Some Assembly Required

I have been waking up lately in a cloud of the most subdued, passive anger. Actually, it's a peaceful, friendly, loving anger that feels ominously like the opposite of a hug. It comes with an ounce of vindication - I'm not crazy for feeling the way I do - and pounds of awareness and knowledge. Still, I control my reactions, stand back patiently, and make many small disconnected efforts to understand.

This has been the persistent soundtrack since I've returned from the jungles of Mexico. Los Angeles has proven to be the unsolvable puzzle, where everyone is mostly preoccupied with themselves and words are used to negotiate rather than communicate. It might be like this in other cities, but this is where I live, where I was born and grew up. The truth seems to be that most people are completely blind to the ripple effect, and people grow so restless in this dense city that many feel they have to get out or go insane. I've seen it time and time again; I even funded one friend's escape to Chicago...or Boston...no, I think it was Kansas City. Honestly, I can't remember which. They all got out of the maze, gained perspective, and found a spot to look back and reconnect on some level.

The obvious direction for this train of thought is to say that they quit, made some kind of mistake, maybe showed weakness at a deep level in their conscience. That would be inaccurate, and besides, I can't make that judgement. All of our lives unfold in unique ways that play out our fears and strengths in a neverending series of tests that either repeat themselves or increase in difficulty. We all have the one thing in common with L.A., though: We see the maze, the puzzle, the huge contradicting mosh pit, and we have all said at one point or another, "Get me the hell out of here!"

I know a lot of selfish people here. I blame them sometimes for the absence of home, the lack of support or unconditional love. These people use me as a resource, they remind me how lucky I am to be in their orbit, and all too often they say the right things but don't believe them, or so their actions would lead me to believe. They make promises that are open to the back door of lame excuses, and often observe and suggest that I should be more understanding, easier to appease, perhaps a little less analytical of behaviour that would otherwise hold them accountable for their flakiness. Denial is a hot commodity, a fashionable choice that keeps the sport of evasion and opportunism alive. It is all about feeling good and making things easier to digest, and never, ever having to take responsibility for anything.

That is why I am not leaving Los Angeles, dirty and mindless as it is. I'm not going to let my birthplace kick my ass. I will not allow the place that broke my heart and offered me equal portions of failure and success - absolute blue furry bliss versus sharp serrated moments of blood red desperation - take me apart and send me packing to a place I have no relationship with. I know that if I leave, most of my problems will travel with me at this point, and the pieces to my puzzle would be left behind lingering in the smog and freeway traffic. I own this. This is the riddle of my life. I don't want to ever look back and say "What was that all about?" and be too far to put things together. I will occasionally step outside and get a view of it all before diving back in, but I'm going to stick it out and tame this cloud of indifference.
My family has always put together difficult jigsaw puzzles every year during the holidays. We've done the double-sided, the story-telling mystery ones, the 3-D puzzles. We have never left a single one unfinished. I may, in this case, abandon pieces that don't belong, but believe me, I'm not walking away from this one just because I'm angry.

This one belongs to me.

The Sun and Moon

Far removed from the usual writing spots, I'm writing this in the Shakespeare Library, deep within the cruise ship Inspiration, currently moving across a quiet and dark Gulf of Mexico returning to Tampa from Cozumel, Mexico. For the past few days, my sister and I have not endured any obligations, schedules, or expectations. We've eaten when we wanted to, did what we wanted to, and brought not a single breath of work or anxiety with us. The only traffic we've encountered was at the jacuzzi next to the salt water pool at the back of the ship.

Ironically, the symbolism of the whole trip fell right in line with familiarity for me; On the way to and from Mexico, I've seen beautiful sunsets (which incidentally, look much better reflected on water than they do framed by rush hour traffic in my dirty rear view mirror) and the almost impossibly beautiful moon, which embraced the water and ranged in color from orange as it rose in the sky to stark white. My temporary home, as I mentioned before, is called the Inspiration, and all of the decorations have had something to do with the arts. In Mexico, I've seen a culture obsessed with the sun and have done my share of worshipping during the whole trip. I've wandered through Mayan ruins dedicated to the goddess of the island where specialities are fertility (love) and prosperity (money). I even made an offering, a coin in a small pile of others despite the fact that "In God We Trust" is written on them.

In all of these locales, though, I moved in the stillness of the world around me. I was in the ocean, the jungle, the stars above in a dense, black sky. I was at the center of my universe, and I wondered which symbol captured me the best: Am I the sun, opening my effect and my attention to the whole world around me, or am I the moon, perpetually hiding in all the ways I've written before, always keeping a dark side reserved? Well, it wasn't a very difficult question. Nani said it once: I am the sun. Try as I can, I give off light and heat, I illuminate and clarify, and until the end of time, I chase the moon, always finding her in a sky that doesn't suit her.

And so I return to the race. I will immediately lose that sensation of moving without effort, the vision of waves moving silently past. I'll immediately lose myself, sitting once again in a huge box of lights and meeting rooms, a ship that goes nowhere with a captain who travels alone and incites competition and a fight for survival among his peers. With the theater a bit off in the distance, how will I recognize myself? How will I find the center of my universe?

I will look for old friends. The sun will look down for the son, painting the sky and reaching out to encourage and comfort. The moon will always give me a place of surrender, peeking out from behind buildings and through the lingering smog, reminding me of the ocean without a visible horizon, that despite all of the obstacles, she and I are continuing our dance.

I'm going to give this place another try, and then I'll look for change. When I rediscover and reaffirm who I am, the things and people who define me as I'm not lose a little color and gravity. In only a few more hours (we disembark tomorrow morning), I'll insert myself back in a little changed. The old world will need some adjusting.

Previously, on LOST in LA

One year ago, I was sitting on a bus dreaming of taking a real vacation. I looked out at the people on the street, wondering why I wasn't in my car singing to the soundtrack of RENT, calling family or friends on the way to who knows where. I was sitting in someone else's space, not quite relaxed, subliminally unsatisfied and just going along hoping that things could change by themselves. While some things haven't changed, I am in a different space right now.

A week ago, I wrote the following unfinished sliver of thought:

Friday, May 11th, 2007, 11:18am
As I sit here between two buildings and about 2,000 people working under oppressive fluorescent lights, I wonder why I'm the only one sitting out here. Maybe it was the spreadsheet that had me going cross-eyed. Maybe it's the glimpse of the outside world from the edge of my cubicle. Maybe it's simply that perpetual ache in my heart that constantly wants, searches, needs something real.
Ahh, there it is. That's what is happening just underneath the surface, the surprising and recurring theme that defines my perpetual sadness. It doesn't mean that I'm never happy; I'm just defining one note in the symphony that is always there. It's my soundtrack.

Yup, you saw it correctly. That's how my handwriting translates through typing when I write at the office. It's Courier New from a world that forgets about people until they become a problem.

So I still flow like water around everything and hardly stay still, and when I get my head screwed on straight before I go to bed, I wake up the following morning completely disinterested in the past. This is especially easy when I've exhaled a whole week like this one, watching it slip by because it was dominated by work and automation. I am not sitting on a bus; I'm going my own way, and that includes a vacation to the Yucatan peninsula in 13 days. I sang all the way home from work (and the gym) today, and I'm not so concerned at this point with whom is along for the ride. Everybody in this city seems to be tumbling in their own bubble, and the whole thing from a distance must look like a huge carbonated novelty aquarium.

