For those of you playing along at home. . .

June 14, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

For those of you playing along at home, below are a few
updates on things I have here written about:

The
caffeine-reduction experiment has been a near-fail since beginning the
temp job, but continues to remind me to feel guilty.

I realized this morning that the free bus I sometimes catch to BART can take me all the
way to the city, instead of transferring to BART (thank you to my school’s
student bus pass, making bus transit in the East Bay free).

I put
back up the series of my paintings that I’d taken down during Calling in
the One, at which time I’d realized that women
not looking at their lovers was something I wanted to move away from. I
put them back up when the okJew was potentially going to come over, and I
didn’t want a blank expanse of wall over my bed. I’m not sure if I’ll take it back down.

I have
not yet finished, but I have begun, the art project for my friend’s
wedding. It sits on my desk, accusing me.

I
bought cat food.

I graduated with a Master’s degree a month ago. And I was offered a weekend job at said pet food store. Generously offered (not the compensation), but no thank you. Not yet, at least.

I have
art that I need to make for the September art show my friend invited me to
join. I’m not sure what I’ll do, but it’s been backstroking through my
psyche for a month or so.

I must
follow-up with the boss at where I’m temping to ask her precisely what she
meant when she said she would be happy to give me “a recommendation” for
auction houses here and in the city (um, I meant NY city – I guess that habit still dies hard).

My dad
will be closing on the sale of my childhood NJ home in the next month or
so, and is planning to move with his fiancé to their new Florida home
toward the fall.

I am
eagerly awaiting June 20^th, when the results of the daily
sweepstakes I’ve been entering for a trip for two to Italy will be
announced. You may be the lucky winner.

My
writing style is influenced by who I’m reading currently.

At the
moment, I just finished Nora Ephron’s new book, and began a collection of
essays by David Foster Wallace, whom I’ve never read, but seen the
author’s name so many times on my BART rides that I thought to give him a
whirl. I’m not sure I will continue.

I will
be art modeling this Sunday for the artist who I first worked for, and two
of her friends. I’m not sure I will continue.

I have
9 new voicemails I haven’t checked.

I went
on the walk I’d planned to take on Tuesday evening yesterday evening, and
it was glorious. I ate what must have been a small, cherry-sized peach,
unless it was of course, a cherry, from a nearby tree which I jumped to
pluck from the low hanging branch. I’m not dead, so it was not poisonous.

As
soon as I get paid this cycle, I’m going to register for the summer acting
classes at A.C.T., and I can’t f’ing wait. I looked up all manner of
electronics yesterday that I could hypothetically use my more regular
income of the next 6 weeks to purchase, and yet, I realized that what I
really want are those lessons. And new shoes.

I’m
now working one-on-one with a woman who’s found recovery around negative
patterns of behavior with sex and men, and I’m infinitely looking forward
to freedom around some of this.

I’m
continuing to work with a woman one-on-one around financial recovery
stuff, and am looking forward to being “placed in a position of
neutrality” around money.

I love
Patsy.

I haven’t
yet played my bass with my friend with the drums up in Berkeley, and it
too stares at me, not gently weeping, but with silent mewling.

I
realized that most of the writers I’m reading right now have written as freelance
writers, and it occurs to me, that I might be able to do that, if I look
into it.

I
haven’t applied to any jobs since last week.

I used
my 3 lb weights yesterday after my walk for about 3 minutes. And began to dread the 3 hour posing/drawing session on Sunday.

Dr.
Palm Reader’s office wrote to ask after me, and so I looked up my
soon-to-end chiropractic benefits “in network,” so that I can get back to
that kind of thing, without breaking my bank, or participating in a
somewhat murky flirtatiousness.

This
is the end of my list.

adulthood · authenticity · band · compassion · courage · dance · discovery · letting go · life · maturity · music · performance · persistence · poetry · receiving · responsibility · self-care · singing · surrender

Pulling a Carmen: 2

May 5, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

When I began this blog-a-day back in November of last year,
my first post was called “Pulling a Carmen,” as I’d been reading and was encouraged by her own blog-a-day postings. In the time since, sometimes I
just find it hugely funny how parallel my path is to my fellow blogger and
friend.

For recent example:

I also just starting going back on to the internet dating
scene. In fact, I have a coffee date today with someone I met on JDate

I too have said fuck it, and asked out a dude yesterday.
Unfortunately, turns out he’s married, but it felt really good to do so.

Several of the books that are lining my desk and bedside
table are travel books about Europe, underlining my intention to take a real
freaking vacation some time this century.

And, I also rented a camera and video camera from the
school’s A/V department to begin taking pictures again.

Sometimes I feel awkward about our exceedingly similar
trajectories, as if I’m copying her, but the reality is that independently, we
come to these things, and then come here to write about them. It’s really
funny, and also somewhat comforting to know that there is someone who is
traveling a similar path toward “To thine own self be true.”

On that note, I went to see my friend’s band play in the city
last night, and then headed with my girlfriends to go out dancing in Oakland.
Prior to both these… we went to the Dharma Punx meditation – nothing says
spiritually fit like meditating for 40 minutes before downing coffee with an
add-shot. 😉

But to relate it to the ‘self be true’ part – each of these
are places where I want to feel more connection. I hadn’t been to see live
music in MUCH too long. It’s on my current list of “Serenity Moths” on my
refrigerator (a list of things that aren’t cataclysmic, but slowly and
subterraneaously eat away at my serenity and foundation). Yes, “Absence of live
music” is on there, and so should be “dancing.” I’m a white girl. I have no
ambition or goal to be anything but a mildly flailing Elaine Benice, but … i
love it. The absence of self, the absence of self criticism or posturing or
need to be anywhere or anything else. Lost in the music.

