Road to Orlando: Dress Rehearsal

11-15-13

 

So, the Orlando Adventure continues.

We have had our monthly workshops, photo shoot, and this last weekend—our final dress rehearsal.

We went through our material for each different competition (which for me are TV Commercial, Monologue, Cold Read, Creative Runway, Photography, and Singing), and also got our final tidbits of information from our coaches. 

We got to practice mock interviews and callback decorum.  I really paid attention to detail and figured out that I will be going to mock interviews and callbacks for three different groups of people: casting directors for TV/movies; agents for modeling; and theatre and music people for singing.  So, I am working on picking out the pertinent info about myself for each category, so that I can individualize each interview and maximize my marketability for each one.

I got to do runway walking with the Fashion girls! This was a big deal because I am not a Fashion Girl.  I am a Commercial Girl.  I technically can fit into the Female Fashion Plus category (praise God for good hip measurements), but then everything I do at the showcase would be scored or looked at in comparison to the rest of the Fashion Plus Girls, many of which are about a size 9.  So my official category is Female Commercial, but I picked each competition very strategically.  I wanted a chance to walk the runway, so I chose Creative Runway.  All my acting will give me exposure in that area, plus I get to sing.  I did the Photography Competition because I know I photograph well, and have been taking pictures since I was 14.

So when I got to walk with the Fashion Girls, our Fashion Director man said, “Gilda, you need to learn how to do this, in case you get picked up by some of those Plus Agents.”  I felt pretty special getting to mix in with them!  And I feel very ready to meet any and all of those Plus Agents who may be wanting me to do some print or commercial work for them. 

Many people have asked me, “So what do you hope to gain out of all this?”

Well, honestly, I get kind of overwhelmed when I think of the possibilities. 

One of my goals is to land a TV or movie role.  I would also like to be some sort of spokeswoman, so I can use my English and Spanish.

Now, I know Orlando may not turn into some Overnight Success thing for me.  It might.  But if it doesn’t, it is the beginning of a series of stepping stones for me.

And I am ready and willing to climb the ladder. 

My Orlando To-Do List is slowly shrinking.  I am now working on minute details, like planning for and budgeting for car parking at airports, food and incidentals, and securing a fantastic makeover on my iPod Nano for the trip.  J  I also still have to complete my Creative Runway outfit, and find some jewelry for my singing outfit.  And, of course, I must continue to run through my monologue, song, and TV commercial, as well as have backups ready in case agents ask me to pull another out of sleeve.

And, I am trying desperately to find the discipline to exercise daily, instead of sporadically, and keep up with my writing and reading.

I am so ready to get on that plane and start what will hopefully be an exciting new phase of my life!

Earth Wanderer

11-15-2013

I grew up on the road, kind of.  My parents worked for a big-name agriculture company out West, and we followed the harvest.  During the summers and fall, we were in Salinas, California; winters and springs were in Yuma, Arizona.  The drive time between the two cities is somewhere between 8 and 11 hours.

I learned to be a very calm road-trippin’ child.  Packing up the car every season became a familiar ritual.

I remember staring out the window a lot.  I used to play a game with the rain drops on the windows, watching them to see which one would “win the race” to the bottom of the window.  I read every road sign: those about mileage, tourist traps, construction zones, speed limits – all of them. 

I memorized the places we stopped along the way, our familiar “rest areas”; the Mcdonald’s just outside L.A., that giant tree somewhere near Paso Robles, nestled amidst the rolling hills of what must be equivalent to prairies out West.

I drank in scenery from all of our family drives: the rows of lettuce fields on the way out to my dad’s “office”, the city parks, the trees along the freeway.  My favorites were the drives up to Monterey, Watsonville, Castroville, and Santa Cruz.  I now know these drives were essentially out to and up the California coast. 

In California, I learned to love the ocean.  I learned to recognize the feeling of the almost-too-cool breeze up on the rocks.  I memorized what the sun felt like beating down on my bare skin on warm days down in the sand. 

In Arizona, I learned to watch sunsets.  I became familiar with people of all different skin tones and cultures.  I was accustomed to hearing at least two languages everywhere I went, sometimes sprinkled with some Korean or some Middle-Eastern dialect. 

The music and food I grew up with were reflective of the cultural whirlpool I grew up in. 

I always used to hear my mother say she was “ready to go somewhere exciting” or “wanting to see something different”. 

I was used to being on the move, and to being around different kinds of people and culture.

I think this was how my peculiar sense of wanderlust started.  It started very small, very innocently, and then it grew.

It turned into wanting to be in Times Square, waving up at the TRL studios, instead of watching MTV from the living room television.

