Author: kathie

a flier from my daughters school:

As part of the

Learning Through Art Program of the

Guggenheim Museum

Third Graders

asked

What is the ideal environment in which we can

grow and thrive?

We looked at environments we knew well: home, school, playground.  We looked at the ways in which Native Americans who lived here 400 years ago valued and used the environment.  We looked at the things our planet needs to be a good home for us.  We thought about what we need to grow and thrive.

Then we created a mini ideal environment starting with a box which we transformed in our own ways and symbolic objects which we sculpted out of clay and painted.

And then we listened to what our artwork said.  Be sure to read our writing.

Guggenheim Teaching Artist: Jenny Bevill

Classroom Teachers:

Ms. Browning, Ms. Hayes, Ms. Jerry, Ms. Tollhurst and Mr. Jansen

Artist’s Assistant: Chelsea Bahr.

…talking to my visual-artist-mommy neighbor on the train as we escorted our kids home from school–her day went about the same as mine…not done/didn’t get to/not enough time…

Maybe next week we’ll organize taking turns picking up the kids for each other so we can each have an extra hour of work time.

Time Management

I really do not have as much time as I think I do on a daily basis.  Things always take longer than I think they will.  Time passing is a constant surprise to me–as is the fact that my family needs to eat dinner every day.  (Why aren’t they as satisfied with coffee and protein smoothies as I am?)

Today I am being focused after yesterday’s snowday combination of sledding and cabin fever.   I actually worked and got things done, and yet it is not enough. I haven’t done half the things I thought I could do while My Kid is at school.   Since I don’t have a real job  (just that eclectic assortment of fuzzy free-lance artistic stuff) I’ve got hours…  NOT.  I was good today too.  After I dropped My Kid off at school, I wrote in a coffee shop for two full hours.  On the way home I bought a Backstage and saw a gig I might qualify for.  When I got home I typed up a new resume (listing clown work and children’s theatre in a new configuration) and wrote a cover letter.

Now my time is up.   I have to go pick up My Kid and I never cleaned anything.  Whoops!

volunteering

I worked three different formal volunteer situations today.

In the morning I was a chaperone for the third grade field trip.  In the afternoon I helped set up for the Scholastic Book Fair at my kid’s school.  In the evening I worked the silent auction part of a fundraising dinner for a childhood disease organization.

I’m tired and wondering if the “economic downturn” will help recalibrate the work life balance of some of the working mommies of the world.  There is significant pain and stress involved in visibly being there for your kids, not being with your kids so you can be involved in your community, and making the allowances necessary to be available to do things that need to be done when they need to be done.  Oh yeah, that’s in addition to working for a paycheck.

Why do mothers do this?

Watching the skinny sparkling people with their wine glasses chat and bid on luxury items, (for a good cause) while the catering staff in their matching jackets and burdened with trays swirled unceasingly around them I wondered why some work pays so much more than other work.

Oh and I watched part of Michael Moore’s “Sicko” documentary today.

I’m thinking about the economy.

Ash Wednesday

People can’t usually tell my religion by looking at me.  I don’t wear a hijab, the Muslim head scarf or a wig like certain Jewish women.  But, I identify with these women and feel  self-conscious discomfort on the one day a year I wear a big sign on my forehead that says “I’m Catholic.”

I was startled to see a woman on the subway with a big black mark in the center of her forehead.  I thought Ash Wednesday was next week.  Just yesterday I was thinking to myself: “I think I’ll give up alcohol for Lent since I registered for that Pilates class.”  But, I thought it started next week, and bam– Ash Wednesday is today!

In Midtown there were lots of people with ashes on their foreheads.  I was in Rockefeller Center.  St. Patricks Cathedral is across the street. 

I overheard a young woman calling someone on her cell phone, “I’m just calling you to remind you to get your ashes.”

And that is how it is done–in a New York minute.

Usually  a church service is produced around the event of the distribution of the ashes (ashes to ashes and dust to dust–just in case you forgot) though not necessarily a mass.

Overhearing a comment on the efficiency of the operation I took note of the time I got into the line that stretched down the block from the entrance to the cathedral. 1:33pm.  At 1:43 I entered the church and by 1:46 I was done.

There were ushers passing out programs and guiding us into line.  There were 3 priests in my aisle.  They looked young though, maybe seminarians or grown men in alter boy costumes.  (You wouldn’t think this was the religion I grew up with, I keep running into these situations that are so foreign to me.)  They were taking shifts and rotating from the different stations, there was a container of wipes so they could clean the ashes off their fingers when they were relived.  They seemed to rotate around the cathedral like lifeguards changing chairs at the city pool.

I tried to take in the silence, or the canned music or the gregorian chant or whatever it was that filled the space.  Then my cell phone rang.  Before I left the building I stepped into the tiny gift shop and bought some books on Easter and Lent for My Kid.  

I was thrilled to find contained therein the same recipe for bunny salad made of pear halves on a lettuce leaf, decorated with almond halves, raisins, red hots and cottage cheese that I had proudly prepared for my family at Easter when I was in 3rd grade.  

