stumbling virtue

Doubtless

 

Theodore Roosevelt settles into a canoe for a day of exploration and potential death in the rainforest.

Sometimes, life in the city can be difficult, particularly when it comes to travel. The subways will slow down to a crawl or idle between stops for no apparent reason when you're most in a hurry. On summer days, the steam rises from the paveway and the sun beats down on the shoulder-to-shoulder crowds as you trudge seemingly forever to your destination. In the winter there is ice to slip on, snow that drifts into your boots, wind that turns your umbrella inside out and leaves you exposed to the freezing rain, and bone chilling temperatures as you walk from place to place. At times like these, I could remind myself how hard it used to be to get anywhere, especially for those intrepid explorers of the 19th and early 20th century--who braved the unknown wilds of Africa and South America in order to fill in the blank spaces on the world map or answer questions about the nature. They endured blistering heat in the jungle, freezing winds in the mountains, or constant rain. They came close to starvation, fought illness and injury with few medical supplies. They wore bad shoes and clothes that were either stifling or inadequately thin. They dealt with a variety of insects that would make an entymologist consider another profession. They never knew what might lie ahead--predators, unfriendly natives, unpassable mountains, or steep rapids.

Yet...I also wouldn't plan my expedition into the unknown with a low amount of provisions because I expected to be able to hunt, fish, or trade for food. I wouldn't insist on traveling like a pasha, building a slow fury with my porters. I'd find out more about the men I brought to work with me. I wouldn't take foolish risks, such as ignoring my guide's instructions or trying to do things that I knew would get me injured. I'd leave the fine olive oil and mustard at home in favor of more practical food. The truth is, if you read enough stories about those brave explorers and the trials they endured, you'll inevitably find that some of those trials were brought on themselves through arrogance or sheer stupidity.

That is certainly the case in Candice Millard's River of Doubt, the story of Theodore Roosevelt's 1914 descent of the Rio da Duvida (River of Doubt) in the Amazonian jungle. As you read about the preparations for the journey, the mistakes pile up so thickly that even the participants seemed to be aware of them. But trapped in their own pride, determined to follow through on their announcement, and risk their lives for a piece of geographical immortality, they proceeded.

Strike Three

 

The man was kneeling in front of the boy so he could be face to face and nod sympathetically as the kid, still in full Little League uniform cried his heart out. I tried to walk by quickly, not wanting to intrude on the scene that was taking place in a dark corner of the park, no doubt chosen so the embarrassment of the tears could be hidden from the other players who were still out on the park's ballfields. As I passed, though, I heard the man say, "You know, if you strike out seven out of every ten at bats, you're in the Hall of Fame."

This line, said to distraught kids for decades now, is meant to illustrate the difficulty of baseball, a game perceived as so impossible that failure is acceptable, and much more common than success. The legendary hitter has likely made more outs than hit home runs; the pitcher who passes the 300 win mark of immortality has also probably lost 200 games. In most jobs, that kind of failure rate will get you fired, but in baseball it means that you're better than almost anyone else in your profession.

The only place in baseball, though, where failure is not tolerated and perfection is expected is the umpiring of each game. As Bruce Weber points out in his book As They See 'Em: A Fan's Travels in the Land of Umpires, the only time umpires really are noticed is when they fail; the dozens of tiny perfections in every game go unnoticed.

Curtain Down

 

And after all that, the show closed. Yes, a great production with great reviews and happy audiences, done after only four performances. Not only was there the problem of a sick lead actor, but also a copyright dispute that ended ugly  between the producer and director. I can't really detail here as who knows who may find these things, but let's just say it all came to a crashing, unhappy, and sudden end. So now I'm unexpectedly not in anything, and to be honest, I feel a bit lost. Okay, a lot lost.

Champagne Wishes

 

One summer while I was in college, I realized I wasn't making enough money with my temp job in an office, so I took a second job working nights and weekends for a catering company. They did off-premise catering, meaning that we brought everything to a person's home (or considering the area they worked in, estate), or party space, etc. One of the very first parties I worked at was at the, well, estate of one of the wealthiest families in a very exclusive town. The poolhouse was as big as the homes of some people I knew. The event was a fundraiser for some charity the family supported and it ran late. After the guests left, I trudged around busing the tables, picking up glasses and empty bottles. Then I noticed the woman of the house walking across the terrace where I was clearning up. She stopped and picked up one of the half-empty bottles of champagne that were scattered around the tables, and poured the remainder into a glass. She saw me watching, and smiled and said, "Never waste good Veuve Clicquot," then walked back into the house.

This made a serious impression on me. It seemed like a very sophisticated thing to say--just being able to pronounce a champagne's name certainly said something about a person's upbringing and social status. I vowed from then on that if I ever had anything to celebrate, I would make sure Veuve Clicquot was served, and I would absolutely make sure it was never wasted.

Of course I didn't know anything about Veuve Clicquot (or even champagne), including that the "veuve" in the title meant "widow" and that the champagne's history included an actual Widow Clicquot, who helped turn a small winemaking business at the beginning of the 19th century into one of the more revered names in the business. I learned this, and more, after reading Tilar Mazzeo's The Widow Clicquot: The Story of a Champagne Empire and the Woman Who Ruled It.

