Welp, after over a year of hemming and hawing and playing the piano, I finally bit the bullet and moved to the desert. Not that moving to the desert was the actual goal, but starting grad school was. Before I continue, I must apologize for not having posted anything in MONTHS. Sorry. I was busy living my life so I could have things to write about on here. It's cyclical, you see? Ta da.
Anywho. A lot has happened since we (myself and whoever you are) have corresponded. A whole entire summer has happened, in fact. I'll give you the sparknotes version to catch you up. I music directed the musical "Footloose" for a theater company in the Twin Cities and it was a total blast. The cast was obscenely talented and the rest of the production team was a dream to work with. My favorite of pretty much any show I'm involved with is watching the transformation from auditions to performance. To see the full arc of building a show is truly inspiring, especially when one appreciates the scope of putting up a theatrical event. SO MUCH has to happen to make everything work. Truly a collaborative experience. I'm also excited because I've been asked back to music direct "Cabaret" for the same company next summer! Its nice to know that I did my job well enough that they wanted me back again and its also a huge relief to know that I don't have to be looking for work as soon as I'm done with spring semester. When I wasn't in rehearsal or performances for Footloose, I was teaching. I logged about 450 hours of classroom and studio time and I found that it was a decent activity to fill up time. HA. Kidding. I don't think I often realize just how lucky I am, but I tried to take stock of that as often as I could this summer. It isn't often that a theater artist can make a living entirely from their art, but through a ton of luck and some help from my colleagues, I lined up enough gigs to both fill my time and earn enough dough to live on (which is saying a lot because I love to eat at nice restaurants and I can never have just one rum and coke).
Well, before I knew it, August rolled around and then it was suddenly time to go off to college. Again. I hadn't truly realized the severity of my decision until I got in my car and started driving across the country with my sister. Up until then, it was just a fancy plan in my head where I would bounce around in Phoenix for a while and maybe sing some stuff before promptly coming back to the life I know and love in the Twin Cities. You may be asking yourself whether or not I'm as ignorant of reality as it may seem, and I am here to tell you that yes, at times, I can successfully feign ignorance until it whirls around and whaps me in the face.
Thats what it did today. If you haven't come to this conclusion, I live in Arizona now and I just finished my second day in the Masters of Musical Theater program at Arizona State University. In about 21 months, I will be a master of musical theater. Whatever that may be….Anyway. If you have ever watched Sven Sundgaard on KARE11, or any other weather broadcast for that matter, you may have the common sense knowledge that Arizona is a desert. And deserts are mostly hot. So hot, in fact, that for the past week, the average high temperature has been 107 degrees. I know that people say "Oh, its a dry heat in Arizona, so it doesn't feel that bad" but I'm here to tell you that when you are sitting completely still but are still soaked with your own sweat, it doesn't feel like a pleasant dry heat.
Back to my point. There was a storm last night with wind and lightning and the whole bit, and this storm dropped the temperature to a chilly (note the sarcasm in my voice) 80 degrees. I was so delighted with my situation that I ventured out from my newly organized and cleaned studio apartment to the convenience store around the corner to purchase a Diet Coke. Perfect, right? I was so enamored with the low temperature that I decided that today (Friday) would be a lovely day to walk to campus for my classes and then walk home, thus being able to fully appreciate my new surroundings. So here I was, looking spiffy in a navy (never again) t-shirt, some cute white shorts and some canvas slip-ons. I was ready. My first event of the day was a hearing for the choral faculty at ASU. They wanted to hear me sing some shtuff and practice my solfege, which they now (I assume), regret. This hearing was at 9:50, so I decided I would have enough time to warm up when I got there if I started walking at about 8:20. The campus is about 2 miles from my house, and the music building is on the far side, so I would have to walk about 3 miles to get there. Totally doable. I figured if I walked at a brisk pace, it would take me about 40 minutes or so to get there. Welp, I quickly found out that it was back to the normal Arizona heat, so brisk wasn't an option unless I was in a car or wanted to pass out within minutes of departure. But that wasn't the killer. About a mile into this adventure, my feet started to really hurt. I looked down and quickly came to the conclusion that these canvas slip-ons might not have been the best choice for a 3 mile jaunt. (Keep in mind that I have to repeat this journey in order to get home.)
So about a mile and a half away from the School of Music, I stopped at a gas station to get some Band-Aids because I literally was hobbling along this main street like a baby deer who had just been born and then shot in one knee. It was awful. I put about four bandages on my right foot and five on my left. And that was BEFORE my dance class, but that's a whole different story. So I go through my day with my choral hearing, a really cool class on acting for musical theater singers that I think I'll love, and then a voice seminar for my voice teacher's studio. HOLY COW, the people here can SING. Its nice though, because at ASU, they don't crucify you for enjoying musical theater as opposed to opera, in fact, they encourage you to pursue your interests and areas of talent. Other unmentioned institutions of higher learning, take note.
Then, at about 1:30 it was time to walk home. UNTHINKABLE. I don't think I've ever felt nearer to death in my life. During the walk, I kept splashing myself in the face with my water bottle, but unfortunately I might as well have boiled the water before doing so because my trusty Nalgene could do nothing to keep out the scorching desert sun. It took me about an hour and 15 minutes to get home and the only thing I could do upon arrival was sprawl myself out on the cool tile and hope for a speedy death. Well, that didn't happen, so I made myself a turkey sandwich instead, which sufficed. I know now that I'm not allowed to spend extended periods of time ramming around outside in the desert during the summer. Common sense isn't really that common, ya know?
Tenderly (because my feet still really hurt),
Andy
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