Am now face with the issue of confronting a director with a potentially fragile ego regarding his work in a community play
that may go on the rocks unless the actor is integrated into the play. As far as directing a play is produced the actor is aware that the director must direct the actor's actions...I take it that some novice directors think all they have to do is have the actor read is script and then wait for blocking to be done after lines are remembered...not the case in professional theatre or if you want to get anywhere near that.
One approach to coping with the disorganized director is to speak to the producer whose backing is responsible for the release of the play in the first place. And it is the method of approach that is a key element in the social discourse and harmony that should be addressed in the play development in the first place. The actor is also a human being and has the right to question why the director has not blocked his actions yet, or why he has held back and if his views are conflicting than maybe the latter should rethink his tactics especially if weeks are running by, the actor is still not off book and has no or little sense of how to enter into a particular character role...or what types of interpretations might be available to him. And still the director still has the notion that the blocking is somehow secondary to the learning of the script!!?
The same approach to facing the director could be applied to a variety of situations where expertise comes as a matter of getting involved with new learning experiences. A new director like a new craftsman has to be open to constructive criticism which will benefit him/her in the end. Or he can stay where he his and pout with a wounded fragile ego and say to himself that nobody wants to accept 'his method'.

As far as table tipping is concerned I was rudely reminded that it should be gratuitous and that I am under absolutely no obligation to provide one especially when proper table service was lacking. When faced with an obnoxious restaurant management I will listen to their reasons for being tip but I won't be coerced. And people should be more discerning where they dine any complain about the shortage of proper service if it is lacking.
A group of us went to eat at a local oriental restaurant and after asking to add an additional chair to a table to seat 5 we were flatly refused. The maitre d' didn't even bat an eye or acknowledgement our upset at the proposition of having to sit at two separate places. And it was the lack of acknowledge that caused me to decide on not leaving any tip whatsoever. No amount of prodding would sway the management they were bent on keeping all the tables the way they were with the excuse that the public would have to pass.
Was it worthwhile discussion the issue with the lady at the cash. Absolutely not. To add fuel to the argument after he others had already refused to leave a tip, as I was the last she had refused to forward a receipt to me unless I cover everyone else's tip! I distinctly remember the broken English but I had to cover the tip, to which I remarked with a rhetorical question: "Do you expect me to pay the tip even though our request to sit together was flatly denied ?" This was besides the fact of having waiters flying by and picking up plates without asking whether we had finished or not! She adamantly replied
yes and her reason was to be able to pay her staff below minimum wage!

What would you do when some distant relative calls you out of the blue from your country of origin and says its urgent,
call back? Easy, call back and see what the problem is, right? But what would you do if that distant relative who carries the same family name calls you from your country of origin at a distance of lets say 50 years since the last attempt and that occurred only through older relatives who have long passed away and had emigrated overseas to Canada or the US almost a century ago. Some would have jumped on the situation and gone to work immediately to get in touch. I held back. Such was a situation that faced me again after about 30 when I last got a call from someone looking for lost relatives.
Then that person was reticent to explain to me the connection. It was a lady who claimed to have the same family name as my father, but when I asked her about her other relatives to get a family tree out of the situation, she backed down. It seemed she was disillusioned with the prospect of finding some connection. I on the other hand had already lost my father and my mother wasn't in to speak the same language that would have likely made her feel more comfortable.
The latest episode began with a strange ring on my phone that had to be a long distance call which broke up. Some after I got a message that was either Russian or Ukrainian, since it sounded from that neck of the woods. I thought the person must have been overly assuming his lost relatives would only be able to understand those languages. After all the years have passed; all my older relatives have long gone from my father's generation and mother is well on in years. Sure enough a few days pass and I get a call, this time in good English from a young man introducing himself with the same family name as my father had before emigrating to Canada in the mid 1920's. He said what city he was calling from only I wasn't sure if I had understood that well but failed to say what country. Lets not forget the ex-Soviet Union is now splintered into many republics and the city could be in White Russia, Bielorussia or the Ukraine for all I know. Iwas given his phone number without the area code which we are so used to having here at home. So even if I were interested I would have had some research to do before being able to call back. Who was this young man with the same family name? There are many on the web with same current family name living in the US and Canada who are not related to me, so why would he be related even though he has the same family name? And after so many years, not speaking the same language and not having any direct connection to who would have decided to call "urgently" I wasn't interested in becoming a sponsor overnight . I no longer had the drive I had 30 years earlier to investigate the nature of calls such as these.
Others will argue that one should keep in touch with your family and relatives, that's a good thing. But I believe in keeping in touch with family while they are alive not when they are generations removed and there has been an absence of contact except for an 'urgent' call every 30 years. Experience has taught me that it would be likely the young man was directly looking for support either in his travel to Canada or in being sponsored by a relative such as myself, if indeed I was a relative.
I also wanted to get the opinion of my older siblings who also share the same family name. None were interested and for the same reasons. I would have liked to be a little more responsible in making some initiative but how well would that have looked knowing that I am just making ends meet in Canada as a writer, artist and teacher.
What is my message in all this? Many of those would have arrived from Iran and other countries over the years have lost some contact along the way with family that decides to stay. It would be best to keep in touch with them while they are still alive and instill that process into the next generation if these relatives are ever going to reunite with those that have emigrated. This may be wishful thinking, most often I think a family split is inevitable especially when large geographic distances are in between, the older connections have died off and the new generation living in the 'new' country has values completely different from what was in the old.