Back in the saddle (yet) again

Hey, I'm back! Didja miss me?

I must say, the past couple of months have been some of the most exhausting, tumultuous, often-frustrating, but ultimately rewarding times I have ever known--and I've known some tumultuous times in my time, let me tell you. To recap, here's what I've been up to:

• For the first time in years, I acted in a play. I played multiple supporting roles in a production of Paul Rudnick's The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told, including this one absolutely killer character, a disabled lesbian rabbi in a wheelchair who's the star of her own cable-access talk show, kind of a lesbian version of Dr. Laura. Community theatre, I have found from past experience, has this tendency to completely take over your life--and so that happened with this production. But that doesn't mean I didn't have the time of my life! Plus you would not believe the terrific upper-body workout I got from pushing myself around in that wheelchair!
• The same weekend as the play, I had a major speaking role in my church's annual Lesbian / Gay / Bisexual / Transgender Pride service. I was originally scheduled to be the major planner in charge of the service, but fortunately I was able to delegate that out. But I was still tapped to lead this one liturgy I wrote specifically for the service, and it turned into a really beautiful thing.
• Just last weekend, I rode herd on our church's contingent in San Diego's Pride Parade (yes, San Diego does their Pride celebration a month later than everyone else--I'm not totally sure why but I think it's to not conflict with the major Pride celebrations up in LA, Long Beach, and etc.) We'd chartered a trackless trolley from a local tourist-tour outfit, and then festooned it with banners and streamers and stuff, and then had a contingent of walkers and riders and parasol-twirlers. I am far from the first to observe that trying to organize a bunch of Unitarian Universalists is like herding cats--I luv all you folks, but damn were my nerves shot after that! But all's well that ends well, and everyone had a good time.
• Oh yeah--and somewhere about six weeks back, Mr. E, the elderly gentleman for whom I am live-in caretaker had another major health weirdness. Once again he recovered remarkably quickly, but for a couple of days in there we really thought we were gonna lose him ... and then for a week afterward we were concerned he'd need to go to skilled care. He's about 96% recovered at this point--dude has more lives than a cat. It's just me who's still reeling a little, even six weeks later.

In the midst of all this, my food admittedly got a bit random--hey, you try rehearsing for four hours straight, and then leaving rehearsal to find the only eateries still open are the 24-hour burrito joints. But even with all that, I managed to keep my weight on that same ol' plateau it's been hugging for months now. And with the physical workout from the rehearsals--not only the aforementioned wheelchair-jockeying but also an actual dance number!--I think I may actually have lost an inch or two in body measurements. In fact, I'm pretty damn sure I have--teeshirts that had previously fit snugly are now giving me some ease around the arms and bust. Yowza.

But, in some ways even more momentous than that, I found doing theatre to be a major epiphany for me. At least some of it had to do with how well my parts suited me--it felt like I completely knew how Rabbi Sharon was supposed to be from the moment I cold-read her part in auditions. But even without that, acting just felt so totally right, like something I had been meant to do all along but am only getting around to now. All those frustrated creative juices I used to pour into my preaching, and have only sporadically put to use more recently doing spoken-word, came surging up with a vengeance when I was raging on stage. I dunno what it all means, and I dunno if this was just a fluke and the next play won't be anywhere near this level of epiphany-hood, but I am determined that there will be a next play, and I will follow up to see if this is my calling for the next hunk of my life.

Comments

[Heidih]

Great to hear an update on your journey. Especially nice to hear about your epiphany moment through the theater and also to remember that without this wonderful lifestyle change you have made, the bod just would not have been up for the play. I have been trying to learn from events like this that others are experiencing and to keep myself open to those experiences in my own life.

[Rona Y]

Just wondering how your're weight-loss has been coming along. Haven't seen you around eG lately, either, so I was a bit worried!

[mizducky]

Hi Rona--That's so sweet of you to check in on me! I'm afraid I haven't been around eGullet much recently, partly out of extreme busyness, partly because whenever I do find time to look in there these days, I'm just not finding a whole lot that entices me to post. Oh well, these things happen.

Meanwhile, the busyness also signifies that I'm having a real life now, and I just am not hyper-focused on the weight management blog like I used to be. I'm going to be re-vamping my whole blog/web presence thing very shortly and try to integrate my foodie stuff into the rest of my blogging, the way I'm attempting to do with the rest of my life. So stay tuned for further developments ...