Friday 21 June

I've learned in my almost 1 week here that I have started a pattern for my feelings towards this place. It's pretty simple actually. It's a love it one day, hate it the next type of pattern. Since I got my laptop yesterday, it was a love day, so needless to say, today was a hate day. A REALLY big hate day.

This last week or so I have been doing everything in my power not to explode and bust out into tears. Today obviously seemed to be the day that this was going to happen. I'm not sure what sparked it, but I'm pretty sure it had something to do with the stage manager coming to me asking for rehearsal props that I apparently agreed to making, and was very upset that I didn't have these props for him.

Also, the Designer came to me and wanted me to go with him to the place where most of the furniture was stored so I agreed to go. This place where everything was stored is at this barn that seems like it dates back to the Caveman times. It's huge, ancient, and I'm pretty sure is ready to collapse any minute. It was great trying to find furniture for this. While we are pulling this stuff the designer is pulling this stuff and is informing me that I can just re-upholster this couch and re-finish that table, and do all these other alterations to all these pieces of furniture.

Apparently everyone here thinks there are 248 hours in my day and that I am capable of multitasking like no other.

Well, shit.

On the verge of tears I went to my roommate who is also the spokesperson for all the interns and told her everything and asked her if I would be able to talk with the production manager sometime that day. She told me she would go and talk with him and see what she could do. I decided to spend the rest of my day in the prop shop, by myself, doing research on how I can make or buy a grammophone. Eventually the Production manager came down and we sat down and talked...for quite awhile.

I have thought about this whole experience this last week here and have decided that I am just burnt out. Pure plain and simple. With everything that happened at SCAD my Senior year, and with all the shows and other things I had to do while I was there, I knew that after all of it I was going to be burnt out and that is why an internship seemed like a good answer: I didn't want to have that extra responsibility, I wanted to be able to have a breather and I thought that while I would have some responsibility as an intern, most of it would fall upon the Scenic Charge and the Props Master; but they don't exist here. I told him that I felt that the listing for this position was very decieving and that if I knew there wasn't going to be a props master or a scenic charge and there wouldnt be any other paints/props interns then I wouldn't have taken the job. I also explained to him how I was just exhausted from everything and was not capable of doing what they wanted me to do this summer. It was too much and I could just feel myself breaking down and I needed to take care of myself because I could only see it getting worse. I explained some other things to him and he asked me if there was anything he could do to change my mind on wanting to leave. I told him that I really just needed to get home and let my brain rest, and he said that he respected my decision and appologized for being decieving in the job posting and that he would start looking for someone to replace me and asked if I would be willing to stay until they found a replacement. I agreed to do so.

I don't know what else to do. I can just feel my body becoming more and more exhausted and more and more stressed. I realized that I have basically been going non-stop between summer stocks and hard-core college since the beginning of my sophomore year. Now was the time that my body and brain decided that it had had enough.

I had to usher that night and this creepy man started talking to me while I was standing at one of the doors. Apparently he is on the board of the theatre, so I knew I had to be nice to him. I awkwardly talked to him for about 5 minutes and then right before he walked away he looks and me and goes "You are a very pretty young lady"

....Awk Awk..... gross!

After ushering I drove back into civilization and called my dad and told him what was going on. He was supportive of what I decided to do, and told me to keep him updated.