Last week I did not post, so I will make this week’s post a little longer and talk about the plan we developed and the crazy events of yesterdays encounter.

While we believed that we would have a core group, we still may be short in terms of participants. That being said, we will more than likely need to act ourselves and may even need to recruit some other faculty to be a part of the play. The scripts have been somewhat cut. However we thought it would be beneficial for the students to also feel that they had some part in producing the play. We plan on having them cut some of the lines as well. As we comb through the act, they will give there input as to what props and costumes should coincide with the parts of the act. Our hope is to finalize roles by next week. Unfortunately, the plans that were put in place did not exactly workout.

Due to injuries and interviews, I went to St. Jospeh’s on Thursday alone. This did not phase me as I knew there was a core group that had pretty much been assembled. Of course as I called Haley before I left, I did NOT realize how wrong I was. In fact, over the week that we missed a few of the students had been fighting and were not allowed to participate. I figured this would still leave a pretty good group and when I arrived Haley still seemed a bit uneasy about the group. Nevertheless, we went to round the group up and started our first read through. As we got through may be the second page, a fight broke out outside of the building we were in. At this moment, I knew all attention was lost. The kids ran to the windows to watch and I was stuck sitting at the table looking at Haley and waiting for them to come back. There was nothing she could have done, I honestly looked at her out of sympathy as she has to deal with this on a day to day basis. She commented on how cool and collected I seemed, not knowing that I am no stranger to chaos. After the fight ended or the kids lost interest, they came back to the table. As I started to begin again, three students left. Haley gave them an ultimatum that if they were to leave they could not come back. They kids then stated some remarks that I don’t believe are appropriate to relay. By the end of the day, we had only four guys and one girl who was totally disinterested. As we look forward, a lot of extra planning will have to go into the act. Not having enough girls may be a problem, but we shall see.

I do think Haley wants to be a big help. Unfortunately the nature of the environment at St. Joseph’s Villa is a little difficult to maneuver. She has been courageous, and I truly understand why she may need a break. I am worried as to what is in store if she does leave. That will be for another blog.