Huntsville, AL - Well, not exactly. It's more accurate to say that I'm on Interstate 40 in Arkansas, heading to our next destination from Huntsville. Hawk viewing is a popular sport today as we go through AL, MS, TN and AR on this trip. But close enough. Hunstville was a mix of many things, so much so that it's hard to know where to start. I guess, when in doubt, nothing gets you going like a chronology of events. So let's start there.
Tuesday 2/21 - A travel day from Monroe NC to Huntsville AL. The route took us through a chunk of road we've already passed, through Atlanta and Birmingham and then up to Huntsville. It was an unusual route in that we had to go a bit south in order to come up back north. No real east-west routes were available through the very southern foothils of the Appalachians (as I guess). Huntsville is a city which has as the foundation of its economy NASA research and a large militray base. As a consequence, the University of Alabama-Huntsville is a college which concentrates on the sciences and engineering. We were hosted by the English Honors program. Our lodgings were on campus, in a complex called the Bevil Center. What was really sweet was that the space we played in was in the building right next door, a large open space reminiscent of Lee Hall in Fredericksburg MD. They set up platforms for us, and it was a pretty wide and live space. Jessica was my roommate for this stop, so we moved in and went over to the university center to explore the space and get a little food. Later that evening we went to a movie sponsored by the student Democratic group entitled Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices. The documentary itself was of questionable quality but it got its point across; so well, in fact, that Jessica has sworn off going to Wal-Mart for company supplies or any other reason. My wife has been all along a Wal-Mart boycotter, and I think after this film I'll have to join her. The clinchers for me were Wal-Mart's deliberate use of government social services as a subsidy for not providing living wages or health insurance to its workers, and images from the Chiese factories where Wal-Mart makes some of its goods. Also, I should mention how little the billionaire Walton family returns philanthropically to society - a total of $6,000 on one recorded year. For me the realization that all this is deliberate corporate policy, and not just an after-effect of being large, seals the deal. Finding Target stores has replaced finding Wal-Mart stores on the road.Wednesday 2/22 - This was sort of an all-around lazy day. The weather was none too good; rainy all day. I found the fitness center and went down there in the morning to get on the treadmill. Lately it has been hard to find a place to exercise, and I had begun to worry I was putting on a few of those pounds I had lost. But I weighed in at 192, so I'm maintaining but still haven't cracked that 190 barrier yet. It was a great fitness facility, with very nice treadmills, a track, and a very interesting stretching cage. There was a pool there as well, but I did not see a hot tub. I think the one they had was outdoors, and it was too cold to go out there. After my 35 minutes on the treadmill and some laps around the track, Jessica and I signed out the van in the morning and went food shopping with our per diem. We had a microwave and refrigerator in the room, so doing some shopping keeps us from going to restaurants. I grabbed some bananas, chocolate milk and three Healthy Choice dinners, plus a bag of pretzels. We did treat ourselves to some sushi across the street. The afternoon went by sort of surfing the net and making last-minute preparations for my Friday presentation. We loaded in around 5 that afternoon and started off the run with R3 that night.
As I mentioned in my last post, this is a "season ticket" stop, with S2 having been a regular feature for maybe 15-16 years here. So there's a devoted following among faculty and the Huntsville Literary Association. So our audiences for all three shows were very receptive and looking forward to each evening. They also book in some local high schools, but unlike other venues the high school crowds come in the evening. RIchard's audience was small but receptive, and the show went well all around. Jessica and I were running very low on merchandise, but nonetheless we did pretty good business with what we had. But it was obvious from doing the first show that people were ready to visit the merch booth. A beer and some pretzels rounded off the day.
Thursday, 2/23 - Off to the fitness center again for a workout. I walked over with Daniel, who has been pushing himself extra hard on the bicycle lately. I did 40 minutes this day, burning off about 300 calories. After showering and eating lunch, I went over to the University Center to meet with Dr. Jerry Mebane,
the man who runs the Honors program and sort of coordinates our visit. He is a very kind and mild-mannered gentleman, soft spoken in a sort of Southern gentleman way. He's a Renaissance Lit guy and has been at UA-H for going on 20 years or so. He was kind enough to take my presentation and load it on his computer, so we tested out all the equipment and had a nice chat. He gave me some idea of what to expect. After we finished I went back to the room and took a nap, as I was sort of beginning to feel some tightness and fatigue from the workouts. A Healthy Choice dinner, and off to the theatre!Much Ado that night went very well. It was the largest of all three audiences, as this was the show the area high schools had booked the most. They had to drag in chairs to seat the overflow of people who showed up, so the place was packed. I think it's safe to say that we had the audience eating out of our hands during the show, as they were with us every minute. I think the thing that all of us like best about the show is that we take the audience on quite a roller coaster ride, moving from hilarity to pathos to hilarity. This audience really, I think, came with us on this night through the whole journey, and that made the evening very satisfying.
