I've been focusing on the positive, the good aspects of this life I now lead on the opposite side of the planet and the new work that accompanies it. This is my first "real" job. As an actor/teaching artist work was sporadic with prolific times of long hours and great progress going hand in hand with times of complete stasis. There is a consistency here that I am unaccustomed to, a daily routine, a rigidity that I often push against. The incredible director Anne Bogart writes that only within the container can we find freedom (while she speaks mainly of the actor/director and the necessity for setting choices into place when rehearsing, I find her words extend beyond the world of the theatre). This is my container right now, my boundaries are set from 7:30am to 3:30pm - but within the confines of classroom walls, attendence lists, ringing bells, and curriculum goals, I may have the opportunity to experience unparalleled freedom. My work here is to ignite imagination, to transform the space each class inhabits so that the "math room" may simultaneously be a courtroom, a palace, a bedroom, a kitchen, a forest, a ship, a club, a bar, a living room, a rocket to the moon... My own imagination thrives in that liminal state, betwist and between reality and fantasy such that the line blurs between the two. I can only hope my passion is infectious, that some of these students walk away changed, with a greater perspective and a child-like sense of wonder when encountering the world. Perhaps these are grand aspirations. But, as Marianne Williamson says:

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous,
talented and fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?

So, who am I not to be? Who are you not to be?

Post Spring Break

I won't lie, say it isn't hard to leave behind everyone you love, the warmth of heart, the smell of home, the familiarity of those who love you for who you are, not what you do. The return is never gentle, the plane slammed down onto the Entebbe runway with unnatural force, wheels screaming, "Wake up! This is now! This is your life!" Jet lag kept me in a zombie state for the past few days, but slowly the coma confusing past and present is fading and this reality is coming into focus. It is not perfect. It is not ideal. But it is what is. For this moment I am a teacher. I'm breathing into the role: looking for the ways it might ignite my imagination, trying not to take anything too personally, and working with the mind that resists and reaches into the future. There is nothing simple about this work, each moment brings new challenges, new triumphs and new mistakes. The line is hard to draw, especially in terms of discipline. When does exuberant enthusiasm become hyperactive distraction? The choices are endless, some succeed and some fail. I'm learning. For now, I will rest in the present, here in the computer lab with the fan blowing and the birds chirping and the sky growing grey with storm clouds as I write to all of you.

The Play Is the Thing

ISU presents Romeo and Juliet

The hall was made for conferences at a reproductive health center with the most hideous curtains known to man - thick cream fabric with bold wavy patterns in navy and blood red, dizzying to the eye. I spun the space on its head so that we could use the balcony, making their platform our audience.
The stage was a configuration of wooden black risers, warped from years of rain and romping, splintered at the corners, hollow beneath such that even flip flops filled the room with elephant-like stomping sounds.
The costumes were jeans and t-shirts, Montagues in black and Capulets in white, some traditional Ugandan robes for the Friars, and an Ethiopian dress accompanied by a white eyelet parasol for the Nurse (played by boy of course).
The cast comprised of fourteen students from grades 8-12 of every nationality you can imagine: Congolese, Bangladeshi, Iraqi, British, Korena, Ugandan…
The transitions between scenes required the students to run around the entire building, mounting and descending stairs with the rapidity known only to teenage lungs and legs.
The students were brilliant: the intensity of their emotions heightened the language to such an extent that our little nothing of a play became the shot of adrenaline so needed at this school.
The student audiences giggled at the kissing and gasped at the fights, staring with wide eyes at the feat before them.
The parents were glowing.
The faculty and administration were slack-jawed.
“How did you do this in such a short amount of time?”
“You turned a sow’s ear into a purse!”
“Drama is back!”
The director of the school said he had never seen such amazing acting in any high school production.
I know this play backwards and forwards and yet they still moved me. When my lovely Romeo pronounced, “Is it even so?” after learning of Juliet’s death, tears welled up in my eyes.
After the final performance, the students hugged me and thanked me for being “the best director ever.” Seeing that I’ve never directed before in my life, nor even fully comprehend what it means to do so, I was and continue to be stunned.
And thus, a little triumph for Ms Eve was born.

Romeo and Juliet Rehearsal

rehearsal rehearsal rehearsal
Shakespeare in bite-size pieces
swallowed by young minds
slowly digested into truth

the clues are in the text
listen to each other
bring the language to life
voice body - body voice
put it in your own words
what if what if what if

a bare-bones production
the world slowly coming to life
a nascent form of brilliance
the spark of teenage stage kisses
lighting up the sky

Saturday Afternoon

Internet at home got too pricey to justify so here I find myself at school on a Saturday afternoon, sun blazing, gentle breeze pushing the swing-set like the ghost of a child. Feeling nostalgic today - a twinge of loneliness. The picnic bench where I sit is painted bright red, the red of grandma's kitchen table where she stacked the tins of brownies for Thanksgiving. I can hear the sound of the metal lids pop and smell the sweet chocolate wafting up from beneath the layers of wax paper. I can still see her hands, spotted, skin worn like your favorite set of sheets so thin you can almost see the invisible dreams gone by. I wonder what she would've thought of all this adventure. Everything here is strange: the giant leaves on the trees reminiscent of a Dr Seusse illustration, the argument in Luganda hovering in the air from the construction workers just beyond the parking lot, the brick red earth that sneaks into my apartment dusting the floor with the fine filth of Africa, the stench the reeks from the pores of poverty...
I could certainly use some company though the silence of empty classrooms is simply solace.

Performance Uganda Style

"O-Obama! O-O-Obama!"
we cheerleaders take the stage
red white and blue inspired
jumping like hot potatoes
the audience laughs and claps along to the rhythm of change
"Yes We Can" gospel roaring "Amen"
"America, America" harmonizing with contemporary African steps
real reactions taken to extreme in the body of a small white woman
with a big voice and a bigger heart
holding hope in the final moment
before blackouts and bows
the tension of the future hanging
delicate and thundering in the distance
so close we can all taste it
bittersweet

*National Dance Week Uganda performance at the National Theater (2/27-3/1) with Okulamba Dance-Theatre Company.

Where I'm At

Been a bit negligent in my revelations and recollections of life on this side of the Earth. So here's where I'm at:
- Traveled to the waterfalls of Mt Elgon on the 9th grade trip where we worked for a day in a rustic clinic with a patient intake of over 1000. Seeing that they only operate the clinic once every few weeks, they finally had to shut the doors after running out of medicine - can't quite shake the sound of the metal doors slamming people away like cattle.
- Still reckoning with the juxtaposition of dreams/hopes/expectations/what is/what could be.
- Lobbying for a black-box space so that drama might thrive at the school since I'm currently teaching in various classrooms around the campus (drama ain't drama when you teach it in the math room).
- Trying a new method of acceptance and nonattachment, as in, "I love your enthusiasm today..." rather than "Stop yelling and listen to each other..."
- Rehearsing for a dance/theatre piece to be performed this weekend at the National Theatre - it's about life after Obama (combination of contemporary dance, documentary theatre style monologues, and good old fashioned cheerleader exuberance).
- Engaging in collaborations both as an artist and teacher outside the school walls as I search for ways to integrate Uganda into both my experience and that of the students.
- Studying Butoh dance/theatre with a Japanese master visiting Uganda - learning to walk to the rhythm of the music inside and slowly disappear into no dance... no self.

So that's where I'm at: making friends, making meaning, making theatre, making progress, making mistakes, making choices, making chai, making it all up as I go along.
It's quite a ride this life... you never really know what you're signing on for - the reasons we use to justify decisions may in time prove meaningless, usurped by a truth too profound to envision. Who knows what will come of it all.