Wednesday, November 21, 2012

We are baaaack.

If you look back in March, you'll see my last post.  Randy Kirk, volunteer welder, had ordered and cut metal tubing which I mounted on top of Foxy's side walls in preparation for the next step: welding the rooftop centerboard and cross members to the walls.  I don't weld, nor do I own the tools. Luckily,  Randy had pledged his assistance and promised to call when his workload subsided.
While Randy worked on fabricating projects and metal art over the Spring and Summer, I had my own distractions... 

I NEEDED A JOB.
... When I moved back to Seattle after ten years away, I had a plan: to offer Trager bodywork sessions for a living while I finished the dwelling and applied for dance professor jobs.  When I got here last summer (September 2011), I found out that Washington state requires healthcare licensing before I could offer hands-on or manual therapy to paying clients. To get a license I had to pass the state board massage test.  To be eligible to take the test, I had to be recommended by a massage school. So, it was back to ten more months of full time school for me... studying massage at night --Swedish, myofascial, MET, lymphatic faciliation, etc. and my favorite, anatomy & kinesiology (really!)....



... and by day, building a space to make an income: turning the old Burton Back Bay Inn dining room into a Pilates and massage studio. Yup, mostly a solitary job for me.
Dining Room, BEFORE CONSTRUCTION

DURING CONSTRUCTION
Movement Intelligence Studio, AFTER
  Then the stress got to me. I lost twenty pounds, went through mood swings and inconsolable feelings of hopelessness.  My heart pounded all day, including at 3 o'clock in the morning. A doctor visit revealed that, no, it wasn't my thyroid.  It was adrenal exhaustion.  The bad news is I overloaded myself with stress, which kicked my sympathetic nervous system into full time alert, spiking my adrenal levels and plummeting them just as quickly. And wow, a glass of wine on an empty stomach sent me through an emotional tremor or two.  I've always considered myself ...um... 'emotionally available', but never inconsolable and scared.  Go figure, I also lost my bf in the midst of this.  So, a lady cannot do everything.  She MUST learn to manage projects appropriately (and drink less coffee).  The good news: this happened to me during my thesis performance in grad school the year before, so now I have an explanation for the identical behaviors.  It is good to know that freaking out has it's biological explanations!  Even good stress can be too much.
 Enter Randy, six months later.  So, metal kept him busy all summer, and in September, when indian summer was in full swing, we spent a couple weekends ten feet in the air (okay, Randy was up in the rafters, while I held the water hose). Above is a picture of Randy welding the center 2x3" pipe to the end of the roof, of his. 

Above, his last weld (today anyway).


 Above, you can see the trailer's wall/roof corner is.... drum roll please.... columnless!

Then, tawdawww, Randy demonstrates the easy-to-place column installation, for the transition from open stage to folded-up-trailer, when Foxy needs to have structual integrity for the bumpy road. Why is a columness stage necessary for dance? Answer: So my dancers and I don't bump our bodies on columns. You'd be surprised how annoying columns can be when you are concentrating on the dance. If Im going to spend all this time, money, and energy on a (albeit MINI) dance space, my priority was a space with no columns in my way.

OMG, Foxy (short for Foxglove), the mobile performance dwelling with a roof! Well, 3/4 of a roof.  We still need to finish the exterior waterproofing. Nevertheless, she has most of a roof, and far more structural integrity than a typical travel trailer. Randy, above, testing Foxy's strength. I think her first showcase of choreography might be a zip line from her deck and into the Central Cascades' Scottish Lakes .... any volunteers??
 I HAVE A JOB.
I am one month away from another graduation ceremony.  I passed my state board exam.  Soon the LMP license certificate will be in the mail! My Pilates studio is up and running, and I visit the city one day a week to spread my dance movement teachings to guess whooooo.... dancers!

Soon, the eco-mobile will warm up the front burner again. She is rather grimy and wet under her tarp tent.  I am finding her a roomier cover/garage so that we can work on the roof for a few more weekends before she is ready to weather the great outdoors.  I have leads on private and public spaces, with no final decisions yet.  I am hopeful she'll be on the road (for the first time) to relocate indoors in a week or so.

Meanwhile I am submitting EcoDance for a Seattle sustainable business start-up program, a ten week program for Sarah and I to flesh out the possibilities with investors.  Application deadline, December 15.  Ay yi yi, tranquil, mija, es un dia a dia.