Week one at VCCA complete! Hard to believe it’s been 7 days already. The work on my new play is going pretty well so far. When I got here I was halfway thru a rewrite of act one - I finished that, and hope to finish the first draft of act two by tomorrow.

I usually despise and avoid nature at all costs, but other than the scare stories about rabid raccoons and brain-eating amoebas (I’ll try to post a picture explaining that one later), being out here in the sticks hasn’t been too bad.

I’ve even bonded with a horse that hangs out by the fence near the path I walk to get to the studios. And by bonded, I mean I will stop and look at him and he will walk over and stick his big head over the fence to sniff me and I will sometimes pet his head until I get annoyed by all the flies and walk away.

My head is always filled with the play. The characters wake me up in the morning. I crawl out of my dorm room, grab some food and lots of coffee and walk to the studio. When I need a break from myself I’ll go bother a visual artist in one of their studios and ask them dumb questions about their art. When my fingers give out from all the typing, I go swim in the pool, or catch a ride to the nearby college to use the gym over there. I’m feeling very lucky and privileged, so I made a donation to charity: water the other day, which is the kind of thing I should do more often even when I’m not livin’ the good life.

7 more days…