Ugh. What happened to this week? I’m pretty sure I worked Wednesday night, but what was Thursday? Oh wait, right, I worked. And then Friday? Yeah, worked the night shift… and then this morning, pretty sure I got up after six hours of sleep and went back to work. Oh, so THAT is what happened to my week. Huh.

I’m not complaining. Wait, yeah, I guess I am. I don’t mind working. It’s just… well, I won’t go over this again. After work, however, I took the train to Queens and was picked up by my Sean and Jordi to head to his show. He was, truly, onstage for only about three or four minutes, but it was actually a good time. It was “A Soldier’s Play”, I think, remade from the movie “A Soldier’s Story”. I think. Lots of strapping black men in tank tops. And some lovely acting as well. Sean then drove me home which took just about a lifetime, and now I’m here, about to fall into bed just in time to wake up for- you guessed it- work! WORKworkwork.

This seem like a really good time to buy my ticket to California.

Have I mentioned that my interview for the Peace Corps is on Tuesday?

Bedtime.

The sun- get this- the sun is actually… are you ready? SHINING! Shining, I say, and even though it is a wee bit chilly, my windows are wide open to the breeze.

I just walked in from yoga class, which I barely made after being dropped off in Midtown on our way back from the farm. Even though the weather was horff-riffic, the weekend was actually really nice. I raced out of work early to catch the 6:15 train to Wassaic, where my brother picked me up. On the way to the farmhouse, we listened to the music my mother wrote for the Pink House, with Ian telling me what was happening during each piece. The music was simpy amazing- the talent my mother possesses actually hurts my heart. To think that her blood runs through my veins. In my wildest dreams, I will be half as brilliant, create only half the magic that my mother does in a single phrase.

The sun was almost set, and the hills were verdant and soaked, and I realized as I only do when it happens, that I am content in the company of my brothers. It is one of the few times that the world perfectly rights itself. I was realizing this as we rolled through the country, thinking about my time away from them and the rest of my family if I get accepted into the Peace Corps. But Ian and Tessa have promised to visit me wherever I land, and my mother as well. I will call it the Williams Family Returns to Africa.

Strange, though. We got home, meaning drove into the heart of New York City, and I actually rolled my window down to smell my home. I love this city with a passion that I’ve never felt for anyone outside my family. I feel loyal to it, proud of it, I feel as though it is a part of us. Driving in the hell of midtown I actually missed living in the city, versus Brooklyn. Station Break- big news- my Peace Corps recruiter just called and we set up my interview for next Tuesday. Things are certainly rolling along. I’m terrifed they won’t want me, and terrified they will.

Okay, so, seriously, I know I’ve been complaining about the weather since this whole thing began but this is ridiculous. It’s the end of May, it’s raining, cold, and windy, and it’s time. It’s time to give us New Yorkers a break. This sucks, Ma Nature, and I expect you to make it up to us shortly. I want a month in the 70’s and low 80’s, no kidding around. I want June to be sunny and warm but stay away from the century mark on the thermometer. Seriously. The last two Junes, on my birthday, which for those of you who don’t know is June 26th, it has been steamy, heavy hot. I want to not sweat on my birthday. Other than in yoga class.

So in this sucky rainy day, I rode my bike. In the rain and cold. I had to ride three different places, one in Brooklyn and two in Manhattan, to pick up my reference forms from the lovely people who I chose to recommend me. My fourth stop was at the Peace Corps office on Varrick, right here in good ol New York. I chatted with the kind reception woman who seemed to think that if Africa is where I want to go, it will not be a problem. I think I will also throw in a bid for the Pacific, since there are some awfully pretty islands out there. Ideally, I want to work in forestry or agriculture, because I feel I can do EMT stuff and AIDS awareness anywhere I go, and it would be great to do triple duty. I am supposed to call next week to set up my interview, and if I pass that, there are two more hurdles: a background check, and a health exam. I am not worried in the least about either. My only health issue is my sight, and if they didn’t let people with bad eyesight in the Peace Corps I’m afraid they wouldn’t have a fraction of volunteers that they do now. Who knows, maybe in the background check they will discover some of Sean and I’s trickery when we were early teenagers… but I’m telling you, the Judson Pie incident was entirely called for. And so was the Boat incident. That’s all I’m going to say about that.

