Red Giant

I have started two or three entries about my strange, spectacular, and perilous journey in a new job, a whole new world, really. I write for about a paragraph about all of my dreams leading up to it, and then I look at everything that followed, and that cup of inspiration sits empty, indifferent to the whole story. I just can't write enough details of all the good and bad I've had over the past eight months because the real issue doesn't lie with job satisfaction. The thing that needs to be unearthed is altogether much larger than that, because let's face it: this is just the start of a new chapter in my career, so of course there were going to be struggles.

What I have to confess is that I am seriously lacking inspiration. I am starving, thirsty, my humanity draining and my need to create waning. Only now, as I am with my family in Miami for the holidays, can I recognize myself and realize mistakes I've made this year. I have seven days left of this vacation to examine my life, reconnect, and be brutally honest about everything I'm doing and not doing. For that matter, it's encouraging that I've gotten past the first paragraph. I think this means that I'm a little closer to the truth of the moment.

While I have watched my latest muse lose her brilliance and interest, I haven't been in touch with friends. I've allowed work to take my whole focus, thinking about it when I'm not at the office and not sparing enough energy to create new projects on my own. I've taken on projects at work that increased the target on my head, and I just have to ask, with everything I'm doing, am I spending my time wisely? Am I showing interest in the right things?

Being around family refocuses all of that in an instant. Nothing else matters here in the cradle of love. I can begin with this, let everything else scatter to the winds, and then there are obvious pieces that remain. They stick despite all of the changes, because I hear their voices on my phone, get messages from them, emails, and when I'm away, they stay and watch over my apartment. They seek me out and know me for who I really am, and still, what have I done?

I realize I'm hopping back and forth between the past and the present, but things have to change. I'm yelling into an echoless chamber and have finally woken up to see what I'm setting myself up for. I've been able to dim the lighthouse of my heart for maintenance in the past, so...I think that is exactly what's called for now. My heart doesn't lie, and thanks to years of theater where everything false becomes as obvious as those rare moments of truth, I can't lie to myself any more, either. Where will I find the inspiration that I've missed so much, and what is the name of my next muse?

The brutal, uncompromising truth is that I can't pursue what I can't create. That is what I do best. I don't compete, I don't express meaningless ideas. I'm made to live a creative life out of necessity, and that often means I have to go at it alone.

I aspire to be better than I am, so think about that when the changes come.

Sleeper, Awake

I see the image of her in my mind as I've seen it a thousand days since I last touched her, and I remember myself as I was. It's been a recurring theme, defining experiences sometimes before they have a chance to happen. It's a badge of courage, that memory, and it built a sobering tolerance of every difficult thing I've encountered in my life. I've struggled, I've gone head first through rejection and failure, and I faced much of it alone. That was by choice. I've seen in her my importance to another person, and though it's still there, what I never saw was the growth of myself beyond her eyes. I just set myself to pushing ahead, way ahead of the pack, stopping occasionally to see something beautiful, but not real. Because I wasn't alive, surrounded by people who constantly looked over my shoulder for the next best thing, I stopped looking and worse, I stopped hoping. No, I'm not a celebrity. I'm not rich, nor do I drive a nice car or own my own home. I don't walk into a room expecting all eyes on me, and I don't expect anyone else to open a door for me in my career. I only focused on building my life from and inside ground zero, but things are beginning to change.

I've come to a new place where I don't have years of investment. I am brand new, judged as I am, and there are no thoughts of what I once was. My value only exists in the moment, and if there once was a place to deny myself, to accept being overlooked and underappreciated, this isn't it. I am what I do. I'm trusted with difficult projects, compensated in more ways than one, and gain the exact measure of what I put in, at the very least. I'm in a land of appreciation, and this is a foreign place compared to where I have been, where I've paid my dues.

So, of course, I have to change. Darwin once said that "It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change." I can't speak to anyone else I recognize as older but virtually unchanged, but since I write to ask the questions I may not have answers to, and I constantly turn over the topsoil to try to figure out what the hell I'm doing at any given moment, it's not a matter of this possibly being the time for me to change. It's an undeniable truth. I have to be brutally honest with myself and begin to let go of old habits and beliefs. It's right there in front of me. It's that hill I can see from twenty steps away from my house. It's the addition of new people in my life, and the reintroduction of old friends.

I see an image of her in my mind, but it doesn't resemble a picture I've held for a thousand days since. She is redefined, with a new name and possibly...who knows...maybe a new promise. In fairness, I should hold and offer my heart with no hesitation, for I've kept it so long for no apparent reason other than fear. I'm not afraid any more. Let this be a new recurring theme for me.

The Jungian Thing

The unpredictability of day-to-day life never ceases to amaze me, but people do. Often, you appreciate people for whom they are and don't even attempt to define them, and then suddenly, like a hockey player being checked into glass, you see someone display an awesome boundary of their limitations, either through action or blunt inaction. These are the same people who will give you advice despite themselves, turning a blind eye to their flawed nature and repeating things they've heard, speaking with such hollow wisdom, embarrassing themselves without knowing it. They talk about a big picture but see the world through a pinhole. They correct your behavior and justify their own. They say exactly twenty words too far in the wrong direction, and everything after that is just mindless wandering in the weeds of their own dissatisfaction.

Words are as cheap as the unsolicited, unqualified opinions that literally litter every avenue of communication we know, and it's gone so far in recent times that people, I believe, have forgotten how to be polite to each other. People will enter a conversation - be it text, email, chat, or even in person - with one need in mind and upon getting what they need, the conversation ends on one side. It seems a growing majority want to be heard and not responded to. That's the impersonal Internet generation, built on more tenuous connections rather than few strong ones. That's where the search for real people becomes so difficult to hope for.

You know who you are.

And I mean that in the sense of you knowing where you stand. Are you sampling people and experiences from a party tray, or do you begin your search from within? Do you step outside and act with good intention, or do you immediately enter the race and cock your arm to strike down any person or idea that threatens to pull a distant spotlight from you? Do you know only about love for one, or do you know about love for all? This is not a test; I wrestle with those questions all the time, both with how people affect me and how I want to carry myself.

I said that you know who you are, and I meant it. Either you've examined yourself in a mirror and put it into words, or it's the theme song playing in your subconscious. These things are self-evident, and they create recurring patterns that can last a lifetime. One that comes to my mind is the constant reminder to rise above the moment and aspire, build, keep moving and searching for truth wherever I can get it. Most of what I've found lately has been the dirty and dense variety, poisonous and completely foreign. The minority - in truth - has been priceless and promising, and the very least I can do is weigh them equally. That's where I want to put my focus, as much as I'm able. I am distracted, but I haven't lost hope.

I am flawed, still reactive and can hold a grudge needlessly. While I try to practice diplomacy and steer away from emotional situations, I'm quick to react negatively when people make the simplest things difficult. In many respects, I'm stuck in the maze of my own making, but I'm not dull enough to believe the present resembles the future. I want more. I need to grow. I look up and off into the distance, and believe I can and should get there, even if I stand to fail many times on the way.

I will get there, despite myself. If I can help it, I'll choose the right words, find the right people, and let everything else fall away. The truth is - if I'm not blind to it - always right here, right now.

