A Reading...

I had to give a 'Reading' of my thesis project for my teachers and classmates yesterday. The purpose of a Reading is to prove to the Thesis Committee that you are ready to go with your performance, scheduled a month after the Reading. All the music had to be memorized and the scenes as close to performance level as possible. What a grueling, nerve-wracking process this has been. Who knew that a biography could be so difficult? When you're trying to put someone's life onstage, the dramatic element is king. You can't just give an expose of the person's life in monologues, you have to show it, so the audience will care about your subject. This means conjuring scenes that 'might have been.' And then, how do you cover the life of someone who has always been associated with a bigger name, George Gershwin? And how do you draw out their identity apart from this other person? These are the challenges I am faced with for the next month, until my performance, April 24 and 25.

going to the big apple

Last May, on my 30th birthday, in fact, my class got together at Starbucks on Newberry Street in Boston and talked about putting together a showcase to take to New York City this spring. We figured out a theatre to rent near Broadway, got ourselves a director and musical director, helped pick out each other's best songs and outfits and have invited just about 150 major casting directors and agents to attend. I leave for the city tomorrow! On Thursday, we will have a performance at 3pm and 6:30pm.

I contacted the family in New Jersey I used to nanny for and they are coming to the 3:00 performance. Then on Friday night, I am going to Jersey to see the younger girl, Margot, perform in her high school musical, Anything Goes. Its going to be a regular reunion!

New York, here I come!

Lenten Journey II

So far, in my forty days of personal preparation for the Easter Season, I have found that even in my "putting off," I have become focused on putting that thing off very well, and not very focused on Christ. I keep returning to His 40 days in the Wilderness. When was it, again, that it happened in His ministry? Right before the crucifixion? No, it was actually before His ministry began and directly after His baptism, when the dove descended on Him. Why did the Holy Spirit drive Him into the wilderness? I don't know. But there are a couple of parallels here to draw from the story of Noah, when another dove appeared, when another forty days of testing or flood waters arose.

I believe the flood represents the baptism or burial of sin, as thousands of rebellious people perished under the great waters. The ark saved the righteous inside. Was Jesus our ark in the desert of sin, taking our stains and burying them in the tumultuous waters of the wilderness? But even more intriguing is the dove. God sent a dove to Noah only after months of quieting the rebellion on earth. So the dove only appears when sin is eradicated*. Peace with God only comes when all my sin is buried. Was it the same dove that descended on Christ before he entered the wilderness and death to self? Announcing that Jesus would bury or wash all sin away and that once the sin is eradicated, there could be peace with God?

I believe these things are intentionally difficult and convoluted to piece together--Pearls of Wisdom that must be sought out. I don't have it figured out, but if Christ went into the wilderness to bury my sin, then these forty days of Lent should also be about me burying my sin. Because I must die with Christ--its not a free ride. The thing that I chose to "put off" is not a comfort that I can take or leave, but something very common, a commodity in fact, that can and often does become an idol in my life. Jesus had no idols and we are called to be like Him. So, I want to effectively, not nominally, put off these things that distract me from a blameless Christ and Holy God. Pray that I focus on Christ and not the thing I am "putting off."

"I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness and speak to her heart." Hosea 2:14

[*inspired in part, from The Legend to the Treasure by Gwen Shamblin]