Comedy/Tragedy

 

Our laughter needs medicine.

So the play opened, we've had solid, enthusiastic audiences, and good reviews. Now the lead actor is sick and has had to leave the show...with two more weeks of performances scheduled. We're deciding what we'll do tonight.

Sigh.

We try to do comedy and we get drama anyway.

Disappearing Act

 

Percy Fawcett, last of the intrepid Victorian explorers.

It seems like it should be hard to get lost these days. People carry cell phones to stay in contact. Cars have GPS units. You can map out your route in advance on Google maps. Pets are microchipped.

But people, animals, and things do get lost, or they disappear, never to be seen again, and when that happens, it's devastating. When someone dies or something is destroyed, it's over; when a person, or a pet disappears, you are always haunted by the possibility that they might return. And as long as there's that possibility, it's impossible to move on. When something is lost, everyone attached to the lost is also lost in some way, with those left behind doomed to fall down a rabbit hole forever, unsure of where, when or how it will end.

David Grann's The Lost City of Z is about three lost people who have captured the imagination of many others: Percy Fawcett, last of the intrepid 19th century British explorers, Fawcett's son Jack, and his friend Raleigh Rimmel. In 1925, the trio set off on a highly publicized expedition into the Brazilian jungle in search of El Dorado, the city of Gold that Fawcett called "Z," and never returned. Since then, there has been a veritable cottage industry of people who descend into the jungle trying to find out what happened to Fawcett, and some of them has been lost as well. Just as Fawcett was obsessed with finding Z, so have many others been obsessed with finding Fawcett, so much that members of the Royal Geographic Society, which Fawcett belonged to, sigh and roll their eyes when another person shows up to search their archives, determined to find the clue that has eluded all the others and can lead them to find the fate of the Fawcett party. One librarian Grann talks to hints that many of the Fawcettians are more than a little bit crazy.

Laughter/Medicine

 

Last night was opening night. In the middle of act two, I checked the time and was astonished to see that we were running much later than we had in rehearsal. We tried to figure out what it was, because there hadn't been any major hitches or problems. Then we realized that the show had slowed down because the audience was laughing to often and so long, which is the very best reason to run late you can ask for. It's strange, after rehearsing for so long without an audience, you almost forget that there are going to be people out there who are actually responding to everything you do. Now all we have to do is hope word of mouth spreads and we get more good houses, just like last night. My only regret is that I have such a small part and therefore am such a tiny part of the fun. Sigh. I know. I'm a very bad person for thinking that. Note to self: enjoy everyone else's sucess or whatever. And make sure you kill in your five minutes onstage.

Meltdown

The refrigerator died today.

This called for emergency cookie baking to use up the butter and eggs.

Now I have a double-ton of cookies. I may have to stand on a street corner and hand them out to bewildered passersby.

Money

 

Wheelbarrows, the hot fashion accessory in Weimar Germany for carrying around all that worthless currency.

In the last six months or so, as the worldwide economy has gone through its whirlwind of confusion and doubt, many people have sought to make comparisons between this fall and the Great Depression. As someone who has spent a lot of time reading about the 1930s, I can tell you that the resemblance isn't that close. The movies were a lot better back then.

While reading Liaquat Ahamed's Lords of Finance, though, it is hard not to see some similarity in circumstances that led to both downturns--too easy credit and a bull market that was perhaps too strong to control, for starters--although this one is nowhere near as severe as the one seventy years ago. And if I, one of the world's supreme economic dolts, can understand those things while reading Mr. Ahamed's book, then he is a miracle worker of the first order.

Alas, I Knew Him

 

My co-star Frank.

There was a night in early April when I sat on the train on my way home from rehearsal, fuming to myself, "I can't WAIT to be in a play where I'm just an actor." I was sick of everyone's complaints and questions about the script, and being AD wasn't what I had hoped to be. I was tired of the responsibility. Now, though, I've moved onto a play where I am just acting, and it feels sad and empty in some ways. I guess I liked mattering for once.

Despite some rocky days, I guess there aren't many tests of theater like putting on a production of Hamlet. It's something to be proud of, I suppose. After all, how many times do you get an opportunity to be Shakespeare's co-writer/editor? I enjoyed working with you, Will.

On that last night, you always promise to keep in contact with everyone, but it rarely happens. However, I did get to keep Frank, the skull who played Yorick. Frank told everyone who would listen (and those hardy souls were few and far between) that he had once acted in a production of Hamlet with David Garrick in the 18th century. He said he played Laertes and had more fans than Garrick. Sure, Frank, whatever you say. Maybe that's the course of Shakespeare. You start out playing Hamlet or Laertes or someone like that, then you play Lear or Prospero, and then end up playing Yorick. Alas indeed.

On to Moliere now. Wish us luck.

 

Frank seemed lonely, so Bear joined him. The blur is from Frank trying to push himself centerstage.