A New Prometheus

Enough is enough. I've written enough optimistic passages to qualify for the very first Hallmark book, an extended greeting card that not only expresses Happy Birthday and Thinking of You, but it also aggressively works towards spinning the negative on its head, regardless of what theme is playing in daily life. Right now there's so much noise. So much noise. I can't throw the iPod cone of denial over my head this time. What's more, I'm going to commit myself to writing something every day to get myself back on track. I'm in the midst of my rookie season and am beginning to forget the love of the game.

What's bringing me back to that? I meet so many people who once loved something, or were moved by something, and left it forgotten somewhere in the past. There are likes and dislikes, attractions and reactions, sometimes the search for an elusive truthful moment. And I get lost. I get busy, and I get lost. One thing I can see clearly now, which I've tried to ignore many times, is that I have lighthouses in the darkness of my memory, reminding me to write, to create, to play music. It's annoying sometimes, because I just want life to be simple. What's worse is the fact that I see these people, or at least read their words and visualize perfectly what they looked like the last time I saw them, and yet I can't tell them that they mean this much to me, still. I wouldn't dare, not even in a weak moment, or risk losing contact. I remain aloof and parenthetical, and brush the feelings aside. It's not fair, but it is the product of trial and error.

The trial has been acknowledgment of things going well, but denying what's actually happening. That's really hard to do, because as much as I may have aged, my body and mind in effect and interest, I still have my old enthusiasm for the simplest things. I will unashamedly let my inner dork come to the surface and say exactly what's on my mind, playing and cracking jokes whenever I can. I'll show interest in the smallest detail, and sink completely into music or a movie without judgement, as if that piece was written expressly for me to watch it. I'll often do things alone to preserve that wonder without judgement, and practically dance with that freedom.

The error has been trying to share that wonder with people, or slipping and saying exactly how I've felt. That seems to be the very last thing people want. Honesty. Appreciation. A complimentary, supportive nature. It all smells strongly of commitment and obligation, like a green cloud that will leave an unwashable smell in their clothes. I've already written here that I've been accused...and I couldn't emphasize that word enough...accused of being too truthful. I've been treated like the greatest medicine with the most bitter taste, shoved to the back of the medicine cabinet and forgotten.

So I step back into the darkness that follows, and I re-evaluate. I think about why I can click with some people so well and then be rejected immediately for an apparent fear that things are going well. Am I too open? Am I too available? Am I too different? At this point in my life, there are irreversible traits and choices that I live with, not understanding an ounce of regret. I've written about it the whole way - for 23 years - and I don't envy a single person. I don't actually optimistically hypnotize myself into thinking that my best days are ahead of me. I can only think obsessively that creatively speaking, I have something great yet to discover. I don't get that from faith, and I don't get that from past successes.

I look off into the darkness, and I see those points of light in the distance. One tells me that I could and should let someone love me again. Another one tells me that I'm smart, and talented, and unique. Yet another one tells me that no matter what decisions I make, they'll be the right ones and I can always alter my course. I tell myself....

Seriously, screw life being easy. My options aren't always laid out simply because there are things that I have to do for survival, and then there's the constant pull from my creative side. It has to survive. It has to keep an opening in me big enough to breathe, to feel things profound and unforgettable, letting out a hopeful voice that keeps searching. There are times I can't get to sleep at night because the overture is still playing.

I work, I pay bills. I buy food and sleep, and so, I live.

I listen to the muses, the lighthouses in my heart, and that makes me feel alive. I can't have it any other way.

The Devil With the Three Golden Hairs

Sometimes I need to remind myself of the quote "We cannot become what we want to be by remaining what we are." Yes, it's one of those things that people say while disconnecting themselves from the spirit of the idea, but damn, it's so absolutely true. I want to spend every day of my life practicing the act of becoming, and I have to remind myself because I get distracted with so many things from day to day. I lose sight of the big picture...which...and I realize this is very stream of thought...I have to consider myself lucky that I've got a sense of a bigger picture than this, you know? The big picture constantly comes into focus and continues to evolve.

Not that I actually have a lot of distractions, compared to what other people might have to deal with. Over this summer, which is about to end, I've spent five days a week working no less than 10 hours a day with two crackberries strapped to my body and 15 pounds falling off of me. It's as if I'm in a submarine that has been floating under the polar ice cap for months, and just now I'm beginning to see the sun shining through the surface. We have one week left of summer that has had so many moments beyond anything I could have imagined a year ago. One year ago I was isolated at a desk, working on my own, worried about my future in a strangely symbolic cul de sac on the 6th floor of an industry I had no interest in. One year ago, I was laying face down in a rut, fed up with patterns of my past and yet at the same time completely stunned by vertigo when faced with a distant, staticy wall of options. They were all out there, beyond reach or definition, but since I had a paycheck coming in every week, no matter how miserable I was I could still sit back, do nothing, and earn money.

In one month, I will be a year past my own personal independence day. I will have survived the thrust into the unknown, the pinpoint landing onto the top of a hill, and I will have faced the trials of a difficult summer. I've been away from family and friends, out of touch and entirely focused on sleeping and working. I can make this all worth it if I start making upward moves within the company. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy I sometimes ignore or encourage the opposite of, and really, the act of believing in the outcome is more powerful than hope. It's the innocent knowledge that the way to get to where you want to go is never a straight line, but as long as you keep your eyes on the next finish line, you'll get there. Here's the secret behind the secret: It doesn't occur to most people you'll meet to turn their gaze above the crowd and see that point in the distance. Because of that, they'll try to discourage you from being different. They'll laugh at or argue with your lack of compliance to their standards. They'll resent you once you're pulling away. After a while, their voices will fade off into the distance, and you'll find yourself in unexpected places, like deep beneath the polar ice cap or a very loud and brighty lit hilltop overlooking the San Fernando Valley.

I'm on a small team now, working in Entertainment and doing everything I can to keep my eyes up towards that big picture. When will I settle down? Will I ever have a family of my own? When will I start arriving at a creative plateau where I can look back at everything I've done? I haven't even begun to answer those questions. I still have so much to look forward to.

What you wish for

On Saturday, I did absolutely nothing. I spent hour after hour on my couch not thinking, not feeling, not worrying about anything. I simply let each and every responsibility bubble up to the sky and breathed in my own little space where I haven’t had to be good or great, nor have I been judged today. I earned that day.

The story to that point has not been told, nor would I want to directly revisit each and every emotion I’ve gone through over the past few months. To tell you the truth, it hasn’t been easy for me to – in essence – start over again, or at least, that’s how it feels. Yes, be careful when you ask for something, because you’ll get it up close enough to see the imperfections, jagged edges, and patched up areas. Did I say that I’m starting over again? I’m more like…replanted, put in a bigger pot…with better soil. I’m just more exposed to the elements this time.

The last most people heard of me, I got a job that on paper looked like the perfect fit for me. It felt like the two sides of my life, the creative and the professional, were finally coming together. The best things about the job are obvious to most, and I really do count my blessings, especially when I compare where I am today and where I was a year ago. I can hear live music by some really talented artists, learn about their creative processes, and soak in their experience and expression in ways I haven’t thought of before. I can plan events, run them with the same feelings and intentions that I had on more productions than I can count over the past decade. I’m working three miles away from home for a great company.

The steep learning curve of the job has been the most difficult thing to ignore, because of the crazy schedule we have. There are few personalities in the mix, a team of five regulars and a handful of part timers who help with the events. My obsession with how well I fit in reminds me of how frustrated I was many years ago at both my job and at Playhouse, and in that case, it just took months, years…to break away from the pack and make a name for myself. That’s when I had time. I was at that starting point in my late 20s. I’m now back to square one at 40. Again, that’s just a perception on my part.

