TITLE: 31 things AUTHOR: Tavia DATE: 6/19/2008 07:38:00 AM ----- BODY:

Today, for my 31st birthday, I share 31 blessings of my life:

My husband, Percy Wheeler.
Percy is an inspiration. My best friend. My biggest fan. He's a constant, unwavering source of support, laughter, encouragement, comfort, challenge, truth. Meeting and marrying Percy has truly been the greatest surprise and the greatest gift of my life.

My family - Terry and Carolyn Gilbert and Cy Gilbert.
I know that not everyone is nurtured by their family. Not everyone has a close, loving, honest relationship with their parents or their siblings. So I am aware of my good fortune and feel deeply thankful to have been given parents who are wise and funny, intelligent and seeking, generous and warm, kind and real and loving. And now that we're both adult-ish and he no longer stomps on my feet for little sister torture tactics, my older brother, Cy, has become one of my closest friends. He's immensely talented, and has a great capacity for love and and tenderness, a burning fire that fuels his intense passions, and a spiritual grounding that has cleared pathways for my own quest.

My kitties.
My lovely catties give me unconditional love and affection, steal my pillow in the middle of the night, purr in the crook of my arm, chase their tail round and round in the bathtub, vomit on the stairs, the bed, the couch, the kitchen floor, and my bathrobe, chase each other up the stairs and down the stairs and up the stairs no down the stairs, who reach their paws out to touch my cheeks, who purr and flex and stretch in joy with just one loving look from me, who come running to the door the second the key is put into the lock. To all the kitties I have loved - thank you: Mirren, Blossom, Houdini, Sossity, Puffin, Smokey, Polar Bear, Echo, and Turtle. (And a special thank you to my little black rabbit, who I had when I was 12 years old, and who was named Percy Olin.)

Voice and story.
Working with my voice and learning about the mind/body/soul/spirit/voice connection has brought me the greatest joy and the greatest challenge. Hearing voices and stories enriches my life - from singers like Cassandra Wilson and Bob Marley and Johnny Cash, actors like Davina Porter and Norman Dietz and the cast of The Archers and the late Anna Fields, radio producers like Dick Gordon and Krista Tippett and David Isay.

Portland, Maine.
Portland has been my home since the fall of 2001, and it's the city in which I met my husband, became connected to the ocean, started riding my bicycle long distances, started my first compost pile and garden, and felt a part of a connected community for the first time. This is the city where I started my voice acting, found my business partner, and chose a direction for my heart and soul. I thought I would be here for 3 months, and seven-plus years later, I'm still finding beauty and meaning in this unexpected home.

Cornish College of the Arts.
The college that gave me four rigorous, demanding, enriching, and empowering years of study. I'm honored to have studied with all the great teachers at Cornish, and the thankfulness I feel at my years there is too deep to detail.

The Salt Institute.
Salt gave me a place to learn storytelling, to learn to listen, to learn to trust my perspective. All these years after my three intense months at Salt, I'm still processing what I learned there, becoming the person I began to be there, connecting with the people who started me on this long journey in sound and voice and story and truth.

Nancy Gnecco.
Nancy has been a great teacher and a spiritual guide. Her direction has been invaluable.

Stephen and Jess.
Stephen is my precious friend, my business partner, my director, my sounding board, my confidante, my teacher. His fiancee, Jess, has become a dear and trusted friend. I'm grateful every day that Stephen puts up with me, believes in me, shows me patience, humor, understanding, and commitment. I'm so fortunate to have both of these wise and wonderful people in my life.

Leah.
My indescribably beautiful sistah. She teaches me gardening, health and nutrition, strength, deep friendship, soul, love. I could rave about her, but she and I know what she is to me.

My host of beloved friends.
Jamalieh and Josh, Jason, Elena, Vernon, Pete, Eric, Nadine, Lynda, Jennifer and Jeremy, Maggie, Thatcher, Scott Sheffer, Scott Logan, Pam and Kyle, Donna Galluzzo, Cathy Plourde and Add Verb Productions, Mandy, Peter and Karyn, Paul Haley, Zack Barowitz, all my Renaissance Voices compatriots, Bernie Horowitz, Bianca, Marita, Jeff Forman, Liz and Nate, Erik, Randall, Ian, Andrew, Lorelei, Cynthia, Hal, Matty and Sarah, David and Louisa, Els and Jim, and a very long list of people who make my life a life well lived. And those people who have gone from my life, and will always be deeply loved and deeply missed - Zeke Miller and Howard Miller. Byron. Josey.

