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  1. In Turmoil at the Moment

    Saturday, September 29, 2018













    If you read my last blog entry, you know I actually had concern about taking time off from the day job to have an acting job.  Well, after 18 years (first part time, then part time with some amount of benefits, and finally full time with benefits), I was kicked to the curb.  I am glad I chose to take the time for the acting gig.


    Since I am here as a performer (acting and comedy), I don’t want to reveal my age, but losing health benefits now is quite frightening.


    The circumstances of me getting let go is deep and inevitable once I had 
    my third director.  It is book length.  It may appear as a series of columns on my years in adult education. 


    So at the moment I am unemployed.  Haven’t yet received an 
    unemployment check. 


    Once they revealed themselves as a program that would get rid of our 
    counselor who helped so many people in such significant ways, I knew I was next.  I saw what was valued and what wasn’t.  Many laughed when I said I was next.  Many thought I was simply wrong and paranoid.  But what they don’t realize is I grew up under the threat of being put in the foster care system.  My gut knows when I’m going to be tossed. 


    When it happened, staff was shocked, jaws hanging, and some speechless.


    Students are bewildered.  Some are truly heartbroken.  Several refuse to 
    return to that program.  The saddest part is some have given up on school altogether.  It must trigger their PTSD.  The people who made them feel good are gone; the ones they have a hard time with are upgraded.  So much of what goes on in the current government echoes in that program.  Deceit is a big one.  Several people told me to fight it.  I do not want to work with people who don’t want me.  The sad part is the students who, in my mind, I worked for, DO want me.  Some just don’t get it at all even after I tell them I was let go.  They respond with, “So are you coming back to teach?”  Those are the ones who needed a person like me as their teacher and a counselor like the one we had as a person to talk to.


    The Bronx community who benefited from our program lost a lot.


    I personally am in financial fear. 


    I recently played a homeless woman in a short film.  It is scarily 
    convincing.  The director was super thrilled.  I’m a bit creeped out.





    So if you were thinking about coming to Sunday’s Divorced Divas of 
    Comedy show, please do.  I need every dollar I could get.  Thank you.  








  2. 2 comments:

    1. Lisa Harmon said...

      I wonder if you and your students can find another way to work together outside of that organization?

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