I find myself using the phrase “at my age” a lot lately, perhaps to remind myself that I don’t have a lot of time to waste, nor can I allow myself to settle into any kind of satisfaction with where I am at any given point in time. I’ve been completely focused on and distracted by the 10-12 hour work day, finding it difficult to unearth the inspiration it takes to write a script or even a blog entry. I’ve lost touch with friends and family, glancing over at a loose collection of open-ended emails and voicemails. When that happens, I begin to lose a sense of myself apart from everything else. Descend on a hill in 91608, where neon lights and loud music ring in a beautiful chaos every single day of the year, and look beneath the lights for a person searching for a voice again, watching people pass through in a brief moment of their lives.

Let’s call the act of doing nothing an awakening, because as I learned in acting class, even nothing is something. It’s a chance to breathe, to remember, to see one’s surroundings clearly, short of being reactive. It’s an opportunity to say that from here on, I can change things on my own terms, and to accept the fact that I wanted all of this, for better or worse. I can’t ignore who I’ve been on my way to whom I will be. There is no actual starting over, come to think of it.

There is only the beginning, which exists only in the now.

It’s about damn time that I saw my way through writing this.

To See The Next Peak

I sit on the floor of my living room on this windy night with the lights off, a moment to see the difference between where I've been and where I am. There's a gap in my account of everything, a lapse in words but not action. Here's what has gone unrecorded.

My blind faith in the right job came at absolutely the right time. I refused to give in to the most obvious path into the entertainment industry, the secretarial admin route. I tickled the severance package and unemployment checks, and just as that fuel gauge touched red, I saw the job listing like a beautiful pair of brown eyes framed by dark hair. I submitted for it right away as one of my wishing well attempts and remembered a week later that I knew someone at the company, and two days after making contact, I interviewed for the job. A week after that, I had an offer in my hands. It was less than what I earned before, but my last job was paying rent on my soul. This job is actually the natural habitat for me, albeit with a bit of the new guy awkwardness that was tenfold for about the first year at my old job. I'm impatient. I want to know everything now. I'm human. I'm prone to mistakes when I venture into unknown territory. As far as an entry level door into the entertainment industry, this is the most attractive one. I am a Production Coordinator for Universal Citywalk Entertainment and Special Events.

All cool points about the job aside, I'm still me, you know. I still discover myself being rejected in the strangest of ways, and on the flip side, my connection to other people became stronger. I've been told more than once that because I am hard to respond to when honesty comes into play, responding to me becomes insignificant. That's not the intention, that's the reaction. I've been told more than once that my best reaction should be to run in the opposite direction from those people. I figured out that I don't have to run. I merely need to ignore the option to open that door. I mean, seriously. Seriously! Why would I place value in connections to people who place no value on me? No, no longer. I don't think it's right to point out a virtue as a flaw.

I've also worked on a different approach to this year's film festival, more involvement with the committee so that even if everyone walks away without a very heartfelt "thank you", the experience leading up to the festival is a good one. I must say, this year's committee has worked very hard on the selection and lost the battle a few times in the end, but most of the films that made the final list were really dissected and discussed, and therefore earned their spot. We are turning into this final straightaway as a team, and I'm proud for my part in it. Now...oh crap...I have to work on the presentations. Crap.

I still feel like I'm constantly in a dogfight, seeking targets of opportunity while looking over my shoulder. At what point do people feel like they arrived somewhere, and not just to a point where you see how much higher you might have to climb? When can I exhale?

There is that blind faith, the knowledge that everything you do to this point counts, and that you can change the course of everything should it ever occur to you. I have a good job. I have a regular rotation of friends I hardly get to see because of said job and days off where I just want to rest. I think...and I hope...that merely convincing myself that the next good thing is about to happen will make me more open to see it when it does, if that makes sense. Some might call that my annoying optimism, others might call it "the Secret" and make millions on merchandising the idea.

I call it a much better option than surrender.

Good Morning

It's Easter 2008, and no one has been able to explain the correlation between this as a fundamentally important Catholic holiday and the tradition of an abnormally large white rabbit hiding colorful eggs and chocolate from children. I didn't wake up with candy somewhere in the house, nor did I put on my Sunday best and go to church. I woke up this morning, just before six am, to the sound of someone rattling my front door. To put it more accurately, it was the sloppy sound of a drunken hand trying to stick a car key in my front door. Needless to say, I didn't need a snooze alarm. I got to the peephole just in time to see a bald head swaying, trying to focus motor skills, not expecting me to turn out the porch light. That was unexpected moment #1. He backed away after a delayed reaction, fell ass first onto my lawn, then staggerred off to the left out of view. That's when I opened the door, kicked his keys out, then closed and locked the screen door, followed by the main door. That was unexpected moment #2, which resulted in his zombie like path off to the right and down the street. When I left my house two hours later for San Diego, I noticed his keys and his...socks. The scene was everything Cinderella isn't.

I didn't care. I needed to get out of the house, out of the city.

The trip down to San Diego, and especially Balboa Park, should not be taken for granted. Once past the grey/brown haze, there are rounded green hills, gorgeous fields and valleys, and the very self-absorbed but mind-numbingly huge Pacific Ocean just out of reach in its own playground. Just now, as I write this hours later, I feel like I just took my first breath. Los Angeles doesn't allow you to breathe, and the journey South steals it.

And so, I've been practicing the delicate balance between wondering about my future and surrendering to it. Today alone, I saw things I didn't expect: the people and artifacts of Pompeii, a sexy grilled portobello mushroom sandwich that made eating it feel like an ilicit affair, an amazing photography exhibit, and a sign announcing an Ozzy Ozbourne tribute at the Santa Fe Springs swap meet. I think the theme of the day probably applies to me as much as it applies to religion and candy egg hunting. Everything lends itself to the next thing, regardless of what you choose to pay attention to. Sometimes the moments of your life fall like cherry blossom petals in a soft breeze, and sometimes they're the chocolate bon bons on the conveyor belt next to Lucy and Ethel. There is a progression that makes us wiser, smarter in a way, but again, that depends on how and when we recognize it. Wherever you're sitting, you are moving at about 1000 miles per hour, simply by the fact that you are sitting on Earth. You can choose to say that you're going nowhere, or you can realize that you are racing towards tomorrow. It's up to you.

In the movie "Singing in the Rain," Don Lockwood is being consoled by his friends Cosmo and Kathy after a disastrous opening of his film, The Dueling Cavalier. It was a technological mess, a shallow story showing the lack of the stars' acting chops. They were used to things as the way they were, and suddenly, they were thrust in the position of being left behind by the entertainment industry, of becoming obsolete. That was March 22nd. On March 23rd, Cosmo came up with an idea that not only pulled them back into the game, it saved the film and put them way ahead. That was one moment. One idea. They took it and danced and sang the rest of the way.

Here's to hope and being awake enough to see the moment when it comes.

Flight

Ahh, so new digs with more privacy and a little more dedication. I feel like I finally moved in with the more dependable of two options and remained friends with the other. This is where I should have written all along, and hopefully this kind of focus doesn't inspire any stalkers or....