13 days, and I'm on my own schedule, sitting on a cruise ship with my sister and turning my gaze from the rear view mirror towards the Mayan ruins poking over the tree line. I'm going to clear my mind, relax my body, and open my eyes to the new direction I have to take when I return. Once again, it's time to turn over the topsoil and see what grows.

Sometimes, to find your way around, you have to get out and come back in.

Brainsqualling

I have a writing exercise that helps me when all other thoughts of story structure or creative wandering lead me to a sad little stump in the road. I make lists. I do it to pass the time, I do it to avoid making a trip right to the center of what I'm feeling, so...wait...that's significant. What am I avoiding? (Sometimes the words come out so quickly I get surprised by things I write after I read them.)

Okay, maybe that has to simmer for a little bit. I...uhh...where was I? Oh, lists. Yes. I make lots of lists. Among the crazy, stupid things I make lists about, I occasionally use them to empty my mind when I'm in transition.

So I asked myself, can I name ten lessons that life is trying to teach me? This is what I came up with:

1) If you have to say something important, say it and then let it go

2) Second chances are overrated and third chances are just plain dumb

3) Sometimes people are truly unaware of their actions, and sometimes they're just unaware of the consequences. Most of the time, they're only focused on the benefits.

4) Apathy and indifference are in style right now, but they're the plastic cup of friendship; They're convenient, stackable, and completely disposable.

5) If you don't believe in compromise, you can either hold on to your principles or you can hold on to your friends, but not both at the same time.

6) Life is too short to settle for spending time doing things you don't like doing.

7) You can't blame people for wanting to use you for the things you CAN do instead of the things you WANT to do. That's their limitation, not yours, and you have an endless supply of the word "no" at your disposal.

8) People will fight for the freedom of stupidity, and they have a right to that. For example, George Bush was elected TWICE.

9) 99% of everyone out there will not care about the details you obsess about, so make them count for you.

10) Try as much as you can to get the world around you to conform to your rules, but know that people will not change. They'll twist and contort slightly to fit around you, but sooner or later they'll snap back to the person you should have seen and accepted in the first place.

11) Never limit yourself to ten.

12) If you reach for something or someone and you get denied or ignored, don't lose faith in the action. You are merely a key looking for a lock.

I suppose the real question at this point is whether or not these are too big for fortune cookies. Okay, this isn't quite like the other lists I've made, but this is all about brain maintenance.

Now what is that other current I very nearly tapped into?

Every day I wake up in my own bed with the belief that there are very real people out there somewhere. I know it's true; I know a couple of people who are genuine, responsible, empathetic people. Why I don't spend more time with them is beyond me. Somehow I find myself trying to gain the trust of people who fall short of being completely open, people who can't participate in a human exchange of thoughts and feelings honestly and with great care. Okay, before I even get into this....

I acknowledge the fact that I'm extremely open and at times reactive, that I will call out behavior and say things at any given moment because they occur to me (that may be the training as an actor - it really transforms you). I have an almost unfiltered connection to my instincts yet at the same time I'm trying to figure out why I find myself in the ripple effect of people whose least favorite subject is any bad reflection of themselves. I think I'm trying to begin with accountability, the knowledge that I sometimes have unrealistic expectations of people who can't measure up to those precious few whom I can always count on. I make the decisions to care about and stand close to the wrong people. I did it for nearly twelve years with one person. I have to accept blame for that.

But I'm already involved. And I will be here again. When you train for years to be sensitive to behavior, to make the other actor on stage the most important thing in a moment, then you're going to spot false behavior like a bright orange jumpsuit. You'll see the shallow belief behind words as clear as bad singing. You'll begin to doubt before you believe, and then...as I've seen with people I've worked with in the past (not naming any names), you completely isolate yourself while you're in the business. That's the maddening life of an artist. It's no wonder why most people don't get too involved in the craft, and those who do can get lost so easily.
So who's real, and who's merely out for themselves? How are you supposed to react when you discover that someone you've invested in is not interested in your problems? In the past week, I've dealt with being interrupted, rejected, bombarded with small talk, and at the same time being told to stay cool and to simply enjoy the friendship when I'm obviously not being treated like a friend.

And here's the real bottom line; In the past week, my mother was admitted to the hospital via the emergency room and is still in a hospital bed without much more than guesses about what put her there in the first place. It's been nearly impossible to get a hold of a doctor, but tomorrow she may be two procedures away from being released. Hopefully. That's where my heart and my mind has been, and still, with that knowledge a few people have taken shots at me. I do believe that's worse than the indifference of others. People should know better, but they don't. The end result for yesterday was a total breakdown and the clouds of depression darkening the sky. It shouldn't have happened. After having gone through losing another friend to cancer, walking away from my theater company and finishing a production, the changes at work, and my mother, I shouldn't have had to go through the catharsis I did.

So it's time once again to toughen my skin and try to move past, to focus on the health of my family and to not take on the baggage of others as my responsibility. Yes, it hurts like hell when friends acknowledge I'm having trouble and abandon me, but when I step back, my priorities become a little more clear. My family comes first. I can always call them and - thank God - my mother is getting better and I'm going to commit to calling my parents a little more often. My very real friends who love me also need more of my attention, because they have proven themselves, even when we've had trouble in the past, that they won't leave me.

Most of all, because I need to be there for the most important people in my life, I can't lose faith in myself. I am who I am because I've chosen to be. I write. I play music. I am working hard for a creative life and trying to find a career that will fullfill that. Right now, I have a film festival, a play to direct this coming Saturday, and another play in the works. That's what I know I have. There may not be a relationship in there, nor is there a muse any more, but I do have purpose. Some people have exchanged that for a sense of belonging, but I think I've done okay for myself.
This was the sound of me hitting bottom. This is a frame of my deformed shape meeting an immovable object. Change comes next.

Say Goodbye

It's been a strange few weeks. I actually started to write a couple of times, but well...you know how it happens in my world. If I can describe it in two lines or a paragraph because I've mostly said it before, I'll dump the gas tanks and ditch in the ocean.

The past two weeks have been all about the phrase "I wish I knew them better" which is, of course, always said as an afterthought. Such as we are in this high speed attention span world, we see and experience things and suddenly we're ready to click on the next thing. The very next thing. Watch me raise my hand. I can be guilty of this myself, but possibly less than the average person because I constantly look for something genuine, and then I write about it, or create it in stories. I'm an opportunist in that respect; I really tell those who are close to me what I'm thinking and feeling to a fault. This little self-indulgent collection of journal entries is a great example fo that. Whom do I write this for? Here's my secret: I don't consider this writing. I'm recording myself, preserving the moment in a medium that comes as easily as speaking. Whether I'm any good at it is up to the viewer. This is just what I do.

Here's another secret: Even though I do all this, I still find myself saying "I wish I knew them better."