The band brought something else up for me. Like the
“dropping” of the whole acting bent at the beginning of this year, what I’ve dropped
more often than anything is the “being in a band” idea.

As you may know, I have 2 guitars, a bass, and a small USB plug
in keyboard. Each as dust-covered as the next. The bass amp sits as a monument
to abandoned dreams in my apartment.

Last night, watching my friend’s band, I remembered that this is
something I want to do. In fact, I’d emailed one of the guitarist’s wife about
6 or more months ago to talk to her about her own process of getting toward
singing in a band – embracing her inner teenage rock chick. If I had my … well, if I had my own back, I guess, I’d play
bass, and I’d sing. Talk about vulnerability.

This week, I stood practically naked in front of an audience
and spoke my poem into a microphone in a moderately full theater. That isn’t nearly as frightening to me as
standing in front of an audience, singing, or playing.

The truth is that for several years, I’ve been gathering information
about the whole bass playing thing. But, no, I haven’t been playing. A few
years ago, I asked a guy I knew for bass advice, and he sent me a long list of
places to start (which I didn’t pursue). About a year later, I contacted this other guy about bass
lessons (which I didn’t pursue). … And the guy I asked out yesterday is also a bass player. Apparently,
I have a thing.

Every few years, I’ll troll craigslist, and I’ll answer a
few ads for singers. I even recorded myself a little on my computer’s
Garageband to send as a sample. I got a “not a good fit, but thanks anyway” from one,
and no reply from another. And, hey, I don’t blame em. When I’m terrified, it
comes through. I don’t know. I’ve written here about it kind of frequently –
and dismissed it and been “embarrassed” by it just as often.

However, once again, the thing that occurred to me last night as I
watched my friend’s band was another case of “I want to do that” … followed by
“I can do that.” There is no one stopping me, obviously except for myself and
my fears, and that critic that says “Not good enough” and chops me off at the
knees before I start.

One thing I’m working on releasing at the moment, a pattern
and belief and behavior that is just not fucking serving me anymore, is my need
or habit to stay small.

When I was living in South Korea, my friend nicknamed me
“Ballsy Mollsy.” I had the absolute chutzpah and hubris to ask anyone anything,
go anywhere, and do pretty much whatever I felt like doing in the hedonistic
way most drunks do.

However, there is a quality of that Ballsy woman who still I am,
somewhere, and who I want to resurrect or reveal or uncover or let loose – or
even just let into the light a little tiny bit.

I find it’s happening in some ways. And I know to have
compassion for myself as I try to aim in this direction which has been a Siren
song for me (uh, no pun intended) for … oh, 15 years.

But compassion for slow progress, and acceptance of
stagnation are two different things. And I’d really like to move forward from
here.

So, for your reading pleasure, here’s a poem composed about
a year ago. Reading aloud is encouraged. As is recalling the line “So let it be written, so let it be done.” Cheers. m.

Band Practice

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acting · community · direction · friendship · performance · poetry · school · self-support · theater · work

"I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life"

May 2, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

When I was growing up, when my family went on long car
rides, my dad had
instituted a rule. My brother and I could only ask the question “Are we there
yet?” three times, combined. Not three for him, three for me. Not phrased
differently to bypass the rule. Three times. Are we there yet.

I’m sort of glad the Universe doesn’t have a rule like that,
although I suppose it sort of does. For the number of times that I’ve asked
what’s next, the answer remains as vague as the Magic 8 ball’s “Reply Hazy –
Ask Again Later.” Apparently 3 seconds later is not later enough, and you get,
“Cannot Predict Now.”

But, it’s sort of comforting in some ways I suppose. A friend
said to me recently that we don’t know what’s next because it reminds us we’re
not G-d. I also heard that G-d loves us just enough to not let us know what’ll happen next. The perpetual
“SURPRISE!” type Higher Power. But, really, I think that if I ever knew really
what was to happen next, I’d spend a lot of time manipulating to my way of
thinking – if I’m meant to go in direction A, then I’ll start to pack for that
direction, not knowing that perhaps I’m supposed to go to A, but with a byway
in L, Q, and H in order to learn what I need by the time I get to A.

I was out with a group of us school poet folk last night at
dinner after our performance poetry … performance. Which went highly well, I’d
say. Pretty full theater, no technical problems, and, me, in my makeshift
nudesuit – because really, when the else time would I have the opportunity to
do that??

So, we’re out at dinner, and the women who are finishing
their first year are asking about my experience there, if I took cross-courses
at Berkeley, if I’ll stay in the Bay Area, and what’s next. And they’re
just curious. I say that I really took school sort of as a walk – I looked into
taking a GTU cross-course, but didn’t. But, I took painting, and singing, and acting.
I mean, it is a liberal arts college
(though you may not guess that from the highly funded business school it now
hosts). I did take the school
experience as a bit of a walk. It wasn’t academically rigorous. I think I took
one class that had a lot of reading on theory and criticism. I took one that
had moderate reading like that. And the rest, well, they were pretty much,
write poetry, read poetry, discuss poetry. Period. It was sort of awesome.

I suppose I feel a little chagrined at not having taken more
advantage of the opportunity, but then on the other hand, I think I also took great
advantage in ways that weren’t as “rigorous.” I did just find out yesterday
that you could rent the most awesome a/v tech equipment for up to two days –
even lighting and high tech cameras and video cameras – so I’m a
little bummed I didn’t take advantage of that – cuz it sounds AWESOME. I guess
I do have a few days left! Maybe I’ll be a filmmaker for a few days, as I
continue to send out tendrils into the work world.

