The Tree of...

I performed my Tree vignette for class today. I was nervous and uncomfortable, but it helped to be in a small group with similarly inexperienced performers and only Alex (the program director/authorial performance instructor) to evaluate. I like Alex a lot--he is charming and funny, with a tendency to ignore his own jokes, which of course makes it even more amusing. But he's also a very good teacher, open and energetic, making it very easy to take risks in his classroom. I was proud of my ability to recognize my own reservations about the Discipline (or his approach to it), but I'm also very open to it, hoping to discover as much as I can before I jump to any judgment.

Alex's approach reminds me of a comment Ewan made in the lecture yesterday--that Czech theatre is not quick to lose itself or commit fully to emotion or impulse, but prefers to take a step back. In other words, it is very self-aware, never taking itself too seriously. Alex refers to a principle of "admitting"--calling attention to the illusion, admitting that this is only a performance. (This, of course, brought me back to Poet momentarily.) I am still not totally certain where my preference falls--with the self-aware or the fully-immersed, but I'm glad to be learning as intimately and intensely as I am.

Before my tree piece, Pete, a fellow student who is also a teacher of Theatre and Math (I know, right?) at Kent Denver (I know, RIGHT??) went up to present. He chose an improvisational approach, and spoke freely about the theme of "age." He explained his concerns and musings about growing older in body and soul, and the fear that comes when one realizes that one's dreams have become memories. The whole thing was very moving and thought-provoking, but one moment struck me especially deeply.

He said "There's a time in your life when your world stops expanding and starts shrinking. And your body stops expanding and starts shrinking along with your world." What a beautiful and terrible sentiment. (And all out of an improv!)

A striking tree about halfway up Petrin Hill.

I often have to stop and remind myself that I am still young and my world is still expanding every day. It's strange and terrifying to me that college is now in the past. I hate thinking about it, to be honest. But there are wild and fantastic things in my future. The real experiences and adventures are still to come. I hope I will not take them for granted. I am putting a show in the Fringe Festival. One day, I am moving to the Czech Republic.

Come to think of it, RIGHT NOW I am drinking espresso cokolada in Cafe Slavia. The pianist is playing American jazz standards. It is sundown in Prague. I am studying my great love, Theatre, in my greatest love, Praha. These are the wonderful days, now. The best I can do is let go, be alive, and be awake to it.

I visited Vysehrad today, which is, no question, my favorite place in Prague. It's a place of solitude and quiet, but also life and nature and music. The birds and the wind and the river and the bells make an absolute symphony. It's disarming. When I visit Vysehrad, I always feel as though I'm remembering a past life. A life in which I stood on these same stones, looking out at the river and envisioning the birth of a glorious city. I imagine it erupting from the wild waters and blooming into being.

"Vidím město veliké, jehož sláva hvězd se dotýkati bude." ("I see a great city whose glory will touch the stars").

It also seems to me, sometimes, that Praha is all in and of my imagination. Like I'm unraveling a string along the path of my own thoughts. From my mind, labyrinthine streets unfold, winding and intersecting at inexplicable angles, with no organization--yet somehow they always lead back to a familiar base, no matter how far I might stray. I seem to imagine buildings and cars around each corner, and they materialize. Possibilities reveal themselves according to my wishes, or my suggestions. A funny thought.

Praha, threshold of my inspiration, child of my dreams, spirit of my thoughts. You live in my bones and you bounce around in my skull like the clattering of bells. Maybe the day I finally get lost in you is the day I get lost in myself.

A view from Vysehrad.