A few weeks ago, I lose another friend to cancer. It came switfly in two emails; my former boss, much better known as my great friend Cathy, wrote to me to tell me that her husband Dave was diagnosed with stage 3 lung cancer towards the end of last year. I immediately remembered Maxine, I remembered Siony, I remembered the paradoxical unfairness and glory of Robert's last year, and then came Cathy's second email. Dave was undergoing chemo, beating the cancer little by little. In a cruel card up fate's sleeve, a blood vessel burst in Dave's lung and he bled to death. This stirs up so many conflicting emotions - anger at the deceptive patience of cancer, frustration over the growing belief that it is a death sentence, and the regret over not having spent more time with Cathy and Dave. We had dinner a few times when they lived here and I had a standing invitation to go visit them in Indiana. I just never made it out there. He had a dry sense of humor and was brilliant, but cancer doesn't discriminate. He was stolen from us.

And so we arrive at the final effects of the layoff my company began two months ago. I remember saying to a superior right before it happened that I didn't care if I was on the list, but I hoped they didn't take any of my close friends. The word came, and again, bad news came via email. My friend Nattie wrote an email to our little group and wanted to see us right away. She had two months left with our company, a deferred layoff, and now those two months have expired. Whether we spent those last months the best way we could have is irrelevant; I said everything that was on my mind and we had weeks filled with lunches and breaks and hundreds of text messages. The change was out of our hands and we all dealt with it the best we could, but...well, I can't exactly say that it's all over because we'll always be in touch, but things will be different.

So we find each other from day to day, we meet people we have something in common with and work our schedules so we can see them again. We connect and on rare occasions we say the right things to the right people and then suddenly time sits still. We think that things will always be the same. Think about that for a second. The things you count on from day to day could be there tomorrow, everything you know...every place you go...the people around you...but that just doesn't mean that you can take any given moment for granted. In hindsight you wish you had more of those opportunities, another chance to say the right thing.

What's left, but the love we have for the people in our past? Isn't it better spent on the people who are around us now? Yeah, I forget sometimes the short attention span of the average person nowadays. Most go through these shocking moments of reality and then click on the next thing, but I suppose the fact that I'm sitting here writing about it might put me in the exclusive minority. Or maybe not. There are a lot of blogs out there.

Ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.
~Kahlil Gibran

The Razor's Edge

A completely blank canvas of a Saturday begins in reflection of past blogs, days spent in three worlds, and nothing but the future on my mind. Once again, the future is in the here and now. Before I do anything with myself for the day - for the weekend - I need to keep writing for my own salvation, proof that I walked this earth and met people along the way. The way to where is the real question.

I had two interviews this week at Warner Bros, two eye-opening and provocative experiences that really make me look hard at the definition I've worn for the past few years, and definitely the past five and a half months. Apparently, what I haven't exactly seen as clearly as others could is the fact that if you've attempted to put a title on me, it is still an underestimation. If you've attempted to define me, you still don't know the whole story. If you've needed me for one thing - and I'm talking business here - I am able to do six more things beyond that. I don't always see it because I'm modest and am always focused on helping people, but when I have to sit down and list my skills and then talk about them, I find myself wondering who that person is on the sheet.

And then the question comes: "Where do you see yourself in five years? In ten years?" I thought they were talking about what company, or a specific position, of which I only knew one thing; I wanted to work for Warner Bros for as long as they would have me. If I eventually become an independent, hired by them to make films, write TV shows, or someday even running the whole studio...well, then, all that is possible. The truth is, I've been building who I am for years and haven't followed a path. I'm on an artist's journey, and am constantly finding out about where I want to go. Is this safe, now that I'm turning 40? That ten year question puts me at 50, and it's difficult to think about my life at that point. Maybe I can answer this question better later on, but until then I need to write and fill my time away from work with the life, the pursuit of "Know thyself", which I picked up when I was about 15 and visiting the Oracle at the Temple of Apollo in Delphi, on the slopes of Mount Parnassus in Greece. Out of everything I did on that trip - I travelled throughout Italy, saw the Vatican, and stayed in a suite a few blocks away from the Acropolis - the Oracle held something special for me, an excursion I requested and oddly, when we got there, my parents and I were the only ones there. It was familiar, it was quiet, and shortly after that I started writing my journal. Know thyself. It's not a waste of time to explore that.

And so, I had a moment from my musical this morning, towards the end of the play, when I'm thinking about my past and following the advice that Andrea's character, Helen, gives to Jack: "Begin again." I pulled out my guitar, started playing songs I wrote, a few other songs I found chords to on the net, and then played the song from my musical that had me thinking about the people close to me, the people who own a very private piece of the best in me. I thought of calling someone new, someone I had been trying to reach for some time now but remains shrouded by clouds and trees, off in the distance. I called my friend Heather instead, and that is what I suppose this other person does, constantly returning to proven sources of love and understanding. Andrea, Heather, a handful of others...they're my foundation, and they will be there five years from now, ten years from now, when I am suddenly where I was headed all along.

It could be said that the best forms of advice come two words at a time. Know thyself. Begin again. Keep trying. When I can look back at a week or a single day and say, "that was a significant, important experience for me", then I know I'm putting the advice to good use.

There She Goes

I don't know why I was inspired to include this, but tonight I found myself playing a song I wrote for someone a few weeks before she moved away. In this weird time of perpetual, slow transition, I think about those times when I was very present...and I had to write about it.

There She Goes

I see my friend is leaving

Gone already, she is

For whatever I knew has left me

Already

But where do I go from here?

I stand here, mixed and conflicted,

Wondering what it is that I did

Or didn't do

I ask my ocean for forgiveness

And there it sits, rolling.

Because I stopped walking,

Mesmerized,Inspired,

Feeling a whole sky of emotion,

Feeling more of myself than ever,

And all the while becoming obsolete.

So here I stand, ripping inside,

Dropping memories to the sand,

And I let go,

Saying goodbye to my friend yet again,

And there she is.

I see my friend leaving

Gone already, she was

As I remember her when she loved me.

(but no more)

And my heart drains itself of all its love,

To paint the best picture of her I know

In this moment,

And there she goes.

SubNova

About fifteen years ago, maybe more, I was camping with a band of gypsies close to San Diego, just north of the Mexican border. Yes, you read that right, I was camping with a band of gypsies. My theater people at the time were an unusual bunch, and we went to the sanctioned event called the Baron's War, where people would use modified weapons - all padded swords, axes, and halberds - and stage mock battles in various scenarios. While the aggro warriors beat each other senseless, earning bruises and faking death, we gypsies were off in our own tent getting drunk and taking naps until night came. As soon as it got dark, three or four of the warriors girlfriends would come drink with us and they danced as we played our drums.

At some point in the late evening, I walked away from the big red tent and into a clearing to see the tent from afar and hear the absolute absence of city sounds. And then I looked up. Across the sky were more stars than I felt I could comprehend, an overwhelming feeling of insignificance beneath this complex and limitless canopy. I almost fell to my knees, it was so staggering, but I slowly started to breathe and take this in. The more my eyes focused, the more I started to get perplexed about the concentration of stars in the middle. It didn't seem real. A voice off to my right explained that this was the rest of the galaxy I was looking at. I couldn't see who it was, but that was a rare moment of clarity that definitely made me aware of the size of things. Me, my problems and struggles with daily life, my loves and losses, were all sitting on one invisible dot swirling around one mostly invisible point of light, in perspective. On this unique world, I place importance on the small things, and sometimes they take the focus from the big picture. I had the vision of the really big picture for one night only. One brief moment in time that I can't seem to forget.

