success, failure, life, and ...?

to say that it's been a tumultuous weekend would be an understatement.

Thursday night, I went to the theatre to drop off programs and watch the show. I was also supposed to update some of our sound files, but due to a miscommunication the necessary cable was not at the theatre. I had finally passed the stone that afternoon and my body was feeling light and I hadn't lost the glow of adrenaline that my body gets when it finally rids itself of such an unwelcome intruder. As the show approached though, my chemical uplift began to fade and I found myself on something resembling a caffeine crash. I headed home and chilled out for the evening. I found out the next day that one of the speakers had begun to go bad, and that most of the sound cues were marred by unbearable crackling. Not cool.

So, Friday comes and I'm supposed to be at the Eureka at 7 so that I can do box office for Match Play. I need to go to Chinese Angle first though, to update the sound files I had failed to update the previous night. I get there at six, and proceed to wait for a half hour for the stage manager to no avail. While there, one of the theatre techs shows up to look at the bad speaker. I can't stick around long though, and finally leave at 6:30 and just miss the stage manager with the cable.

I realize that I failed to bring a video cable adapter to allow me to use my laptop with my LCD projector (both of which I'm carrying), so I swing by CompUSA to get a new one. They are out. Aware of time ticking rapidly away, I move further away from my final destination to get to the Apple store, only to find that they are sold out of the necessary cable there as well. Hot, sweaty, and late, I arrive at the Eureka carrying lots of gear that I cannot use, having run all over downtown fruitlessly for 45 minutes after not doing what I wanted to do at the Playhouse.

I was a bit cranky.

My mood was not greatly improved as 10pm drew closer and closer. We had no advance reservations, and foot traffic was non-existant. 9:40 came and went, and we had no audience. 9:50 came, and still we had no audience. 10:00pm came, and it became painfully clear that a huge crowd was not about to appear on our doorstep. I didn't need that cable I had run all over failing to get. We didn't have a show.

We all sat and drank the concessions for an hour or so, and then headed a block up to a local bar. I'm not that much of a night owl, so I was surprised at how the bar got fuller after midnight... the time I usually make my departure from night hotspots. One of my performers lives not far, so I had a ride for the evening so we stayed out very late. One of our crew, who I see but rarely, kept petting my hair and talking about how every time she saw me I had a new identity while her husband grinned drunkenly at us both. On some level I was relieved to not have performed that night, as we were all bone tired. Still, I felt this was a bad omen.

Anastasia tried to buy me a shot before I left, despite my protests, so I ended up giving it to a young lady who had just arrived at the bar. After seeing her male friends responses to that, I advised her to keep her mace at the ready and we made our exit. Despite my having snubbed the drink, Ana declared it just what she would have done and gave her full approval.

I got home well after 2am, exhausted, frustrated, and pleased all at the same time.

Saturday morning brought my mother and aunt. We were going to visit my other "aunt", who is actually my second cousin. This aunt is suffering from severe pancreatitus, and had been scheduled for surgery on Thursday but couldn't do it due to an attack of pneumonia. I had seen her a few months earlier. She had been in an induced coma for six months, and was unrecognizable. Her hands had been fairly deformed by the swelling and her face was that of a stranger. She made an odd noise with each breath she took, somewhat like a throat clearing, and she did not move at all. Very little had changed since then. I know that she can feed herself and move, but chooses not to. The swelling has gone down, but not by that much. She needs to have this surgery immediately, or this could be the end. Paradoxically, the surgery itself might kill her. It is truly a damned if you do and damned if you don't situation. I made her smile a bit, best as I could, telling her of my friend's fixation on my new identities as her husband grinned on, but I don't know if that was to be our last meeting.

Mom dropped me off at home and I tried to rest a bit before heading into the city, but I was unable to take a nap. I had gotten a call while on the way to the hospital about further technical problems with the Chinese Angle that had resulted in a total absence of music during the two songs, forcing one song to be abandoned and the other to sing a cappella. I canceled my dinner plans and got to the theatre by 6. The light operator's boyfriend thought he knew what was wrong and promised to bring some adapters, but what had been communicated to me by my stage manager led me to believe that he was barking up the wrong tree. I spent an hour diagnosing the problem and creating a stopgap solution, telling the producer and stage manager that the only thing that would truly get us back to the way we were was a new speaker with the right connectors. No adapter that I knew of would do the trick. I mixed all our music to a mono connection so it would no longer be directional, but at least be heard out of the other speaker when the light operator's boyfriend showed up right at seven... with a new speaker. He plugged it in and everything worked perfectly again. We had both diagnosed the problem correctly, and the information I had been passed had been scrambled. I raced off to the Eureka to help with Box Office again.

Audiences for Match Play haven't been much better than Submergency, and as 10pm grew closer, I knew in my heart that we were in for a repeat. Sure enough, not one single person showed up for the show. Chris, Brian, Trish, Dave and I went to the nearest pub got some beer and played pool. I noted that a perfectly fine pub, with nice furnishings and a great downstairs pool table was practically deserted at 10:30 on Saturday night. It was agreed that this was a strong indicator of our problem. The theatre is located in a late night desert. We are not a destination. I vowed that if no one showed up for our Sunday matinee, I would end the run of the show.

Sunday. Off to Suzuki, which was a good class and I was able to talk to Jeffrey a bit about Sweetie Tanya and about what is happening with Submergency. For all its technical problems, the Chinese Angle is an enormous success, and for all that people enjoy the show, Submergency is an abject failure. I am experiencing the highs and lows simultaneously.

I go right from class to the theatre and get everything ready for the show, knowing in my heart that this is the end. Remington shows up to do lights and box office, and we catch up for a bit. The cast shows up, and two women walk up and buy tickets, thinking that we're part of the fringe festival. Ten minutes later it's time for the show to start and I give them back their money. They are very understanding and undeterred, but I am a bit heartbroken. I would have liked to make them laugh today.

Submergency is dead, at least for now. Match Play is also going to close early, so we decide to take over next Sunday evening and bring Radiostar to the theatre and do a live set for friends, followed by a farewell improv Jam for Christopher DeJong, who is leaving in a few weeks for Africa. It's turning lemons into lemonade, but we all feel good about it.

Well, at least mostly good. I am glad to get my weekends back, but sad for the failure. I have succeeded. I have failed. But the failure is hard to be too heartbroken about, when the image of my aunt looms so close in my mind. Her body essentially broken, but her will even more so. I can only imagine what she would give to be able to succeed and fail as I am doing.

I have tomorrow, as far as I know, so I'll treat that as a gift.