Author: kathie

Tonight I went up to Theatre Row Studios to work with Mark Lonergan and Joel Jeske who work in a traditional status based vaudeville style. I liked it a lot. To an outsider the two different studios of people in comfortable clothing entering and exiting at the behest of a male in a folding chair probably looked almost identical. But, from my point of view Chris Bayes and Joel Jeske’s approach to clown are completely different.

My sense of the clown gym with Chris Bayes, was very much that of a drama professor and his students, which is to be expected since Chris Bayes teaches clowning in a number of different academic acting programs.

Mark Lonergan and Joel Jeske were also teaching and doing most of the talking, but their approach seemed more like peers taking their turn to show and tell other creators of physical theatre how they came up with their material and what works for them.  They talked about their work in Parallel Exit and how much talking was involved when the ensemble made up of men from different performing disciplines, dance, clown, musical comedy and music first started making new work together.

The clown looked at situation and decided to take the time to figure out all the different ways he could possibly approach it while the musical comedy guy said, Just tell me what you want me to do and I’ll give it to you.   Those two would have a difficulty making new work together unless they appreciated the value of each others approach.  Apparently they do since that company has been in existence for over ten years.

Walking to the train, Mark and I had a brief conversation about the RBBB Clown College and how it is missed.  When the clowns were offered contracts at the end of Clown College class they had a cohesive style.  Now that the clowns are hired individually their performance styles are all over the map.

When I got home, The Husband (who used to be a theatre director), was working on a presentation about, Agile, his favorite approach to software development.

I see similarities between the work of self-producing physical theatre companies and  the way an Agile software development team works.  Trust and respect are necessary between all the members of the team or the ensemble for successful communication and collaboration.  Conflict is to be expected as part of the creative work of building the team (or ensemble).  But, when each member comes to understand and willingly participate in the unwritten norms of behavior that define the identity of the team (or ensemble) that is how the stage is set so that amazing things can happen.

I went to a “clown gym” tonight. Afterwards, I felt like I’d been to a gym, the way I feel after a nice yoga or Pilates class.

It was touch and go for a while this morning. My Kid didn’t want to get out of bed and didn’t want to get dressed and didn’t want to eat breakfast and when we finally go to the Parade Grounds didn’t want to play. But, her teammate’s parent, Ad Agency Mommy, was right. She said that all the girls needed to do to get their heads into the game was run. And they did.

I’m grateful that this season my daughter was placed on an AYSO team that has 4 girls from her former elementary school. It will be good for them to touch base with each other each weekend since they each attend a different middle school, two in Manhattan and two in Brooklyn.  I don’t think there are more than five kids from my daughter’s 5th grade graduating class going to any middle school this year.  They are scattered all over the place.  I’m all for school choice and don’t think they should all go together to the same middle school–but none of them?  That’s just crazy.  They were blown all around the city like leaves from a tree in the turbulent windstorm called school choice.

On September 10, 2001, I took my 14-month old to the first session of a mommy and me toddler gymnastics class at the Circus Gym on the Upper West Side.

My daughter played on an AYSO soccer team for the first time when she was seven. This will be her fifth year playing soccer. It’s a very different game now that the girls are big.

My Kid just called me on her cell phone to tell me she was leaving the school with her friend making her way slowly to Girl Scouts with plans to stop at a store and buy a notebook “because I had to write my assignment on just a piece of paper!”.  I won’t see her till six o’clock. Ten years ago on September 9, 2011 one of her favorite things to do was hold a ball above her head like she was going to throw it. Then she would drop it behind her back and The Husband acted like he expected the ball and couldn’t find it. My baby would laugh and laugh.

Yeah, so last night and tonight part of me genuinely  thought “Hey, maybe I’ll get to go to see a clown festival show…  Yeah… Nah…

“I have some information I need to share with you.”  says my child using the language of the education professionals.

She hands me a multiple-page handout entitled:

 “Virtuous Expectations”

Let me just take a moment here to copy down a few of my favorite ways in which one can demonstrate an understanding of the “Expectations Definitions”:

Be Courageous.  Be Just.  Be Temperate.  Be Wise.

(Of course as the parent I support this language and these goals–but as someone who has gone through adolescence myself and who has since observed an assortment tweens and teens in public and private settings noticing how prone they are to groupthink, exaggeration, fits of screams and giggles and not only a lack of preparation but lack of comprehension of the very concept…)

Here goes:

– Show appreciation by clapping when appropriate.

– Keep hands, and feet, and objects to yourself.

– Use a soft voice.

– On field trips: No eating or drinking on the train.

– In the cafeteria: Focus on eating first; Talk only to those across and next to you; Eat your food only.

Cell Phone Expectations:  Use your cell phone only before ENTERING the building and after LEAVING the building.  Your cell pone is away and off for the duration of the school day.  Keep your cell phone to yourself.  Keep your cell phone in your locker or backpack all day.  Keep your cell phone turned off during the school day.  (The NYC schools that I know of have a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy regarding cell phones since so many of us parents who are starting to let our kids go places like school on their own really want and need our kids to be able to call us as soon as they get out of school, when they are about to go into the subway, and as soon as they come up out of the subway.)

Keep your hands and feet and objects to yourself.

Speak at an appropriate volume (no screaming, shouting, or yelling).

Leave school with necessary learning materials for homework.

(How many times does this say, “Keep your hands, feet, body and objects to yourself.”???)

