Here's a rundown of what has happened since I last posted on this blog. It's been quite the ride!
May 2011 to December 2011
- Continued working in the salon, going to school part time (BA in Art History to possibly work with arts education non-profits), mommy stuff (started having my son full time in June), DJ'ed for KTUH on Mondays 9:00 am to noon HST (The Garden with Michelle LaBelle). Got monthly massages as part of my self care routine (something I established in Cosmetology school).
2012
- February: Directed 3 monologues from the ARTS at Marks Garage production of "The Vagina Monologues" by Eve Ensler. They were "The Flood" with Pam Schildknecht, "What if I Told You I Did Not Have a Vagina" with Amina Peterson, and "I Was There in the Room", with Lori Kimata. I was so lucky to have them in my pieces. I think we raised around $6 k for the Domestic Violence Action Center.
The directors from this production: Terri Madden, Tony Pisculli, Michelle Poppler, Me, and Lola Love. Photo by Eleanor Svaton, from her theatre review blog Enter Offstage.
- Continued working in the salon, part time school, mommy stuff, KTUH (until December 31, 2012). Lots of cool DJ gigs including BFA shows at UH, UH Art Department Faculty art show, KTUH used music sales, and Smoke.
From the Ka Leo Article "No More 'Art for Art's Sake'" by Chasen Davis. Photo also by Chasen.
- Did some fun theatre projects as well. "Richard III" was from summer, "Alice" happened in the fall.
From the Hawai'i Shakespeare Festival Production of "Richard III", directed by Tony Pisculli at the ARTS at Marks Garage. Photo of me as a Murderer by Chesley Cannon. I played York, one of the Murderers, Tyrell, one of Richmond's soldiers. I also did hair and makeup and chose the 1940's era jazz music.
From LCC's "Alice in Wonderland", directed by Betty Burdick. I played the Dormouse (and ensemble), Melissa Kenigton played the March Hare, and Reb Beau Allen played the Mad Hatter. I also helped with makeup for the ensemble. Photo by Salem Sipes.
2013
- January to October: I attempted vocals in a 1960s soul/funk cover band called The Barbarellas, which was fun while it lasted. I learned I'm better at karaoke and dancing and acting like a singer, but I'm not really a singer. Haha! Good times.
L to R, back row: Tyson Balmores on drums, Alex Gallichotte on bass, Dexter Lum on guitar.
L to R, front row: Malia Baloyot, me, and Sonnett Parks. Photos by Robert West. (above and below)
Flyer design by Blane Nishizawa. The Barbarellas Logo by Julia Lenore. PC (L to R): Jonathan Reyn, Malia Leinau, and Kaveh Kardan
- Life happened. Malia got pregnant, Sonnett moved away to become an astronomer. We tried auditioning some girls and we had Stephanie Kong join.
- We had a gig to play the Zombie Crawl but I couldn't make it. Luckily they held it down because I was in the ER that day and later admitted to the hospital.
- I remember constantly having a problem with my right ear...like it felt stuffed. Sometimes it felt like shouting in a fog. Like I had a bucket on my head. It came and it went but was more apparent when I was stressed out. My GP was the one who prescribed the antibiotics and ibuprofen because he thought I had an ear infection and had congestion, plus I had some bad headaches. I insisted something was wrong with my ear and he referred me to a ENT, so I saw him the day after that appointment. The ENT looked in my ear through a scope that went up my nose and saw that I had a patulous eustachian tube. The following day, I ended up in the ER.
- It turned out I had acute renal failure. Basically I had an allergic reaction to antibiotics prescribed to me (vomiting) and the prescribed ibuprofen constricted the blood vessels in my kidneys. I couldn't keep any fluids down, and I asked my friend Sarah to drop me off at the ER and take my son to school for me. Thank goodness for technology. I was able to text a whole bunch of people to let them know I was okay but wanted privacy, to have my son taken care of while I was admitted, and to tell the band members to keep playing.
Gotta keep smiling!