I have one more class to complete. I have a class time on
Thursday for Acting Fundamentals, and then our class performance next
Wednesday. It’s just a scene, each of us students paired with someone and doing
a scene assigned by the professor. But, I feel really comfortable there. I
forget. I mean, after that flurry of activity in December and January around
headshots and auditions and monologues, I let it all go to focus on school,
which was appropriate, but now that I have a little more breathing room, I hear
it. Like I hear the painting studio.

Stress and creativity aren’t quite compatible I suppose.
But, in any case, being on stage last night (though I wish I’d reread my piece
before I got onstage, as it was quite distracting to know I was/appeared
naked!), and practicing my scene with my class partner, I mean, I just feel like
I know this. There’s an incredible
amount to learn, but I know about blocking, and staging. I helped the two of us
create movement in the scene, to listen to the text and let it inform us. I
also tried to not be bossy 😉 as this was a joint effort. But I felt in my
element.

I have an invitation to have coffee with an acting friend of
mine – something that’s been pushed down the pages of the calendar like a
shuffle board disc, and I intend to ask my acting teacher to coffee for an
“informational interview” type conversation. But as I continue to look for
work, to find out where and how I’m supposed to earn, and embody the question “what can I give”
rather than “what can I get,” and let go
of the Am I There Yet, I can also take FULL advantage of what I have in front
of me – advocates, peers, and a wicked a/v department.

balance · performance · poetry · progress · self-care

Reframe.

April 16, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

In a stroke of inspiration, I have produced both
disappointment and excitement. Disappointment, as I’m not sure I’ll wear a nude
body suit for my Performance Poetry class final performance. Excitement, as I
think I know what my piece will be about.

As I’d mentioned, I needed to see if the whole brazen nude
body suit thing would be supported by the content of the work – why wear that
if you’re going to tell lyrical poems about cherry blossoms? This morning,
however, I believe I was struck with the inspiration paddle, and think I know
what my piece will be about.

Originally, it was to likely be about a woman’s relationship
with her body, how it waffles between ownership by self, and ownership by
others, including mainstream media, etc. But, I feel that I’ve covered a lot of
that for now in my thesis work, and although, sure, that’s an issue that’s
present or “up” in my life, as I began fleshing some of the new idea out in my
morning pages this morning, I think I’ve found something riper, funnier, more relatable,
and interesting. I’ll keep you posted.

I’ve started using a different morning pages notebook, as
I’d finished my last a few days ago. It’s thinner than the last, but much
larger pages, which equals much longer writing in the morning. (It’s also made
from post-recycled materials, so it’s not new growth trees being cut down so I
can write, I wonder what the Harry Potter
stars are up to now – which, yes, occurred this morning along with all the
else.)

I was a bit intimidated to be writing these 3 long hand
pages much longer – would I have enough to “fill” it? What more could I
possibly have to say. But I actually think this new length is just right for
me. It’s longer than the last, and is giving me the room to get further into
stuff before I wrap it up or end. Which is partly why I think my new idea for
my performance came about – there’s more room to work it out, and watch it
stumble across my page.

On another note. My friend left yesterday, and my little
space is my own again. Driving to the airport at 5am will a) make you
appreciate a rental car, and b) cause the skipping of my morning blog
yesterday, so please forgive. I was a bit pooped and outward energy depleted
from the trip.

It was very good practice, though, I believe. To wake up and
have a person there. To go to sleep and have a person there. Granted, on the
pull out couch, but still. I’ve been a solitary bird here in my apartment for a
long time, and having another human here … well, was interesting to notice how
I act and react.

Part of me is enormously proud that I got in most of my
morning practices, and I stayed within my spending plan for her trip, and
brought lots of snacks and meals with me so I didn’t have to eat out very much
at all. Part of me is very acutely aware of how other-centered I become in the
presence of someone a) so close to me, and b) who’s in my space almost 24/7.

But, the good news, is that I noticed it. And I began to do
my best to reign back in my codependency. I don’t need to complete your sentence. I don’t need to add in my two cents about your story with my own.
I don’t need to be thinking of
how to respond or what I’ll say next to keep the conversation interesting and
exciting.

It was hard, honestly, in the few times that I consciously
thought, I can let this thread lie. I don’t need to pick it up. It wasn’t that
I was being cold, or uncommunicative. But when there came moments when I
certainly had my opinion, or an alternate opinion, I didn’t have to voice it. I could let my friend state her opinion
or share her story without having to add in my own or contradict or augment
what had already been said.

Some moments, it felt to me like there was a huge, blatant
gap in the space when I was usually “supposed to” say something. And it felt
awkward and uncomfortable for a moment – within me. Surely, she didn’t realize
anything, and a new thread of conversation would be picked up immediately. But
I noticed. I noticed, basically, that I was holding my tongue.

Which, I suppose, leads me back toward my own center. I
don’t have to put out every idea or thought in my head. I can let myself rest
in the calm of a conversation, or someone else’s story. This isn’t a very
frequent habit of mine, usually. Although, I do tend toward the loquacious
side, with my friend from New Jersey, we’ve spent so many years as the other’s
half, it’s “natural” to want to just chitter chatter away. But, I realized it’s
exhausting.

She, again, was not asking me to contribute in a way that
was depleting. And it also comes back my former habit of accepting jobs I don’t
want, when they’re not asking me to give from my dregs. If I take care of my
center, notice that my focus is somewhere in between me and another person, me
and a job, and can bring it back to myself, and sit, sometimes in the
discomfort of not engaging in a behavior that leaves me feeling depleted, then I
get the chance to give from my best, and also, to simply rest in the
companionship of another person.

performance · poetry · progress · school

Of indeterminate weight

April 11, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

I met with my thesis advisor for my last meeting with her
before I hand it in to the school library to be bound and put on a shelf with
all the other theses that won’t be read 😉 No, but really, I see the light at
the end of the tunnel finally. It sort of looks like a disco ball, or
headlights – in other words, it doesn’t look normal. But I suppose none of this
is normal for me.

