap suds would ensue. We’d have created a memory. I’d be thinking of it right now and get a warm feeling about that person.

Instead, he froze, and looked at me with tears in his eyes. I apologized, and I never tried to be playful with him again. I felt bad, and I felt sad, but mostly I was hugely disappointed. Because I could see all the missed opportunities for happiness in our future. And I felt that loss acutely.

Growly Dreams

I enjoy watching my dogs dream. Their little paws run and they sometimes twitch and yip. I imagine they’re chasing squirrels. But tonight Devo was growling in his sleep. I called his name from across the room. I didn’t want to touch him in case he thought I was the adversary. (I’d like to keep intact the illusion that I’m in charge.) When he woke up he looked a little confused for a second.

Was he the aggressor in the dream, or was he being attacked? I hope it was the former. I hope he doesn’t have dog-shaped nightmares. I hope that he isn’t experiencing anxiety or stress that is expressing itself in his subconscious. God knows I’ve been under a lot of pressure lately, and I’m sure he senses it. But I want him to have sweet dreams. As shitty as my life sometimes is, I pride myself in giving my pets a happy existence. They didn’t ask to be here.

What are animal dreams like? Scientists are discovering that a wide variety of animals play, so they must get bored. But they seem to cope with boredom much better than we do. That implies that they have rich inner lives. If that’s the case, they have imaginations, so are their dreams as surreal as ours can sometimes be? And what would be surreal to an animal?

I know when I lived in Mexico, my dreams got very simplistic because I couldn’t express myself as fully in Spanish as I can in English. How do you express yourself without language? How do you see things when your color spectrum is different? If you’re capable of hearing a lot more, are your dreams more aural?

The one image that I can’t get out of my head is that of a sleeping whale. Some types slumber in the darkest depths, head downward. That must feel like being in a sensory deprivation tank. That has got to be the ultimate zen-like state.

Which begs the question: Do whales have wet dreams?

Can Johnny Come out and Play?

Parents don’t hear that plaintive question at their front doors very much anymore, because kids are too busy glued to their computer screens to go outside. I can’t remember the last time I saw a kid riding a bike or I had to slow down to drive right through the center of a stick ball game in the street. You never hear about baseballs crashing through plate glass windows anymore. These things annoyed me at the time, but now I miss them.

And even if you grew up in an era when you did get to ask that question quite a bit, you learned quickly that after the age of about 21, it becomes increasingly harder to get your friends to come out and play. The older you are, the more you become bogged down with responsibilities. “I can’t come out and play today because I have to earn a living.” “I can’t come out and play because then who will watch the kids?” “I’m just so tired. Maybe next week.”

Trust me people, if you die tomorrow, your last thought isn’t going to be, “Damn, I forgot to wash the dishes.” If you have regrets, they’ll be about the things you didn’t get around to doing with friends and family.

I’ve reached a point in my life where I want to play again, but there’s really no one to play with. No one fits my whacky schedule. Everyone is busy, broke, exhausted, content, lethargic, or overwhelmed. And that’s probably the loneliest paragraph I have ever written in my life.

[Image credit: quickmeme.com]