Following the performance the Honors Society sorority, Sigma Tau Epsilon, gave us a reception at a building which was a former one-room schoolhouse and is now an art gallery. They cooked up some mean food, all right - fired chicken, fried catfish, ham, macaroni and cheese, deviled eggs and an assortment of salads and such. They topped it off with a trifle, which is a combination of pudding, cake, sherry and fruit. Actors being actors, we naturally stuffed ourselves. I sat down at a table with some faculty members and other adults, while the rest of the troupe mixed in with other attendees and the sorority members. The students, of course, gave us tips on where to go in town for fun and amusement and offered to accompany us. More on that later. And there was this great 80-year-old southern belle who put on quite a show for everyone in the place, Full of compliments, and apparently still living the high life. If Blanche DuBois had lived to be 80 she would have been this woman. After the reception, a beer (no pretzels) and sleep.
Friday, 2/24 - As I got up, had coffee and prepared to go to the gym, Jessica suggested that we go take a hike up on Monte Sano State Park. We were thinking of doing that on Saturday, our day off, but the weather report indicated Friday was going to be the better of the two days. We both needed to do laundry as well, so the plan became gathering the laundry, using a drop-off service (which I had never done before; $1 a pound, and I had 12 lbs. Turns out to be a bit more than doing it there, but you pay for the free time). After "breakfast for lunch" at Waffle House (Jessica's first visit), we went to the park and had a very good hike. Jessica had gotten directions from a hiking web site about some rock cuts (simiar to Panama Rocks for Fredonia readers), so we set off there. although we did not know it, we missed the first trail head and hiked tothe bottom of the saddle, where we found
ourselves on the Mountain Mist Trail. The area has some 60 miles of trails through state lands in the are. Given that we started from the wrong trailhead the directions we had were wrong for us, but we didn't realize it until we came upon three people hiking down from the ridge. The man who set us on the right path was maybe in his late 60s and it was obvious he had just come out of the hospital.Both the back of his hands had IV bandages on them, his ears were bandaged and he had other hospital marks about him. But he was quite friendly (recognizing our northern accents) and asked if we were in the area as cultural ambassadors. When we told him what we were doing, he laughed at the inadvertent accurateness of his guess, but thought it was too much for an old redneck like himself. He set us on the right trail for the rock cuts, and soon we found ourselves there. The actual area was small but interesting You can check out the canyon movie here. Then back to the van and home by 3:00, where another nap beckoned. The walk was a fine substitute for the treadmill, and quite preferable.That night I gave my pre-show lecture before Return. It went over very well, I think, and was fun to do. I got some laughs here and there. Members of the cast popped in and out to offer support but couldn't stay the whole time. If you want to see the Powerpoint presentation, just click right here, but be warned it's a 3.9MB file, because I did not bother to re-size the photos I used. The show itself was a hoot. There had been some concern that it would not be well-attended because the title is not well known and the public service ad in the local paper had not gotten published. But we pushed the show the previous two nights, and as a consequence there was a good-sized audience there. Musically it was one of the best we've done in a while, and the audience just enjoyed the hell out of it You could see the knowing nods of the boomers in the audience as each song began. We did an encore at the end of the show, and usually Jessica and I do not participate in the encore to make sure the merch booth is staffed for those people who do not stay through an encore, but this time no one left, so Jessica and I went back on the stage and danced Pulp Fiction style. Then we went back to the table and damn near sold almost everything else we had for sale. I don't have a final total, but I am sure we did close to $600 worth of business in the three days. Not too shabby. Then load-out, notes, picture, beer and pretzels, and sleep.