The general feedback I got from both my advisor and my
faculty reader were both rather generic. One said, This is indeed a poetry thesis
(great, it’s not an aardvark). The other said, It was actually interesting
(great, glad you didn’t drool sleep spittle on it). But, really, I didn’t get
much constructive feedback, which is a) a little relieving, and b) not very constructive.

For all the work and mental crises, a check mark, basically.
But, c’est la vie. I have a few things that are room for improvement to
edit/revise before she sees it again for the final sign-off before April 20^th.
Also, I have it out to two poetic friends of mine for their eagle eyes on it –
for, hopefully, some specific feedback.

But, for all it is now, it’s a bit anti-climactic. Which, is
better than drama I suppose.

Drama will come both literally and figuratively in the two
final performances I’ll have in May. The performance poetry piece I’ll write
(….???) and the acting scene. I met with the poetry teacher yesterday to talk
about performance persona vs. character. Theater vs. performance art. And it
was helpful. If only to confirm that the “amped up version of self” that I
consider performance art is actually what he also means. He clarified that it
doesn’t mean to do as he does and dress as a chicano in drag with a sombrero
and a dog collar. That’s his amplified
version of self – for me to do something like that would be … well, who knows,
maybe one day – but for today, something else.

I’m not sure what the work will be about. But I know how
I’ll dress. If you remember from the Performance Persona blog, I said that the
most authentic persona I could be right now was myself – well, I intend to wear
a nude body suit, only.

I’d had this thought way earlier in the semester. Something
about both the vulnerability and yet boldness of it appeals to me. With so much
work that I’ve been doing to get comfortable with my body, present in it, a
part of it – well, why not?

The only stipulations the school has, he told me, was no
full frontal nudity. And he said he’d never tell me to pull it back. So, now I
need material that will warrant that. Do I need to go that far? Is it sensationalism? Does it matter?

I wrote a few poems for performance yesterday, but they
don’t have quite enough meat to support the visual. But like a great pair of shoes – sometimes you build the outfit around them instead of the other way around — and so I will just have to build a performance around this visual, costume/non-costume.

I had the strangest dream that two friends insistently brought me over
to do my laundry at my ex’s, and I was reluctant, as his new girlfriend
might be there. She wasn’t there, but he was on the phone with her, and I felt all
awkward, but everyone else seemed to think this was fine.

Random side-note.

acting · authenticity · discovery · performance · poetry

Performance Persona

April 6, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

The first week in May, a few things will happen. On the
Tuesday, I will be performing some of my poetry with my creative writing class in an end-of-semester performance in the actual theater at school – for somewhere
between 3-7 minutes. And on the Wednesday, I will be performing a scene with a
partner for my acting class final performance, where people will be invited in to
come see us.

This reflects back to me something I sort of already know about myself and my passions – I have a
hankerin’ for perfomin.’ Some folks do; some don’t. – I do.

In my creative writing class, we’re supposed to, or invited
to, work on a “performance persona.” I’ve been marinating on this, and not to
use what’s apparently become my catch phrase – “Yeah, but…” – I have realized
that so much of the work I’m doing and have been leading up to is to drop the
persona.

Most of my life, I’ve walked with a persona on of some sort
– the shy girl, the drunk wild girl, the promiscuous girl, the “nice” one. I’d
like to come back to center for a moment. Or longer.

Basically, I think that my greatest performance persona will
actually be my authentic self – that seems to me, for myself, for now, to be
the bravest person I can show you on-stage. Now, of course, it is performance, so it’s a bit of an amplified version
of self, but it’s not obscured, which I think is how I’d been before.

So, I love the intention, and think it’ll be simply fun to
play with a persona, that’s, to me, what acting is about, not performance
poetry. In acting, I am someone else,
with a different history, mannerisms, inflection. I am shy or wild or
promiscuous or nice, and I call on those parts of me that understand that
experience, but it’s also acting.

An interesting distinction was made by my performance poetry
teacher on Tuesday between the two – he said that he likes to use the
microphone and the music stand still in his performances as opposed to without
it, as without it he thinks indicates theater, and with it indicates the
tradition of poetry and writing. I don’t know that I fully agree, but I
understand his point, and it was interesting to then ask myself what do I
consider the difference, if I’m using my own work?

What is performance poetry, and what is theater? Do I
consider them different if I’m speaking my own work? I actually think I don’t.
I think it’s, like I said, an amplified, perhaps more emphatic self, but I
don’t think it’s removed from the writerly tradition to not use pages and a stand. When I’ve performed…
there it is – I was intending to say “when I’ve performed my poetry in the
past,” and that’s what I consider it. I don’t really consider it “reading,”
unless, really, it’s reading.

Even when I stand with my papers in front of me, and a
podium and a mircophone at a poetry reading,
it’s still performance. This isn’t just “reading,” as I would read to you from
the phone book, or a text book. It’s enhanced, it’s intensified, it’s amped up
inflection and emphasis and meaning and pause. I want you to be moved to emotion.

Seems like theater to me.

Although, it’ll also be nice to let myself play with the
extremities of a performance persona, just to try it on and have fun with it (who doesn’t love a good wig) –
I still maintain that my boldest persona is just me, micced.

action · healing · joy · meditation · performance

BART: BY ALLAH, RISE THESPIAN!

January 15, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

Hahahahaha! Hahaha! Sorry, that was the acronym that
occurred to me when I was trying to figure out how to express “spiritual
experience on a urine-smelling trans-bay public train.” And, lol, I really like
it – it makes me laugh!