- Halloween is one of my most favorite holidays. I was out of the hospital for a little more than a week but I HAD to go out to Hallowbaloo. Not only because my bf's band played in it, but I knew going out to participate would make me feel better. I put together a Bride of Chucky costume (bf was Chucky, of course). I watched their set, walked around a little, armed myself with a bottle of water, and after about 2 hours, I was ready to go home since I still got tired easily. It was worth it, though.
Me as Bride of Chucky. I used a black sharpie and black hairspray color on the roots of a blonde wig, bought a fake knife, did my makeup. Already had the clothes lying around. White contacts were supposed to be for the Zombie Crawl. Photo by Alissa Lee.
- I took it easy the rest of the year. No big projects, just spending time with loved ones. I did things that I enjoyed. Got lots of therapeutic massage, did some healing mantras and guided meditation from home, but not as much as I would have liked. Continued to eat as clean as possible.
Although I was taking it easy, I still had to go out and support SB-1. I ran into awesome folks, including Amina, who was in one of the Vagina Monologues pieces I directed. Love wins!
2014
- February: Started feeling a lot better. Continued self care practicing including yoga, Buddhi Yoga, and massage. I worked on my screenplay and finally gave it a title: "Water Wings in Paradise". It's about a woman in her mid-20s floundering her way in Hawaii. Kind of like an alternate universe version of me, but not really. Haha. I'm near my mid-30s and am a single mom, and am definitely not floundering.
- My friend Johanna Rhyins came to visit and took some photos with her Rollieflex camera. Steph, Rikita, and her room mate also came along and had some photos taken.
Photo by Johanna Rhyins @ Puu Ualakaa State Park. It had been four months since acute renal failure and I felt great, stronger than ever. This photo means a lot to me because it was the first "pretty" photo I've taken in a while. Thanks, Jo!
- February/March: Fernando Pacheco asked me to be the announcer for his new show, "Almost Local". We shot the studio segments of episodes 1-4 in one day. Special thanks to Andrea Rodriguez for being on set (as a studio audience member turned hairstylist) for helping me change my outfits and change my hairstyle for each episode. I chose to have Michelle LaBelle as a stage name since I still enjoy using that name.
Michelle LaBelle and Fernando Pacheco on set. Photo by Linda Enos.
Photo by Ding at Miss Catwings' Ice Palace birthday party.
- April: Taught hair and makeup for a Pin Up/Showgirl Workshop with the Academy of Tease (thanks, Lola Love) and rented a chair from a salon. Teaching was awesome and didn't require me to use my pinky too much. However, shampooing and working on hair all day was a bit sore, and I wasn't as busy as I thought it would be (a six month hiatus will do that) so I had to give up renting the chair. It was fun while it lasted.
Graduation photos with my students by Firebird Photography.
Top row, L to R: Kehau, Michele, Terry.
Bottom row, L to R: Athena, me.
With Pamela.
From my short stint renting a chair. At least I look nice!
- May: I spent a lot of time volunteering at the ARTS at Marks Garage as a gallery sitter. It was a lot of fun and gave me an idea what it would be like to work in an art gallery/performance space. I wanted to go back to school part time to get my Art History degree and decided to enroll part time for the Fall 2014 semester.
Photo by James Anshutz. I think this was for some kind of brochure.
- Designed makeup for Hawai'i Shakespeare Festival's "Edward III", directed by Jason Kanda.
- Fall: I started school. I was so excited! I took only one class, Tagalog 101, because I haven't taken any languages yet. I used to be a lot more bilingual so I decided to take this class. Luckily, I lived close to school and was able to walk over.
- September/October: I started to do hair and makeup on the side again, but really wanted to learn massage therapy as well. It was part of my self care routine since 2008, and being at the physical therapy clinic also inspired me. I decided to go to massage therapy school, which was also located on the same campus of my academic class. I let go of a leadership position for my son's school parent committee, but volunteered whenever I could.
- Designed makeup for "Sweet Soiree", a burlesque singalong play by Pretty Peacock Productions.
