Good morning. I woke up 15 minutes ago. I’m staying at my friend Ellen’s for a couple of nights before I move into a new place for the whole of May. She had a blossom tree party last night and the tree over her garden is just so pretty.

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I never expected it to be like that when she asked me to come over to celebrate her tree. Cutting a long story short, it didn’t work out at my last place and I was asked to leave the night I wrote my last blog so I had to go and sort something else out quickly. I am going to the small claims court on May 15th to try to get my deposit back as advised by the police when I got them to go to the apartment with me. Not a pleasant experience at all but the good thing is I knew how to sort other things out and a few days later had somewhere else to live, and thank God for friends.

I ended up in a place by myself for a week too in a cool part of Brooklyn called Williamsburg so that felt like bliss. I love living alone so any opportunity I can do that is great. It just happened that the other housemates were away. Yes, yes yes!!! I don’t mind living with others but I just need my space and to just get on. I’m no trouble and have had no problems anywhere else since I started my ‘Soprano and a suitcase’ thing. I try to turn everything into a positive though now. It’s effort but it leads me to a better place on the inside. I have a great place as from Tuesday for the month of May near to Prospect Park in Brooklyn sharing with others in a three storey apartment with a garden so things have worked out better for me. If you can’t vibe in the right way where you are it’s time to move on. She asked me to leave and I just want my deposit back so fingers crossed for that. It’s a lot of money.

I also watched ‘The Secret’ when living alone. Just tap into the law of attraction and creating the reality I want. It just makes so much sense when you listen to what they are saying and I relate to it so much.

‘Ask and it is given’. They say to visualise what you want. Absolutely no problem with that. I see the pictures really clearly in front of me. It’s operation Julie Andrews right now. Ever since I spoke to the Belgian conductor in Philadelphia the other week I knew it was something I had to do. Do a Julie Andrews show but I have to take it step by step and make it happen. I HAVE TO AND I DON’T KNOW WHAT I’M DOING!!!! That’s the panicky fearful me very much present, but the me that just knows this will happen is taking time to listen and doing what I can.

A friend told me about the Lincoln Center library here that is for the performing arts and I am allowed to join as a visitor for three months. How cool is that? I just love New York City for so many things, so I got my backside there this week, saw they had tons of research stuff on her (videos and books etc….that I can’t buy anywhere) and I literally came out the first day excited as a kid in a sweet shop.

It’s the thought that I really can make my dream come true. I said to a friend the other day ‘I have a mission in life and I’ve always felt it so strong that I have it do my mission and my biggest fear is that I won’t do my mission’ so when I have moments where I see some chunks of light in this whole mammoth task of how do I get into America but also write a Julie Andrews show, get musical arrangements done and know how to do it all and have the money to do it all. Very daunting at times. Like, seriously daunting.

I wake up now saying 5 things I am grateful for before I begin my day. Just keep being positive, and believing. Oprah Winfrey is the Queen of this. Everything is always working out for my good. Louise Hay is all ‘Life loves me’. I’m realising it’s all a matter of choice.

Singing wise I’m getting some new songs together that Julie sang and on Monday I’m singing at the homeless place I volunteer at so they get to hear them. Songs from ‘South Pacific’ and ‘My Fair Lady’ etc…….all the stuff I grew up with. I can’t wait until I have my own arrangements done and can make it my own. Really exciting but I realise that I have to do the research first to know how to then do the next part and I know that I’ll have to find ways to do it in the UK too. Once I get something together I can apply for funding and see if I can get it out in some venues in the UK. I don’t think I’ve ever done anything where it feels so daunting but that I have to just know it will come to me. I am never alone in these things.

There’s not much talk of singing this time (my apologies for that). It’s more background stuff. I have been in Central Park but one of my slots has been cut because some other musicians came back and needed some time there so I have to think of plan b’s. I was fed up for a day thinking ‘I just find a comfort zone and it stops’. Never any comfort zones. Housing, singing, future, but I know I have to keep staying in gratitude. At least I have one session a week. Everything helps.

I go to 72nd st the rest of the time and I went to The Met Opera on Friday to see Verdi’s ‘Rigoletto’ (liked the production and some of the singing but bugged me that when Gilda died her dad was not really dramatic enough for me),

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with the free tickets someone gave me and went to the subway stop afterwards full of people who had been to the opera, heard a saxophonist playing some opera and thought ‘maybe I could go there’ and sing before or after a show. Catch the punters. Just give it a shot if I had the guts to. I think it would either be ‘we’ve just been the the Met reaction and not be interested or ‘that’s nice, good for you’. If I do have the guts to try one time it will be interesting to see.

The agent is letting me know too this week about a coaching with a guy from Broadway. I want to do it just to see what he says. I’m not aspiring to sing there but I want to see what advice and help he can give me on singing the songs with a more classical edge than what is done these days. I was watching a couple of videos the other day in the library from the past and singers tended to sing more classically in general and that’s what I want to do. I also watched a cool interview with Kitty Carlisle, the wife of Moss Hart (he was the guy who directed Julie in My Fair Lady years ago on Broadway and she was also a singer and dancer), and she had all these stories of George Gershwin, Cole Porter, Jerome Kern and the greats.

All personal first hand stories that George Gershwin was the life and soul of the party because he made sure he was etc……how they worked so hard to do their thing and faced many disappointments etc…it makes it all easier for me to keep going to hear their stories. I was also sat with a friend of Ellen’s last night who said ‘one time we stayed in a hotel in LA and Julie Andrews had the room above us and we could hear her doing her singing exercises. I’m like ‘wish it had been me and I could knock on the door and say hi’ (yeah right, as if I would).

So five things I am grateful for today:

That I can sing. How lucky am I?

That I’m in this lovely Sex and the City style apartment with my friend Ellen for a few days. Good she can help me out.

The beautiful blossom tree.

My lemon in hot water to get my day going.

That I’m in NYC. That’s cool in itself.

I’m also going to get my UK events on my website this week. Start thinking about that again. Check me out at http://www.iamnicolamills.com