Where have you gone, Carla DiMaggio?

Almost a year since my last post. Sigh. I'm a busy woman, what can I say? My typical day starts at 7:30 am or so, getting up with William. We play, have breakfast, get dressed, until Daddy takes over around 8:30 or so. Then, I'm in the shower and into work by 10. Work all day at Performance Network, Ann Arbor's non-profit professional theatre, which has its own challenges, then it's home by 5 or 6 to get Phil (my husband) off to rehearsal. After that, I'm playing with William, feeding William, bathing William and putting William to bed at 8 (if all goes well.) Then, dinner (mere necessity) and back to the computer for any leftover work projects, of which there are always plenty, until about 11. At least two days a week I've got an event at the theatre and on those days it's home, get the baby-sitter situated, and rush back to said event, which last until between 9pm and 12:30am (like the recent opening night of K2).

On a regular night at 11, I'm SUPPOSED to start getting ready for bed, which I hardly ever do, because I'm an habitual night-owl, there's always more work to do, there's John Stewart whom I love and there are countless websites on baby development and nutrition that I frequent, being an obsessive-compulsive mother and all. Oh and Facebook.

So, you can see that it's difficult to find the time for many things, one of which is blogging. The others are keeping in touch with my siblings, exercise, baking, sending thank you cards, taking and organizing photos of my family, planning family trips, going to the Dentist, getting new glasses and cleaning my house, which are all things I desperately want and need to do, not necessarily in that order. Oh, and taking the time to patent the myriad things I want to invent, including glow-in-the-dark binkies, snap-socks, an IPhone app I have in mind, pillow-hats and a website that features arts advocacy items like a bumper sticker that says "I'm an arts supporter, and I vote."

Today, quite honestly, I'm stealing a little time. I'm at home with my husband who is sick and needs a hand with the baby, so I'm working from home. I'm sitting on the bed in my bedroom with my laptop, while William naps, blogging. Feeling like I'm accomplishing a year old to-do feels great, until my employees read this and are on to me. There are so many things I want to write about, like theatre criticism and how the theatre critics in this area seem to be just as disjointed and insulated from one another and the outside world as the theatre people do. And there is arts advocacy, the lack of which by all of us is leading us, careening, into the death spiral of Michigan arts funding. There is my vision of the future of Performance Network and figuring out how to get there. There are all of the little insights from my pregnancy and first year of motherhood, which include, among other things, the realization that even when my son is 18 years old, I will still want to pull him into my lap and cover him with kisses. The realization that I will not be able to do this is makes me wish I could keep having babies, although I know my body and my pocketbook are worn pretty thin from just this one. There is my feeling of isolation from the artistic community I was once so closely knit-to, and the challenges of being "the boss." There is so much more.

But for now, I've updated my blog template. My son is waking up. I've got to go.