Such is the girl whom I called my moon. Such is the friend who escaped L.A. by clicking her heels three times and moving back North. Such is the one major love of my life who checks in on me every couple of years from the uncomfortable seat of married life. They all appear and disappear, brief moments of exciting rediscovery and silent rejection that keep them up in the memory of my night sky. I say what I say to them with full knowledge that my honesty either means nothing to them or can be completely irrelevant, and will often be met by good intentions followed by silence.

That's where I pick myself up and keep moving. That's where I continue to encourage myself to keep believing. It's because that sky is still out there. That possibility of finding that connection with someone again is still there. Hope is still alive, and all this, the rejection, the disappearing acts, is really irrelevant in perspective. We are just sitting on one arm of our galaxy, and I am just one invisible dot on the map.

And the Wind Calls My Name

I could have written in the hot spot, the very moment I sent my cast off to the wrap party, leaving me behind to sit in the theater alone. I could have written sometime during the foggy-headed weekend, something about milestones and never regretting the decisions we make in life. I could have, but I didn't. It took the wind a few days to clear my head and start shaking the trees outside to grab my attention. This is where I am. I'm listening to the howling sound of change.

Sometimes I give a list of random questions to friends I lunch with at work. Yesterday's set included the question: "What two things did you learn last weekend?" Number one for me was that 40 is old if you haven't done anything with your life (and in some respects, I haven't). The second revelation was that going into and coming out of anything, be it a career, relationship, or life-changing experience, you have to do your best to know who you are. In the end, you may be alone, on the ground covered in dirt and blood, and everyone might judge you for falling or looking unattractive, but if you know who you are and value that, then this is all you need. I repeat, this is all you need, this intimate knowledge of and belief in the best things you have to offer. You may be fortgotten, you may be ridiculed, but you know where you stand. This is where I am. I'm listening to the reaffirming sound of my own conscience.

I won't go down for being the nice guy.
I won't go down for holding on to my principles.
I won't allow myself any longer to interpret rejection as a fair evaluation.

If there's no love where I am, then I simply have to keep looking for it. I have to have faith that it is out there, maybe in another group of friends, another place of work, and on another stage. It's out there, and that's where I need to be.

Say/Do Masochism

I'm going to break a major rule of my blog writing style, and I'm a little disappointed in myself, because I came up with a title for this entry that captures the idea but unfortunately uses key words I need to use in the body. If you haven't noticed already - and I'm betting you haven't - I have a rule about blogging that I do everything I can to maintain: I can't use any of the words from the title in the body of the blog. It was never like this with my journal because nobody ever read that, but this is a different medium. Nevertheless, rules were meant to be broken, but only once, or else the novelty wears thin.

The things people say and the things people do are in two different worlds. I've seen a lot of the two contrasting lately, and in the wake of after effect, I'm wondering what the words mean when the action betrays them. I wonder if people are just not aware of what it is they say, and beyond that, I wonder if I should place more importance on the things people don't say. Actually, my theater training tells me the truth: Place more importance on the things that people do or don't do.

I also have to trust my instincts. There are friends I have absolutely no doubt about, and I've been accused of a resistance to new things and new people, but that's why you establish close friends and everyone else is friendly. It doesn't mean that I love people less, and it doesn't mean that I lose a little faith in people. I just have to embrace this individuality I've practiced for so many years and...most importantly, I have to know myself. I can't take perpetul rejection from a few people to heart. To do so would be insanity, and especially now when I'm redefining so much in my life, I really need as much belief in myself as I can find. This is the project of Stewart 4.0 in the making, and there's more in the balance than you may be aware of.

There's an old saying...oh God, I might have mentioned it two three times before in this blog, so you might wonder who exactly I'm trying to convince...anyway, there's an old saying that goes, "We cannot become what we want to be by remaining what we are." Oh holy shit yes, there is truth in that. "What we are" is the part that's difficult to define, because it's not what we think we are, it's a matter of who people want us to be. A friend of mine recently reappeared and seems to be stuck in that hole. Another mysterious friend from my past wrestled with the question, defining it in her email address with the demand "need to be me". But who is "me"? Who am I?

Okay, I keep bringing up in various entries that idea of "we are what we do", but that's the fight. That's the struggle to leave the labels and definitions placed on us by other people and realize our potential. That's when you start looking for the people who love and accept you, and I've been on both sides of that. I've been very lucky to be the one theat some people have turned to when they needed to recenter themselves. Tonight, right after work, I reached out to two people - one of whom has always been unconditional with me and leaves me feeling great about myself, and the other has had a crappy answering machine for as long as I've known her. They have a piece of me intact, and suddenly the others...the ones who can't make up their minds....

Well, the things we say and the things we do are two completely different things. If they match, it's a unique convergence and the truth behind them go straight to the soul. You've given yourself sincerely to another person. That's where my weakness is. Since I practice this, it's easy for me to feel let down, a little bewildered, wondering what it was in any given moment that I did wrong, and why I fell short of a person's expectations. I see that blank stare from my boss sometimes and I know everything there is to know about how much longer I should stay at my job. I get blown off repeatedly by the friend who wants to keep the tight circle of friends together, and I scold myself for lowering my guard around her. I carefully navigate the changes with my theater home, always keeping my anxiety about it in mind, and I take shallow breaths of self-esteem to keep my eyes focused and my heart intact.

And what touched all of this off? The guilt of complacency. The idea that if I tried less, believed a little less in myself, and simply accepted where the people who are physically closest to me want me to be, scares me. It upsets me. I've always had a fear of mediocrity, of letting time slip by me unnoticed without anything to show for it. Many years ago I started letting go of the people and places that never knew me because I wanted to do more, I wanted to be more, I just wanted to have more fun with life. Today, an instant of being cut off in mid-sentence after being held at a repelling distance took me from strange wonder to a stinging cloud of rejection.

I can't let it get to me. I have to keep in mind all of the great things I want to do. Better than that, I have to remember the people who believe in me, the ones who extend themselves to knowing me. The tragedy would come from the acceptance of rejection, and that is something I'm not inclined to do. No, that's not the legacy I will live up to.

And I always thought: the very simplest words
Must be enough, when I say what things are like
Everyone's heart must be torn to shreds.
That you'll go down if you don't stand up for yourself
Surely you see that.
~ Bertolt Brecht
(a poem given to me by Christine Cavanaugh, one of the truest, most direct people I've ever known)

St. Hat Tricks Day

I just stubbed my toe. Walking barefoot to the kitchen barefoot after having gotten home from the theater at about 12:30am, I accidentally kicked the edge of...oh, never mind. I'm in pain.

Okay, I'm over it now.

I just talked for a while with my lead actor after a decent performance of my play, and looking back at my history at Playhouse, I'm so glad that this was my last conversation with an actor in that theater. There has almost always been one actor who stays late, the one most eager to learn. Over the years it's been people like Vito (the absolute opposite of the word "lazy"), Suzy (the most talented actor I've ever worked with), and tonight it was Amalia, the person who goes beyond the word actor and achieves that definition that is beyond most actors' reach: she's an artist. That's everything I aspire to be, from my first conscious breath in the morning to the moment I close my eyes at night. It comes as no surprise that these three people are the ones whom I attribute my experience to, the ones who made everything worth the trip I've taken.

