It's been a long time - for me - since I've written, mostly due to the heat, being busy, a few surprises, and all the fanfare I shower myself with when I'm motivated enough to change my life yet again. I've actually written a lot - nothing blog-worthy - but on the eve of a new challenge, I feel the need to catch up and really seek out a moment of clarity and perspective about my life so far. Why now? Is what I'm about to do that important? Not really, it's just a writing class I'm starting tomorrow. What would inspire me to stop and look back now, other than the fact that most of my writing will be focused on the study of writing?
I've got a year to live.
Don't read that wrong. I'm not planning on dying, nor am I sick. I mean, I don't know when it'll happen, but if I go, I currently have everything I want. I have a few really good friends who are committed to life and our investment in it together. My family's doing great. I've had a whole life in theater stuffed into a decade and promise of bigger and better things. I've found a way to pay attention to what people are saying and doing, and I'm endlessly entertianed by the dance around me. I'm so thankful for what I have, but yes, all this can change, so I'm inspired to make better use of my time and get back to living a slightly larger life. That includes getting on my career, getting back to learning and seeking new places and people, and even new avenues of charity now that the one through work is caught up in the merger and the other one through theater has no home for the moment. I've sat in the cocoon of home recuperating from having left my actors and my stage, but I am currently in the midst of recreating and rising from what was.
I have a year to live. Really live. And then after that, I have another one. It allows me a chance to make plans beyond saying "I have a day to live". This is basically me saying that I'm optimistic about my future and not weighed down with regret. My mistakes from the past, especially the ones that invited recurring patterns, only lend to my experience and not to my character. My character is all about the things my friends recognize: I love, and love with my whole heart, and I take care of the people close to me. I'm opinionated but committed, eager to connect (sometimes to a fault), but at the same time - and most of the time - I choose to go my own way.
Here's what my experience dictates: Acting has taught me to not respond until I'm really provoked or inspired to react. I only recently learned this on a personal level. Also, you own your own perceptions and issues with the outside world. 90% of the time, people have more than enough on their own plate to accomodate worrying about your problems, so...this is what I tell myself...pull yourself together and keep moving. If you can do all this and choose happiness over anything that might slow you down or obscure your view from the answers you need on a daily basis, you can pretty much stay young and true to yourself. It's not easy, but sometimes the practice surprises you, and you find the spectacular in the simple moments of the day. Alternatively, you could be distracted by the unsolvable mysteries of situations that are completely out of your hands. It's your choice.
Yeah, you have to accept that there are things you can't help or change. You have to be okay with that. There are mysterious people in the margins of my life who play by their own rules and on rare occasions enter my world like strange lights in the sky, appearing and disappearing without explanation. I used to think that the exchange was somehow a reflection of me, both an attraction to who I was perceived to be and a repulsion to the realization of who I actually am. In reality, it has nothing to do with me, and I have to either let those moments go or fight the temptation to reach for them. It's usually both. I'm still practicing the balance of that.
What's the worst that would happen if you, in a mixed moment of courage, changed a response to something, or said exactly what was on your mind? What would happen if you suddenly chose to not do something expected of your character or decided to stop living a life that isn't working for you? You and I have that same year to look forward to, my friend. It can be whatever you want it to be. We do, after all, have a year to live, and in the end...if it really is the end...it would be such a crime to have wasted it.
We are still here. That means we have a choice. Isn't that all the power we need to begin?
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Tight
BEFORE I say anything else, I'm watching Dancing with the Stars and both Dolly Parton and Wayne Newton are scaring me. Scaring me! Wayne hasn't had his face pulled back as tight as Dolly has, but man. Wrinkles add character. Sinatra looked great as old blue eyes, Sophia Loren is still a hottie. Plastic surgery people, please save the money for something else. It's okay...no, shh shhhhhh, it's okay to age.
Wait - how many times have I written about turning 40? Also, am I not working out like it's a new fad? Okay, guilty. I'm still not ever going to pull my skin back over my face like a condom on an apple core. Yeah, I said it. How's that for a mental image?
