Wow

Yesterday, in our rehearsal for the September 29th Oakland Museum show, my director said:

I think you can now consider yourself an actor.

I was like:
What?? Why?????

Actor, like Dancer, is a title I don't yet dare claim. Every rehearsal shows me the universe of craft I'm just taking my first baby steps in.

But, according to my director, I've come a long way. From:

Poet who floats all over the stage

through

Slam with Poses
(a phrase that stung like a taser the first time she used it, in Vienna. Even though I totally got it, and totally agreed with her. Now it makes me laugh, it's a running joke between us)

to this new place where I:

1) Don't float
2) Have a conscious sense of language - interpretively, not just sonically
3) Am capable of taking stage space
4) Am present physically
5) From that place of physical presence, do the thing I'm going to do
6) Am technically conscious while doing the piece

Wow.