In any case, I will start toward the middle, and work my way
back to that.

I arrived at the audition for the musical theater company,
attempting to still my breathing into something less hyperventilatey. I
arrived, got the information sheet, and took a seat on a plastic chair in a
long white hallway with other hopefuls. If you’ve ever sat with a group of
aspiring musical theater folks, or watched Rachel on Glee, then you have some idea of the kind of energy that
is spit balling, pin balling, manic speed balling against the very narrow
walls.

Add to this the fact that at this particular audition, the
walls were very VERY thin. i.e. we,
hallway hopefuls, could hear every single note of the person auditioning as we
sat on our “Next!” chairs.

So, while sitting, I decided it would probably be good to
get my heart rate down from 76 Tromboning through my chest. You know that
really high heart-rate feeling, where you’re pretty sure everyone else can see
this thing pulsating through your clavicle? So, I began to meditate. Because it
was the only thing I knew that might calm me down. I’d looked at my music
again, but at this point, whatever was going to happen, would happen. I knew I
didn’t know the lyrics as well as I’d like, and I knew I hadn’t rehearsed as
much as I’d like, but, there was no
more, really, I could do at this point. I even tried to read a little from a
spiritual book I brought with me, but I wasn’t absorbing a thing. It was like water slipping off oil.

So, instead, I sat. And began to breathe. “Think of your
breath as a bridge between your inner world and the outer world. Notice where
your breath goes as it comes in and goes out. Don’t try to change it, just
notice. Is it deep, shallow, cool, warm?”

And I continually came back to this line of meditation
guideposts, because it would often be interrupted with comparisons. “That
person sounds really good. Why didn’t I choose a better song? Oh, they didn’t hit that note right. Eesh, are they
really going to hold that note out.” And this, began my heart-thumping all over again. Back to the breath.

Because that’s what a lot of the hallway energy is – am I
better or worse than you? Are you better or worse than me? How to I stack up?
How do I compare? How will I do?

And, believe me, a constant chatter of comparison against
anyone, “better” or “worse,” was enough to bring me out of any sense of
acceptance of que cera cera, whatever
will be will be.

To quote what I’ve heard many times, my job is only to do the
work and show up, and leave the results to G-d (Higher Power, Universe, … or
Invisible Sky Fairy, as my great friend likes to call the Power and Calm and
Connectedness we all have within us). So, however I do in that room is really
none of my fucking business. (It is my
business to prepare more, but, c’est la vie. What’s done is done.)

There comes a moment when I’m meditating – vaguely aware of the
people going in and out of the room, shuffling through their sheet music,
someone’s mom nervously helicoptering around her – when suddenly, and
surprisingly, it all goes numb. Suddenly, my heart rate has slowed to a lull,
my breathing to a calm almost still stream, and I begin to experience the tingles that I’ve come to associate with my HP. Perhaps you’ve experienced them
– I had them at that camp experience I told you about, and when I hear a
particularly moving piece of music, or when I hear a story of divine intervention,
and sometimes even at the end of one of those sappy rom-coms when everything
swells (uh, pun intended?) and joy radiates from the screen and sops right into
my core. – Those tingles.

Suddenly, sitting in this hallway, I am calm.

It’s hard to express the depth of that moment, but you will
perhaps identify with it, and also with the near-immediate return to the more
fervent breathing and heart-rate. But for a few seconds, my tromboning heart
was still. I was moved, and grateful, and surprised, and most of all,
reassured.

On my way into the city for the audition, I had to get
copies of my acting resume printed, and was in the copy shop. I was ahead of a
woman who offered me a stapler, and I said, Sure, as soon as I stop shaking! I
said I was heading to an audition and I was really nervous. She said that when
she was 16 (i.e. a long time ago), she was going on a clarinet audition, and
her teacher said to her, Imagine you are 74 years old, and how insignificant
this will seem to you then. And though there’s a part of me that feels that
auditioning for a musical for the first time since I was 17 is actually quite a
significant and really awesome thing, she’s also right. It’s one audition out
of many I believe I’ll have. Whether it’s this, musicals, theater as theater, or none of the above, I
don’t know. And I don’t much care.

What I do know is that sitting in that plastic chair, I
knew, bottomlessly, that this was a part of my path. Showing up, doing this
righteously scary thing, is beyond significant for me, and is helping to shape
the entire rest of my life.

Which, then, brings me to the BART moment. For those
uninitiated in Bay Area public transportation, BART actually stands for Bay
Area Rapid Transit, and is a train which crosses under the bay, connecting SF
to the East Bay. It is also a carpeted train system, which means it hangs onto
every loogie, urine, spill, and foot traffic odor and stain that marks it. It’s
not the place you want to bring a hot date. Nor, in fact, is it the place you’d
imagine having a spiritual experience. But, to get back to the point.

Sitting on BART, on my way into the city with my headshots,
and resumes, and sheet music, and palpating heart, I began to go inward here.
Where I went is somewhere I know – it is an open field, surrounded by a forest.
I discovered this place the first time I said it aloud to my therapist a few
years ago, “I feel like if I step out into the light, there’s a sniper waiting to take me out.” I have
felt, for a very long time, that if I step out into the sunlight, the stream of
life, my power, my gifts, my nudges, that I will be cut down, metaphorically
gunned down by the sniper(s) who stalk those trees. That as soon as I step foot
out of the shade and into the field, BAM!, dead.

Although we’ve, and I’ve, been doing much work to dismantle
this fear, it’s always been on my radar of “Don’t step too far into your own
life, Molly. Stay small, stay hidden, stay safe.” I am mostly clear on when and
how these ideas formed, and indeed, it had been important for me for a long
period of my life to stay small, hidden, silent, and therefore safe and
lovable. I am only lovable if I am small. If I get too big or loud, I will be
quashed down.