It’s not quite 9 on a Friday night, and I am debating whether to go into the city to buy a good map, or to curl up in my bed and watch The Fellowship of the Ring for the billionth time. That’s right, I’m as cool and popular as they get. Actually, I turned down plans tonight simply because I didn’t want to go out in this weather. So C’MON, ya’ll, turn the heater up on my city! Yeesh.

It’s amazing how you can live in a place for years and never see some of the most beautiful things that are a mile from your door. In the last three days, my best friend Anastasia and I have gone to Coney Island (where we rode the rides and ate ears of corn on the beach), walked the Brooklyn Bridge, explored Chinatown and Little Italy, ate dinner at a restaurant that was transplanted from Tuscany, saw live music in on the Lower East Side, and sat in a Ben and Jerry’s for two hours and talked about the our past together and apart, the present state of our disgusting government (had to throw that in there) and our futures. Anastasia found out last week that she won a Fulbright-Hayes, which will fund her research in Vanuatu and Indonesia. Years ago she thought about applying to the Peace Corps, and so is thrilled that I’m headed in the same direction. Both of us hope to be overseas by the end of the year, and she has promised to come visit me wherever I land. And if I don’t get into the Peace Corps (which is not an option as far as I am concerned, I will go visit her in Vanuatu. It would be amazing if I could do both.

I’m already starting to dream about what I could do if I get in. I could give up my apartment early, spend some serious time here with my New York family, some serious time with my California family, quit my job a month early. All good stuff. Here’s another things I’m thinking… I have $4000 in credit card debt. I also have terrible eyesight, requiring contacts and glasses and all sorts of other evil devices which might not be

readily available in the jungle. So… here in New York, certain hospitals are paying women $7000 for their eggs. I mean, the ones in our ovaries. I don’t know how much the general public knows about this procedure but a good friend of mine has done it three times and the only after effects were a fatter bank account. 7 grand would get me out of debt and more than pay for laser surgery to improve my eyeballs. My only concern would be that both procedures would be pretty taxing to get done in the same summer. But it would put me in a great place- frankly, a safer one- if I didn’t have to rely on contacts and glasses to see. I’m basically blind without them.

Just another idea I thought I’d put out there in cyber-world…

Tonight Anastasia and I were fantasizing about kicking a certain someone in the… I mean, is it illegal to simply want to kick someone where it would really hurt? I know the threat of physical hurt is illegal (assault) but what if someone makes you really, really mad, so mad that you lose hope, and you daydream about walking up to him and saying, ‘THIS IS FOR ALLOWING SNOWMOBILES IN YELLOWSTONE!!!!” SMACK! One well-placed foot. Ah, well. A girl can dream.

Christmas of 1987 might of been the worst of my life. The only thing I asked for, a bird cage, was faithfully delivered even though my mom was selling original works of art just to pay the rent. The bird cage, when I opened it, became a symbol of my life, one which was fifteen years old and filled with misery and angst born out of a terrible divorce (and, truth be told, regular fifteen-year-old unhappiness). But then I got to open one of the presents to the whole family, sent from Kent and Melissa in Iowa. I tore off the paper to find a sweet little picture frame, and inside, a picture of my first nephew Sean.

I always thought Sean Patrick would be blessed, since his namesake was (and is) my life-long hero. Every time I see him again I am astounded at his intelligence, his humor, his very Williams-ness, and mostly, how freaking cool he is. Cooler than most of us Williams could ever hope to be. And when i was all of fifteen years old, absolutely beside myself thinking my life would always be this bad, a tiny picture of my beautiful nephew made all of the difference. I ignored the rest of my presents (particularly the cage) and did nothing but stare at what was the most beautiful child I had ever seen. That picture, in some random strange way, gave me hope. I must of known the terrific man he would one day be, and somehow, even for a few minutes, everything was going to be okay.