I guess this is about the magic number of three. At the beginning of this weekend, there were three performances left. When I was done (for the most part) as director tonight, I sent three of my actors home, or to a bar, or to wherever they were going on this holiday. I even had three crew members tonight. The real questions is, as I write on the third Saturday of the third month of the year, is this play the way I want to finish a career at Playhouse West? Is this the best I've ever done?

I have to say...that the answer lies with the audiences. I will never feel like it's the best thing, because I always want more. As my distant friend Iulia says, "more and more, always". I work my actors hard until closing night, and then I will, as I've learned how to do through repetition and experience, be satisfied with the outcome. It is what it was always meant to be.

I love the process. I love the moments of clarity, of pure bonding with artists and that understanding of what we're doing. Whether or not the audience gets it is kind of irrelevant. In this chapter of my life that's closing, I committed myself completely to the actor, to making sure that they are different on closing night than they were when I first saw them rehearse. I know I haven't reached all of them, but I worked my butt off through each and every performance. Back in my college days, I gave extensive notes to my two actors in a black box theater when I made my directing debut with "Two and Twenty". Tonight, with two performances left, I gave my final notes at Playhouse in a black box theater to two of my actors, and then one.

That actor is a musician an an artist. Those are three of my favorite words.

The Law of Proximity

I have been trying, over the past week or so and especially last night, to write a new blog entry, and to do it in a way that's a little more than just narrative, a recap of what I ate for breakfast, what I ate for dinner, and what happened in between. Always, I ran out of steam, lost the next thought in a cloud of distraction, and whatever I wrote is immediately deleted. I've done that many times in my life, written pages of a script, short stories, songs, and deleted them without a second thought. I guess I've done the same thing with people. That, unfortunately, is a little too easy for me.

Sometimes the lyrics of a song haunt me and call me back to writing, which helps me cleanse my cluttered mind. Lately I've been hearing the following from the song "Crumbs", which I used for "The Shape of Things":

I can tell, by the way you're pushing crumbs around the table
You're not listening to me
And you say, that you have come as far as you are able
But you're not far from the tree
And you say, you're OK, but you live your life like it's over
And you say, you're OK, but you live your life like it's over

So I stop, many times a week, to look at the world around me and see the people who are near and far away. And there lies an idea I have about people whom you just can't connect with, and the people whom you do. It is those names, those faces, that can define us...that attempt to define us, but that's not right. The distance between us defines us.

I once wrote about a girl I knew for over a decade, a friend whom I used to write to nearly every day. She was the single most consistent and important friendship for years until she moved out here. Gradually, I started recognizing her less and less, and soon I realized that when she lived on another coast, she was still sharing the same space with me, living in that mailbox. When she moved to my town, her life existed in her zip code, and suddenly our friendship stopped being relevant. It didn't live inside the mailbox any more, the emails were saturated with appointments, schedules, dinners, inconvenient invitations, and the strange expectation that she could put forth less effort than writing email, because we were in the same city. The people who grew closer were the people who were physicallycloser. That's the way it always was.

Earlier this week, my company had what it calls a RIF (a Reduction in Force), laying off some 130 people, assassinating them from an odd family of people who have been driven to work and overwork for the past four years, stuck inside two buildings within a song from the packed Ventura freeway. While they were being informed that they were being let go, all of their access was being revoked. Most of them didn't get the chance to say goodbye, and I don't know who's better off, those of us who are staying or those who are going. We know each other, we've grown on each other because we are near. When the depth of friendship can be affected by a floor or two, the attention paid to distance is a greater thing.

In two weeks, I will be ending a 10 year relationship with my theater company with the final performance of "the Shape of Things". Aside from everything else I've written, I know that my relevance in a whole group of people will suddenly disappear, even darken in Playhouse's habit of slandering the people who leave. I keep getting assurances from those close to me that they wouldn't dare say a bitter word about me, but I know better. I'm making the jump into a void, into complete uncertainty, but I do know who will be in that void with me. The comfort of knowing the few people near me definitely outweighs the idea of not knowing everyone where I've been for the past few years.

The song finishes with:

And all the things you ever tried to tell me,
Somehow don't apply to you
You're the one evading hope, side-stepping every inkling
That the good guy, the early bird, the one who tries, the one who tries again wins

So despite the rejections from the girl, the company, the difficulties with career and direction in my life...I'm still in it. I pull in closer and focus on myself, keep myself strong and keep trying. Every last person might be off in their own zip code, but I will reach out to the people who have made an impression on me, and if they have no reaction to that or to me, then all I can do is keep moving. I can't be afraid to try again.

If I give up, stay in one place and everyone else keeps moving around me, my whole life will be a series of deleted pages. Hey, forget about this whole distance between people defining us. What defines us is what we do, and how we react to things. That is who we are.

The Memory Of

"Take this sorrow to thy heart, and make it a part of thee, and it shall nourish thee till thou art strong again."
~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I woke up this morning with a profound sadness. I have no idea where it comes from. I could attribute it to the legacy of depression that comes down to me from my family - two of my uncles on my father's side ended their lives abruptly - but that would be a copout. I don't have to own anyone else's depression. As much as it might be chemical, it is also my choice, just as it was my choice (and has been for 10 years) to go home after a play rather than hanging out with castmates at a bar. I usually come home, wind down, and begin to empty my mind through whatever means I can find: writing, playing guitar, sending out a few emails, maybe some Photoshop work. Whether I'm on stage or directing, doing a show takes a lot out of me, so I need to empty that before I go to bed or else that insomnia comes around again and I'm up all night thinking...feeling.

Wow...it sounds like I'm a big mess, doesn't it?

C: You think you're the only one who feels these things? A lot of people feel sad, they just don't write about it.

S: You think? I can't always tell what other people are feeling. I just see what they do....

C: So you label that and move on. Have you ever heard of the "benefit of the doubt"?

S: Yes, I have, smartass. Sometimes it's just easier to consider the worst case scenario and be nicely surprised.

C: Or maybe, Eeyore, it's easier to think that people, for the most part, have good intentions and when they do something wrong, they just might be human.

S: How did this turn into a conversation about other people letting me down?

C: How did you forget that this is a conversation between your conscious and subconscious? Do you think I don't know what's going on with you? (pause) Listen, I know that this is a big year of change ahead of you. I can feel the anxiety connected to that.

S: Damn, I keep forgetting I can't hide anything when I write these conversations between us.

C: I think you're leaving Playhouse for the right reasons. I think you're doing the right things for your career by starting to network your way towards Warner Bros.

S: Thank you.

C: But I also know what a leap of faith these things are. You're solid in both places right now.

S: It just can't keep going the way it's going.

C: Right.

S: And I can't become what I want to be by remaining what I am. What I do at Playhouse gets lost in the competitive atmosphere controlled by two people. What I do at work is rewarded and counted on, but it's so wrong. It's not what I'm meant to do.

C: So take that leap of faith. Change your life this year. Know that there will be mornings when you'll wake up a little sad -

S: I wrote that I had a profound sadness. Look at the top of this entry.