It turned into wishing with all my being to be out on the dude ranch with Mary-Kate and Ashley, and then go with them to see Paris.  And then London, and then Rome, and then Australia.

I even opted for books that were set in different places.  I loved the “Drina the Ballerina” series, and being a part of tea time or the metro rides in London.  I traveled to Stoneybrook, Connecticut (a fictional city) and sometimes New York with my friends in The Babysitter’s Club.

In the spring of 7^th grade, when we went back to California as a family for the first time in 4 and a half years, I held on with every heartstring to the reliving of my childhood travels.

In high school, I got to travel all over Arizona and Southern California for my athletic competitions.  The hours on the bus?  Bliss.

And then, I moved halfway across the country for college, and have traveled around the Midwest for my track and field career out here. 

I have traveled to Bolivia and Grenada for volunteer trips, neither one of them long enough, each time falling in love with the native people and connecting with my soul in a way I did not know to be possible.

I don’t think this really boils down to never being happy with where I’m at.  I think some sort of a gypsy soul or spirit was instilled in me a long time ago. 

Today, my love of travel and culture largely encompasses my being.  I have travel plans, wishes, hopes, and dreams.  They are not really tourist destinations, so much as places I want to go to connect with people who carry within them a part of humanity’s history.  I long to breathe the air my ancestors have breathed, and experience the emotions of trial and triumphs from before my time.  I am a lifelong learner, and a lover of all that is human.  I want to understand the connection that Earth has had with its inhabitants over the centuries. 

Some people are content never stepping beyond their front porch.  Not me.

“And miles to go before I sleep; and miles to go before I sleep.” –Robert Frost

Road to Orlando: Part Three – Dressing The Part

Road to Orlando: Part Three – Dressing The Part

 

 The end of October/beginning of November have been spent getting ready for my big dress rehearsal: the final selection of my competitions was last week; the final workshop for Orlando, this coming weekend.  It is a two-day event, and all of our outfits for all of our competitions have to be finalized.  So since last week, I’ve been doing a little more scrambling for clothes.

The clothing requirements for the showcase are very specific, because everything is geared for the agents to be focusing on the talent/model, and not on the wardrobe.  All of my acting categories require khaki pants and polo shirts, neither of which I previously owned.

These clothing requirements have been in the back of my head since August Orientation, but I hadn’t devoted the energy to shopping for them yet, or rather, I was preoccupied with the monthly assignments for the different workshops.

But last Wednesday, the day before Halloween, I went to Goodwill. 

And there I found 4 cotton polo shirts (men’s size J ) , a pair of khaki pants, and a denim skirt (for the photography competition runway).  The denim skirt I wasn’t crazy about; I knew that I would probably need to get it altered before December, but it would do for Final Workshop.

Three days later, I returned to TACOL, the thrift store in Lindsborg.

There I found a second – BETTER – pair of khakis.  These are in a “long” length for tall girls like me! The Goodwill pair is now my backup. 

I also at some point during the week realized that I would need “interview” clothes, and overall some nicer stuff to be wearing all week in Orlando, as I will be staying on the resort with the agents and casting directors, in the same building with them at all times.  I also need to look presentable every time I’m down in the ballroom as an observer for any of the competitions I am not in.

So, luckily (actually, by the grace of God), I found several tops at TACOL that I deem Orlando-worthy.  J

Today, just today! – I got a second denim skirt – one that fits much better, and will not need alterations.  It is perfect, and I bought it from a lady here in Salina, whom I found on a local Buy-Sell-Trade page on Facebook.  It was 5 dollars.  Perfect.

I can’t help but be utterly grateful for the fact that I am a hippie.  I love thrift-shopping not just because of the lower costs, which for a Human Services worker like me, are AWESOME! – but I love thrift-shopping because it encourages us to use the plethora of things already in existence, instead of contributing to the energy costs and usage that are needed in order to make NEW stuff.  In the last several years, my eyes have been opened to the gross unfairness in the way people across the world live in comparison to us here in America, and I’ve been redefining my parameters for “acceptable” and “necessary”.  Shopping second-hand makes me proud, because it reminds me of my resourcefulness and my refusal to give in to societal pressures that demand that I purchase more, more more.
I will look amazing in Orlando, in mostly second- or third-hand clothing.  I will walk that runway in a dress my sister mailed me from Arizona, a hand-me down from one of her sorority sisters.  I took pictures in clearance-priced and thrift store finds, things no one else wanted.  Well, I thank those people who passed these pieces by.  I will be wearing them as I audition for and receive my first TV or movie roles.

It’s been such a journey and a test of my creativity and resourcefulness to find the clothing I need for Orlando.