My feet.
These feet of mine, which have given me so much incredible pain and challenge, have given me compassion, understanding, wisdom. Without these feet and all these 19 surgeries and all the unusual experiences of growing through life with a persistent reminder of mortality and humanity and fragility and strength, who would I be? Where would I be? These two funny feet have been a gift.

Stevie Kallos.
Stevie was my teacher at Cornish and my friend after college. Now she's a wonderful novelist and she's publishing her second book, Sing Them Home, coming out this fall. Stevie is a loving and devoted parent, a wonderful woman, an artist, an example of how to navigate in this complicated world. I admire her so much, and will be proud to narrate the audiobook of Sing Them Home later this year.

Paul Meier.
Paul is a great teacher, researcher, writer, and listener. His talent for dialect work is huge, and his understanding of voice and speech and communication and story-telling and theater is magnificent. The International Dialects of English Archive is a gift and one of the best things on the internet ever.

Pat Fraley and Hillary Huber.
Pat and Hillary have been my friends and supporters and cheerleaders. I have been amazed at the amount of generosity, care, concern, and kindness they have shown me. They're not only talented and successful, they're real and they operate in the world with integrity. I adore both of them.

Grover Gardner and Blackstone Audio.
Grover gave me my first unabridged work as an audiobooks narrator, and I'm thankful that he was willing to take a chance on a green, unknown narrator. Blackstone has been a great publisher to work with and I'm proud and honored to narrate for them.

Literary Companion.
Ogden Morse gave me my first narration work ever four years ago, and not just any work, but Shakespeare, Greek classics, classic American and British novels - incredible words to read. He believed in me and gave me a chance to narrate, direct, cast, and manage his narration projects. Without Ogden's faith in my work, I would not be where I am today. And Ogden isn't just a client, he's a person I have grown to deeply respect and admire and trust. The more I work with other people, the more I recognize how unusual it is to work with people who take their time, build businesses and relationships slowly, and whose actions speak louder than words. I hope I live up to Ogden's example.

Scott Davis and bicycles.
I had such a crush on Scott Davis back in the day, and even though he broke my heart a little bit, it was because of him that I started to ride a bicycle. I had to think of a way to spend time with aloof and squirrely Scott, and the best way I could think up was to ask him to help me pick out a bicycle to ride...and then to suggest lots of bike rides. I didn't ultimately have a love affair with Scott, but I did get a love affair with bicycles. He was lovely, but bicycles are even lovelier than tall, freckled, redheaded boys.

My grandparents.
I've always loved my family, but as I grow older I'm finally starting to understand the importance and meaning of family. With growing perspective, I understand how I link back to those who came before me, and I appreciate the lives they created, and what those lives have planted in me. My grandfather, Don Houts - a watercolor and oil painter. My grandmother, Mildred Houts - a nurse and homemaker. My grandfather, Glenn Gilbert - an upholsterer and small business owner. And my grandmother, Tharel Gilbert - a small business owner and homemaker. I appreciate my relationship with my one living grandparent, Tharel, and really enjoy watching her develop a friendship with my husband.

Seattle.
Ah, Seattle. Where my heart lives. There is always a space left empty by my distance from this city. I will never forget driving into Seattle with my family for the first time when I was 14 years old, and feeling like I'd come home. Seattle gave me summers at The Northwest School, two years at the University of Washington, my first apartment, my first experiences living away from home, first concerts at The Moore, love affairs and fierce battles, the WTO protests, theater and dance and music and art, adventure and tumult and my first home on Capital Hill (the smallest possible condo), education formal and informal, beauty and pain and wandering and tears and a sense of self and smallness and greatness and place. I never meant to leave my city for longer than 3 months, and now I don't know if I'll ever get back for more than a visit. But I know my beautiful Seattle will always be there. I yearn for Seattle.

Idaho.
My home state. My 13-years home, which I only now appreciate after having long left it. I grew up with the complication of living in a Mormon Republican state, when I was from a Christian family and where being aligned with the Democrat party was the deepest religion. This was not easy. It was lonely and stressful and made me anxious to get away. But now, when I look back on my life, I see how fortunate I was to grow up on my friends' farms - gathering eggs from the chicken coops and experiencing sheep-shearing and running across the corrugated metal roofs of the pig pens and watching a hog being born. I helped irrigate a field and had bonfires in the desert among the sagebrush and lived near the Snake River Canyon and Blue Lakes. I rode dirt bikes in the South Hills and hiked down to Pillar Falls on the last day of my senior year of high school. I took piano lessons in Filer and guitar lessons in Pocatello and watched fireworks and listened to the city band concert at CSI. I did theater with the JUMP Company and the Dilettantes. And as it gets farther and farther away, it feels like it wasn't so bad. It's not so terrible to be from a state with incredible natural beauty, roadless wilderness, and the sweetest-smelling air. I'm grateful now, and I can't wait to go home for a visit.