Well, I've learned something about myself this week. I've learned that I sometimes act on ideas a little too quickly, before people have had a chance to adjust. Sometimes, I even get to ideas before others, and this causes a political ripple effect that tends to turn back on me. It happened with the theater company, and many years ago, and happened at one of my jobs when I was put in charge of a major project and upon completion I rewarded the team before my boss got a chance to. That man was very gracious but was caught off guard. People in the entertainment world are much less understanding, and feel entitled to a competition of ideas before collaboration. There's almost always the illusion of collaboration, but much too often, one selfish person ends up sitting on a big idea for lack of the ability to pull it off. Progress is held up, potential and opportunity are left on the vine to wither away, but let's keep our priorities straight. The ego stays intact.


And then there's the matter of an existence on the net offering people an alternative to a real exchange. I blog obsessively, sometimes not online, about my life as I try to figure things out, even going so far as to script conversations with people I couldn't otherwise talk to. It's a great device to use when you need to get things out of your head and lay some thoughts to rest. Of course, the unintentional purpose it has served has been to excuse some people from that real exchange, to satisfy a curiosity that completely absolves them from participaton. That much is not cool, especially on such a social site as MySpace. The great thing is, some people read my blog and still write, which is amazing, I think, because once you dig a little deep to write a blog, you never come off in an attractive way, I think. That really holds true if you stay on the traditional diary or journal theme of a blog. I am not a hot potato or an illegal substance. Some people get that.


On second thought, maybe all this isn't so much about other peoples' reactions to what I do or what I have to say. Maybe this is more about regret, and whether or not it's relevant. In either case, analysis of it is backwards-looking, which is dangerous. The best thing I can do is either react or not react for the moment, and then adjust to whatever change comes from inspiration or...well, those uncontrollable outside forces.

Such is life, I suppose. We rarely know exactly what it is we think, much less why other people do what they do. What do you really have control over, anyway? Think about it. In every instance of injustice that I've been through, there's been a mix of my actual part in it and my perception of other people in it. Truly, when the moment has come and gone, there's only one course of action to take.

Create distance, invite time, and rise above.

His Quietus Make

I will actually come through on a promise I posed on my very first entry here in MySpace, spoken out of caution and concern on January 11th, 2006. Since then, I have written almost 80 entries, but the real number of journal entries since the mid-80s makes this little experiment look like a playing card. In truth, it's not MySpace. It's our space, where we have shared friends, shared status, possibly a spot on someone's top friends list, and hopefully a photo that doesn't make us look like a mass murderer. We build who we are online, sometimes despite who we are in real life, and because I love to write, that option to blog here was the irresistible chocolate donut sitting there on the plate, daring me.

The truth is, if you let it, this little wading pool of thought can get deep and a little revealing. Sometimes, it even gives people the option of reading you without effort and that affects the lines of communication. The real question becomes: Why do I feel the need to write this stuff in such a public place? My journal began on loose sheets of college ruled paper, then moved to word procesed documents and printouts, all kept in the same binder. Eventually, three binders were filled and now sit in my attic, where in hindsight, I realize all of my thoughts should be kept. The geek in me couldn't resist the Internet, so here I am, swimming rivers of change and knowing that this is the wrong place to write.

See, my space is up here, in my head, in the conversations I have with my friends and family. It's in the stories I write (I'm in the thick of writing a script now, and that might be the reason I was jarred loose from the pattern), and the music I play. My space is wordless: a hug, a handshake, a kiss, the truth right in front of you.

So why do I write, and will I keep blogging? Somewhere I'll keep it up, because this is what I do. For more than half of my life, I have emptied my heart and mind into words so I could have a little perspective for myself and indulge in the demons and angels of doubt and hope. It's a habit I'm not going to give up easily, and eventually, the living, breathing line of this little section will go away.

What I said a few years ago is true. Blogs are stupid. We are much smarter than the thoughts we leave behind.

(Of course, this just means that I return to Blogger and stop writing on MySpace. Blogger's great, isn't it?)

Compass

The view from where I stand is so different, as if I took a long walk absorbed in my thoughts and didn't realize I left the city. Life had been the same for years, maybe a decade, where I was constantly going from one schedule to the next, creating, fighting, always hungry to get to the next thing. It was one half of life lived in the misery of a day job, and one half breathed onto stage, rehearsing and playing, working hard and trying not to blink so I didn't lose a single moment. The only problem was that though I did more and achieved more than anyone, including myself, could ever imagine, I didn't actually get anywhere. I made my mark at work, transformed the stage, but I stood at the same level, staring at the same four walls. I think that's why I quit managing the theater. It wasn't so much the politics and frequent miscommunication. It was the sense of being in a different place than everyone else.

Looking back, that might be where the crack was formed. I lost my job, lost a lot of contact with friends in the process, and arrived at this view, a long journey pared down to one set of footprints and more change on the way. I've had nothing but time and space to think about what I've done and whether or not all of this was worth it. I realize I've been flipping over this same exact theme as if I've been studying the little holes on either side of a pancake, but something always happens that takes me back for a moment...draws my eyes to the horizon behind me and then turn to scan the foggy future. Something always makes me wonder about my hands and the relevance of the things I can do. This is just one the many wonderful things about being 40.

Something always comes up...the other day I was cc'ed on an email from an old friend about the play we'll be in this Saturday. It's going to be her last. It will also probably be the last time I will see her for a long while, as she's moving out of the country to get married. She was my favorite girlfriend on stage, my duet in the musical that took so much out of me. She spent the day with me when I got ready to take that train trip, and took me to the station. I knew she was engaged, and newly so, but I didn't expect her to leave so quickly. In between her acting jobs, she was a great friend, and...okay, I just caught myself because for some reason I'm eulogizing her. Maybe I'm not really talking about her at all. New paragraph. Get off this.

I once wrote that you never see love coming, but when it leaves, you watch it's every step. I guess...I love my friends and sometimes wish things would never change, but they do. Friends in my past have gotten married or moved away, or just faded from one life to another, and they've all become unrecognizable in a way. I know I'll be in the right frame of mind on Saturday to say goodbye to this friend, because emotionally I have to become a little detached when I do this play (it's complicated), but in the back of my mind I know two other friends will soon be married, and I'll isolate a little more. Everything seems to be pointing to the things I've done and will do more so than the people I've been around, so I stand here with this strange, different view, trying to reconcile what I've done and what I'm meant to do at this point.

Make art. That's what Glen Hansard said at the Oscars when he accepted his award for best song. That was the first thing spoken the whole night that had an impact on me. Make art. That, of course, set the table for what his partner had to say after: "Hi everyone. I just want to thank you so much. This is such a big deal, not only for us, but for all other independent musicians and artists that spend most of their time struggling, and this, the fact that we're standing here tonight, the fact that we're able to hold this, it's just to prove no matter how far out your dreams are, it's possible. And, you know, fair play to those who dare to dream and don't give up. And this song was written from a perspective of hope, and hope at the end of the day connects us all, no matter how different we are. And so thank you so much, who helped us along the way. Thank you."

There lies the courage to move on and keep trying, in those words, in the heart of truth and pursuit of a voice in art. People have not always made sense to me on a very personal level, but find me in the middle of writing a play, standing in front of actors with my notebook in hand, or playing guitar and singing with others, and you can see me live in a way that love always failed me. As the new saying goes, "Unlucky in love, damn good at art."

It's time to get moving again.