Okay, yeah, so it’s been a ridiculously long time, but if you were living my life right now, you’d understand. To make up for it, I’m going to post the blogs I’ve written while on the road or away, most likely with typos and all. So here we go:

May 16

I’m sitting on a train with my dad and Carole, heading upstate to check out some restaurants for the rehearsal dinner. It’s been a long, strange week. The man I’ve been, well, sleeping with for seven months ha decided to call it quits. I applied to the Peace Corps. My dad has approached me with a buisiness proposition that is hard to refuse. My head is spinning.

I’m sad about the lover thing. He was barely more than that, so I am not heartbroken, but it is still… disheartening, I guess, since he was the first person I’ve spent any time with since my ex and I broke up. But it also wasn’t altogether good, so in the end, it is a really good thing that it is over. Pearls before swine, my whole romantic life has been, and at least this time I did not hang my heart out.

Peace Corps. Really excited about it. I’m already in phase 2- getting my references together, approving my backround check, narrowing down my skills and where I could best be put to use. My recruiter is a youngish-sounding man who I think is out of the office pretty often, as we have yet to connect on the phone. But it is even a good process for me, as it clarifies what it is I want to do.

The business proposition… I’ll talk about that more when I have more knowledge.

Beyond that, work, work, work. Little more in my life right now. My best friend in the whole wide world Anastasia is coming to town this week, which will be great, and she is also one who is a terrific ear when I dion’t know what to do. She’s coming at just the right time.

May 18th

So it is several days later and my long crazy week is only getting longer. Tess and i got up this morning at 5 to get me to the train on time to get me back to work in Manhattan. But the only train was a little too early and now I am sitting in University Diner (Restaurant? Who knows) typing away before my eggs benedict arrive. I have to have an expensive breakfast because you have to blow $10 here to use a credit card. Alas, I’ll have to follow it with pancakes.

I had a really lovely and way too short visit with my Dad- so many more things to talk about, so little time just the two of us. Wow. I wish I could go back to fifteen year old me and tell me that someday I would write that very sentence.

So why does it not freak me out to be away from the artistic world for over two years? Why does that feel totally okay except for when I stop and think it shouldn’t? The thing is, I can write. maybe I can even get a writing gig while over there, maybe with an online zine or something. I would be totally satisfied with that life. I think. Who am I kidding, I have no idea.

It’s a really pretty day. A woman just rode by, very slowly, with another woman on her handlebars. They both had red hair trailing down almost to the seat of the bike.

The last few days I’ve had a really hard time keeping it together. On and off, I just feel so overwhelmed and almost out of control.

Just a few thoughts before I fall into bed… yet another week of working just a little too much.

1) How is it possible that a country like ours still has the death penalty? I mean, it’s beyond horrifying, it’s absurd. In the year 2100, some hot second-in-command starship dude (preferably one that is tall and hulky and bearded and responds to the name “Number 1”) is gonna look back at poor little pathetic America who still thought they had the right to decide if a person will live or die. Considering how we treat our homeless and elderly, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. But I am.

2) Because of lovely blog reader Jill, I’ve applied to the Peace Corps. Several of my family members laughed when they heard this, but it is a true funny thing. I’m banking on it. I want to do it. I am thrilled. The application took me like five hundred hours.

3) I think it’s about time for the man I’m going to marry to show up. Just show up. I got time, I’m going into the Peace Corps for god’s sake but I really think I’ve done this solitary thing long freaking enough. I’m a great writer of letters. When I’m in the bush, we will take “a little break” since you might have to sow some more seeds here in New York, and I might have to sow some of a different kind in Zaire or Zimbabwe. But really, I think it’s time. I mean, seriously. I have so much to offer, and need so little of his time, so will the person standing next to him just tap him on the shoulder, give him a little nudge, and say, “She’s ready. It’s time.” And then he can waltz right in where I work, or tell my friends where to find him, I don’t know, call my brothers, take out an ad in the Sunday New York Times. Figure it out.

4) Birthday season officially has begun, starting with Tessa on the 9th, and Sean tomorrow, and Ian soon after, and then, well. After a year off, I do believe that Birthday Month is back on the schedule. Starting June, there will be a host of activities.

5) I’m going to sleep.

P.S. All of the typos from the last blog were a result of typing on my portable keyboard and Palm, since I can’t see the screen so well and I uploaded it directly. I find them charming, and will leave them for the world to see.