These beliefs are very old.

So, yesterday, on BART, I found myself in that forest and field. I
stood in the middle of the field, flanked by all of my teachers, guides, and
supporters. A troop, or a menagerie, or a coven, of strength. From this place,
I invited all of the snipers to come out of the forest. I told them that their
work was done, and they were no longer needed. That, as you can see, I have an
entire community of entities to help protect and guide me now, and that their job
is now obsolete.

I swept my mind’s eye through the forest to the right, and
invited the soldier there to come out. He came forward, and I thanked him for
his service, and let him know he could now leave. And he did, through a wooden
hatch door that appeared in the grassy ground before me and my team. Down he
went. I scanned through the woods from right to left, and invited all the
troops out, watched as they lowered their guns and slung them over their
backs, in a position of neutrality and peace. I thanked each one, and at one
point it felt like there were dozens, and they just all flitted down through
the hatch with my general blessing.

Finally, it seemed like there were no more snipers in the
forest. But, I went to take a look to ensure I’ve created an entirely peaceful
and unendingly safe place for myself. And, in fact, I found one last sniper. I walked into the forest, and a ways back, he was, lying on the
ground, resting against a tree, maybe with his camo hat pulled forward over his eyes. And I approached
him, and told him it was time to leave. He nudged up his hat, looked up at me,
and said, “Are you sure?” Are you sure you don’t need me anymore? Are you sure
it’s safe to go out into the fields? Are you sure that my work at protecting
you is done?

Yes. Yes, soldier, I am sure.

And so, we both walked out, tromping through the forest into
the sunlight of the field, and I held onto his arm, like an old friend, because
in essence, he was. And we feel kindly toward each other – even though yes,
he’s attempted to kill me, that was his only way of ensuring my safety.

We walked up to the hatch, and I saluted him, and he saluted me, and in real life on the BART train, I got a little emotional at it, at this
goodbye, and down he went, through the grassy hatch, which closed, and sprouted a flower, or perhaps flowers were laid upon it, like a memorial.

But. After this? You wanna know what I did? I went
CARTWHEELING through that forest!! I began to run and jump and sing and yell
and cartwheel all throughout that fucking forest. It was free. It was clear.
This was a safe place for me again. Or perhaps for the first time.

I was free.

Sure, perhaps it will take some getting used to, this
walking out into the sunshine, this taking the reins of my own life, this
“owning voice” thing. But, clearing out my psyche and my heart of obsolete
warriors feels like an incredible start. And after years of toeing the line,
stepping up to it and back away, don’t get too close, Perhaps now. Perhaps NOW,
I get to cross it, in cartwheels.

Amen.

adventure · community · cooking · joy · performance · self-care

Italian Hot and Sweet

January 14, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

First of all, thank you for the outpouring of love which
you’ve sent me over the last 24 hours. I am grateful for your love and care.

I took yesterday off from work at the suggestion of the
receptionist, whom I called to say I was running late and was dragging a bit as
my grandmother had passed away, and she asked, Why are you coming in? Stay
home. And I said, well, I have those projects I want to finish so maybe I don’t
have to come in next week, and I’ll be in as soon as possible.

After about another 10 minutes of semi-aimlessness, I called
back and said, you know what, I’m going to take your suggestion and not come in
today – I’ll be in on Monday. And, so I will. I do have one project, not to
finish, since it’s epic, but to show her how to do, to pass the torch, and once
I do that, complete that task, I will be done there. I say with a finality that
allows for change 😉 But, I am feeling so over it. Sure, lots of people feel
“over” their jobs, but I have the opportunity and the freedom to make a change,
and so, I will make it. Before I get too resentful, too late, and burn a bridge
I may need some day.

One of my options for alternative income will be approved or
denied on Sunday. I’m auditioning for the live modeling guild in the Bay Area,
and they pay well. Like I’ve said before, they also require “motorized
transportation,” but I’m not all too worried about that. I have a feeling
things are in the works around me and a car. First of all, because I reached
out for help around finding one, and second because I have the support system
of my financial folks to help me really piece together the amount I can spend –
although I haven’t sat down with them yet, I let two people know that I would
be reaching out to do so.

Today is my audition for a musical theater company, and true
to my Serenity Moth, I haven’t practiced whatsoever. I have the music for one
of the two songs I’ll sing, but am still not sure what my second one will be.
And, I wish I’d practiced. Duh.

It’s “funny.” I had done my numbers in December, and had
come to the conclusion that I actually didn’t need to work these few weeks before school started, but
greed and anxiety came in, and I took the two weeks at the temp job. “Funny” is
that last week I was stupidly sick, and worked one full day. That’s it.
Then, this week, with my increasing lateness to work, and then taking off
yesterday, I haven’t worked a full week anyway. It’s like the Universe saying, See, darling, sometimes things will end up the way they’re supposed to
anyway – and you would have been better off not fighting it.

Yesterday, I did meet up with a friend for tea, and we spoke
poetry, and school, and artistic integrity and honesty. And it was just nice to
sit in the middle of the day drinking a hot beverage with a beloved friend. I
wish I’d allowed myself the last two weeks to do that. But, c’est la vie.
Perhaps lesson learned.

Afterward, I took a walk up over the border between Oakland and
Piedmont (aka the rich section), and went up to my favorite tree swing. There
are a number of swings in the streets up there, hanging from the trees closest
to the sidewalk and street, and although when I first began to sit on them last
year, I felt self-conscious, like these were someone else’s and I shouldn’t be
on them – I’ve gotten over it 😉 And I sat for a while on my favorite swing,
swinging intermittently and letting myself oscillate back to center – which
sort of feels like a metaphor for yesterday.