And so the calendar of the church marks the passing of the years and the changing of the seasons.

Cirque du Soleil Reverie

I spent so much time with clowns and art this week that when the younger single people sitting at the table in the diner after the late night Clown Lab after Downtown Clown Revue  started talking about putting their tapes together to apply for the upcoming Cirque du Soleil auditions I thought I was one of them.

 They say there is lots of work.  New shows are in development and existing shows need replacement cast.  My friends have studio time booked and video cameras ready to complete their applications.  

Riding the A train back to Brooklyn I was mentally cataloguing the video I have of myself in performance, what was recorded during the last production and what I might still need.  Cirque du Soleil is to circus people what Broadway is to musical comedy triple threats.  It is both the summit of all aspirations and the kind of high calibre gig that leads to more work.  Who knows, maybe The Husband will be transfered to Las Vegas. Maybe another Cirque show will set up in New York.  Maybe I could become attached to something that has a long development process and touring doesn’t become a reality until My Kid is in middle school or high school.

I walk through the door to our apartment.  It is nearly 3 am.  The lights are on and the TV is blaring because My Kid had fallen asleep in the front room  watching the Disney Channel while waiting for me to come home.

She has written a note: “Tonight I was going to go to sleep with mom but she had to do something like see a clown show.  So I tried to stay from going to sleep.”

Jeff Raz said the hardest part about touring with Cirque du Soleil was being away from his family.

So…

Never mind.

 

 


going home after a performance

 

In the tunnel underneath 14th street I pass a man offering his wares; 

                                                                       A New York Times

                                                                      Published Poet

                                                                      SHARES his poems

                                                                      Poems also 

                                                                     Written upon request

 
On my way to the F/on my way to W4/ to change to the A /passing a young guy on a bench with his little moleskin journal and his black backpack and his mustache and his shadow of a beard waiting for the L to take him to Williamsburg where the hipsters live/A Chinese man reading a Chinese newspaper/Another man listening to headphones reading an article, “New Designers Worth Investing In”/Essence Music Festival swag bag on the shoulder of a young woman and a drum encased in a GORE-TEX travel case/The woman changing from ballet flats to ankle boots readying for the next event of the night/Red lipstick and black Bettie Page bangs/I hear piano music, where is it coming from, is it a tape?  Oh my God there’s a guy on the opposite platform sitting at a wooden upright piano. How did he get it down here?  Did some friends of his, out of work stage hands and grips bring it down for him?  Is he planning to play all night?  Is he just waiting for a train? With a piano?

On the subway a man and a woman who look to be security guards talking about changing jobs and 401K’s, the second conversation I’ve overheard today about career benefits and advancement in the industry of keeping the rabble away from the rich.

The skin tones of most passengers going home on this midnight train are darker than the ones who ride home in time for dinner during rush hour.

What was I thinking about?  Oh yeah, clownmommy.com 

I’m a mommy and today I am a clown:

7:00 am up and out on the train to school by 8:30

Coffee and writing at Joe’s in the West Village.

Lunch with The Husband near his office in Rockefeller Center.  He’s been busy and we haven’t had a chance to talk through some of the logistics of life including but not limited to the fact that My Sister is in town on business and My Kid has ALL NEXT WEEK off from school.

A little shopping, there was a big sale at Tristan which happens to be in the building where The Husband works.  Just trying to look a little more like I belong in Rockefeller Center.

Then I go to a Duane Reade drug store.  Whenever I’m in a new show I buy something at the drugstore on the way to the theatre on opening night.  It used to be because I needed a color for the show different from my real life palate or I forgot to bring bobby pins, or my old mascara had dried out.  That is still true, but it has also become a personal opening night tradition, a good luck gesture.  It is the beginning of my preparations to go in front of an audience  before I even get to the theatre.  It’s a ritual.

Gotta get on the train again and go collect My Kid from her after school robotics program.  The kids haven’t come down yet.  I talk to other mothers about the winter break.  J is going on a family ski trip to Utah.  M is taking her kids to Florida.  Working parents without a winter break register their kids for one of several available mini daycamps.  I’ve registered My Kid for the two days I need next week.

 “Come on honey, we’ve got to go into Manhattan.  Mommy’s got a show.” 

“Sure you can have money for something from the YMCA bake sale”, anything to keep us moving steadily towards the venue for the 6 o’clock call.

Get on the train.

Get off the train.

Here’s the deli, need water, Odwalla Super Protein, and that Greek yogurt that tasted so good yesterday.  This is mommy’s dinner.  You’re going to eat with Daddy.  Vanilla milk?  OK, sure.

Here we are.  There’s the stage.  Now lets go upstairs.

Hi this is My Kid.  My Kid this is Everybody.

Jef doesn’t want us to put on too much makeup.  He wants us to look natural.  He’s worried we’re putting on too much makeup  Does he know we (the women) all wear makeup to the clown labs?  We do.  He’s just never seen us put it on.  Just because it’s not as drastic as his Slava Snowshow makeup doesn’t mean we’re not wearing it.  He worried that would be too much or that my lips will be too red (therefore making a comment on the red sweatsuit in a way that presents an unintended stereotype).  I’m not doing that. (If I did I would have deliberately spent time at the drugstore choosing a lipstick that exactly matched the bright red of the clothes wear in the show.  I had the chance and I didn’t.)  He doesn’t know how many  mommies reapply their lipstick just before picking up their kids from school.  (My mom always used to apply fresh lipstick before going to the grocery store.)  This is normal and the lipstick I use is one I carry on ordinary days.