- I started teaching Shakti Flow once a week at the ARTS at Marks Garage, thanks to the Academy of Tease. My classes were really small, but I had a lot of fun working with the students' fitness level, and channeling my DJ skills by throwing together killer playlists on Spotify.
Photo by Josh Weissman.
2015
- January: I ended up getting an A in Tagalog 101, and was eager to start my photography class in the spring since I needed 3 art studio classes. Tagalog 102 got canceled due to lack of enrollment, so I figured I could take an art studio class.
- The day after I had an awesome group massage practice session with some classmates (with the guidance of a licensed massage therapist), I dropped my son off at school then was on my way to work. I got into a car accident.
- My car got totaled. What's funny is within a few minutes after the accident, as I waited for the police, I got an Amazon Local Deal alert for acupuncture at $45. I had been to that clinic before and it's walking distance from my place, so after getting my car towed, calling my insurance, and resting a bit, I went over to my acupuncturist and explained my situation then got treatment.
- The next day I went to a walk-in orthopedic clinic and got some X-rays and was given pain killers and a muscle relaxant. I'm pretty stubborn when it comes to taking stuff like that and only took it if I needed to.
- Spring semester started but I had weird vision problems. I couldn't focus on my camera, and my vision was a bit blurry even though I wore my glasses. I still went to massage school (I definitely took a few days off after the accident) and my classmates gave me rides to and from class.
- My sinuses and my right ear (oh great, again?) started giving me problems. I was born with a preauricular sinus pit and I never had any issues with it. However, it started to get inflamed and wouldn't get better, even with Keflex. Within days it swelled and I was told I had to get a PICC line of antibiotics for a month to treat it. Luckily, I had to get an incision and drainage (eww, I know) and didn't need to get a PICC line. My ENT (the same one who discovered my patulous eustachian tube, which is doing a lot better nowadays) told me it would be better to remove the sinus pit after a few months.
- I continued massage therapy school and did what I could. I took a break from work, withdrew from my photography class. I stopped teaching Shakti Flow. My treatments included chiropractic, acupuncture, and therapeutic massage. I was also able to trade massages with classmates. It felt like I was a case study and we've taken note of my progress. I also did yoga (mostly restorative) and guided meditation.
- "Almost Local" got picked up and the episodes started airing in January on OC 16. New episodes every second Wednesday at 6:00 PM HST, but episodes are also online.
- March: I quit my job to focus on getting better (pain and stress was no bueno) and continued massage school. We shot the studio segments of episodes 5-8 of "Almost Local" in one day. Andrea helped a bit, but I made it easier by wearing a hair fall and just did a Bettie roll up front. She just needed to help with dressing and touch up the hair.
- Mid-April: Ear surgery! It was weird to have a piece of me that had been with me since birth easily removed. It wasn't quite so easy, the procedure usually takes half an hour to an hour but mine took an hour and a half. I had to go under because the trigeminal nerve is near the sinus pit, and if the nerve became nicked, I would have a droopy face. Anyway, no droopy face, I was pretty sore from the right side of my head down to the right side of my neck.
- End of April: Started massage clinic. Need 100 hours of massage clinic by the end of the program.
- May: started physical therapy. My C3 was rotated (therefore initially affecting my vision and sinuses), had headaches, and pain in my left lumbar and left piriformis from the accident. I had my left leg laterally rotated while I drove, so that was a hard lesson learned.
- June: was able to have a little bit more of a social life again.
- July: shot episodes 9-12 of "Almost Local"!
- Clinicals started out as grueling on my body, but with time (and all of the treatments) have helped tremendously. I'm not 100% healed, but as of August, my C3 isn't rotated anymore and the joint movement in the cervical spine is remarkably better. There's still some subluxation and there are good days and bad days with the low back and left hip. I recently started doing more hair but I still don't think I can handle doing a full day of work on my feet just yet. A couple of weeks ago, I spent 6.5 hours on my friend's hair, changing box dye black with dark blonde 1.5" roots to a bright red violet. Hooray for Pravana and patience! By the end of that session, I had to take pain meds and muscle relaxant and got massaged by classmates two days in a row. Sitting for more than 2 hours at a time gets sore, too.