C: There will be mornings when you wake up a little sad, and that's just the aftermath of having done something you love doing the previous night knowing that it's going to end soon. You forget how great it is when you're not doing it, and you forget how much you're going to miss it when you're in the middle of it. This is about right for you, you know....

S: You think?

C: With every show you've ever done - I'm talking about beyond college - you're experiencing things a few weeks ahead of time. You know what that sadness of the final performance is going to be like. And then...what? What's beyond that? It's completely unknown.

S: Ohhhh that's scary. New school, new theater company, new roles.

C: But do you know what's great? You don't have any concept of failure with that. You don't see yourself returning to Playhouse to direct or produce -

S: That would be the failure.

C: So this bold move to walk away from ten years could be the thing that breaks life open for you. Think of all of the weekends you've spent there, the late nights rehearsing and all of the people you've worked with. You came to every cast having to prove yourself all over again because your reputation at that school has been smothered time and time again, but you did it and now you have all of this experience behind you.

S: I sacrificed a lot to get here.

C: And you're wondering if it was worth it.

S: Yeah.

C: You have one thing that many people don't have when it comes to the creative world, and that takes sacrifice.

S: What...? What do I have?

C: Instinct. You know how you react whenever something creative is broken down into structure, laying things out into a formula for everyone to follow? It's against everything artistic, isn't it?

S: Yeah, I guess I don't understand it.

C: That instinct will always be there for you. The sacrifice - while others have gotten married, had children, moved into big houses and indulged in their lives - helped refine the thing you love to do. The sadness in the morning is part of the artist that goes to bed at night. You don't put any of it on, it's part of your DNA now. DeoxyriboNucleicArtist.

S: Cute.

C: And before you begin to think about what it is you're not, and what you don't have in your life, show that depression the fact that you're sitting here working through this having a conversation in a virtual world.

Okay, so maybe that actually qualifies me for psychiatric help, but truthfully, I feel a little better now. When the credits start rolling, all it means is that this particular movie is over. There's always room for a new one, and if I'm standing alone at the end of the next one, all I can do is keep looking forward and try a new leap of faith.

"There is no future
There is no past
I live this moment as my last
There's only us
There's only this
Forget regret
Or life is yours to miss
No other road
No other way
No day but today"
~ Jonathan Larson

Creation Took Eight Days

With the heaviness of that last entry, you might wonder what direction I'd have to go in to recover. The obvious answer is that I wrestled with the same question years ago. That's also a non-answer, bred out of avoidance and clever misdirection. The truthful answer is that the direction always changes. I had started writing a follow-up a few times, even considered deleting that story, but I can't. It's part of me. It explains a lot, I think.

So here I am, dealing with the issues of today: Work is a little difficult to maintain, my father is in the hospital recovering slowly from knee surgery, and of course, I'm watching the health of the rest of my family. Add all the change with my creative life, and that's more than enough to handle. Somewhere in the margin, my niece is finally getting her wish; She has collected enough friends to replace my family, and seems to be on her way North with her two sons, a distance that might still feel too close to any of the three families she seems to hate. Her philosophy is "Love me for what I am, not for what you want me to be", but that has to contractually involve the rule that she's not built like us. I remember someone who used to be in my life telling me that she's not "thoughtful and sensitive like you are. I can't be like you."

Yes, there are people who are not built like you, who can't appreciate what it is you're feeling at any given moment, nor are they interested in bridging that gap. They don't "get" you, they don't see the best in you, they don't, in the end, have anything in common with you beyond sharing the same space for a limited amount of time. I've said that I'm different many times in my own blog, so I have to give them the benefit of the doubt. I just tend to focus on the many people who will always be strangers to me rather than fully appreciating those precious few who actually fit in my world.

The direction at the moment is towards tomorrow, with a healthy balanced stand in the present. Who is with me? Who wishes I could be different, maybe someone I used to be? The sometimes unacceptable reality is that goldfish grow to the size of the bowl. My niece will leave and put us behind her. My sister will heal and grow without her and the boys. My parents will adjust to life as they get older. I, like them, can't ever go back to who I used to be, because I, too, have grown to the size of my bowl.

The people around me will just have to get used to that.

Naked History

On a very special episode...of the blog: Things are explained and math is applied to abstraction. A brief retelling of the past explains the frustrating complication of the present, and whatever you do, you won't want to miss the final five lines. (This episode rated PG-13 for strong language.)

This is the story you don't know. You might understand human behavior, you might have met a hundred people who fit exactly the same description as me, but you don't know how I work. Some people may be predictable, there may be only about 700,000 words in the English language, but I utter one word and chances are good that I mean something different than the person next to me saying the same thing. I don't have all of the answers, but I am looking for them.

A little over a decade ago...holy shit...about a decade and a half ago, I fell in love. I found the singular answer to everything, the name and the face I wanted to see every single day of my life until the last sun set in my world and I slipped away to that perpetually moonlit sky. She was omnipresent, threading herself through every pore and every blood cell that went through my veins. In other words, it was absolutely crazy how important she was to me for the few years I knew her. She fit. I have to add at this point that I was a virgin before I met her - I didn't see any value in just wanting to get laid before or since - and as easy as it would be for you to assume that her role in that part of my life increased her importance to me, just wait before you snap a judgement.

I wanted to marry her, started talking about plans and knew in my bones that a life spent being a good husband and father from that point on would be the very thing I wanted. I was, at the same time, just starting to seriously study theatre acting and directing, so - Libra that I am - I started balancing. Her mind wasn't so made up. She wasn't exactly ready to settle down, nor was she convinced that I was the one. When I found out that she immediately wanted to be with someone else, I suddenly found myself on the floor of my bedroom on a New Year's Eve, seriously considering making it my last. I prayed with every cubic inch of my breath for a new answer to fill the void left by the old answer. Before I acted on anything, I had what my friend Eric Edwards called "a moment of clarity". I heard my family turning Dick Clark up in the living room and my thoughts switched to my annual tradition of dancing with my mom at the stroke of midnight. My soul was patched, my face was washed, and I went out to be with my family.

Sometime later, my answer once again rejected me for another, and I was suddenly staring at an empty bottle of sleeping pills, The doorbell rang, I answered, and two police officers stepped inside to check on me and offer me some sound advice. Something changed inside me. It was that instant of fear, the fear of letting down my parents, of suddenly falling into a downward spiral that I could not come back from. I had to face the friends who called because they were worried about me. I had to see her again.

Slowly things mended between her and I, but it was never the same. There were glimpses of hope, but late that year, the behavior returned and I found myself staring from the outside in again. What replaced the feelings of loss and fatality was fear. It was in that last conversation where I thought to myself, "Holy fuck, I can't keep doing this. I'm addicted, I'm hurt, and I'm lost, but I can't keep looking to her for an answer to who I am." It may have sounded like I was angry at the moment I told her I was done - she, by the way, laughed at that reaction - but I was scared to death. I knew a part of me was gone, and that I would have to completely rediscover myself. I hung up and did what I'm doing now. I pulled my notebook and started writing. When I was done with that, I had nothing but pieces around me and I wasn't wearing a single facade. I was starting at zero.