The later afternoon I spent on my couch in the dwindling
sunshine reading Eat Pray Love, a book
I’ve read before, and which seemed exactly the book I felt like reading. And
perhaps influenced by the first section when the author is in Italy, and
influenced by her self questioning (What would you, self, like to do?), in the evening, I asked myself
what I wanted to eat. Nothing on
the commercial strip seemed like what I wanted, so I decided to go to the
grocery market, and just see what appealed and cook something. I had a vague
idea about a pasta dish I’ve made before (also likely influenced by the “food porn”
section of the book) but they didn’t have fresh basil (it’s not at all
basil season at the moment), so I started to pick up random vegetables that
spoke to me.

This blog perhaps is longer than I intended, but a long time
ago in a galaxy far away, I was a 19 year old suburban college student in the
summer between sophomore and junior year, and I was blazingly in love with an
Italian-American. Blazingly – burn hot, burn quick. He, of the red growling IROC
camaro, yes, really, and against-stereotype dredlocks, was a chef. (Well, at the
moment, he worked at a pizza shop, but…)

One evening, he and I were in the kitchen of my house and he
decided to cook up dinner. He began to do the most amazing thing. Something I
had never ever seen before. He started to randomly take items, vegetables, meat, out
of the refrigerator and prepare them for the pot. How do you know what to
put in?? I squealed. Without a
recipe??

I was shocked. I had never seen someone cook in this way
before – without a recipe. He replied, I just know what I like, so I throw it in.

It was so novel. It perhaps sounds ridiculous to you, but at
that moment, my entire world of cooking and food was cracked wide open – and
beyond that, my ideas of rules, freedom, joy, frivolity, experimentation were
cracked open as well. It was a pinnacle moment for me. And each time I just
begin to “throw stuff in,” I still get a thrill of adventure.

So, when, yesterday, I was in the grocery store, and had to
abandon my very specific basil recipe, I found myself creating something
entirely new. Would it work? Who cares – I want to try. So, with a basket
filled with locally-made pasta, sun-dried tomatoes, capers, Italian sausage –
hot and sweet, a log of mozzarella, stalks of asparagus-thin broccoli, and a few sweet red peppers,
I headed home to the healing power of food, creation, adventure, and self-care.

P.S. it was marvelous! – but next time, ix-nay on the
capers 😉

dating · fun · integrity · Jewish · performance · responsibility · self-care

Bless It or Block It

January 3, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

How many things can one person wholly commit to?

I went on a first date yesterday via a set-up. It was
really fun. We got along great, and had a nice time. And so, now all the
‘What-if’s pop into my brain. Or, the questions, doubts. He’s not Jewish. Is
that a Deal-breaker – I’ve never yet decided. He lives an hour&a half away. I don’t
have a car – I’ve done that “medium-distance” relationship before. It looks
like – or it did look like – attempting to shove all the things you would be able
to do throughout a week into the weekend. Get all the fun and funny and
adventure and rest and sexy time all in the 48 or so hours you have together.
It was a lot of pressure to only be “happy”, and sort of exhausting. Plus, at the time, I also had
a car.

But, mostly what’s been on my mind since yesterday (besides
the obvious knowledge that I actually don’t have to do anything right now, as I haven’t been asked out for a 2^nd
date yet, so … slow the crazy train). … But, How many things can one person … or how many fledgling things can one person commit to?

By this, I am considering my new-found and very fledgling
commitment to myself and my dreams. It’s ironic(?) that after going through the
book Calling in The One, which helped to
push me into the direction of performance, stage, music, following my dreams
basically, that now, here I am faced with a potential opportunity for romance,
and I’m hesitant. Is there enough of me to go around?

The next few weekends look like this: women’s new year’s
retreat in Napa, audition, audition, audition. Yes. Three auditions in the two
weekends following the retreat. And then there’s the rehearsal that will begin
for The Vagina Monologues, which I’m in
at school at the end of February.

So, … hence, “bless it or block it.” Were this gentleman
Jewish, living in SF or Oakland, were I a private transportation owning female,
would I, do I want a relationship right now? After doing all that “work” to
make myself available for a relationship, have I simply cleared the space for a
relationship with myself? Which, don’t get me wrong, is incredible. I’m
entirely thrilled and proud of myself for heading, however haltingly, in the
direction of something which incites joy in me just thinking about it. But, is
there enough left over? Do I want there to be?

These are the questions that arise after one date! But, it’s
not him, or the date – it’s me – what am
I available for? Beginning to take the most delightful and frightening and nail
biting steps in the direction of my heart’s desires for myself is a lot of
work. It is a commitment. And
when I began CITO, actually when
I read the preview pages on Amazon before purchasing this dubiously titled book, I knew as soon as I read “If we’re finding
an absence of a supportive, nurturing, committed relationship in our lives, we
have to ask ourselves where are we not these things to ourselves?”, I knew then
immediately where I wasn’t committed to myself, in this area of my “silly”
nudges, dreams, aspirations, desires.

So, now here I am. Becoming more fully committed to myself
and watching this tree bear the fruit. The fruit is joy, not the job, the part,
the gig, it’s the joy of watching myself head there. It’s entirely new and rad
and incredible to begin to remove the roadblocks I’ve arbitrarily placed in my
own path. (I can’t be on stage because I’m too tall; I can’t play open mics
because I can’t play guitar well enough.)

I’m willing to remain open at this moment to whatever
happens next. Maybe we’ll be friends. Maybe he won’t even contact me again.
Maybe he’ll ask me out and I’ll say yes. But, none of that is happening at this
very moment. What is happening now is that I need to get ready for work at my
SF temp gig, and I have some lovely Little Star Pizza leftover to take for
lunch.

