So many of you have told me to keep in touch.  As much as I would love to call each and everyone of you every single day...with a typical 12 hour day schedule, that seems far from possible.  So, I decided to start a blog.

As most of you should know, I am officially a Barter Player at the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia  (http://www.bartertheatre.com/index.php).  I am one of the lucky few who have a job out of college (in my case RIGHT out of college) and will be here for a very fun, but grueling, 15 months.

After performing Ordinary Days with my very bestest friends on Friday night, partaking in a very fun party that lasted way too late in the night for me to drive 12 hours the next day, and tearfully pulling away from my three best friends, I was off to make the 17+ hour trek to the Appalachians.

The drive wasn't all that bad, actually.  I had goodies from Grandma and NPR to keep me company the whole way.  And, once you hit Tennessee, the view is GORGEOUS!  I mean, where were the unending fields?  What are these things called trees?  After a terrific stay with my cousin, Ashley, I had only 5 more hours to get to my new home, Abingdon, VA.

The view?  It didn't get any less gorgeous than before.  The outskirts of town are commercialized, a Kmart, a Krogers (HyVee, but worse produce), and fast food chains.  But when traveling into town, it's like I stepped into 1857.  All of the sidewalks here are brick.  In the 15 minutes it takes to walk to the theater, I don't think there's a single concrete sidewalk.  All of the buildings are brick.  All of the houses are brick.  The buildings have kept their charm and are so well kept that, aside from the cars, it's like I took a jump to the left and a step to the right and did the time warp again.  :)

The Barter Inn, where all of the Barter Players and most of the younger or not-as-permanent Barter employees stay (40 people!),  is a huge, again, brick building that used to be a dormitory for a former woman's college.  My room is at least 12 ft tall with a probably 7 ft tall window.  Our rooms are connected with bathrooms, which I share with 2 of the summer Players.  Across the all is my kitchen that I share with about 6 people, all of whom say are clean, we'll wait and see about that...  Within the Inn, there is laundry, a TV room, and the Player costume and prop shop where we work on all of the stuff for our shows.

Around the Barter Inn, which is on top of a tree covered hill (soo many of those here), is the rest of the former college which the Barter has turned into their various shops and rehearsal spaces.  Next door is the former theater (where Gregory Peck made his debut) turned rehearsal space/costume shop/prop shop/accessories shop.  Behind the Inn, is the scene shop and storage space.  We each get a parking space with our name on it which is both cute and very convenient.

As far as my Playerdom goes (what they call our time here as a Barter Player), we had auditions yesterday and then a 6 hour lecture about the theatre's acting philosophy.  Wasn't as dry as one might think.  Within our orientation, I found out all about what our responsibilities are.  We have children's shows throughout the entire year that usually go up in 3 weeks and are performed for around a month.  We have understudy assignments that, when we have no rehearsal, we go to the mainstage rehearsals and take notes.  We run crew for all of the rep shows.  And we have player projects where we put together a performance of our most terrifying fears.

There are 2 theaters here.  The Mainstage, a 506 seat proscenium theater where the big shows happen, and Stage II, a 100 and something blackbox-like theater where most of the Player shows and the smaller mainstage shows happen.

I have call in a bit for a Rep. safety training, but I'll write so much more later!