For the following three years or so, I didn't answer the phone. It wasn't just her. I didn't answer phone calls from anyone. I floated like a ghost to my college theater, left that place, went to another college to finish off my degree, and though I had sworn off of anything romantic, I got caught in TWO romantic triangles. Both ended with me running in the opposite direction as if I was on the downward slope of an avalanche. I left college without the degree and went to work.

What I couldn't deny was my love for acting and theater. I was a hard worker, too, sacrificing my creative life for the sake of the daily routine of working, going home, doing nothing, going to sleep early, and then repeating the same thing on the following day. As much as I denied that I ever wanted to go to that world of entertainment again, it was always right there. It was just outside my door, in my peripheral vision, in the back of my mind when I went to sleep, in all of the scribbles on the wall of my shower. They were snippets of stories, ideas for the next journal entry. Oh yeah, this very thing you're reading was my life support.

I enrolled at Playhouse West without any intention of being a working actor. I just needed to do it. I needed to study, to act, to read plays and see what it did for me. After only a short time, I was asked to work on productions, and that led to directing. That led to writing and producing. That led me to today, where I'm considering the next move of leaving Playhouse and starting up completely new somewhere else, ready to write, direct, and...teaching.

To this very moment, this very beat of writing this - oh Lord - very long story that I needed to write because I've never quite told the story, I still have that fear inside me. I still have a connection to that person on the floor with the knife and bottle of pills in front of him (wait - did I mention the knife?), like a string tied to a thumbtack and fixed to a moving point. I survived this long because I've always tried to stay singular of purpose, always conscious of being direct with the people I talk to, honest with my feelings, and not wasting my time being superfluous because with every wasted breath, I feel a little tug on that string. Sex clouded my judgement; I chose to be celibate and have kept it up since then without reservation. You might have wondered why I work so hard, sometimes coming home from a long day of work and immediately working on a project before I go to rehearsal. I'm running, my friend, filling my life with color and music, keeping every possible form of expression close to me and doing my best to reassure myself and everyone around me that it's great to be alive.

I am George Bailey running through Bedford Falls. I am the blip of the heart meter, pinging and giving signs of life. I can make a connection and then turn to the next thing because I've kept myself alive all these years. Whether people understand that I'm trying to be genuine and not throwing out words to be anything to anyone...well, that's on them. I only know how to give. I don't know how to ask. I have the life I never knew I wanted. How could I fault myself for that?

The girl resurfaces every few years or so, and I see her as the best friend I can never have. She's not the answer any more, even when I heard her voice again, because in the void she left behind, words, music, shapes and colors all fell in and became part of me. There are beautifully mismatched patches on my heart, and the scars left behind are all forgiven and drawn into the pattern of my experiences. Within the brief encounters I have with her - she always disappears suddenly, like my own little Brigadoon - I fall short of convincing her that my life is good. It is, simply, just me making the best of wherever I'm standing, with that hunger to live and keep moving towards the things and people who inspire me.

I'm not looking for the answer any more, because there are so many all around you, if you would only stop to take a look. The answer, as I've recently come to understand, is just being in the present, and suddenly I don't feel that tug on the string any more. This is how my life works, and I'm here to tell you that I love you, even though I don't know exactly who is reading this right now. You might be listening to your own soundtrack and none of this makes any sense to you, but the way I see it, I said what I came here to say.

I'm still alive.

But Not For Me

Bubbles are fun little space to live in. They refract light, hold a little environment unto themselves, and when they burst, they shed little tears of joy everywhere and leave a perfect circle where they land. How many things do you know of that leave a perfect impression when they come to an end? I suppose that depends on your particular definition of the word "perfect". It might depend on your reaction to endings.

I don't know if this will make sense, but I crave those endings. I have an addiction, a longing for that lingering final look when your eyes drink in an image for the very last time. There are a few things I wish would never end or change, for the most part, but everything else seems to have a blinking expiration date on it. I think...this comes from the fact that I've had so little closure with important things in my past. There has perpetuall been so little awareness of this thing we share together that I carry with me a collection of things and memories I alone put value in. Everyone else does their own thing - work hard, go home, fall in love somewhere along the line - but I feel like I fly beyond the radar across a quiet, ever-changing landscape. I see what I see, go where I go, and I exist in this little bubble of the blogosphere like a comet cutting through the solar system, only occasionally changing course.

This might be a mild, slightly bitter helping of insanity. Of course, I can't define this as insanity, because...well, what am I basing it on? What's normal outside of my life that I can compare this to? This is normal for me. No, I think that insanity only comes with hour after hour of frustrating therapy, and I haven't even invited that into my life yet. Isn't this supposed to be therapeutic? Yes - reality check - I'm writing this for me to sort out things in my mind and heart. It's a selfish act of lacerating self-exposure, hopefully walking the line of brutal honesty and entertaining literature ("Ohhh thank God that's not my life.").

I actually started this entry in a California Pizza Kitchen, which I didn't think would be crowded, but there I was having a white pizza and a Sam Adams in the midst of a Valentines Day crowd completely at ease with my singularity. I wrote the following few lines in my directing comp book before diving into this, which I'm finishing at a Starbucks:

In a little diversion...art stops for life and life stops for art, both turning to mirror each other. The air I breathe is filtered through pen & keyboard, so I validate myself by stating "I feel, therefore I am, and if you think this isn't normal, don't look."

This is me attaching myself to the moment, refusing to go home where I have work awaiting away from the work that I run away from. This is me treating myself to the road less traveled, towards doing what I want to do rather than what is easy to do. This is me practicing detachment and independence from the world, as seen through the walls of a bubble. The light is refracted, the world distorted, and I wonder sometimes if this is exactly what it really is, and not just the way I see it. I have that gift, of taking these moments to stop and look, but still I wonder. What is it that other people do? Do they simply work hard, go home, and fall in love somewhere along the way, never asking why or how?

If I change my life and only work on what I love to do, what would fill the void? What would I leave behind, once it's all over? I hope I leave something close to the shape of a perfect circle.

Stepping Out of Line

I learned something about myself today. Okay, wait...let me backtrack for one second and preface that by saying that I've always said this about myself, and have tried to manipulate this into being true, but...wait, actually, I started seeing this on Saturday but today this little habit suddenly flicked me on the head and said, "No, this is actually the way you are."

If I find out that someone is doing exactly the same thing I'm doing, within the same circle of influence - be it something they do with a person or just something that would merely duplicate an effort - I immediately turn off of that thing and focus my attention somewhere else. It's instantaneous, once I acknowledge the dupe, and then the previous thing (what was it?) doesn't really exist any more. Ewwww it's kind of an L.A. thing, I think. It's that living in the moment reality .

It's okay. No, it's okay. It's kind of funny, actually. I figured it out at work, in that aquarium of uncertainty where the population is unhappy at the moment as the budget cloud looms above, threatening to poke holes in the ground with layoff lightning. That's the perception, anyway. The sky has yet to begin falling. Nevertheless, I enjoy the little distractions, and the people sometimes indulge in quirkiness that I can only assume comes from living most of the week inside an 8x8 box. These people have their own rules, but just the same, you try to have unique relationships with the people you work with. It doesn't always work out that way.
People are different at work. It's actually time for me to affect a change in my work situation. Maybe I'm getting cabin fever at the old twin buildings over in Woodland Hills. I roam the building like a caged animal sometimes.