I tried to stress, but all the necessary clothing was provided for me, if only I was creative enough to think outside the box and think about where to get it.

I will definitely post some pictures later on.  J

Road to Orlando: Part Two – Pushing Through and Smiling Pretty

November 6, 2013

 

Well, I wanted to write more about Orlando.  If you don’t know, I auditioned and have been selected to perform in a national talent showcase in December.  I will perform a monologue, sing a song, film a TV commercial, walk a fashion runway, and present my photographs to agents, casting directors, and producers from all over the country. 

I’ve written about the initial audition, and I’ve written about our first two workshops, which were in August and September.

October was photo-shoot month.  I spent from September 22^nd thru October 20^th putting together my outfits for my pictures.  I did procrastinate a little bit.  I don’t have a lot of really nice clothes, so this was challenging.  I was to have 3 “looks” ready; this quickly turned into emptying my entire closet, trying things on weeks ahead of time, and panicking. 

I didn’t need to panic, because, as everything else for this event so far, the clothes came to me.

Back this summer, I was browsing through clearance racks at a department store and found a couple of beautiful tops for like 2 dollars each.  They were out of season (fall wear), but I bought them anyway.  I didn’t know when I would wear them, or if they would be completely comfortable.  I ended up wearing both of these for my photo shoot. 

I was very fortunate that my friend Jodi emptied her closet for me back at the beginning of August.  The forest-green peacoat that she gave me was in the pile to go the photo-shoot.  (We were assigned to bring with us 6 possible outfits from which to choose our final three).

Also sometime in August, I made a stop at my favorite thrift store, TACOL, in Lindsborg, Kansas.  I found a really pretty top, also out of season, that I knew would look good on me.  It ended up that my photographer said, “This one; definitely this one; I love this color.”

I already had the skirt, tights, and jeans that I wore as bottoms for the shoot.

Still, it came down to the night before my photo shoot, and I still didn’t really have things paired and selected yet; I just had this giant pile of clothes that I knew were “appropriate”.  So, who do I call over, but my friend Maggie?? She lives down the street and sat in my room for 2 hours watching me try on clothes and telling me what looked good and what didn’t (I donated that Christmas-tree-green, sequined, crocheted sweater). 

The trip to KS City for the shoot was smooth.  The only thing that bothered me was that I think I over-conditioned my hair that week, in an attempt to make it smooth for the pictures, and it ended up being too heavy I think and really stubborn against holding curl.  But, I hope I made it work.

I won’t get my pictures until after December 1^st, or as soon as I finish paying off my tuition for the showcase.  The staff will select my two best pictures to display at the showcase in Orlando, while I walk the runway and introduce myself to everyone in the audience. 

After the photo shoot, I’ll admit I didn’t think too much about Orlando for about 5 days or so, and then it was time to dive right back in.  I was pretty exhausted after the photo shoot; it seemed like a lot of time, effort, and stress went into making the photo shoot happen. ( I also spoke at a women’s retreat the day before the photo shoot, so I had been preparing my speech for that at the same time as prepping for the photo shoot.)

The rest of October was spent getting money together for my Orlando payment, keeping the rest of my life in order, including keeping up with work and my other finances, and trying to get back into some form of a workout schedule.

Plus, it’s been the beginning of cold and flu season, so I think my body’s been fighting illness since the beginning of October.  I’ve been trying to use affirmations like, “I am strong, I am healthy, and I am fine” in order to convince my brain that my body is not sick.  It works for the most part.

Last week and the week before was when I was teetering on feeling feverish and achey.  But I nipped it in the bud by chugging gallons of orange juice and going to bed at 9:30 pm for a few nights.

Orlando or bust!! 

"Gilda"

3 Nov 2013

 

Gilda means “God’s servant”.

I learned this in high school, in my freshmen Morality class (I went to Catholic high school), although now I can’t remember what language that meaning has its origin in (I think it’s Gaelic).

Looking back now, I know it was divinely appointed for me to learn the meaning of my name at this specific time of my life.  Think about it: the beginning of high school is when our independent identities start to set in; yes, it’s when we start rebelling against our parents, and talking back a little more than usual, but really, it’s because our adult personalities are starting to form.  At 14 or 15, we are old enough to start forming our own opinions, and pay attention to the world around us; we are no longer “kids”, both in our own minds and in the minds of those who start giving us more responsibility and holding us accountable for our choices.

So for me to learn, even if on the most superficial of levels, that I was made to serve God, changed everything.

 I say this now, without even having thought about it before! I think this knowledge, of what my name means, in one of probably hundreds of interpretations, subconsciously set me up for life.