 If you’re ever going to need to spell this out–you do need to SPELL IT OUT FOR 11, 12 and 13 year olds!:

Be aware and stay clear of doors.

Keep appropriate spacing.

Walk directly to destination.

Watch where you are going.

Walk in the restroom.

There are many many ways to say things like:  “Only eat at eating time in the eating place.”  &  “Keep your hands to yourself.” & “Talk at a normal volume.”

The school prohibits the use of electronics during the school day which includes but is not limited to: Cell Phones, IPods, Hand held video games and Cameras…

The time I spent at The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Clown College comes to mind.  In our daily morning meetings we were told:  “Do not juggle fire in the parking lot!”  “Do not juggle the produce at the grocery store!”  “Do not get your ears pierced during your time at Clown College as it will interfere with your ability to apply your makeup completely.”  ” Do not shave your head bald as you have already been fitted for a wig cap.”    “Wash your dishes every day or cockroaches will be attracted to your room and the lovely Venice Villas management may have grounds to evict you….”   and all kinds of things we should or should not do that had never even occurred to me.

I met my kid at her middle school after dismissal–outside the building…

She seems OK.

She wants to go home.  But, she wants to walk.  She doesn’t want to jump right on to a bus or a train.

We stopped at Aeropostale.  She chose one t-shirt to purchase.  She doesn’t seem to feel the need to purchase a whole new wardrobe and turn into a completely different person–which I, as a parent -without much to to on- take as a good sign.

She doesn’t want to stop at the diner.  She doesn’t want to talk to me.  A soda and chips from the deli will suffice.

At home she goes into her room.

Processing…???

I get a call from her “advisor” at the new school.  They have “advisory” at this new school.  The adult teacher person has been assigned 12 students to keep track of over the coming school year.  She called me to give me her cell phone number and e-mail address.  This is very encouraging.  I had an awful time in 6th grade and I graduated from elementary school at the end to 8th grade.  The building didn’t change.  The schedule didn’t change.  Nothing changed except for the fact that the 6th, 7th and 8th graders were all going through puberty…  All I can say is I”m glad my kid, and all the other kids in the building have been assigned specific grown-ups to talk to about whatever is going on before  anything has been identified as a “problem”.  Because there will be problems.  Bodies will change size and shape.  Boys will cease to be “the enemy”.  The realization will set in just how much school there is left to get through if one wants to become a doctor or a scientist or anything else…

As a parent, I found it was surprisingly hard to concentrate on anything in the hours that followed leaving my daughter at a new and larger school.  (It doesn’t help that the media, especially WNYC is constantly referring to 9/11 when I was newly transplanted to New York with a walking baby in diapers).  I remember the first days of preschool, Pre-K, kindergarten and all of the other grades throughout her elementary school career when, on the first day, the parents were allowed to escort their children to their classroom and meet their new teachers.  No more.

The first day of middle school isn’t anything like the first day of elementary school.  It wasn’t like kindergarten. We didn’t go into the classroom. We did go into the building but only a few feet until my child identified the correct person with a clipboard who told her what group she was in and where to go. And then we were done. The husband and I were so disoriented we got on the F train going further into Brooklyn instead of into Manhattan. Oh well. A cup of coffee together–which we had time for because middle school starts almost an hour earlier than elementary school did.   Thank goodness for the short commute.  Theatre people and musicians are notoriously bad at getting their offspring to school on time.  In New York City it is the attendance and lateness records that affect the outcome of the school application process for the next school on the great education conveyor belt.  (Well it was a conveyor belt for me in mid-America.  It’s a crap-shoot in NYC.)

In Manhattan, before I got down to work, I walked from The Husband’s office building through Times Square. I walked through the Disney Store and Toys R because I was missing my girl. The Disney store was full of costumes she is too old to wear. At Toys R Us I remembered when she was so small I kept a running list in my head of developmental toys: blocks, dishes, puzzles, dress up clothes and wether or not she had them yet and when I would give them to her. There wasn’t anything for me to buy for her today.  Her objects of desire come from other establishments now. Sigh.

 

I was thoroughly entertained watching my 14-month old walk because someone had she walked like a drunk and I agreed to the point of laughing out loud.

On Thursday, September 6, 2001:  I was impressed that my little girl ate 2 plums along with yogurt and some of my cheese for her breakfast.  I took her to the to the mom and baby support group we had been attending at the Elisabeth Seaton childbirth center on 14th street where I realized that she was the oldest one there that day and that we would have to switch to the Tuesday toddler group.  Afterwards I pushed the stroller to the Bleeker Street Playground, had a slice of pizza for lunch and then took the subway from West 4th to Chambers to see Rennie Harris and the Urban Bush Women performing in the World Trade Center Plaza.  My Kid fell asleep on the train.  The Husband met us there after work and we went home together.  We had just discovered this was a a great place for us to meet at the end of the day, on our A-train subway line, halfway between our Brooklyn apartment in Fort Greene and The Husband’s Manhattan office in Chelsea.

I had an application for the Montessori School at the Brooklyn YWCA in front of me, doing the math with various combinations of hours and days trying to figure out how much childcare we could afford.  I was getting ready to look for a job. We were still so new to Brooklyn. September was going to be the first month that my husband, daughter and I were all going to be together for a whole month in our own place in our new city since the job transfer from Seattle.

I was looking forward to meeting other moms from the neighborhood who had walking babies the same age as my daughter at the first session of the toddler playgroup at the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church at 11:30 on Tuesday, September 11, 2001.