You've failed your readers, Teddy Hoffman.
He woke with a start and listened for the voice again. Nothing. Just the sounds of New Delhi at night, its distant honks and beeps and vrooms and wee-oo-wee-oos muted into a sleepy hum. "Must have been a dream," he thought, "One of those weird ones you get after eating spicy foods." He had been eating spicer foods lately.
Stop thinking about food.
The voice again. "Who's there?" he whispered, blankets bunched under his nose.
It's me, your conscience. I charge you with abysmal procrastination and taking advantage of your readers' patience. What have you to say in your defense?
"...I was busy?"
Poppycock! cried his conscience, Try again!
He tried again:
"Putting off writing my second entry may seem like an act of careless procrastination, but you will find that it is actually a highly strategic and deliberate decision: After all, what better time to reflect on my three months in New Zealand than a little over two weeks after I have left? Sure, punctuality may have kept the the folks at home updated –and may have been what I promised, and may be what's expected of me as an "adult"– but over the weeks I have gained the nostalgic retrospect necessary to give them the update they deserve. Rather than a rushed immediacy, I will instead offer them a detailed, thoughtful, and cohesive summery of my last few weeks in New Zealand."
Balderdash! cried his conscience. That's not even an original excuse: You wrote that during your 11-hour layover in Hong Kong! And that was the only thing you wrote! You could have written and published your second post with time to spare! His conscience had a point.
"You have a point, conscience," he admitted, "And you have convinced me: I will write that second post. Tomorrow."
MARK ME! If you pile up enough tomorrows, you'll find that you are left with nothing but a lot of empty yesterdays!
"You stole that from The Music Man," he declared, blankets now held confidently under his chin, “And A Christmas Carol.”
Don't blame me: I'm just a projection of your guilt made manifest by your overactive imagination.
"And spicy food."
And spicy food.
Scoville scale-related cuisine aside, his conscience was right. After all, hadn't he promised his readers to update his blog on a week-by-week basis? And even if that promise was a kind of tongue-in-cheek, wasn't two months a long time to go without any updates? Yes, yes it was.
"Fair enough, conscience," he admitted, "I will go update my blog now. I owe it to the folks at home."
Good. And while you're at it, you have some emails to respond to, and whatever happened to...?
But Teddy couldn't hear his conscience, which had faded into the background like the white noise of traffic. He had work to do. And so, dear reader, Teddy brushed the dust off his blog and began to type.
One thing at a time. Baby steps. Slow and sTeddy wins the race.
"Hey, that's a good line," he thought, "I should find a way to fit it into my second update…that, and 'Electric Boogaloo.' That joke never gets old."
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CHAPTER TWO: IN WHICH TEDDY TRIES TO UNOBTRUSIVELY FIT "ELECTRIC BOOGALOO" SOMEWHERE IN THE TITLE
Boogaloos aside, last we left off I was on the brink of a few adventures. Since then, I have left the land of Middle Earth with a tale or two to tell, so rather than bore you with the Extended Edition, I have boiled down the details into a handy-dandy list of:
THINGS I'VE LEARNED IN NEW ZEALAND . . .
…ABOUT FRANZ JOSEF:
What it's like to spend several hours in a car driving through New Zealand, feeding birds that aren't supposed to be fed and cracking jokes about things like what a whale might order in a bar.
How dizzy you can get soaking in chlorinated hot springs.
How to stop a ceiling from leaking the night before your glacier hike when no one is at the front desk of your hostel and the emergency number isn't working.
How to complain the next day, but not vehemently enough to get a discounted price.
What it feels like to ride a helicopter and kiss a glacier and hold an icepick.
How hot hiking up a glacier gets on a sunny day, and how scary Global Warming is up close.
How exhausted the whole kit-and-kaboodle can make you, especially after eating two victory PB&J sandwiches upon your return.
…ABOUT PERFORMANCES AND GOODBYES WITH JOLT DANCE:
That coffee and pizza go together quite nicely over a long day of tech rehearsing for a dance performance.
That I am utterly terrified by and near useless around sound boards and projection programs.
That pounamu is the Maori name for New Zealand jade (AKA "greenstone"), and that it is known as the "traveler's stone" for its protective properties and the "dream stone" for it's ability to help wearers realize their potential.
That pounamu has a spiritual etiquette to it: You must never buy it for yourself, and it can only be received as a gift. Preferably the night before a show.
That this gift can be made even more precious when the cast that you've been working with for the past three months passes it around a circle, each member blessing it with a silent wish for your future.
