On Personifying Autumn... and the melancholy and beauty of Autumn Leaves

Um... this wasn't what I had planned for THE GREAT HALLOWEEN COSTUME OF 2011. I'd been giving friends clues about it: "I will be tasty and delicious," I taunted. But, the nearer the end of October came, the longer the hours I ended up working to get this show Big Love off the ground: about 60 hours per week for a couple of weeks, then about 80 the next, and by the last week, I worked - no exaggeration - about 90 hours over seven days. Some people don't believe that this is possible. But I assure you, it is. It just sucks a lot. It's like being in grad school, except that you find yourself wondering why the heck you're still working these kinds of hours even though grad school ended years ago. And it is not exactly conducive to things like also producing a Halloween costume in one's "spare time." So, the show opened on Friday the 28th, and I entered post-show recovery mode, and "Plan Tasty and Delicious" was simply not going to come to fruition in 2011, but I still needed a costume for a ballroom party I was determined to attend on Saturday the 29th.

So... gasp... I RE-USED A PREVIOUS COSTUME. But I did re-vamp it. The first iteration, thrown together last-minute back in my grad school years, had sparser leaves, only safety-pinned in place. So, hours before I was to leave for the ballroom party, I jogged over to Kmart and picked up another bag of fake autumn leaves (it's ridiculously easy to find fake autumn leaves in October), and I stitched them all in place so they wouldn't get mussed when I danced. The garments to which the leaves are attached are four pieces (skirt, tunic, Turkish bodice, and scarf) that I acquired during one of the summers when I worked as a sales wench at the booth of delightful designer (and all-around kind and beloved gentleman) Steven Overstreet, at the Southern California Renaissance Faire. Those were good times, they were.

Oh, and in case it's not clear: I was "Autumn," darn it! Not "Mother Nature" (though our planet is quite ill, we still do have more than one season!). Not "a fairy." Not "some kind of leaf goddess." Just Autumn, plain and simple. There is a song called "Autumn Leaves," sung best by Eva Cassidy. It is beautiful and meaningful. Look it up on youtube, if you wish. You won't regret it. My choice to re-vamp and re-use this costume was encouraged by that song. As a rule, I don't wear a Halloween costume for more than one Halloween, but I made an exception for this one. Autumn makes me melancholy. So does that beautiful song, in a way. But I took something that makes me melancholy, and I turned it, I think, into something beautiful.

I'll shut up now, and leave the rest to eye candy...














Photo credits:
Photos #1 to 9 taken on the campus of Rowan University, by Sarah Louxz
Photos #10 to 14 taken in Philadelphia's Washington Square Park, by Bryce Nichols
Eye make-up by Mandee Ashley

How I Knew I Was Beginning to Identify Myself as an Artist

As I finish editing this post, it is November 21st of 2011. This began as a comment on Facebook, around the middle of the last week of October, in response to a handful of kind and encouraging comments from friends from around the planet, who were requesting that I post photos of the costumes from my show that was about to open.

As my comment grew lengthier, it evolved into a manifesto that I worried could be perceived as a rant, but which for me was more of a realization and an artistic declaration. In my sleep-deprived state, I didn't know if it sounded in any way sensible, and I had so much work to do that it seemed stupid that I was spending time on it, and that I was even looking at Facebook that morning. So I hacked most of the text out of my comment before publishing it, but I realized I might want to go back to those thoughts later, so I copied and pasted them here.

"I don't know if I'll post production still photos down the road," I wrote in the published comment. "I might post a work-in-progress shot of one of the gowns on a dressform later today."

And the rest of this, written in a stream-of-consiousness burst and just now edited somewhat for clarity, is what I had cut away.

The thing is, this artform is only in its complete, presentable state when it is on a stage, on a living, breathing performer, participating in taking the audience on a journey, through an experience - be it emotional, transformative, entertaining, or whatever else. I usually find that so much is lost in photos. A costume loses much of its vitality, its transformational power, its artistry. It becomes just a lifeless outfit.

A very long time ago, when my father was going to be passing through Philly for a few days, and was debating between travel dates, when I suggested that he choose the weekend that would allow him to see one of my shows, he said to me: "It's not important to me to see your show." He said I could show him pictures afterward. But I never did. Oh, I've showed him photos from other shows since then. But I never showed him photos from that one. It was not that I forgot. I made an explicit decision not to share the photos, because I felt that too much of the artistry was lost in the translation from living theatre to production still photograph. And even now, nearly a decade later, when dear friends and family who obviously cannot afford the time and expense to fly across many states, a whole continent, or even an ocean to see one of my shows, very lovingly and enthusiastically request that I post photos, I feel a hint of gloom and hear my father saying that again. Isn't it silly how things like that stick with us for so long?