I am beginning to see a few people for their patterns, and one clicked in today, suddenly changing my instinctive behavior around her. It has been a kind of domino effect over the past week or so, brought on by what I can only describe as a white hot focus on my own survival and the things I absolutely have to do. It's a little fireball of prioritizing things, so I found that my mind tends to switch things off.

Mi vida loca. I don't settle, apparently. It's my fear of mediocrity wreaking havoc on the things I do. It's also my practice of noticing patterns in everything, so...is it really weird that I can make abrupt turns and focus my attention in a completely different direction? Maybe not. I just thought it was funny.

Okay, maybe this didn't merit a whole blog entry. I just felt like writing.

Other People Do

I had written the perfect blog entry, the one that encapsulated the moment and mood, and in the end it pulled together all of the points and painted a simple lesson for me, colored in with a palette of perspective. It was a bite-sized blog economically written, complete with a bathroom break and a deceptive beginning, and then....

You know, sometimes as in life, you click on "submit" or "complete", or in this case you click on "preview & post", and you end up somewhere completely unexpected. "Preview & post" took me to a page of advertising. Going back one page took me to blankness. What was fed to the MySpace blogosphere as an intricate meal of ideas and feelings came out as a silly litle fart. Funny, how these little things remind me of the larger things I've done with my life. I especially go through this at work - all preparation and no fanfare - but the paycheck seems to make things easier.

Anyway, I started this entry in my notebook, the 5x8 ruled book, of which I have a large stack from over a decade and a half of journal writing. I could take that anywhere and often needed it with me as an escape. That's where writing scripts and poetry were born, the kind of lingering gaseous cloud that occasionally gives birth to a few starry ideas. This little book combined with frequent "Ctrl + A / Ctrl + C" keystrokes will hopefully prevent another lost entry. I couldn't recreate it; It was late at night and had spent myself writing it. It's time to move on. I guess that was one of the central themes to that lost entry. It's the whole moving on thing that I keep talking about, with constant reminders to live in the moment.

I opened a play last weekend, the last one I intend to fully produce and direct at Playhouse West. We had a standing ovation on opening night and a full house the following night. It felt right. If I'm going to work on a statement play, I want it to be received well, and I want people to see my actors loving what they do. All professionalism aside, I want people to hear what I'm saying as an artist, that apathy is unforgivable. I, like everyone else will tell you about themselves, like speaking my mind, and I try my best to word things as carefully as I can so that people know exactly what I'm saying. I've been called blunt. I've also been called tactful, but this is all good in everyday conversation. As an artist - and I almost hate using that term, but I wake up every day with the need to be creative - I see things that need to be commented on, or I feel stories that need to be told. That's why I could never walk away from this life. This is who I am.

Last night I found myself in front of a truly inspiring girl, a goddess with a magnetic smile, telling her exactly what I saw in her in the most poetic terms, without reservation or doubt. I had only one thing in mind, that I had to tell her who she was to me. I couldn't lose the opportunity. I know we live in a world that instigates comparison and fear. I know we work in an industry (entertainment) that constantly tells you that you're not good enough, or that we already have people like you. The people who succeed are either those who persevere or those who are the current flavor. Now, it would be too easy for me to say that I'm going to champion those who persevere, but that would be taking something away from what I do, and especially, from this girl. No, I will speak up because that's what I have to do with a gift of communication. If I can express ideas, if I can translate, then I simply have to say something.

First of all, my job as a director is to make a play common. I want everyone to recognize what's happening, to relate to what's happening in whatever medium I'm working in. A statement is pointless if I'm the only one who believes it. I have to make sure my actors understand what we're trying to say. I have to make sure that every aspect of what I create contributes to the idea. I'm not sloppy that way.

Okay, enough about the technical stuff.

The girl is amazing. She's sweet, smart, beautiful, and especially unique. She's talented, and there's something about her...that's completely enchanting. I equate her with that elusive idea of something romantic, as if she's always shot with that soft lens that blurs your vision slightly. I made a connection last night as the full moon rose above the roofline outside the theater before I went on stage last night. There it was, perfect and mysterious, rising above everything with a glow that makes it bright enough to make your eyes adjust, but still, you had to look. Every time I see the moon - I've always looked for it - it's hypnotic. So is the girl. When I see the moon, I'll think of her.

Have you ever seen someone like that? Open your eyes...and don't let the moment go by. I may have lost a journal entry, I may have created or worked on things in the past that only had meaning for me and nobody else, but the girl knew for at least a moment that someone was inspired by her, and loved her completely for it.

I don't know how other people go through life sticking to a schedule, filling the hours with work, shopping, cooking, cleaning, and distractions scattered throughout the weeks that slip by unnoticed. I don't know how people maintain. That's not me. I have a different way of doing things, and it has everything to do with recognizing the world around me. That's the life I've chosen.

Ahhh wait...select all...copy...now, preview and post.

The Christmas Miracle, Chapter Three

Sometimes the lessons are in the out of focus periphery, the things that solve themselves without our intervention. Well, really, that's the lesson itself. We're not superheroes. Not every miracle is a thing that requires our full attention and involvement.

The miracle lies in the moment. This moment. No, not the moment ago when I started saying "The miracle lies in the moment...". It's not even in the moment when I wrote this thought. It's this...right now...with you reading this very word, you taking breath right now, your eyes blinking as you scan this very sentence. It's the instant we share when we have the power of choice, where we are at this point in our lives.

I walked through a cold theater tonight, not cold because of our strange weather lately, but cold in the impersonal, forgetful way. There were actors in there - not my actors. They were old friends, but somehow strangers now. They are the victims of a theater company built on the scraps of peoples' hopes and aspirations, a huge monster breathing in angst and greed and exhaling competition and short-sighted loyalties.

I go to work every day with the feeling that I'm always catching up, and I'm still sitting with the struggle of knowing the difference between co-workers and friends. I get mixed messages sometimes, but ultimately, what everyone is most concerned with is self-preservation. Some people place that on the success of the whole company and others have a tough enough time with their square putty-colored living space. One wonders if that's the reason why I roam the hallways talking to as many people as I can and our temp was let go today. We all have different needs.

What gets me through these places, these strange situations I find myself in with people, is that moment after. I keep refreshing my mind and my vision...I kept looking for that miracle and kept getting distracted. That's when I found it. It was the moment I blinked and looked at my good life, and the past began to blur. I remember the weird trip through the theater I spent 10 years in now, only because I'm writing about it. Once I click on Preview & Post, it's gone. I write about the work stuff because it's a part of my daily life, but before I even leave the parking lot at work, these days I'm thinking about the play I'm opening in one week.

The miracle is, I'm lucky. Because I keep myself busy, my life constantly reinvents itself and keeps turning the topsoil over. I have my reactions and see the undeniable behavior - that's my training - but at the same time I stay focused. That's why it was so hard to see the miracle during my Christmas in Miami. It kept happening over and over again, and in the end, when I found myself back in Los Angeles, the whole thing was like dream, a month spent in Miami over the course of two weeks. Would that be the miracle, that life outlasts the little problems that sometimes slow us down and make us stop being a part of living it?

For all these moments, the big questions I keep throwing out there and my need to write about it all, here we are, sharing this thought together, this very breath. That, my friend, is a miracle.