I feel different this school year.
I think there are a lot of reasons, but here are a few.
I don't like living in the dorms again very much. Going from a strong, loving community with so many activities to do at any time to the drab, lifeless Mountain Cluster in San Rafael is depressing. Also depressing is the fact that only like 10% of 2012s still have meal plans and that means I only have about 5 people to eat with on any given day. Half of the time I eat alone, which isn't terrible or embarrassing, but it is lonely. When I have eaten with people, it's been hilariously fun. Singing dirty rap songs as an elderly British aristocrat makes even the worst pasta bearable.
The BFA scares me. It's scary because I love it so much and it's such a challenge. I've never loved anything this hard. Mock Trial came fairly easy to me. Swim team was definitely not a love. This is like the combination of those two, plus passion. Do you understand why it's scary now? With swimming, I might have "cheated" a bit at practice in order to save some breath or not get as sore. I'd only really try at something I couldn't do if others were watching and I had to prove myself or "encourage encouragement." In the BFA, there are things I cannot physically do in comparison to the rest of the class, and it makes me fucking sad! For those of you who don't know, the core classes for the BFA are Voice, Movement, and Acting. Movement is the one I'm most referring to.
A normal day in Movement consists of:
1.) We always start the class with hugs. You hug every one of your classmates.
2.) Following Jeff. Jeff Mills is the teacher, a god like the rest of the faculty. He has us run after him in a single file line while he throws a ball to each of us and we have to throw it back, all the while still moving. We then walk on the balls of our feet, heels, outsides, insides, combinations of all, and then in lunges. Finally we get into a circle and do intense stretching and different kinds of Sun Salutations. For those of you not familiar with yoga, it's not as easy as it looks.
http://www.abc-of-yoga.com/yogapractice/sunsalutation.asp
We add in cat, cow, downward facing down, child's pose... a lot.
3.) We throw 3 balls around the circle, naming the person we are throwing them too. Takes a lot of concentration.
4.) We break out the tumbling mats and learn a variety of gymnastic-type moves. So far we've covered somersaults, forward rolls, shoulder rolls, backward rolls (so fucking hard) volleyball jumps, 360 degree twists, and correct cartwheels. With my arm still weak, he told me I don't have to do the cartwheels, but I'm afraid that it doesn't make me look good to stand back and watch.
5.) After this we do one of many things. Usually it's an exercise to teach a principle of space or dramatic tension. We might pose and then our partner has to fill in the negative space, or we might run toward our partner at full tilt from opposite ends of the room and meet in the middle as close to them as possible without touching or breaking eye contact.
6.) We finish the class with hugs.
When I'm in this class, I have the time of my life. But I can't shake the sadness I feel at not being able to do some things or do them well. I know there is always someone who can do things better than you, but I want to progress. I'm trying to loose weight, which I know will help with a lot of this, but in the mean time I'm having a lot of trouble keeping the faith in myself. If it weren't for my amazing classmates or Jeff's support, I would probably be crying in the bathroom after every class. I can't imagine loosing half of them by the end of the year. I can't imagine ever leaving them.
Voice with Michael Morgan is incredible. The man is a god. I was having trouble with a breathing exercise and he came up behind me, placed his hands on my neck, pulled it toward the sky and all of the sudden, I was breathing more accurately than ever.
Annie's acting class continues to amaze me. She is making me approach everything we do with a childlike sense of wonder, which is what every artist should have. I shocked myself with how deeply connected I got to a character in a scene in which my only lines were 'no' and my partner's lines were 'please'. That was only half my responsibility, as Andrew Fromer, my partner, was perfection. I got some amazing feedback and I felt like I would never question that this is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life ever again. I'll never forget the exercise we did with the egg.
This program is fantastic and I can't ever imagine leaving it. I'm working for myself. I'm challenging myself to grow in ways I've never thought possible. It's making me feel alive.
Dinner soon with Maggie. Chargers game starting in 15.
Something I learned from seeing Whip It yesterday with Emily: Just because you have a new family doesn't mean you throw the old one away.
That line really spoke to me.
-Big D