- August: I've been balancing things out better. Most of my free time is spent with loved ones. I also like to hang out by myself. I venture out and support the arts and local music scenes as much as possible. Restorative yoga and guided mediation are my pals. I've been able to go on a hike a couple of weeks ago on a mellow trail with minimum discomfort.
- Recently, I've been doing Sean Anchor exercises. It's amazing how my outlook has changed in the past 14 days of the 21-day Happiness Exercise. Despite the ups and downs of my life, I've done what I can to maintain a positive outlook. I could always use as many helpful happiness tools as possible. But I let myself have my bad days. It's part of the process. I'm grateful for so much support from my loved ones and friends. I feel very fortunate.
Sailor Jerry Festival (June) . L to R: Me, Diana J., and Andrea Rodriguez. Photo by Casey Ishitani with a photo bomb by Gina. Those Teeki yoga pants look great off the mat, too!
You must be wondering why I don't have photos of son or my bf, or have more details about them. I've been fortunate the have a strong support network of family and friends because parenting isn't something I can do by myself! I've had my son full time since June 2011 and it's been awesome. I've involved him in as many of my projects as I could: bringing him to rehearsals and performances (play and band), yoga classes, workshops, kid-friendly KTUH events, volunteer ventures, etc. As for my bf, although he is a performer, I'd rather keep his identity private since he isn't much of a social media person. I know it's silly, but this blog is public, but my personal FB and IG accounts are private. I don't think I want to broadcast every little thing about my life. In the future I'll possibly include some anecdotes regarding relationships and family dynamics, but nothing too personal. If you know us, you know us.
What's next? I graduate from the massage therapy program in mid-September. I'm looking forward to spending more time with my son, my bf, and other loved ones and friends. I'm going to continue my self care. I want to practice more massage and continue to freelance with hair and makeup. My state board licensing exam for massage is in late November. I'm going to renew my cosmetology license in December. I'd like to finish the 36 credits left for my BA in Art History (hello, FAFSA, I'm looking at you). Basically I want to keep doing the things I enjoy and get paid for them, like always, but even more so, especially once I get my massage license.
I would also love to get my 200 hours in Yoga Teacher Training, and resume teaching Shakti Flow. I'd like to have "Water Wings in Paradise" produced ...even if a segment is a short film, broken down into mini-episodes, or made into a feature length film. I'd like to return to theatre. I'd like to try Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, once my hip is 100% better.
I would also love to get my 200 hours in Yoga Teacher Training, and resume teaching Shakti Flow. I'd like to have "Water Wings in Paradise" produced ...even if a segment is a short film, broken down into mini-episodes, or made into a feature length film. I'd like to return to theatre. I'd like to try Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, once my hip is 100% better.
The takeaway from the past four years: be thankful for a strong support system, take time for self care, find positive outlets, help yourself, help others, acknowledge the range of emotions when facing difficulties (and ride them out), and just keep going. Cheesy as it may sound, it's all about the journey.
There have definitely been many highs and lows with my life the past few years. I've gone through worse than what I've recently experienced and taken them like a champ. I've had some trauma, but I haven't allowed those incidents to define me. There was a time when I considered myself a victim but have moved beyond those incidents as a stronger person. I've survived and will continue to persevere.
My life has been quite colorful, even though I tend to wear lots of black. Haha. Black is left over from my goth days, black was a requirement in cosmetology school, and black makes it easier to get dressed and do laundry.
I'm not in a huge rush to do everything I have yet to do (finish BA, screenplay production, yoga teacher training, BJJ, theatre), but I've always been one to do things that I set my mind to. I don't have to do everything all at once. I'd rather be reasonably busy than crazy busy.
Right now, though, I'll just be right here. Exactly where I need to be.
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