Saturday, 2/25 - Day off. I really didn't have any firm plans for the day off, so I sort of ended up floating with the tide all day. All I really knew was that I had a craving for a cigar, so I was going to try to get one somewhere. In the morning I called home to chat with Ann Marie and catch up on family doings, then spent some time helping Daniel out with some computer issues. The most well-known attraction in the area is the NASA Rocket Science Museum, and I had thought I was going to go there, but as it turned out I got in the "going downtown" van, so I spent
the better part of the early afternoon walking around downtown Huntsville. There are some nice architectural structures, but apparently downtown Huntsville doesn't open until after 5PM on Saturday. It seemed to be one of those downtowns where, if the businesses aren't open, nothing else opens. So Daniel, Jessica and I sort of moseyed about looking for someplace to eat. The only place open was Humphrey's, a restaurant/bar which has live music, so we went there simply due to lack of other options. For lunch I had two Angus Beef Hot Dogs with Chow Chow and Bertman Ball Park mustard. We hung out there until about 4:15 or so, when Andrew and Sarah came downtown with a van to rescue us.Now, our next stop needs some context. I had been looking for a place to buy a decent cigar, and when I was in the process of looking for a tobacco shop I ran across an ad in the Yellow Pages for a hookah bar. I have never been to a hookah bar, so I figured since all of this touring is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for me, I wanted to go to this hookah bar. I managed to talk everyone else into a trip down to this place. Others had had the hookah experience, so I knew i was going with some seasoned vets.
The place was named Hipocratease, and was not quite what I was told a classic hookah bar should be. In New York City, apparently these places have throw pillow on the floor and some sort of Turkish atmosphere. This place had a faux-hip-modern-70s look, and in addition to renting hookahs also sold cigars and massive amounts of porn. It was a bit bizarre as a mixture, to be sure. But we found a small corner in the back and sat down for a smoke. Those who partook enjoyed a shisha (which is basically a flavored tobacco) which I think had apples and raisins in it. You place the shisha in a bowl, cover it with aluminum foil, poke holes in the foil, and place a hot coal on top of the foil. Then you smoke through the water pipe. It had a very smooth, fruity flavor, and was a mild smoke. Very relaxing. The place happened to have a wireless connection, so I took out my Nokia 770 tablet and hooked up to WFUV Radio in Mew York City, which happened to have a George Harrison set playing, complete with sitar. Uncanny. I also found a nice little cigar, so I had the two going at once. Needless to say after about an hour or so my urge for tobacco was completely satiated.
(This is a long post, and I am now getting ready for bed and a 6:45 AM call tomorrow. So, to be continued...)
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PART 2
Russellville, AR (3/1) - Where was I? Oh yes....
Then we went off to an Indian restaurant for dinner. Nothing special there, good food, but I did see some sort of font which was exuding dry ice from it. I could not figure out how it was being done, but it was really pretty interesting, and I have to find out how to get one.
So it's now about 8PM or so, and we lose Jessica and Daniel and pick up Kevin. It's Andrew, Sarah, Kevin and I as we head downtown. The ladies from Sigma Tau had tipped us off to a place called Flying Monkey Arts, which turned out to be a converted factory now used essentially for young artists.
It had a second floor which basically contained books, a series of artist studios, a scooter track, and several neat little nooks to sit down, read and chill. The place had a very eclectic and youthful feel to it. There were many young people there, and it was nice to know there was such a wonderful place for them to hang out and create what they wanted. Every city should have one of these, and it was sort of interesting to come to a place like Huntsville in the middle of the "backwards" South and find such a cool place for teens.The downstairs had a performance space to it, basically a stage and a poor sound system, but nonetheless something that could host performance art and music acts and such. The performance they had that night was the Sex Workers Art Show, which was a collection of performance art by former sex workers. It was somewhat interesting, but for me it was also slightly boring. The younger ones seemed more interested in the work than I was. I took some pictures and some movies (I haven't uploaded stuff yet, but keep checking the pictures and movies links on the right sidebar to see when they go up) so you could get a taste of the show, but you should be warned it's for "mature viewing" and rated "X." But this group is playing some pretty good places like Bard College and other venues, so they must have something going for them. I just felt that many of the performances made their point in less than 5 minutes and became repetitive quickly.
Then we ended the night over at Humphrey's again, listening to Microwave Dave play the blues. The Sigma Tau girls were there to keep the young folks company, while I happened to talk with some faculty members from UA-H who had seen the shows. Nice to have some people my own age to talk to. Unfortunately at one point I lost my glasses, so now I'm working on a spare pair. And that was my day off in Huntsville!