That I am just barely capable of not crying in front of people after giving me precious gifts.
That a sheet can become a wave and a boat and dancers can become whales and warriors; that seaweed and seafoam and plastic bags and cardboard boxes all make excellent dance partners; and that the folks at Jolt Dance know how to put on a darn good show.
Photo courtesy of Ms. Hill via Facebook
…ABOUT REHEARSALS WITH A DIFFERENT LIGHT:
How to scout out a performance space in a cafe armed with video cameras and (fabulous) dresses.
That part of being a company means working together through conflict, and that such conversations and situations ultimately improve the relationships and quality of work.
That David Lynch-inspired dream sequences make theatrical soap operas even more interesting.
…ABOUT LOSING YOUR DOG:
That it is very, very, very, very, very, very hard.
That it can be beautiful too, especially when walking through Christchurch’s botanic gardens and feeling, inexplicably, like your dog is taking one last walk with you.
That seeing a lunar eclipse and a shooting star is an excellent way to end a long, rough day.
That Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You” is the wrong song to listen to after losing your dog. Even if it’s heard while watching a movie like “This Is the End,” during which you startle your housemates by sob-laughing through the last 15 minutes of the film.
That writing is a surprisingly effective way of working through some tough times.*
*The folks running First Class Lit (a postcard-based literary blog) were nice enough to publish a short story I wrote while working through the process of grieving my dog, which you are welcome to read (as well as the other great works published there). It's called "Canis Major."
…ABOUT AUCKLAND AND FESTIVALS:
That you get what you paid for with cheap hostels.
That what you pay for in cheap hostels is loud roommates with a penchant for drinking until 6am, flies in your room, people with a habit of misplacing (or outright stealing) your (labeled) groceries, little birds that steal your breakfast off your plate, an electric stove that might electrocute you one day while stirring your ramen with a fork, things on the bathroom floor that should've been in the toilet, and free tea.
That Auckland has some very nice libraries.
That vegan burgers and “Frozen” go quite well with wine and new friends.
That Auckland has a pub called “Father Ted’s,” and that it is an excellent place to meet your contact and his collaborators and talk about leadership, how to set up networking for differently-abled artists, and what being “illegally” deaf or blind might look or sound like.
What you might see at a festival for differently-abled artists: Crayon Pollacks and neon Roethkos with titles like "Me With My Pants Down" and "Frankenstein and the Mermaid," tactile art exhibits for the blind, steampunk musicals, poets, rock stars, belly dancers, and clowns.
How to justify to yourself not liking certain performances, and what you might learn about your project and yourself by working through your disappointment.
That even well-meaning people can unintentionally delegitimize differently-abled artists’ artistic agency.
That, despite a few problematic hiccups, such festivals are a great step towards acceptance and validation.
…ABOUT RETURNING TO CHRISTCHURCH, PROCRASTINATION, AND LEAVING THE COUNTRY:
That Auckland says "Goodbye" with a sunset, but Christchurch says "Welcome back" with a kick-butt street festival.
How to spend 100 minutes on hold in the post office --ready to mail off your visa application but waiting for confirmation on one small detail before you do, only to have the call dropped because the consulate office closed while you were on the line-- and not lose your mind.
Where to buy a stiff drink in Christchurch.
How to forgive the consulate for their aforementioned offense when their staff go out of their way to call you and extend your visa an extra month just to give your travel dates a little wiggle room.
How to get malaria medication, gifts for your family, postcards for your loved ones, an absentee ballot, and rid of anything you can’t pack in one week.
That you can always count on good friends to give you a ride and/or see you off to the airport, listening to Barry White and Bobby Womack along the way.
So concludes my time in New Zealand, the first part of my year-long adventure, and my second blog entry. Remember to check the "Out & About" link above for new photos!
But wait! cried his conscience, You still haven’t told them anything about India! But Teddy wasn’t listening to, or perhaps he was deliberately ignoring, his conscience. Due to his innate gifts in procrastination, he had become well-adjusted to the infamous "India Stretchable Time," and had no intention of going against the cultural norms of his new residence.
Nevertheless, somewhere in the recesses of his mind, where that little spark of productivity flickered, he resolved to hash out his next entry soon. Maybe not today, maybe not next week, but certainly within a month.
Definitely. Most likely. Probably. Maybe. We’ll see. All in good time, dear readers. All in good time…or should I say, slow and sTeddy wins the race?
Ha! Still golden.
~ To Be Procrastinued ~
