Friday, January 22, 2010

Sidelined!

It's Sunday afternoon and I feel like I've been run over by a truck. In actuality, I have been run over by a set piece. A small one, but the impact to my achilles was enough to warrant an ice pack and a painkiller. I sat down backstage left to assess the damage and fought back tears while the stage manager asked if I wanted the swing to go on. I declined, but did decide to sit out part of the next scene, the one where I just sit on the dune as part of the set. The rest of the act went pretty well, hobbling a little here and there- but right about the end of act one I remembered what I had to do in act two. It entailed jumping around in heels on slippery surfaces, and I decided my ankle didn't need any of that.

In my experience, it's always been hard to call out of the show. I hate doing it. You feel like you're letting everyone down. Then you feel like some sort of a wimp for not being able to tough it out. That's old school. The show must go on. Then after all that guilt, you feel like everyone's judging you for calling out. I once had a stage manager say to me, "It's only your toe". At the tender age of 22 in my first Equity show, I took that to heart and tried to tough it out and prove something. Years later, the chronic pain and injury that resulted from that tiny toe injury taught me firstly that dancers need their toes. Secondly, your health comes first. You are the ONLY one who can take care of yourself and know what your limits are. That stage manager whose name I can't even recall gave me some very bad advice, but now I've learned: Unfortunately it was the hard way. Down the line, you are the one that has to live with injuries you don’t take care of.

So now I sit waiting to see how serious this thing is. At this point, I’ll just gage it by pain. If I stop limping by dinner time, I’ll do the second show. If not, then I wait it out. After all, one day out of the game is better than weeks on the sidelines.

Monday, January 4, 2010

Don’t Tell Paris I’ve fallen in love…

I’m lost in Amsterdam on my last day here. I’ve taken the ligne 2 tram to Dam Square, meandered about the cobblestoned streets lined with forward- tilting buildings and arrived at a bridge with a beautiful old church- one I’ve admired many times before. I know exactly which direction ‘home’ is- but ligne 2 is nowhere in sight. I have no idea how I’ve gotten here.



Ah wait, there’s a tram station, two blocks away. Exhale. Ha no…It’s the 4, 16, & 24. I weigh my options: It’s too far to walk. Like, 2 hours far. A cab? Taboo, absurdly expensive and nowhere in sight. I gathered my nerves and bolstered myself. Rogier, my Haarlem-bred boyfriend, had been trekking around New York & navigating the subway system like a pro after 2 days on his first visit. I could already hear him chastising me, as this was my 3rd trip here, my days totaling around the 30-day mark.

I saunter to the tram map; the 2 ligne simply could not be that far. The map is completely in Dutch, no kind “You are here” sign a la NYC’s maps to be seen. I meet eyes with a rosy cheeked woman, so characteristically Dutch. I make a point to first ask if we could proceed in English to which she replies, “Sure, I speak a little”. They always do that, and they’re always fluent. She aptly suggests I take one of the similar lines that all lead to the central area, hook up with the 2 there. Crisis averted.

On my journey back to Rog’s apartment, I get lost in the sights and sounds of this city I’m about to leave. I feel comfortable, familiar. I think about how hard it was in my first few visits here to ‘get it’ here; it perhaps being a true sense of the national identity. France, Germany, pretty obvious. In cartoons, there is always a caricature. There had to be more to the Dutch than the blonde braids, wooden shoes and windmills. I stare out the window to try and find a cafĂ© for my last decaf cappuccino in Europe as we pass a take out named “Mech: Make and Take”. I giggle to myself as I find that so Dutch. Equal parts kitschy, blunt, innovative and efficient. Funny enough, that is exactly how I’d describe the best parts of my boyfriend. He and his friends once told me as I implored about how they’d describe their national identity that there is a saying: “Just be normal- that’s weird enough.”


I think about this and try to assimilate it with what I have observed in my time here. …And I don’t really get it. To my eye, people here are easy going, considerate, sharp and open. Legalized taboos aside, there’s the fact that the International Court of Justice happens to be in the Hague; People here are relentlessly green: riding bicycles in the dead of a winter rainstorm with nary a frown, all the while looking effortlessly pulled together in a manner rivaling fashionistas in Paris; On mass transit, people pay no mind to delays, in sharp contrast to NY where people would be shouting obscenities into the air in protest. Not only did I find Amsterdam completely ethnically diverse, EVERYone is fluent in English and don’t give you funny looks when you don’t attempt (it’s scary to dare) to speak Dutch. People have accused them of being cold, but I find Dutch folk unharried. Perhaps because their level of health and retirement care is so comprehensive, it leaves the citizens unstressed and free to attend to other matters. Like teaching other nations how to build dikes and dams as they did in New Orleans after the floods. I don’t know…

So I suppose I have yet a lot to learn, perhaps there is a secret dark side to the culture I’m just not grasping. Yes, they used to want to take over the world. There are very few places in New York, for example, that aren’t named after something Dutch; But that evil empire stuff seems to have died off a long while ago. My time in this freethinking & easygoing place has been a respite from the bustling pace stateside. I can’t wait to come back and mark it as perhaps my favorite City in the EU. Don’t tell Paris.