The Trek Across Maine.
Percy and I finished the Trek on Sunday - 180 miles biked in three days. I have a lot to write about this, so I'll tease you and leave you with my deep gratitude and thanks for this incredible experience.

The Common Ground Fair.
I went to the Common Ground for the first time in 2001, and I've been almost every year since. What an incredible place! A celebration of organic farming and gardening, all things local and beautiful. I love going to the fair, where I see people I know and love and only run into once a year. Percy and I biked to the Common Ground in 2002, and maybe we'll do it again this year. It's the best fair, and makes me so glad to live in a rural state.

My home.
For at least another year, we are renting the home of the lovely Alfred DePew, who has moved to British Columia. So we get to live in the middle of Portland, within walking or biking distance of the Portland Museum of Art, Bangkok Thai and Norm's, Monument Square, the library, Deering Oaks Park, Wigon Office Supply, Aurora Provisions, Arabica, Whole Foods, the North Star, Salt, MECA, and The Space Gallery. We have great neighbors, beautiful flowers in our yard, enough space to allow both of us to work from home, and we are so very fortunate to have this house to love.

Seth Godin.
I have to include Seth Godin, who has taught me more about business than anyone else. He is so remarkable, so unusual, so honorable, the purplest cow of them all. I appreciate the contribution his work makes in my life and in my understanding of what I'm trying to accomplish with my work and why I want to work for myself. I am so glad to 'know' Seth Godin, and hope one day to thank him in person for the role he plays in my education.

Tom Filogomo and Tim and Jim at The Studio
Tom agreed to do a project with me a few years ago, and he has surpassed all my expectations. He's become a friend, and he's shown me great patience, kindness, trust, and commitment. I am so glad to know him and to be moving...slowly but steadily...toward the fruition of our partnership. The Studio has been a resource for me since the very beginning of my voiceover career five years ago. Tim and Jim have been unbelievably generous with me - answering countless, hysterical "I don't know what I messed up in ProTools! HELP!" calls, scheduling me for last minute studio sessions, helping me get my home studio in working order, even going shopping with me for equipment and setting it up for me. Tim and Jim are great fathers, great community members, great people, great friends.

Steve Urkowitz.
Steve has been a great friend to Percy and to me, and he's been incredibly generous to both of us. He was an inspiration on the Trek Across Maine, radiating joy and humor and encouragement, as he always does. On several occasions, Steve has handed me the keys to his beautiful Greenwich Village apartment and allowed me to stay for several days at a time at his home when I've had business in New York. He's a joker, a jester, and he does serious theater business. I adore him.

Buzz and Becky Leonard.
This couple has become dear friends to Percy and me, including us in their family gathering on Christmas, fishing trips, birthday celebrations, and dinner dates. Percy and I see that after four children, several grandchildren, and careers that forced long distance separations, Buzz and Becky are as much in love as they were when they first met. They seem to really like us and want to hang out with us, and we feel really lucky to know them and be invited to be a part of their lives.

My community.
I love living in this community, where I can see friends at Coffee By Design, where I know the owner of Bangkok Thai, see friends at the farmer's market on Saturday and Wednesday, walk at Kettle Cove or bike to Cape Elizabeth. It means a lot to me to meet people Percy has known for 20 years, to feel the amount of love and support I've been gifted by marriage. Maine is a wonderful place - a magical state. I love living here, close to the ocean, close to New York, Montreal, Vermont. If you've not visited - come for a little while! See Old Orchard Beach in the summer, Wolfe's Neck Park any time, Popham Beach in the fall, the Eastern Prom on the 4th of July, the first lilacs in spring, the waters of Boothbay. Maine is like no other place on earth.

Theater.
When theater exists in its highest and best potential, it transcends the boundaries of time and space, geography, class, gender, education, economics, language. It is ancient and archetypal, present, meditative, magical. At moments I see and hear glimpses of the best kind of theater, and it fills me with the deepest source of joy.

The Source.
I'm finding my way back to you. And back to myself. Thank you for never disconnecting. I am learning to step aside and let you flow through me.

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