First Day

This is the first day of rehearsal for an awesome project, and I feel so lucky and happy and manic I hardly know how to behave like a grownup.  I want to dance around, I'm so thrilled.  I just had a wig fitting and the woman doing the wigs was gorgeously interesting - Canadian, warm, dog-loving, complimentary, clearly amazing at her job.  How cool is it to be able to walk into a first rehearsal and immediately know I'm working among some of the most expert people in my profession??  It feels like yes, it feels like being awake, it feels like going to a school you already like and can't wait to get to, but when you get there it turns out you are also going on a field trip somewhere awesome.

It feels better than having lots of money.  But it does feel like being rich.

These are the days I do it for - and this isn't even an award or an opening night or the sort of praise and adulation we actors often assume we are doing it for - this is the first day of WORK.  And I love this work. I'm going to walk into a room and figure out how to tell a story in the next two weeks, and then a bunch of people are going to come watch that story and be highly entertained.  They might learn something about themselves, they might just be cheered up in a cold snowy night to see a charming musical, I don't even care.  Most people will walk out happier than when they went in - it's that kind of play, and we're going to be really really good at it.

What else is there to do?  Yes, yes, there's tons of other things out there to do, all worthwhile and useful and often more momentarily necessary than telling a story.  But none of those things make me feel like this, this combination of excitement and happiness and deep interest.

So, you can probably tell I drank some coffee.  But even if I hadn't, this is an amazing, fantastic, Christmas miracle of a day.  Thanks, universe.  It feels really great to win this one.

Now let me finish reading the script....