A Rocky Road

It's so ironic.

I have been having the time of my life getting ready for this Carmen (which is tomorrow!), but I have also been really fighting illness, which is totally uncharacteristic.  I have this problem with chronic sinus drainage, but I never catch things.  The concert producer said that maybe my immune system has been weakened by a lack of Vitamin C, now that I don't eat or drink any citrus.  On the other hand, when I mentioned this to my ENT, she said there is plenty of Vitamin C in green vegetables, which I eat a lot of.

Last Thursday I woke up with a low grade fever, but I took some tylenol, and went to the final runthrough, and sang my personal best. Friday I did some work at home.  Saturday morning I sang at a funeral (just anthems with the choir and the second soprano part in a solo women's quartet by Schubert).  Sunday my chords felt irritated.  Monday I had a lesson and my teacher said he didn't hear anything odd, although I could not vocalize past a B.  Usually I can make it up to a C in the studio although not always at home.  So he gave me strict instructions as to how much singing to do/not do going forward.  Tuesday I went to see the producer, and we worked on staging and she gave me a few props and accessories (what I meant by "having a ball").  My windpipe by that point actually hurt when  pressed it, which made me cough, but nonetheless I got through part of "Chanson Boheme" including the high G sharp, which is one of the nervous making notes because it is a big note.  Wednesday that pain was gone, but through Friday I felt that there was a lot of mucus on my chords so I sounded hoarse particularly early in the day.  I sang a little Wednesday but not Thursday or Friday (those days I just did some warming up - to an A flat, which seemed to be ok).  Last night for the first time I had trouble sleeping because the mucus had moved down into my chest, so I kept coughing.  I finally fell asleep at 2.  I woke up at 8, which actually for some people would be enough sleep, but  usually sleep 8 or 9 hours.

I have been on a regimen of steaming, Neti pot, Vicks, and mucinex.  I may take a mucinex tonight as well as tomorrow morning if I think it will keep me from coughing.  My voice actually sounds less hoarse now that all the mucus has moved down.  Today is do or die.  I have to warm up to an A (my teacher said nothing higher until tomorrow, when I can sing the ending of the Seguidilla to see if can make it up to that B flat).  I will run through Act IV.  Then I will run through the whole thing mouthing the words and seeing if I can do the staging in my heels.

No matter what, I will perform tomorrow. I know I will give a good performance even if  I don't sing my best.

I have just been having so much fun.  I love fooling around with props and costumes (on me, not other people) almost as much as I love singing.  I had hoped to find a job where I could experience that, but it never panned out.  I promised my therapist I would stop agonizing over how much I hate what I do for a living and the hopelessness of doing something else, and just view myself as "bridging toward retirement" and try to do as little of this paying work as I can get away with and enjoy the rest of my life as much as I can.

In case anyone might worry: I will definitely post something about how the performance went but it might not be until Tuesday night, because I am sleeping over tomorrow night with my partner (I am on tenterhooks as to how she will react to my performance, which will be quite realistic) and Monday afternoon I have a lot of errands to catch up on, including taking my laptop to have the keyboard replaced.  (The only way I can type an "e" is to push the key down with a stylus).