I carried that label with me proudly for a couple of weeks after learning about it.  And then, I think it just settled into my soul.

My high school had a community service requirement worked into the curriculum; each student had to complete a certain amount of community service hours during each school year, or by graduation.  I threw myself into that.  I spent my Spring Breaks working the Knights of Columbus food booth at the county fair; over the summers I found festivals to work at, and over winter break, I decorated churches for Christmas.  I know I exceeded the requirement my school set forth.

But I know I struggled with wanting to “serve the most” and “be recognized for all the hours I put in”.  I know now that I was a very insecure teenager, and wanted desperately to be admired for something, anything.

 

I know now that back then, even though I was serving because it was what I was supposed to do (for God and people), I wasn’t serving because I wanted to hear God say, “Well done.”

 

I wanted to hear people say it.

 

And even though I am so grateful that I spent my teenage years looking for ways to help other people, instead of dozens of negative activities I could have taken part in; even though I now see how I spent my teens practicing for my adult life, for the time I spend now in the service of others; even though I love that at the age of 14, I had already decided that I loved to help, and that I loved people;  I know I still struggle with this recognition thing today.

 Lately, I’ve been bothered by the fact that I “haven’t found a place to serve in the church.”  I think it’s a mixture of pressure from the Christian society (to find my “ministry”), and pressure from myself to “be a leader”. 

 I’m learning that this is split-thinking. 

I can’t be a servant if I want to be a leader.

I’m reading through “The Purpose-Driven Life” right now with a friend, and the last few days’ chapters have been about serving, and how it is part of our design.  It’s been really eye-opening, and at times, nauseating, because it’s been shedding light on the parts of myself that are really ugly and that I don’t want to see.

 

I have learned that I am petty and competitive and that I compare my service to that of others.  I have learned that I am panicky and envious and that I “want to be seen” and “want to be associated with” and “want to be known for” serving in a certain setting.

 I want to hold on to the memory of learning what my name means as a high school freshman, and use that knowledge correctly now, for the first time ever.  I know I have always had the right intentions, so I will try not to beat myself up too much. 

 
But from now on, I want to enter into true servanthood. 

 

Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child

October 30, 2013 
This month, my mother celebrated her 50th birthday.

I didn’t get to see her on her special day, because I live halfway across the country, and don’t have the resources or the time off work to be able to go home to Arizona this calendar year.  My sister wants to plan something big to celebrate my mom’s birthday later on, perhaps next summer, when we can all be together.
My mother lives at home with our youngest sister, who is 9.  Sometimes I wonder if my mother gets lonely.  She tells me stories of how my little sister says, “When I grow up, Mommy, I will never leave you.”

That makes me feel guilty sometimes.  I have been away from home for 7 years now, and three years ago when I graduated from college, my mother was ready for me to move back.

I, however, was not.

Most people are in a hurry to move back home; they sense a piece of themselves is always missing until they are back in the familiarity of their hometown.  I did not turn out that way.  I have actually found myself by moving away, and the staying away part was never a question, really.  I never had any desire to move back home.

Part of that had to do with the not-so-fuzzy relationship I had/have with my mother.  My mother is a very complicated, broken person.  Over the years she has manipulated, emotionally abused, and done her best to try to break me as well.  A couple of times she has really succeeded.

But, today isn’t to write about the brokenness; I will save that for another time.

Today is to celebrate the beauty within the brokenness.

You see, I’ve been learning a lot about gratitude and abundance over the past year.  I have been learning how to give thanks for the ugly, the seemingly mundane, and the broken.

So I’ve challenged myself to think through the broken pieces of my relationship with my mother, and to identify glimpses of hope within them.

Even though my mother may not have been the best example to me or the best friend I ever had, and even though I still resent that sometimes, I know there are a few things she taught me that are apparent in my character today.  Most seem like small, trivial things, but they make me smile, and they make me thankful, and that's the whole point.