But it did teach me something: I hadn't realized until then how strongly I felt about the difference between the power of a costume in a performance, and the power of a costume in a production photo. I had only felt it on an instinctive level before then, but I didn't consciously think of it in that way until I was in a situation where I actually made a choice to not share photos of my work because I felt that doing so in that case compromised the artistic integrity of my art. And so, this is my point, my punchline, if you will: That instance, dear friends, was when I realized I was actually beginning to identify myself as an artist. Doesn't it sound deliciously snobbish of me?

Okay, this is way too much thinking for this time in the morning. I have to go distress the heck out of some gorgeous bridal gowns.

As for the requests for production still photos: I'll wait until I see the ones taken by our professional photographer. If there are any that I feel give some hint of the vitality of the costumes in action on the living performers, without sacrificing too much artistic integrity, I might post them. Or I might just be a snobbish artist and hide them away from the world.

We did it our way.

One year ago today, Bryce and I exchanged new rings and renewed our vows of love and marriage. There were no witnesses. There was no recording. There was no documentation. It is a record that exists only in our ever-fading memories, and, I want to believe, in the history that hangs forever imprinted in the air around the space that it occupied only for the instant of its occurrence... and in a calendar entry set to annual repeat that states simply: "Exchanged new rings and renewed vows 2010." I did not tell this story here a year ago, because time passed so quickly, as days became weeks, and weeks became months, and I did not want to share it so ex-post-facto. I did tell a few friends about it verbally, and fortunately I had e-mailed some details to my wonderful friend Sarah L, so some of the text that you see here is from that e-mail - details that would have been lost if she had not so thoughtfully asked me how I had spent the weekend. My memory is terrible, and without photographs and the written word, much of my memories are lost so far into the back reaches of my brain that I don't think they will ever be recalled.

And so I tell you the story today, on the one-year anniversary of that fuzzily-remembered night.

In the year or so leading up to our 10-year wedding anniversary, before I threw my hands up in disgust and yelled something like "Fine! If we're going to do anything for our anniversary, you're going to plan all of it! AND IT BETTER BE GOOD," I had verbally mused at length all about my daydreams about renewing our vows, hopefully while wearing an outfit that included the skirt that used to be part of my simple, homemade wedding dress, and that I hoped we would get a replacement ring for him (since he lost his around year five) and a complementary diamond engagement ring for me (since what we could afford when we were 21 years old and dumb, stupid, and in love was a small band embedded with tiny diamonds - pretty, but not something that said "Hi! I'm married/engaged! No, really, look, it's a diamond!").

Well, our 10-year anniversary on May 20th, 2010 came and went, and it turned out to be a lovely weekend, but the vow renewal ceremony that I had hoped for (such as one done while skydiving, or perhaps officiated by an actor or friend in a Starfleet Uniform, or in a totally cheesy Elvis-impersonator style in Las Vegas) hadn't happened, and new rings had not been purchased. But fast-forward a few months, and rings eventually were selected and purchased. That is a long and boring and rather frustrating story, so I won't go into it. Holy moly, the cost of diamonds and white gold has gone way up since we were in college.

Fast-forward a couple more months, and ultimately, what happened was this: We did something really special, and - though it makes my stomach turn a little when I say it - romantic. One night, after Bryce made dinner (some wonderful spaghetti and brussels sprouts) and we watched the season premiere of House that we had missed on the previous Monday, we went out walking late at night, through Washington Square, and meandering around Society Hill (note to those not familiar with Philadelphia: these are lovely areas in the blocks surrounding our apartment), stopping in dimly-lit courtyards and little parks to dance to Argentine tango music coming from my iPhone in Bryce's shirt pocket. It was totally cheesy, and - gag, here it comes again - romantic. Then we made our way back up to Washington Square Park, where we paid our respects to the unknown soldier (there is a tomb of an unknown Revolutionary War soldier there, a place that is rather special to me, and where I have sentimentally told Bryce I want my ashes scattered if I die before he does). And then, in front of him (Mr. unknown soldier) and George Washington (a statue of the dude, standing behind the soldier's raised concrete coffin), in the magical stillness of that night and in the dancing shadows and light of the flame (an eternal frame burns in front of the soldier's coffin), we renewed our vows with kind words and loving compliments and funny reminiscences, and we exchanged our new rings. I don't remember all that we said, and we'll never be able to remember it because there is no record, but I know one thing I said was this: "I still choose you, Bryce, for husband. I still want to laugh with you for the rest of my life." I had said those things to him about 10 1/3 years earlier, just without the word "still." Then we danced to Ben Folds' song "The Luckiest" (which didn't exist when we were married, but which means much more to us than our selected "first dance" song), cried a bit (this had started intermittently earlier, but it reached its peak by this point), paid our respects to the soldier again and bade goodnight George, and made our way down to Eulogy (a Belgian pub, one of our favorite restaurants/bars)for beer and fries.