We all want to be loved forever, and we sometimes want the ridiculous combination of our youthful bodies with our current wisdom and knowledge. I know I'm chasing it. I see it all over the place in the entertainment world. People want to be seen. They want to be noticed. Just like the craft we practice, the lives within tend to be an enhanced mirror of the lives outside of entertainment. That's why some films and shows tend to resonate so well with audiences. It's not a matter of finely crafting stories based on psychological study and behavioral equations. As one of my greatest acting teachers once said, "actors are very special broken people". The same holds true of any kind of artist.
In a rehearsal this past weekend with that very same teacher as a director, I watched really interesting behavior of people who were getting parts taken away and given to them, who had a chance to establish themselves in a pecking order that just doesn't exist. It happens every time he revisits the show. People want his approval. They want a chance to set themselves apart from others. It's not competition - there's nothing to win. It's manufactured self-esteem. There was one girl in particular who has always drawn attention to herself. She laughed the loudest, even when nothing was funny. When the whole cast would be addressed, she would either talk to someone else or rifle through her purse. She, like Britney, like Paris, like Lindsay, will not stand with others on the same level. She wasn't the only one at the rehearsal, either. There were others screaming for attention, for approval, even physically staying close to the strongest person in the room, the "alpha male" director. It's behavior that occurs in rehearsals and in performances, where the self-involved aren't self-aware. I kept looking around at other people, to see if they noticed the same things I was watching. Only a couple did.
Back in real life, the volume is turned down on the same attention-getting habits, but they're still there. I wonder where they come from, and often ask myself how they make the transition from an innocent cry for help to a destructive, self-serving path that really leads to endless dissatisfaction. So Dolly and Wayne have altered their looks, and I know a few surgically enhanced girls at the office. The girl I saw at rehearsal is really no different than the brat I worked with who never quite found out what it was to be accountable for her actions, even when she could clearly see the cause and effect of them. I've seen the most unbalanced people complain about the drama of others, and all of it, both the creative and real worlds I live in, begins to blur and I ask myself why people seem so disconnected, and at the same time want approval, want to redefine the world according to them.
What in our world ranks possessions over ideas? What makes it possible to believe that we're not okay the way we are? When this life seems to be made of all these irregular puzzle pieces, and we end up craving something real, what happens when we center ourselves and are once again able to manage the whole thing? Do the real things we needed get capped and put back in the medicine cabinet?
You have two options: 1) to tighten up because life moves fast and as you get older, sometimes your decisions illustrate the fact that you are alone with your own values and perceptions, or 2) to relax your hold on everything and see yourself in the ever changing context of the world, constantly getting better and never letting any outside influences take anything away from who you are.
So who are you? Who is the country star, the vegas performer, the obnoxious actress, the divorcee with fake breasts, or the writer blogging late at night? We're not so different, you and I. We cross paths, we fade away, we lose sight of each other, of ourselves, and here we are again. We all want to be loved forever. Shouldn't we first get that love from ourselves?
Wait - how many times have I written about turning 40? Also, am I not working out like it's a new fad? Okay, guilty. I'm still not ever going to pull my skin back over my face like a condom on an apple core. Yeah, I said it. How's that for a mental image?
We all want to be loved forever, and we sometimes want the ridiculous combination of our youthful bodies with our current wisdom and knowledge. I know I'm chasing it. I see it all over the place in the entertainment world. People want to be seen. They want to be noticed. Just like the craft we practice, the lives within tend to be an enhanced mirror of the lives outside of entertainment. That's why some films and shows tend to resonate so well with audiences. It's not a matter of finely crafting stories based on psychological study and behavioral equations. As one of my greatest acting teachers once said, "actors are very special broken people". The same holds true of any kind of artist.