1) My handwriting.  I always get compliments on my handwriting and how neat it is.  This always takes me back to my schoolgirl days when my mother would compare my handwriting to hers (and almost admire mine).  She would spend lots of time practicing cursive with me, back in the day.
2) My driving.  My mother was the one who played Teacher in most of my lessons. Or, she was in the passenger's seat while I was behind the wheel.  During the time that I was learning to drive, she was pregnant with my youngest sister, and the baby doctor she went to was in California, an hour away.  I drove her to many of those appointments, and although she was very critical and overly explanatory of each detail that she felt I needed to learn, I know that my driving skills are results of listening to those details and the hours of practice she gave me.  I also really, strangely, LOVE to drive long distances.  Tell me I get to drive for 6 hours and I jump with excitement.  In college, it was never a question of who would be the designated driver--whether there was alcohol involved or not--because everyone knew my obsession with driving.  The long-distance driving thing comes from my mom; she basically learned to drive by following my dad on the freeway between Yuma, AZ and Salinas, CA every season for work.
3)Doing Laundry.  Now, I know this one sounds sillier than the rest.  But from my mother I learned how to wash whites in order to get them radiant!Also, given a choice, I would rather hang clothes on a clothesline outside than use a dryer--another little quirk from my mother.
4)Housecleaning.  My mother is a BEAST when it comes to housecleaning.  She hates clutter, and takes pride in how well she can clean.  We're talking scrubbing tubs and toilets and mopping floors. And ripping blinds down and sticking them in the tub to clean with a broom and soap and water. Not only am I now good at it all, I LOVE to do it.  I've got to say, this one definitely comes in handy.

Even though they are small things, and as I look through them, seem almost like little obsessive quirks or complexes, they are my memories and my traits.  Perhaps I created these habits in myself, because I was so desperate to have something in common with my mother, to feel like she had taught me or nurtured me in some way, that I convinced myself to develop them.  That is a topic for further personal exploration.

For now, I see them as gems of humorous wisdom from my mother's 50 years of life.

Maybe in the next 50 years, I will find more.

*also, the title of this post is in reference to an old song title*

Aluminum Cans

10-11-13

I saw him walk up with his bike and lean it against the wall.  I wondered what he was doing, hoping his bike wouldn’t get stolen while he went into the grocery store.  I was on my way out of the grocery store parking lot.

Then I saw him lift the lid on the trash can.  Then I saw the small plastic grocery bag in his hand, already full of aluminum cans. 

Immediately, my heart moved with compassion.  I thought to myself, “Here I go home, with my 8-dollar salad, and this man is collecting a day’s worth of cans to scrap together some change.”

I made the left turn I was waiting for and headed out of the parking lot.  Then I remembered it: the giant Hefty trash bag full of aluminum cans, sitting in my backseat, in my peripheral vision, placed strategically so I wouldn’t forget to take them to the recycling center tomorrow morning.

And I felt it, that familiar, still, small voice, in the back of my head yet oh, so clear:

“Give them to him.”

How quick my brain was to make excuses!  “But I have such a big bag of them, I wonder if he could even manage it on his bicycle.” 

“There’s plastic bottles mixed in with the cans; he won’t want those.”

In about 3 seconds, I found the solution: pull into that empty gravel parking lot, pop the trunk of my car, fish the plastic bottles out, and leave only the cans in the bag.  In the next 2 seconds, I was doing it.

I pictured him putting his small plastic sack inside this big, strong, heavy duty trash bag, half-filled with cans….money. 

I placed the white bag up front with me, and drove back to the grocery store parking lot, expecting to still find him at the same trash can.  He wasn’t there, so I drove in a circle to find him.  I tried to think logically about which direction he may have gone in.  I couldn’t see him, so I stopped and asked the Knights of Columbus representative, who was standing outside the grocery store door collecting change for his cause, if he had seen which way the man had gone. 

“Sorry, no, I didn’t.”

I jumped back in my car and continued to drive slowly the length of the parking lot, and then I saw him through the cars! He was at the end of the parking lot, turning north, heading to the two large dumpsters sitting behind the back doors to a bunch of stores in the little shopping plaza. 

The street and the area behind those stores were completely empty.  No cars, no people.  Only open space and two dumpsters.

I pulled my car into those empty parking spaces and turned South to walk to him.  He was poking his head into the first of the dumpsters when I got to him.

“Sir?”

He turned around.

“I want you to have these.”

“Oh, are these from that liquor store over there?”  (Thinking I was an employee handing him our throwaways, I assume)

“No, I had them in my car.”

“Oh, and you just passed me? Thank you…”

“I was just going to recycle them, but I want you to have them.”

(Laughs, a chuckling laugh, like Santa Claus)

“Well, that’s mighty nice of you, thank you!”

It was like he’d won the lottery.

I walked back to my car, got in, and smiled to myself.  I gave thanks for my open eyes, and for my open heart.  I thought how divinely arranged it all was: the fact that my cat ran out of food just this morning, forcing me to stop at this very grocery store on my way home from work; the fact that I had gathered these cans at F’s house in Ellsworth this week, and he had them all sorted and ready for me to take today; the fact that the recycling center in Ellsworth was already closed, forcing me to bring them to Salina to recycle; the fact that I took a brand-new trash bag from F to bring them in, something I normally wouldn’t have done. 

All for that Santa Claus laugh.