I just went to an audition for a national Tylenol commercial. I hadn’t heard from my agent since the day afer I got back from the trek, and it was nice just to get the call. The assistant who called me tokd me about the audition, and then said that they were still thinking of me, that they hadn’t forgotten me, that all the calls recently were for weird ages and minorites, but that I was still in the front of their minds and that I would be hearing from them soon. It was really nice. Work inspires work, even if it is just an audition, and I spent the morning looking at next week’s auditions.

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be in college right now. It was only ten years ago for me, but technology has gone nuts since then. We barely had the internet, and if we did, certainly never used it. I know I used email. I know my rent was $350 and that seemed like a huge luxury. Which it was. I had rooms in my apartment that I never used. I had a music room, for god’s sake, something that I haven’t had since. My refrigerator had its own room. I could easily sleep six. I was acting every day, writing every day. Why, then, do I not look back fondly on my college years like so many others? I see them as years of lonliness and hard work, with wee bits of fun thrown in only randomly. I have great memories of the best shows I did- Quilters, A View From a Bridge, A Comedy of Errors- and that makes me wistful of only needing talent and drive to get cast.

Now I live and work in New York. I haven’t done a play in a year and a half, and even though my last show (The Second String) is possibly some of the best work I’ve done in years, it’s not nearly enough.

I’m sitting here in News Bar, typing away on my portable keyboard and Palm Pilot, and realizing that I will never be happy with a normal life. I will never be satisfied with a 9 to 5, or even a 4 to midnight, for that matter. I don’t even know that I would be happy with just doing a show for a living. Tessa once wrote me an email, saying that she could see coming to visit me, somewhere totally unlike where I am now, me coming out of a house where I lived with my husband, somewhere far away. i don’t know how developed this vision was for her, but it is huge in my minjd and I can’t seem to ecape it. Nor do I want to. I see myself somewhere far away, too. I don’t know where. But I am sure, sure as I am of my family, that I only need find it. It is why I am still single, it is why I am discontented, it is why I feel not exactly right eery day of my life.

I’ve been searching online, looking for the people who are going to take advantage of me, who are going to find the right place for me in the world. I feel like I even know when it is supposed to happen- late September. I am committed to the AIDSRide the weekend of the 19th of that month, and then I feel I am free. I want to put this show together with Sean, do the AIDSRide, and then get the hell out of Dodge. I even feel like my landlord will let me go.

I have to know all of this in heart, less I go mad.

On that note, I’m off for an early Mother’s Day, starting with a massage. It’s going to be a good day.

Good god, I haven’t written in five days? That’s absurd. It’s been a particularly harrowing few days but… well, I guess I shouldn’t be hard on myself when I realize that I actually have a job, and full time job that eats up hours of my life. I would love to have the luxury of spending part of each day writing but it is simply not in the cards, not in my life right now.

I am just getting off two doubles in a row- a “quad” in restaurant terms- which means I was at work from 10 AM to 1 AM yesterday, went back at 10 AM today, and just got home- 1:30 AM. Nothing terribly interesting happend on either of these days, other than watching myself work through exhaustion, which serves to remind me of something I tend to forget: I don’t mind being exhausted, what matters is the work that got me there. I never minded rehearsing from 10 to 10. I relished in sixteen hour days if they involved Red Cross work and EMT class. What I do mind is those same sixteen hours whittled away in a restaurant where I’ve achieved nothing but making some cash.

Sometimes I wonder, do I really want to run off to some place where people are truly suffering? Do I really want to go weeks without a shower or computer? Would I really be as at home with people who make $50 a year as opposed to those who spend $50 on a week at Starbucks? I question myself, honestly, brutally, and frankly, the answer is a yes, yes, a resounding YES. However, I have yet to find the company who is going to place me where I am going to do the most good. I’ve researched several organizations and all of them have one downfall or another (Habitat for Humanity? I would have to spread the gospel- YUCK!- CARE? I’d have to come up with several thousands dollars to spend a few weeks in Africa). So until I find the right people, I will wait tables, audition, and search for my future.

Meanwhile, I’m going to bed.