Our Lives, Our Fortunes, Our Sacred Honor

Now that the Writers Strike is over, any idea of the struggle to be creative in Hollywood quickly fades from the public eye. It gave many idiots the chance to say that the TV shows or movies were poorly written in the first place, and that writers weren't missed. The only good stories were told many, many years ago, or worse, these people expressing opinions over the Internet hardly ever watched TV (which made their opinions about TV in the first place totally invalid). The first thing I can tell you is that the strike isn't really over yet. True, writers, producers, and actors are no longer walking the picket lines, but right now they're going over the latest contract they got from the AMPTP, and consensus is that it's definitely less than what it should be. I won't go into details, but there is still a tricky wording of the contract that needs to be navigated and debated. Do you ever read the small print in things you sign? You might be surprised if you did.

But that's Hollywood, the industry versus itself - the business of Hollywood versus the ideas of Hollywood - and it tends to believe people are expendable. It will exercise this belief from the top down to the smallest corner, many variations on the theme of short term gain for profit. It's practiced in the small theaters and acting schools, in the high profile dealing of organizations representing guilds, and unfortunately, there's more on the way. There is an ongoing debate right now in the Screen Actors Guild over the upcoming contract negotiations, and which of the members should be allowed to vote on the new contract. Obviously, if you pay dues you should be able to vote, but there are some in the guild who don't agree. From the top down, it's an embarrassing overture of narcissism, and the business might be focusing a little too much on "more".

While business looks at the bottom line, it's very easy to lose sight of the sacrifices people make when they choose a creative life, whether it's writing, acting, or whatever it is that requires practice, training, a commitment that takes away from other things in life...other, sometimes important things. The view from where I stand is of people busy doing, constantly creating and looking for opportunities. My friends, many of whom are actors, are perpetually working on films, plays, and auditioning for TV. They will work crew on other friends' films, keep returning to classes they can barely afford if not for the occasional day job or paying acting jobs. These people keep returning to an industry that keeps rejecting them, but despite these crazy priorities, including living a life with low pay and a constant hustle for work, there are still a lot of writers and actors out there, and they need their guilds.

On the other hand...business in general seems to have a similar lack of conscience. A few days ago, I received an email from some former coworkers, the next ones on the chopping block schedule for the extended mix of reduction in force. There's a get-together on their last day at the local restaurant/bar, and they were inviting me. I immediately went right back to the unfairness of the process, of previous layoffs where my friends were sniped from the ranks, where I was asked to dig my own grave and then afterwards endured the enlightenment of seeing who my remaining friends really were. Do I really want to go back there for a visit? I think, maybe, I already said goodbye. Over the years, I was known for writing monthly newsletters, and this was the last one I sent, after I was let go. In hindsight, I guess the most consistent thing about me is that I've always focused on people who struggle, who believe in ideas over profit. Someday I hope to be able to talk to both sides and bring them together. Enough already. Here's what I called "The Final Newsletter":

Greetings former colleagues, close friends, and...well, those of you still at the old Blackjack (the nickname I gave 21st). I didn't want to end my newsletters like...Laverne & Shirley (they had no final episode) or...well, that was a bad example. I didn't really have a whole lot of time to write on my way out, nor did I remember to include my email address, which would have been nice. Nobody could blame me, huh? All of a sudden, I was both Papillon and Neo from the Matrix, and I'm making one quick appearance to finish things off right.

The Tribe Has Spoken
This whole thing has been a surprise to many people, but not to me so much, because I've been through this before. I just wasn't as close to people back then as I was this time around, but I'll tell you two things: 1) I'm sure we'll be BFF, and that we'll keep in touch, and 2) Hey, there IS life after being pooped out by the auto insurance industry, and it's pretty awesome. Sure, John Edwards speaks to the dead, but I can offer the same advice he gives. Those who have crossed over don't really have any ill will over the circumstances that got us here. We're in a good place. We went towards the light and are doing well. We just hope you're surviving and are able to enjoy each other with the time you have together. That is what our bond was when we were amongst you, so I sincerely hope you keep up the tradition. Honestly, there's no resentment towards anyone or anything, only enlightenment in some cases, and relief.

Connectivity
First of all, I have to give you what I didn't give you before. My email address is: sjirel@gmail.com. Use it wisely. Or not. Up to you, entirely. Also, as long as we have the net, we always have a way to keep in touch, don't we? You know I have multiple websites and am busy at this very moment with outplacement and this exciting job search. I want to keep in touch and invite you to do the same. Who knows where we'll be in a year? I hope to send you an update soon to let you know where I land, but I also wish this kind of "upturning of the soil" for you, a chance to really see who you are and what you're truly worth. The main thing that I learned throughout the classes I've taken recently and seeing friends go through the whole adjustment period (Klaus, Yvonne, Hagay) is that I wish I had gotten myself organized much earlier. I had a decent resume. Now my resume is sexy. I had a cover letter and a couple of websites I could submit to, and now I've got a whole networking plan and some solid stuff to work with. It's great to be pushed out of the nest to discover you can fly.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So that's it, gang, the last in a short history of long emails sent to you to let you know that I can hear you breathing in those cubicles and offices, and that you're not forgotten. This has been a great experience for me, and I'll do everything I can to avoid flipping burgers. You're all in my thoughts, and I really do wish the best for you. You made my time at the wrong job completely worth the time I spent there, and I won't forget you for it. Okay, honestly, some details will become fuzzy over time and should we meet again, I might use the wrong name. Don't take it personally. My brain is only so big. Take care of yourselves, and be good people.

Your friend always,
Stewart

Here's one last quote for you:
"And that's the world in a nutshell, an appropriate receptacle."
~ Stan Dunn

Science of People

I've been walking more recently, to the local restaurants and coffee places, and this has offered me brief moments of perspective to not think as much as feel the mileage of the past couple of months. I think I've outgrown this "living on severance" lifestyle. I need to be busy again. No, not just busy. Busy with the right things.

Creatively, I am looking at a blank canvas thinking wistfully about the palette of colors I used to paint with. More specifically, I miss the way I used to feel around people. I miss that effect that some had on me, where I rolled around details of our last exchange in my mind. I would search music for the right theme, see colors and textures that reminded me of what they wore, even called on things they said in the things I wrote. Sadly, in my night sky they are the few steady points of light, not the gaudy ones that sparkle and sometimes fade, disappearing with the belief in their own hype. It's too easy, much too easy, to say that this only happens in Los Angeles, but the truth is that narcissism is a global obsession.

Forgive me if I've mentioned all this before. Some things, I guess, don't change. Consider it a fact that few of my friends give me pause to wonder why some things are said or done. Well, let's face it; The simple, whole-hearted people in my life have given me the opportunity to be a friend in return, and there goes the perpetual cycle of reciprocation and understanding that builds good, solid friendships. They make it easy to differentiate what is real, and what isn't.

As I may have mentioned before, the ace in my sleeve is the ability to remove myself, and walk away, if needed. For example, I was supposed to go out with a girl upon my return to L.A. earlier this year, and it should have been easy. We exchanged emails. I called her and left a message. Then I had time to think - while she was busy not returning my call or emails. I remembered that every exchange was difficult, feeling as if she was trying to manipulate the fog of ambiguity around her as if to simulate an old-fashioned idea of mystery. I had to work hard to earn any secrets she guarded (while she, of course, made it very clear she was seeing other guys). All this play, and I could only wonder what exactly the prize would be. The immediate next thought was this: If I have to work that hard on something that isn't even a friendship yet, chances are the pieces don't fit.

