Reflection

Reflection:  As we near the end of the tour, I have a reflective walk home, with Soph in the stroller in front of me.  What a whirlwind our life has been.  Eric and I moved to NYC in 2004, after meeting at The Barn Theatre in Augusta, MI.  We lived at 191st and Wadsworth Ave., which, for those of you who know, can be a rather dangerous neighborhood.  Gunshots ringing out on the street, people running, 40yr-old prostitutes dancing to no music using the building trash den as there base, seeing a man beat up and left in the gutter outside my window.  Thank God, we both booked the same show and were working on the road for a few months right away.  TheatreworksUSA is a children’s theatre company in NYC and Eric and I booked Huck Finn.  I did it for a while myself and then Eric came in as a replacement.   We had a ball together and it was an experience, in and of itself...you may call it, paying your dues.  Eric went back to the Barn and I stayed in NYC.  New York was even more difficult alone and poor.  By the end of the summer 3 girls had been stabbed in the face, in front of our building, and we decided that we’d better move. 
     We received quite the array of reactions as we moved the last of our things from Washington Heights to Sunset Park, Brooklyn, via the subway.  I remember holding curtain rods in one hand and a giant wicker basket filled with blankets and clothes between my legs.  Some faces were entertained and others were seriously disapproving.  If our Brooklyn wasn’t the hipster haven you’ve read about, it was, for us, a fun place to live.  The actual park of Sunset Park was a beautiful escape for us and we loved our neighbors.  Eric booked his first big job on a Bway tour while living there in 2006 and I did a few small shows in town.  It was a step up from where we’d been, but mice and safety were ever the issue though, as I woke one day to find my neighbor hosing blood off the front stoop.  Some of the craziness of these things really don’t register until like...now. 
   In 2007, we stepped up again and moved into a 300 square foot “dream” apartment in Hell’s Kitchen.  We were getting married that year and happy as clams to be living right on top of each other.  We thought we’d hit the jackpot.  In a way, we did.  A week after our “I do’s,” I booked “Mamma Mia” in Las Vegas.  I shipped out and was there until Jan. 2009.  Eric came out to visit every few weeks and I went to see him when I could get a day off here and there.  A lot of people sacrifice there relationship and time together for saving money, so maybe we didn’t save as much as they did, but we had each other in the end.  The year had been good for Eric too, getting his feet wet doing some guest spots on T.V. and booking a pilot for a sitcom.  We decided to stay in our homey Hell’s Kitchen place.  We loved it and wanted the apt. to work.  After accidentally roasting a rat along with our filet mignon, we decided to move that instance. 
     With the markets in free fall, free months of rent and dropped rates were happening everywhere.  We signed a 2 yr lease in a luxury building at 42nd and 10th Ave. snagging the deal of the century and sang “Movin’ on up” as we moved on up.  We returned to the Barn Theatre, in Michigan, where we had met, as part of their Equity Company.  It was a romantic place for us, so super fun to return.  I was directing Eric in a production of “The Full Monty,” wherein he was playing a lead, when he received the phone call to return for an audition for a replacement in Shrek on Broadway.  We had capable, if not age appropriate, understudies in place, but it was not without it’s difficulties.  He and we were left in limbo for a week.  Not knowing whether or not he would be returning to our show or going to Broadway.  Well, as it turned out, he booked the job.  We were so proud.  He headed off to NYC and I stuck out the summer without him.  It was harder than it had ever been to be without him.  We had pledged that whoever booked the next big job, the other would travel with.  We didn’t imagine that it wouldn’t be possible.  I returned in October and we took a month to visit friends and family before Eric returned to the Broadway cast as the Standby for Shrek until their closing on Jan.3, 2010. 
     After our vacation, we returned to our awesome apartment.  I worked out everyday to lose my vacay weight.  I had a sneaking suspicion after seeing “results not typical” at the gym that “vacay” weight might be “babay” weight.  I took a pregnancy test.  I took all three!!!  The first one got the line AS I was peeing on it.  What happened to the “wait for 3 minutes”?  The others did the same.  We’ll, I guess this is happening.  Excitement and fear coursed through me all at the same time.  Now, to tell Eric.  He had just done what was to be his first and only rehearsal of Shrek.  It was for an empty house, but he worked hard preparing and we viewed it as his starring turn even if he never went on for the role.  I was excited to here about his day and knew that this news was going to be the icing on his cake.  He nervously called out my name when he couldn’t open the door because I had it bolted. 
