determination

One of the reasons why I decided to audition for the musical this year instead of working on tech, was that I was determined to show myself (and the others who might have doubted me) that I could come back with a force and do a musical...with a prosthetic hip.  Considering I haven't been in a proper vocal class or lesson for two years, my singing was rusty; but with the thanks of my awesome friend, ironically enough, named Jessie, we got my voiced tuned up pretty well.  And the acting, I was confident with my acting.  I had been dreading the dancing part of the show though, because normally I'm not very cordinated when it comes to dancing to begin with, but then when you add in movements that my hip hasn't done in a few years the brain and muscles get incredibly confused.

But after tonight, I feel good about it all.

We had a dancing rehearsal tonight, and to tell you the truth, I'm surprised I haven't gone and passed out on the floor already (I'm sleeping on the floor tonight because my back is out again).  I went into the rehearsal feeling good about things, even though my stomach wasn't agreeing 100% with me, I toughed it out.  I had completely forgotten about the repetition of things...

We worked on Sit Down You're Rocking the Boat , which in our show, involves a lot of sitting, standing, sitting, standing, sitting, standing, sitting, standing.....so on and so forth.  And considering how fast paced the song itself was, it was difficult for us to know exactly when to do what, which lead to going over through the steps countless times again and again.  It wasn't too terribly later that my muscles started to freak out from such use all in one "sitting'.

I was determined to get it though.  My legs were feeling like jelly and my brain was yelling at my muscles to get in gear.  By the time we quit for the night my muscles seemed like a completely different part of me that didn't even listen to my brain; so much so, that I had a difficult time standing upright when I changed out of my sweats back into my jeans in the parking lot.

The thing that makes me most happy about tonight, isn't really the dedication of my fellow seniors were putting into helping to get the dance together, or the fact that we actually made it look presentable; but was how determined I was to do this.  Before hip replacement, I'm not sure mentally I would have continued on through rehearsals.  I would have opted to sit out most of the night, but not now, I maybe spent ten minutes total sitting out to stretch and give myself a break.

I know though, that with this determination in mind, I can do this show.  And I'm not regretting it one bit.