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Here in Russellville we have done two NEA high school shows, one in Alma AR and the other in Russellville. Not too much to say about them other than they went well. The Alma gig was in a beautiful performance space which wasn't more than 4 years old, and we could not figure out why it was there. It's not like the area is heavily populated, but in the summer there are probably a good number of tourists, since this is Ozark Mountain area. 
The Russellville was in a converted space which on the outside was all boarded up and looked abandoned. It was some sort of day care/child care center that had an auditorium re-designed as a concert hall, and the bussed in maybe two English classes to see the show, so it was a small audience. Other than those two gigs we have had the days to ourselves. I was so tired on Monday that I couldn't bring myself to do much but go food shopping and hang out. I tried my best not to go to sleep (our call had been 6:45 AM) and was sort of successful. Lately I have been combining some workouts with shows, and it seems that I'm getting a little stiff. Yesterday, upon coming back from the show, I took a long walk around the Bona Dea Trail, which is basically along the woods and swamps formed from Lake Dardanelle. The lake is a dammed river, pretty nice for boating and such. Along the walk there were plenty of box turtles sunning on logs, some geese, bullfrogs, and I also spotted a heron.I've also gotten the troupe a gig at Platteville High School to substitute for two other NEA gigs we lost. That was good, because the troupe will get March 10 and 11 off. This leg of the tour has seemed longer that the last, in the sense that we've traveled farther for fewer venues, and a break will be a good thing.
You may be wondering, having read this far, why the title is "Small Worlds." Well, although it took this much writing to get there, my original thoughts for this post had to do with a feeling lately of how small your world gets on tour. When you lose the sense of your geographical location after awhile (Alabama, South Carolina, Arkansas - what's the difference?) you sort of get the feeling that the country is way smalller than you think. Traveling in the van every day to go somewhere also compresses your world. Seeing and knowing only the 11 other people on tour with you makes the world seem smaller as well, because no matter where you are in the country, those same 11 other people are there with you.
What also makes the world seem small is realizing that, when things are not going so well in your larger world, you can't escape to deal with it. It can be strenuous psychologically at times when company members have difficulties at home with family or friends and they can't simply leave to be with them or help out. Everything has to be done by cell phone, and at times you just feel helpless in those situations. That feeling of wanting to leave and be with your family or friends in distress, but not
being able to leave and having to go on with the tour - and those same 11 people - is, I think by far, the hardest thing you have to deal with while out on the road. Maintaining your balance, maintaining your cool, and maintaining your sense of perspective and work ethic all are tall orders under this kind of pressure. It's also hard to stand by and be just an observer when one of the company members has some situation going on they are trying to attend to, because there's little you yourself can do to help other than offer support. So even though you're traveling across a very large country and seeing so many interesting things, in some ways going on tour eventually compresses your sense of your reality to a few small things and a few people. In our "real lives" we all have a wider scope of activities, family and friends, and squeezing them all out to be with just these 11 others sure is a tall order. I think it's at about this time on the tour, when the novelty has worn off, the grind gets long, hotels all seem the same, and you long for a home-cooked meal, that this feeling of a small, closed world becomes apparent. We have 30 days to go for the winter leg, and while I am sure we can make it, I am also keeping my fingers crossed that this "small world" feeling doesn't make us all too crazy. Edges can get frayed, small things can look like major disasters, but I think we're all smart enough, aware enough, and good enough not to let things grow too extreme. I do my best to keep a positive attitude and a smiling face, because there is still a lot of fun to be had, and for me, despite this feeling of compression, it's all part of the whole experience, and when you sign up for an experience like this, you take the bad with the good. Nothing in life is perfect, no gig is absolutely ideal (as is no job), 
so for me, it's all part of the package. I like to pay attention to the happy moments; Olivia biting my shoulder, filming Alyssa's butt, hiking with Jessica, Daniel's sarcasm and wit, Sarah's smile and laugh (she now has a blog too!), Greg's steadiness, Tyler's craziness, Chris' crustiness and music, Kevin's "Periwrinkle"-ness, Andrew's edifications, and Carie keeping it together. When you make the effort to see the good in people rather than the eccentricities and weaknesses we all have, it makes the world just that much larger for me. And having a world of creative people with large hearts and a willingness to even do this sort of thing and bring these shows around the country can be as large as you let it. -TWL
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