My most practiced instinct is to step back and watch all this impartially, in much the same way I directed plays, watching my actors go through a whole range of emotions on stage. I'm so comfortable occupying that margin in reality, where I can exercise my curiosity. There I can ask, without investment, why people would say "love ya" with the same enthusiasm and emphasis they would have reading those words off a mylar balloon. I can ask why people would use pet names in the middle of largely impersonal ideas. That is my right, after all, to ask the questions, because it sometimes becomes necessary to hang those questions off of weird, open-ended words.

I asked someone, once upon a time on a long road trip, what she was thinking. She said "nothing." Nothing on your mind? It was just blank? There was no thought process fed by anything her eyes were looking at? Did she really shut herself off like C3P0? Okay, maybe her mind was blank. I've never really known that. Maybe she was feeling something and didn't want to talk. Maybe, even, she was thinking in abstract and didn't have words for it. "Purple taffy exploding jiggle warm frisbee sharks."

People really do think nothing, and think nothing of the things they say or do. We automate, follow patterns, and repeat borrowed thoughts. Unfortunately, we sometimes build a rationale for being the way we want to be, unique and different than everyone, just like everyone, just like the person across from you and the loud conversation coming from the next table. What truly sets us apart is how we pay attention to each other, or even, if we do amidst a crowd of unconnected names.

It's too easy to stay apart and alone.

What are you thinking?

The Road Not Taken

It's February already: the writer's strike is allegedly about to come to an end, the Lakers have acquired Pau Gasol, and my niece's baby Mia should be born any day now. Oh, and LOST is back. That's pretty huge. There is one thing on my mind, though, and I need to change the setting. Things must be said.

M: Like what?

S: Well, I kind of thought we'd talk again before....

M: Yeah, things have been a little crazy.

S: I would imagine. You don't mind this, do you?

M: No, it's fine. (pause) So how are you?

S: Surviving happily. You know, lots of change. Okay, that was dumb. You know better than I do about change right now.

M: Not as much as you'd think. I have this one major thing, but it's definite. It's all planned out and...it's kind of exhausting to talk about. It's nothing like the year you've had.

S: You leave tomorrow, right?

M: Yeah.

S: Nervous?

M: Maybe. I don't know. So much is happening now. I'm a little numb.

S: Do you ever feel like sometimes like there's no perspective on the past?

M: What do you mean?

S: Maybe it's just a sense of accomplishment, or a milestone, like you should feel like there's a measurable point in your life that you get past and then move on from...but in reality you look back -

M: And it's all a blur. It's like you're trying to find yourself on a map, but the map got wet and all of the ink has run together.

S: Yeah, exactly like that.

M: Nope. Don't know what that feels like.

S: What? Oh.

M: I'm kidding.

S: Is that just a part of getting older? I'm beginning to think I'm going crazy.

M: Well...let's not start that conversation, because what I know about you -

S: What you think you know about me.

M: Okay, true, but still.

Silence. I looked around the place we were sitting in, but she drank her coffee and looked at me a moment before continuing.

M: I think...it's different for everyone, but yeah, I feel that way sometimes.

S: It's so hard for me to rationalize this stuff because there's so much about people I don't understand.

M: People are not as complicated as you think they are. Normal ones, at least. Are some of those weird people still in your life? How about that girl who only wants to talk through texting?

S: What can I say? They're interchangeable parts. Nobody's really consistent. I do hear from some old co-workers every now and then, but I am really out here on my own little island, you know?

M: That's your choice, though.

S: Those are my standards - there's a difference.

M: You and your impossible standards.

S: Do you really think so?

M: I just can't figure out some stuff about you. You've led kind of a...different life.

S: Somewhere behind that I'm suspecting there are thoughts about me being in a relationship.

M: It's been way too long! All right, I need to catch myself because it's not my place to say anything.

S: When are we going to have another chance to talk like this? You know how this conversation has to end.

There's another moment of silence to let this sink in.

M: It doesn't have to end the way you think it will.

S: I usually begin with the end in mind.

M: But that's now how you actually work through things like this.

S: So tell me what's on your mind. You say that it's not your place, but here you are, sitting across from me. Right now, this is your place.

M: Okay. (pause) I don't think LA is good for you. I think you're surrounded by too many fake people, especially doing all of your theater stuff. Finding good friends is hard enough, but settling down and having a family is nearly impossible when you're not meeting the right kind of people.

S: Where should I go, then? China? Miami? Just because my life doesn't add up a way that makes sense to you, it doesn't mean I'm unhappy.

M: I don't think you're unhappy. I just wish you weren't...alone. I know how happy you were in a relationship, and I feel like part of you is being wasted, or lost, if you're not in one. I just hate thinking that you don't want that any more because of something I did.

S: That was a long time ago. A really long time ago. What did we figure it out to? About half a lifetime?

M: Yeah, I think that was it.

S: Didn't you already say that all this was my choice? Give me some credit.

M: You know what I'm trying to say.

S: I know what you're saying, but...listen, many years ago, I stoppped passing everything through the filter of what life would be like with you in it. I accepted what was left and built on that foundation. You still existed, but in a different way.

M: And what way was that?

S: I always hoped that you'd be proud of me if you only knew the things I did.

M: You shouldn't do anything like that for me.

S: I didn't do it for you. I did it for me. The difference is this: with every risk I took, every sacrifice I made, I thought about the one person who knows me better than every other living thing on this planet and whether or not I was betraying that knowledge of me. Once, when I was helping you get over someone, I bought some lottery tickets, those little scratcher things, and I gave one to you. You said "Oh well, unlucky in love..." You meant that it was one or the other, but you deserved to win at something.

M: I said that?

S: Yeah. It kinda hurt my feelings, because there I was, and....

M: I don't even remember saying that.

S: Well, after you, I made a bunch of those kinds of decisions. I was going to win at something, so...it was one thing or the other for me. Look, if I had chosen to just try again at relationships and pave over the experience of you in my life, I think that maybe you and I would still be here right now, talking about that other thing I didn't choose to do.

M: That...ugh...that just kills me. You take all of these little insignificant moments with me and make them epic stories that changed your life. Who else does that? Seriously. Promise me you won't write a bible about me while I'm gone?

S: God forbid. The numbering of each line alone would kill me.

M: I just don't know why it had to be me. I'm not who you think I am. At least, the person you're talking about is not the person I see in the mirror.

S: That's okay. Someday you'll catch up to my way of thinking.

She took this in for a moment, then checked her cell phone.

M: I have to go.

S: Okay.

M: I don't want you to walk me out.

S: Why?

M: I don't know. I don't want to say. Just let me walk out, okay? Please?

S: Do I get...?

M: I don't think it's right.

S: Okay...I think I understand.

M: It's not because I don't -

S: You don't have to say anything. (pause) Good luck, and...have a safe trip.

M: I will. Thanks for the coffee.

She grabbed her things and quickly left. I just sat there for a moment, learning to breathe again, and then took a sip of my latte, now cold. Tossing both cups in the trash on my way out, I took my first breath of night air, and it hurt somewhere deep inside. Two steps towards my car, I heard my name and turned to see her walking towards me. Without a word, we embraced and held each other tightly enough to leave an impression in each other.

Time, wind, passing cars, clouds floating overhead, all stopped. The moon disappeared, along with the city, the earth, the sky, and any other reason for existence.

But there we were.

