Rehearsals have been so much fun these last three weekends. I'm beginning to feel as if I'm possessed. It's very cool. So different from being possessed by a character when I write. That's a more cerebral possession. Annie Oakley is coming into my muscles, my vocal chords. I'm finding myself saying "What the hell" just the way she does, in my daily life. I'm learning how to swagger (although that's confined to the rehearsals--I'm not the swaggering sort!) I am under no delusions that I am going to become a great actor, or that I'm going to wow the audience, but it feels more natural than I thought it would to slip into a character's skin. This weekend, we started really working with scenes--the lines felt so different when I said them out loud with my whole body than they do when I read the words out loud from the page, script in my lap. A much more dynamic experience. Especially because there are other people's faces and bodies to respond to. For those of you who have acted before, this all must be old hat, but it feels like such a revelation to me. It's marking me, too--my knees are all bruised up today. I have to slide on them across the floor as I sing "You Can't Get a Man With a Gun". Next time, I will definitely bring kneepads. I'm looking forward to it...