AND THEN he goes and hairsprays and blow dries Drew’s hair into some kind of sculpture!

The eyeliner and mascara is just to look awake.

“If Mommy’s looking in a mirror and applying eye makeup, that’s not a good time to jump on her back.  OK, honey!”

“OK please let go of Mommy’s legs.  Mommy is trying to change clothes now.”

“Let go of Mommy.  My cellphone is ringing.  Can you find it for me in my purse?”

“Hello Daddy!  Are you downstairs?  Good!  I’ll bring her right down.”

OK DADDYS HERE BYE BYE

“Have a good dinner.  Do your homework.  Please be asleep when I get home.”

Warm up in the space.  Feel the vibrations.  Can’t go to the bathroom now.  The house is about to open.

Jef Johnson’s CLOWN LAB

presents

Clownical Trials

In situ modulation using perception action coupling 

and combined object vectors

1st PUBLIC INTERFACE

02.12.09

 

In the “white box” of the THEATRELAB  studio/gallery/performance space at 137 W 14th St, New York City, we present for the audience something that to my mind would feel comfortable at the Guggenheim Museum.

It starts with all of us crammed behind a flat making choreographed entrances and exits.  We move around each other fitting into the small space like Tetris blocks in a video game.

Then the entrances and introductions and improvisations

shhhhhh

masks

and exit

solo, solo, solo, solo, solo, solo 

each with objects

I am  third

group effort audience participation

Thanks for coming

Wine and cheese upstairs

talk of clown and Seattle and video editing

Getting tired, remembering tomorrow is a work day and a school day and a busy day.

Good-bye.  Good-bye.  Good-night.

Home at last.  I come in the door, set down my keys.  Hoping against hope, I look for the valentines–still in the box (Wall*E this year) neither addressed or signed and the lollypops, still sealed in the bag, are not attached to the valentines with the scotch tape that is just right there!  Supervision of such is my job and I wasn’t here– I was off being a clown.  Well at least I had the foresight to buy these supplies a week ago, there is still time before school tomorrow morning.  

It’s so late and I’m so tired, but the fact of the makeup, (though minimal), and the hairspray, and the bare feet require a shower before I can get into the bed.

In bed checking my e mail on the laptop.   I forward to the class list an e -mail regarding deadline for the art  fundraiser.  There is a reminder about registering child for spring soccer program (must have talk with My Kid about how much she wants to play)…last chance for discounted family tickets to RBBB Circus…   Did I follow through with that other mother about pick-up and drop-off?  Is my child supposed to bring something to her Brownie Troop meeting after school tomorrow?  Where’s my cellphone charger?  Are we out of milk?   Did I hear a mouse???

Tomorrow… is… another school day… another show day… another busy day…

Everyone’s asleep…but me!

ClownLab show- Feb 13, 14 (NY)

Jef Johnson is a principal clown in the international touring company of Slava’s Snowshow. As Clown, he has also toured with Cirque du Soleil. Jef has more than 20 years of experience working in a wide range of physical styles. His approach is rooted in subjective expression, physical expression of condition through impulse and reflex. He has studied corporeal expression from disciples of Grotowski, Suzuki, Marceau, Decroux, Lecoq, Meyerhold, M. Chekhov, Vakhtangov.

He teaches a Clown Lab in NY on a fairly regular basis. The product, or clinical trial, as he prefers to call it, of one of those Clown Labs will be coming up on Feb 13 & 14.

I haven’t studied with him, so can’t really say what his teaching style is like. His website and (clown journal) was a bit too impenetrable for me to figure out exactly what he is all about.

With most things like this, the best way to figure out if you want to study with him is to go see some of his work. Here are the details to check it out for yourself.

Clownical Trials
In situ modulation using perception action coupling and combined object vectors.

THEATERLAB
137 West 14th Street
New York, NY
February 12-13 at 8 pm
$10.00 Reservations: 212-929-2545
Featuring: Golan, Kathie Horejsi, Julie Josephson, Michaela Lind, Andrew Valins

Jef Johnson’s CLOWN LAB is dedicated to the exploration of the mechanisms underlying the nature of clown through behavior, experience and creative association. This is a clinical trial. Real humans will be used.

To find out more about Jef’s work, visit his website listed below:

http://www.nyclown.com

This is why Barack Obama is our President

During the campaign, Barack Obama reached out to Native People and was adopted in a traditional Crow ceremony by Hartford and Mary Black Eagle of Lodge Grass, Montana.  They were introduced as grandparents to Malia and Sasha. Obama honored his Black Eagle family by having them brought to Washington DC and given prime seats to witness the Inauguration Ceremony.

His mother Dr. Stanley Ann Dunham Soetoro, would have been proud.