In my notebook, in an ideal last meeting, inside my iPod and in a little blog lost in the wilderness of the Internet, there we embraced one last time for the ages, and forever more.

Good luck and have a safe trip.

In the House

I'm sitting in a small theater in La Canada, a place preseved in time without stadium seating, the screen staring out over our heads...okay, wait...I am...the only one here. Blame the rain. The news suggested, because of rain & lightning, that people might want to stay indoors. For me, lightning lost and cabin fever won. Rain is one of those things that I just can't resist. Plus, I had a free ticket for a movie, so I came out to see Juno.

I was in a different theater last night, and the irony rests in this: I don't wonder for a second why I'm sitting here instead of my beloved Arclight. I did, however, wonder what the hell I was doing back at Playhouse West last night. I was originally asked to help with a recording session, and then had to jump on the logo because the crazy director wanted to use a noose to represent the two one-acts. A noose. I ended up burying it in the text of the title, but still, those two responsibilities formed the hook that brought me back to Playhouse to oversee two small productions which the director eventually hailed as the Second Coming.

Both shows have been exhausted in classes, and one of the two was produced at least twice before at Playhouse. The three actors did a nice job - which was to be expected at the beginning of a run - but I just don't know that I saw the same shows that the director did. I have, in the course of the hundreds of performances I've seen over the last decade, seen some chilling performances, including the entire run of the first production of one of the two shows. It irked me when the director said that he had been waiting for 30 years to see work on that stage that resembled the work in his class, because he has come to see my shows and loved them. (Maybe he's just talking about his students. Yeah, that has to be it.)

And then it hit me. This is exactly the kind of culture that the director, who also happens to be the founder of the school, seems to love. Over the years, the people trying to find a voice in the theater company have fought, competed for time and space, and struggled against an apathetic student body to get seats filled. Each production becomes an army unto itself, knowing that a good percentage of fellow actors and directors who come to see it will only come to tear it apart. I've even seen the same behavior at the film festival, where the slogan has been repeated: "Lie, cheat, steal."

So why, I have to ask, do these people work so hard at trying to squash competition on the home front? Why do they work so hard on their own productions and fill their minds with the need to be better than everyone else? Call it my insanity, but I worked with the tunnel vision of why we needed to do the show we were working on. I wanted my actors to act seamlessly and not think, and to never finish working on a role. I wanted my production to stand on its own, with my particular brand and style, to speak for itself as a living thing. In the end, because of my failed struggle to keep the theater company within the reach of the entire student body (just a couple of people in charge did everything they could to squash those efforts), I ended up flying my pirate flag and focused my casts entirely on the center of the production and nowhere else. I isolated my casts and only depended on the school for production space and advertising. I have been with the cast of one play for about nine years now, having played more than a handful of roles in it. Whenever the founder gets involved in the production, I see the same culture coming up again, this time with a handful of people with questionable talent being held up and apart from everyone else. I isolate myself and stay focused. Why does it have to be this way?

Ultimately, I like to think they only win the moment of recognition, the conditioned response that they maneuver people towards, and the people they fool are spent mindlessly. Jack Welch, the former CEO of GE, preached the concept of 20-70-10, in that 20 percent of the work force gets promoted, 70 percent do much of the grunt work, and 10 percent need to be fired. He based this on a competitive performance curve. Acting schools, and I imagine the entertainment industry, are built on something closer to 10-50-40, in which 10 percent are held as the elite, 50 percent are what pay for the acting school and the teachers salaries, and then 40 percent drop out. Know what that means? Everyone is expendable. This probably holds true just about anywhere that greed and insecurity can take root, but I guess in hindsight, the noose in the logo shouldn't be so shocking. It serves the same purpose it always did, to intimidate and illustrate the law of the land.

In the moment where I'm faced with this reality - which I've had a lot of experience with over many years - I always have to make a choice, and it becomes clearer every time. Am I who they want me to be, or am I what I believe I am? The actual answer falls right in line with my search for work. It forms the relevance of my close friendships. It's built into the rhythms of the journal/blog that I've been writing for 23 years now. At the risk of sacrificing everything - and I have sacrificed a lot - I am what I believe I can be. I'm not done evolving.

Being in two old theaters reminds me of how simple things get complicated. I beg you to understand that it doesn't have to be this way. Even a cynical heart like mine can find the simplicity in life and appreciate it completely, but you have to have hope. That is the best preparation for the very next moment.

The Trip Home - Part 2

The last leg of my trip home was spent without dread, without anticipation, without so much as a moment of concern over arriving at Union Station in LA. I was occupied with the moment - truly living in the present as it perpetually unfolded in an ever-expanding bloom of landscape and life. The view out my window was spectacular, and that was a given, but the really unexpected part about the whole trip was the experience of meeting so many new people on the way. These weren't just any people. The kind of people who travel by train know what they're getting themselves into, and are not blase about the adventure they're on, either. They're open, generous, and friendly, and they teach the value of the moment by example. I only wish I could have shared the experience with Flora.

Flora was my mother's closest friend in Miami, and she has been stuck in a wheelchair for many years now. She was the grandmother of my niece's youngest child, and she talked with my mother on a daily basis. By the time I got to Miami, she had checked herself into a hospital because of some pain that she was having, and she hadn't talked with my mother for a few days because she hated being drugged and incoherent. On the road to getting better, they finally talked on the phone and she said that she was going to be home soon. Flora lived vicariously through my 40th year adventures, wanting to hear all about my trip in October, when my dad and I drove up to central Florida to see the space shuttle launch, and this time she was really anxious to hear about my long train trip across the country. On that phone call from the hospital, she aske my mother to make sure to bring me with her as soon as she got home. I immediately thought that it was great that I had taken hundreds of photos on the way, so I could show her my whole trip. My mother told her that she loved her, and ended the phone call with the plan to talk again the following day at 3pm.

At about 2:30 the following day, we received the news that Flora was dead.

The cruel interrupted expectation of hearing from her best friend left my mother weak with grief. The whole house was quiet for hours, everyone sitting in their own corner, distracted with their own thoughts, trying to reconcile the uncompromising loss. There's no way to flip it over in your mind, even when the doctors were clearly to blame for Flora's death with careless drug prescriptions. Any way you look at it, she was taken away.

...and I sat there...and I thought about my parents...I thought about things left unsaid...and undone...and I exercised some re-evaluation in my mind. Have I told the people close to me how I feel about them, even if not everyone has been ready to hear it or is able to accept it? Have I wasted any moments with my family, taken them for granted, or worse, said things in the heat of the moment that I didn't really mean? When I make plans from now on, how can I count on any guarantees and then greet that appointment, that friend, that phone call with a blase attitude of entitlement? All I need to do is hear the sound of my mother being given the news, and I know - even better than I thought I've known before - that EVERY moment counts, and some things just shouldn't take you away from what is most important in life. This experience shook the hell out of me. The rest of my time in Miami was spent a little differently.