This all happened months later than I had wished, but it felt so right, and so magical, and so "us." We truly did it our way. One thing I have always been proud of in our relationship is that we are so adaptable and resilient, and we do things our own way. We appreciate some traditions, but we don't see them as laws. Get married when we're 21 even though most of our family just assumes it means we're pregnant? Sure, why not? Still live in the dorms our senior year, treating our room at Harvey Mudd like our bedroom and office and my room at Scripps like my design studio and kitchen? Sounds like a great adventure. Get a very belated diamond engagement ring for our 10-year anniversary and renew our vows in an impromptu, made-up-on-the-spot ceremony with no witnesses in front of a tomb of an unknown soldier? This is the stuff of dreams, the kind of thing that screenwriters wish they could imagine for their movies. We are constantly reinventing how "us" works and adapting our still-imperfect-but-constantly-evolving relationship to weather whatever comes along, whatever changes we or outside factors bring to it.

And my new diamond engagement ring (though it is now a year old, it still feels new to me) is really sparkly. I like it. Heck, I had ten years to think about the design, didn't I? Word to the wise and thrifty: A "halo" setting can make a tiny rock look much bigger than its actual size, giving you more bang for your buck. And it can be mounted in a low-profile way that keeps it from getting stuck on costumes or other projects that require working with your hands.


An awkward, blurry shot I just took of our rings. My hands are obviously not in wedding manicure form. Please ignore the dirt beneath my fingernails. Marriage is kinda like that. It's imperfect and rather grimy a lot of the time. But when you can make it work, it's so worth it.

My boys turned five years old today.

My practice babies,
my sweetpeas,
my little princes,
my bugs,
my lovebugs,
my goofballs,
my alarm clocks,
my little terrors,
my sweet-sweet-bugaboos...
whatever I feel like calling them on any given day...

They turned five years old today. We weren't in their lives when they were born to a starving, homeless feline equivalent of a teen mom (get your pets spayed and neutered, people!) that had been taken indoors by some kind people when she was about go into labor on their front porch. In fact, they were a year and a half old when we adopted them. But their first foster mom got in contact with me after their second foster mom told her that they had been adopted, so she was able to tell me their exact birthdate. And she even sent me some baby pictures!


I still think of my boys as kittens, but in fact, their cat age equates to about 36 in human years. This chart told me so. It kinda freaks me out that they're five years old already. It's a milestone that reminds me what other milestones such as 15 and 20 mean for a cat - especially for the cat's owners. I have a tendency to worry about issues like this, but long before they actually become issues. This is no exception.

But enough of that. Time for blatant displays of feline cuteness. If you keep up with me on Facebook, you've probably already seen most of these, along with some of the accompanying captions that I lazily borrowed.

Etienne, the more cuddly of the twins, has a tendency to lounge upon us.





And next to us.


And on kegerators.

But I would totally take a nap on the kegerator if I could fit up there.

And also to stand on us.

Bryce is the one who most often finds himself having fallen victim to a cat suddenly landing his head, neck, or shoulders if he leans over. I call this dad-surfing.

Etienne is also immediately drawn to anything that would be likely to make an appearance in a gay pride parade.


Marcello keeps his distance somewhat more than Etienne, and he isn't as keen on posing for photos, but he still cracks me up.

I can still see you, Marcello. You're not fooling anyone, little man.

He does seem to have an odd thing for umbrellas.

"I, Marcello, claim this busted umbrella as my own, and name it the Isle of Marcello. All who approach these shores must pay homage to me."


They're so not supposed to be on this counter, but I can't bring myself to keep them from it when they're simply enjoying the warmth rising up into the counter when the dishwasher is on the heat-dry cycle.

Happy 5th/36th birthday, my little princes. Long may you bask in the warmth and love of our home.