That, and it’s time to print some more headshots. 😉

action · courage · dating · performance · singing

Once More, With Feeling*

January 1, 2012 Molly Daniels HayesLeave a comment

The sun is officially moving in a higher arc around the
building which shadows it, making for more hours of sunlit sofa warming and
fewer minutes of chilly “come out come out wherever you are.”

I actually hurt my back crawling into bed yesterday –er, this
morning. it’s true. something went crunch. or perhaps crack. i think it was the
final sprint in high heels up the bernal heights’ hill a few minutes before
midnight. the *clink clonk* one hears as a woman approaches in heels is also
the sound of her spinal vertebrae collapsing ;P

That said, it was a pretty wonderful evening. friends,
laughter, small talk, awkwardness, zipcar, east bay, sf, fireworks, dancing,
redbull, hilarious mystery science theater 3000 fireworks commentary, old friends, new
friends, a candle-lit lantern floating generously up the hill with new year’s
wishes alight upon it.

I do look forward to getting back to putting this blog up
earlier in the morning. It’s been delayed this week because of sickness … and
today because of new years’ revelry recuperation.

Those of you who click here through my facebook may already
have seen, but I had an early morning dream last night/this morning, which,
though odd, I also count as a portend of things to come. Well, some things.

I dreamt that actor paul giamatti with laryngitis
offered me to play a gig on Thursday, January 17^th at the Loriah
Room on Geary and/or Market and 8^th. We can pull some of this apart on a
number of counts: a) I watched a dvd with Paul Giamatti in it on Friday; b) my
school friend’s girlfriend’s name is Mariah; c) i’ve been contemplating “gigs”
lately.

To address b, Mariah’s name is likely on my mind because I’m
going on a date tomorrow. My friend’s girlfriend (Mariah)’s college friend’s
husband’s best friend… asked me out. Yes, we call that degrees of separation
for sure. Basically, it’s two couples in between the two of us. Apparently, he
came up to visit over Thanksgiving, and my school friend thought we might be
good together, so I told her sure, give him my info. Last week, he emailed me,
and we’re meeting up for coffee and possibly lunch tomorrow. So, yes, her name
has been on my mind in reference to this set-up. And yes, I’m excited, and no I
also have no clue what this guy looks like either! Lol.

Unlike the disastrous blind date of a month or two ago,
however, this one comes with good references! 😉 So, we’ll see. Coffee, not china
patterns. And I enjoy the practice.

As to “c”, I was taking a class last year in which for the
end of the year project, we each had the opportunity to do a little “open mic”
action if we wanted. Some spoke poetry, or read from their personal manifestos.
I sang.

I sang with accompaniment from a classmate, Ivan, who I
found out that day is a really wonderful guitarist. I was going to play the
chords myself as I sang, but I’m not that great a guitarist, and asked him if
he’d play. He picked up the tabs right then, and within a half hour, we were
ready to go “on stage.” It was in the Dean of Student’s house on campus, and
there were about 50 or so people in attendance, mostly school mates, people’s
families. And I sang. He played. We ruled. 😛

Well, maybe we didn’t *rule* but actually, we were pretty
good. And Ivan has been popping up in my mindbrain over the last week or so as
someone to contact to maybe begin doing little open mics with around town.

See, I’ve had this belief that I can’t really do music because I can’t play any instruments well. I can
sort of plunk out some very basic guitar chords, and I often do, alone in my
apartment. I can also plunk out some semi-nonsense on my bass guitar, which I
sometimes do, alone in my apartment. And, finally, I can sort of plunk out some
chords on a piano, which I sometimes do alone in my apartment on a USB plug-in
keyboard, on any piano I may pass in my travels, or alone at the piano in the chapel at
school. There’s a sign on that piano which says for any music student looking to practice, go to the Music Department; for anyone looking for spiritual enrichment and outlet, play on, sister. I’ve been known to sit there for several half hours on end to unload
whatever is happening in my brain. And, sometimes then, I sing too.

Piano was always my brother’s forte. He was the musician, I
was perhaps the singer, perhaps the silent writer. He’s actually quite good,
self-taught, and I admire his skill. He’s been playing our grandfather’s piano
ever since it came to our house when my brother was 8 and I was 11. The most
I’d tend to play then was one or the other part of Heart & Soul. And he and
I still play it for old time’s sake. But, sitting alone in the circular stone
chapel at school, I find the songs that want to be played. And I am moved, relieved, happy.

Alone in my car, when I had one, I’d invent all kinds of
songs and lyrics. Which would flit out of my head as soon as my seatbelt
unfastened. The thing for me about music, about singing, and apparently about
piano, is that I get to find out what mood I’m in. That may sound strange, but
it sort of puts me in touch with a non-verbal mood ring or divining rod. The
tone will be major or minor; slow and dirge-like; upbeat and syncopated. How am
I feeling today? I’ll open my throat and find out. I’ll place my fingertips
against the cool ivory and show you.

So, here we are, back to performance. As, if you may have
gathered, all of the above dabblings into music happen alone. This morning, then, after my very unusual dream, I
was nudged again. And I emailed Ivan to ask if he’d be interested in
collaborating on some very low-key, no pressure, key word fun openmics.
This way, I don’t have to be Jimi Hendrix to get out there. I don’t have to be
Van Halen, or Slash, or Stevie Ray Vaughn. I can be Molly, tentative soul and
creative, with a voice and a melody that will tell me where I want to be led.

*shout out to KatieB with reference to the Buffy The Vampire Slayer’s musical episode. if you haven’t seen it, it’s worth it. 😉