On that train ride home, I really opened my eyes a little wider, approached more people, and tossed any hesitation aside in favor of experiencing more. My last night on the train, I found myself at dinner with Art and Winnie sitting across from me, and Ann sitting by my side. The kinds of stories I heard from these people - their collective experiences, their amazing lives - could have made me feel like such a small person at that table. Each one of them could not speak without fascinating me, as if by sitting there I was as much in the presence of greatness as I was throughout my steps in Chicago and Washington DC. Art had knowledge about everything that came up, especially medicine, which was his field. Winnie had once auditioned at 20th Century Fox studios in the era of the greats. Ann, an interior designer, had dated Mr. Bushnell of Bushnell binoculars, and traveled the world. There I was, merely eating steak and drinking wine. When my turn came to talk, I told the story of my parents in Argentina and their trip to the United States, their sacrifices and difficulties, and then when I got to the lives my sisters and I have chosen, the whole thing became a story about honoring my parents, about their continuing inspiration and the closeness of my family. It slowly dawned on me shortly after I followed Art and Winnie back to our sleeper car (they were two doors away from my room). I sat in the freshly made bed by Jesus, our car attendant, and realized that we all carry our family history with us, that by being where I am and having had the experiences I've had, I've helped to fulfill my parents' dream of living in the USA, and that yes, although I fully felt the loss of Flora because she wanted to hear my stories, my parents still live through me. And I'm a writer, not for studios or for any industry but my own experience, which lends a bit of responsibility for having the ability to write.

I finally arrived in LA, and with a little perspective, I believe I figured out a good analogy for how I see my home city on the map. As I sit here alone in a restaurant (well, writing this part of the blog, anyway), I think back to life on a train and wonder how someone like me can thrive in a slow, social place like that and then turn around and carve my little bubble in this city. Here's the best I can do to explain LA: Imagine all of us at the supermarket. We're constantly shopping, pushing our carts and tossing both our basic needs and little luxuries into the basket. Not once would we think of looking in someone else's cart, not even at checkout, when we're laying everything out on the conveyor belt. At least, we don't look at the different items and attempt to decipher a story. Our groceries - our choices - are our own, and in the supermarket aisles we do not compete for a better collection than the next person. We're merely providing for our own and those who depend on us. It would be too self-serving to say that LA is competetive (with the exception of the entertainment industry), and I do honestly think it's inaccurate to say that LA is unfriendly or selfish. My city of angels is nearsighted, perhaps unwilling or unable to look deeper or beyond.

That's why I fit in. I don't blend in. I don't exactly even stand apart, either. I know, because of my actions and the legacy I carry from my parents, that I am the way I am because I've chosen to be this way. It's not inherent in the geography or tradition of where I live. It's not even valued much of the time. It takes me getting out of the city to find affirmation, or even the simple action of bridging the gap between people and exercising a little selfless curiosity.

Flora recognized this openness that I'm often encouraged to hide. My parents are proud of it. Thanks to Art & Winnie, Ann, Jesus, and the people whom I shared the whole trip with, I'll continue to trust my instincts in this wicked little town and do a little more than merely survive.


Art & Winnie, arriving home


Jesus, proudly standing guard

The rest of the hundreds and hundreds of pictures I took are at my Webshots page:http://community.webshots.com/user/sjirel

The Trip Home - Part 1

I begin this very first entry of the year in a small busy coffee shop in downtown Chicago with a warm cup of coffee and Donna, the sweetest and most efficient server I've had in a long time (they establish eye contact here in Chicago!). The snow has mostly been rained away outside, and the clouds hang low, skirting the buildings and thwarting my plans to see the whole city from atop the Sears Tower. This particular restaurant – Lou Mitchell's restaurant and bakery – came as a suggestion to me by Kevin, a man handing out the local homeless shelter newsletter. Wearing earmuffs and an eyepatch, he led me a few blocks away from Union Station with a little bit of the local history and an enthusiastic impression of the breakfast at Lou's, and I'm now sitting in front of the greatest salmon and onion omelet I've ever had. It's taking me a little time to get through it; It's served in the skillet it was cooked in (all of the breakfast dishes seem to be), and it's huge.

The trick to getting here is to not begin by asking anyone in the stations. Regardless of which one you're at, the people who work there are usually one moment, one key phrase or an off-center look away from snapping. I've tried to keep transactions light, brief, and simple, but at the same time I can see how I might blend into an unthankful population. All I have to do is sit in the wrong coach car, and I immediately know what they have to deal with.

Oh…hang on…free soft serve ice cream right after breakfast. Can't write now. I'll be with you in just a few lines.

Sunday, January 6th, 2008
11:21am MST



The view outside my window perpetually reflects the question "How did I get here?" Right now, I'm sitting in my little roomette with a cup of coffee next to me, typing away at my laptop and watching New Mexico roll by. We are about an hour away from Las Vegas, NM, and a little less than a full day away from Los Angeles. We should be arriving at Union Station at 8:15am tomorrow morning. In total, I will have logged 8,381 miles by train on this vacation (not including the local train I took with Monica and my parents for dinner in downtown Miami). That's four days there, four days back, with sights and experiences throughout the whole vacation that have changed my life. Truly.

Let me quickly recap the Chicago experience and what led me here since then. Right after a conversation with my waitress (mind you, the restaurant was busy and she had other customers, but she had time for everyone) and then a chat with the hostess, I walked away from the restaurant shaking my head. Everyone in there felt like family. Where in Los Angeles is there a place like that? Anywhere, not just restaurants, even in peoples' homes – is there a place like that? The work family cut the umbilical cord and set me free. The theater family is mostly the same. I digress.



I left the restaurant and entered the old Union Station, which is now both used as a waiting area and preserved as a historical place. This was the place where Elliott Ness fought the mob and had the famed shootout with Al Capone. I walked across the Chicago River from there and hopped on a little red bus for a two hour tour through all of the city's sights and attractions. I was pretty much the same wide-eyed camera hungry person I was in Washington D.C. I roamed a freezing Washington with a heavy backpack and layers of clothing, a camera bag slung to my side and a map in hand. I absolutely – and I don't know how to stress the absoluteness of this – made the most of my time there with the seven or so hours I had to roam I saw:

The White House


the Vietnam Memorial again (I bought one more bracelet from the vets nearby and said a little prayer for John Pagel's buddies and all of the vets whose families we've met over the years)


The Lincoln Memorial (I sat on the steps and looked out at the pool, embracing the moment as if I would forever more see myself on the back of the five dollar bill)



The Korean War Memorial (I said a little prayer for Tom Aki's father)


The Air and Space Museum (which also had exhibits from the museum of American History, which is closed for renovations. I was in the presence of….)


The Library of Congress (a building that awed me with both its contents and architecture)


The National Archives (I stood two feet away from the foundation for our whole country, the original set of rules in existence)


All of this, I did on foot. If you look at the map of the area, you'd see I did a lot of walking. Before I did all this, however, I didn't want to repeat the zoo of my Miami to D.C. trip, which was noisy and eventful, complete with a bad cover band playing classic rock five rows behind me and a crazy woman going through peoples' belongings. I got a sleeper to Chicago and assumed that the trip from there to LA would be easier. As soon as I got on the car in Chicago, things started going a little crazy in the car, all the way to Kansas City. It was one thing or another, and I asked about any available sleepers. Amazingly, one became available, and as I sit here now, I'm in my own little cabin writing away, pausing only to sip coffee or snap a picture outside my window. Since Miami I have taken 464 photos. That is considering that the whole time, I've been very conscious of seeing everything with my own eyes first, and then the camera captures the moment after.

In one year, I have seen some amazing things, and what I find most curious is that I could have merely chosen not to. It makes me think…and it makes me thankful. If I didn't write, if I didn't love photography, if I didn't appreciate everything I've seen, I wouldn't be able to tell the story. That, after all, is what I do.

472 photos now. It happens just like that.