     “Coming” I said as I grabbed the video camera and headed to unlock the door.
     “Hi,” I giggled. 
     “Hi,” he said.  “Why do you have a video camera?” 
     “Just go to the bathroom,” I replied.
      He turned the corner to see a bunch of his shirts hanging on the curtain rod.  “Thanks for doing the laundry,” he said confusedly. 
      I laughed as I pointed to the sink.  “No, look down.” 
      He smirked and smiled and grabbed his head and said, “Are you serious?  Oh My God.  This is crazy.  This is great!  I’m so excited!” 
      His reaction immediately calmed my nerves. 
     We kept the news to ourselves that night until we could confirm it with the doctor.   Excitement made me feel as if I could barely sleep, but the tiredness took over and we headed into sweet dreams.  The next day, I got a phone call from Eric at 10 a.m.  “They just called and said I’m on for Shrek today...both shows.”  My friend Michael and I got tickets to the first show and cried about how proud we were.  Eric was starring on Broadway...with Tony Award winning actress, Sutton Foster, no less.  That night I went by myself and sat a few rows from the front.  I was so happy that Eric was getting to live his dream.  His cast members approached me on the street deeming his performance as “the best first understudy performance ever!”  He came home saying people kept telling him how focused and cool he was, to which he replied...”You have no idea.”  (I just found out I’m going to be a father!, he thought to himself.)
     The 3 month mark of our pregnancy fell on the week the show closed in NYC.  We decided not to tell anyone until then.  A meager 4 people outside of our family knew at that point.  The first week of January, we began to spread the good news.  In other good news, Eric had been notified that he would have the honor of playing Shrek on the First National Tour.  Although paper work had not been drawn and ink certainly was not dry, we were excited, but kept the news to ourselves.  In this business, it’s best not to count your chicken before their hatched. 
     I spent the next few months as Assistant Director to a Director friend of ours and Eric auditioned for commercials and T.V.  We planned for having a new baby on the road.  This was not traditional, so I sort of had to draw up my own rulebook and guidelines.  A different kind of how-to.  As details of the tour got fleshed out, we discovered that Sophie (now named) was going to come sometime around...OPENING!   Not only would this be tricky because of Eric’s work schedule being the star of the show, but also because traveling at the end of the 3rd trimester was not something people typically do.  We’ll, we are anything but typical.  We decided to be prepared.  We had a doctor in NYC for all prenatal care and in the case that she would arrive early.  Getting a doctor to take us at 39 weeks in Chicago was a different story.  I spent hours on the phone being denied by office after office, until finally a doctor affiliated with Northwestern took us in.  She was meant to be.  I visited her once with Eric and a few times on my own leading up to the delivery.  My body swelled from the pregnancy, the travel, and the diet.  We drove to Chicago and still no baby.  We settled into the apartment and still no baby.  The show opened for previews and still no baby.  Finally, on July 14.  She decided it was time.  It was a 2 show day for Eric, so I didn’t bother telling him until he finished his second show.  By then, my contractions were 10 minutes apart.  We headed to the doc when they were just under 4 minutes at around 4 a.m.  There was no room for us, so we waited in Triage for hours.  We finally were moved to a room and I was given an epidural almost immediately.  A few hours later, at 5pm on July 15, 2010, Sophie was born.  Eric was out of the show for that night only and returned to work the next day.   Thank God, the next 6 weeks we were in one place.   I had no idea how much time it takes just breast feeding and changing diapers (mine and babies).  With stitches that didn’t heal quite right, and a procedure to fix it, it took more like 9 weeks to heal.   I hear c-sections are pretty painful though, so I’m glad to have avoided that.  Once we got through Chicago, we felt like we were getting the hang of things.  As we moved to St.Louis, we felt a weight lift off of us.  Eric was feeling a oneness with the show and we were feeling a oneness with baby Sophie.  We could recognize that this is the time of our lives.
     As I came up to the hotel and out of my day dreaming, I remembered that the tour was now coming to an end.   In one week, the traveling will be over for a bit.  The logistics planning can have a rest.  The uncertainty of the actors life is eagerly waiting to nestle itself back into our lives.  It's something we've learned to live with.   Next up...?