Finally, I've got internet access! Hip hip huzzah!
I am moving to Chicago when I grow up. I love it. I've never met a city I liked better than New York, but I like Chicago better. Or at least almost as much. It doesn't have the same home quality, although if I lived here it would. And the theatre is great, I've met a bunch of actors, although most of them don't live in Chicago. We're staying in the most lovely inn and one of out hosts, Rio, is an actor/director/photographer/painter/sculptor/former cellist, and He's just the most magical man I've ever met. We talk to him for hours. From what he's said, it sounds like an actor with my particular desires and ambitions could be much happier in Chicago than New York.
Also, Betsy's Bridesmaid Julia (Yeah, My cousin Betsy got married this morning, that's why I'm here) used to act, and went to PA the last year it was PA, which is now LaGuardia, which is the high school i've gone to for all of three days. She now lives in L.A. (and hates the L.A. acting world) and owns a vintage clothing store, which is definitely cool, but she was talking about how if you're gonna act, you're gonna act, and there's nothing that will stop you, and if you want it, then you will find a way to make a living doing it. The way she talked about it inspired me, and I don't really like the word inspire, but it did.
Then, at the wedding, Uncle Barney insisted on introducing me to Betsy's old friend Robert Sean Leonard who was much more famous and self absorbed and starting to get a little fake, although you could tell he wanted to be an artist, but he also wanted to be an artiste. He talked about how when he does films or TV, it feels like work, and it's tedious and boring and it doesn't feel creative and fun, which is always how I feel about film, and when he does theatre, it's infinitely better, and that's why film pays soi much more than theatre. Although he was the most classically successful of the three actors I've spoken to today, he was the least interesting, and fairly obviously, the least happy.
Then, aside from all that Betsy got married this morning! The wedding was just beautiful. They had it in their back yard, which is lovely and they had a little deck which served as the mezzanine, and Betsy had this very simple, gorgeous ivory dress and Ben (her husband) was very unique and wore a tux. The minister guy was a theatre major and very vivacious and happy. It was the fist wedding I've been to where the words "awesome", "supercool," and "totally stoked to be your wife" were used as many times as they were. They had these decorations that Betsy had made, which were basically strings with square bits of paper all down them, hanging from trees, which was magical, and Mom and I had spent a good part of Yesterday (I spent the other good part shopping. Chicago is also great for shopping.) putting tulle everywhere, so the backyard had a very bridal feel, although it also had a very Betsy feel, which doesn't seem possible. Then the reception was at this auditorium a few blocks down, and they had the coolest cake, with little pink squares all over it, and they had a really good DJ, and they handed out these little origami boxes that Betsy's sister Lucy had made. They were made out of all different kinds of paper and they were really pretty, and they had hersey kisses or bubble gum in them and little teeny slips of paper that say "Ben and Betsy Love You." And I danced and had photos taken and talked to people and had food and cake. It was great. It's been one of the best weekends of my life. I've just been very happy. I don't know why. And I've discovered that I am definitely a Crane. (Not the bird, my mother's mother's side of the family's last name is Crane.) I go hang out with the O'Brien side of my family, and although they are all my relatives, I in no way relate to them. Even the Carlson bit of my family kind of bores me, although at least they don't piss me off with their super jesus loving and their incredibly stupid, pro-bush point of view, and there homophobia, and their thing with beer. But this weekend I've been with the Cranes, and I really feel like part of the family. I feel like these are the people I got my genes from. Unfortunately, since the Cranes are all great-aunts and uncles, cousins-once-removed, second cousins, and whatnot, and they are based in Iowa, we don't see them much, although I think there are plots a-brewin' for at least me, if not Mom and Topper, to come back to Chicago sometime in the somewhat near future.
I'm also trying to figure out what's going on with Kurt and me. (I might as well write everything while I have internet access) There was the whole big thing that went a little to far and freaked my parents out, which I'm kind of regretting, but not that much. That happened sometime at the very end of august, and I haven't kissed him since. He went back to school on the 8th, and I called him that night. I saw him briefly the day before, but I mostly hung out with Michael, since he was going back to school to, and I like hanging out with Michael better than hanging out with anyone else in the entire world. Then there was a week when Kurt was in school and I wasn't, where Blair and I had our little party thang, but he ditched us for Paco. (Actually, he just had previously scheduled plans with Paco.) Then, on my way back from 51, which I was visiting on wednesday, I saw him with Mimi and Junior and Maggie and their Murrow friends, and I kinda said hi and then talked to Mimi, although as I was leaving, he goes up to the fence and says "Goodbye Dana, I'll miss you forever" (which is what he wrote in my yearbook at the begiining of the summer, which was also the beggining of our fling. I blew him a kiss and kept walking, but I called him that night, and we had a very, very long, mostly, very boring conversation, most of which was spent talking about what songs he's going to cover with his band, which is a bunch of guys he's met at Friends, who have what is, in Kurt's mind, good taste in music, and in my mind, very limited taste in music, although I wouldn't tell Kurt that because he so identifies with his one genre of music, and totally thinks he's cool because of it, which kinda pisses me off, but I love him. Talk about run-on. Anyways, he was totally boring me, and it's not like I expect him to make a special effort to entertain me, but usually just hearing his voice makes me smile, and hearing his voice was making me irritated. Our conversation ended when he had another call, told me he'd call me back, and never did. We didn't make any plans to get together anytime, because his idea of anytime is tomorrow, and after talking to him for two hours, I was getting that please-god-shut-up feeling instead of the usual o-my-god-I-must-see-you-so-I-can-kiss-you-to-within-an-inch-of-your-life feeling. So I don't know. We were never going out, so I have no technical obligation to do so much as tell him before doing things with other guys. Like Dante. Who I'm definitely crushing on. I have no idea why, he's not especially good looking, although he has dreads, which are fun to play with, and he hangs out with Jeremiah and Jamie and Tim and them so he's most likely a pothead, and I know he smokes, although the first time he lit up, he was hanging out on the steps at Lincoln Center with Charlotte, Imagine, Maurice, Chris and me, and we all told him that if he's going to smoke, he has to go someplace else, and he looked annoyed, but he got rid of the cigarette. And he saw Tim and some other guy on the street and stopped to talk to them, and we kept walking assuming he was going to stick with them, but he caught up with us, which was nice. Jeremiah wouldn't do that. Anyway, Dante's cool, and I like him, and I have a feeling I've probably been doing that crazy unconcious flirty thing that apparently I always did with Kurt. I'll ask Charlotte.