In a rehearsal this past weekend with that very same teacher as a director, I watched really interesting behavior of people who were getting parts taken away and given to them, who had a chance to establish themselves in a pecking order that just doesn't exist. It happens every time he revisits the show. People want his approval. They want a chance to set themselves apart from others. It's not competition - there's nothing to win. It's manufactured self-esteem. There was one girl in particular who has always drawn attention to herself. She laughed the loudest, even when nothing was funny. When the whole cast would be addressed, she would either talk to someone else or rifle through her purse. She, like Britney, like Paris, like Lindsay, will not stand with others on the same level. She wasn't the only one at the rehearsal, either. There were others screaming for attention, for approval, even physically staying close to the strongest person in the room, the "alpha male" director. It's behavior that occurs in rehearsals and in performances, where the self-involved aren't self-aware. I kept looking around at other people, to see if they noticed the same things I was watching. Only a couple did.
Back in real life, the volume is turned down on the same attention-getting habits, but they're still there. I wonder where they come from, and often ask myself how they make the transition from an innocent cry for help to a destructive, self-serving path that really leads to endless dissatisfaction. So Dolly and Wayne have altered their looks, and I know a few surgically enhanced girls at the office. The girl I saw at rehearsal is really no different than the brat I worked with who never quite found out what it was to be accountable for her actions, even when she could clearly see the cause and effect of them. I've seen the most unbalanced people complain about the drama of others, and all of it, both the creative and real worlds I live in, begins to blur and I ask myself why people seem so disconnected, and at the same time want approval, want to redefine the world according to them.
What in our world ranks possessions over ideas? What makes it possible to believe that we're not okay the way we are? When this life seems to be made of all these irregular puzzle pieces, and we end up craving something real, what happens when we center ourselves and are once again able to manage the whole thing? Do the real things we needed get capped and put back in the medicine cabinet?
You have two options: 1) to tighten up because life moves fast and as you get older, sometimes your decisions illustrate the fact that you are alone with your own values and perceptions, or 2) to relax your hold on everything and see yourself in the ever changing context of the world, constantly getting better and never letting any outside influences take anything away from who you are.
So who are you? Who is the country star, the vegas performer, the obnoxious actress, the divorcee with fake breasts, or the writer blogging late at night? We're not so different, you and I. We cross paths, we fade away, we lose sight of each other, of ourselves, and here we are again. We all want to be loved forever. Shouldn't we first get that love from ourselves?
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Me, Myself, an Island
This year...really, this year more than any other leading up to it, has represented the social exercise of maintaining self-awareness with respect to others' feelings while at the same time not caring about what people think of me. It's important to note at this point that I'm saying this with a healthy amount of hindsight, that it's not a proclamation of independence or intent. It's not a discovery or resolution. It's just the result, I guess, of having reached a few limits, and rather than compromise myself to win the favor of others, I've finally thrown my hands up and accepted that, in the moment, I just can't behave the way people want me to, or worse yet, be the person people want me to be. I am so guilty of having tried this in the past - with a theater company, with people at work, with friends, with relationships - and in the end, I've found out that merely disguising the parts doesn't make them fit together any better. It is what it is.
Now, I won't sit here with this pickle in my left hand (it's lunchtime) and tell you that I absolutely don't care what everyone thinks about me. That would just be a flat out lie, and I suspect that anybody who tells you that they're completely apathetic to opinions about them isn't telling you the complete truth. Our reactions are different, but even a two second exchange with a stranger could make or break your day. That guy who honked his horn at you in the parking lot might be immediately forgotten, but later, that unresolved memory might be waiting on your pillow. "Wait...was he honking at me? Yeah, he was. What did I do?" I used to think that adapting to everyone who had a problem with me would solve the whole pillow issue, but it didn't. There's always a reconciliation with the day's deeds, at least in my mind.
What I'm beginning to learn is that people are entitled to their own anger, happiness, and yes, even a sadness you want to take away but sometimes can only be in the company of. The point really is, to be strong, to know yourself, and in my case, to keep asking questions so I can really be here, living in the present and always be ready to change direction and see things differently...
...because I can't, as much as I've tried in the past, make anyone feel anything that somehow fits in the world of my expectations. I only have the capacity to be the person I aspire to be, to constantly learn and pay attention, and hopefully stop wasting my time worrying about things that are out of my control. I've finally surrendered to that, and the get out of jail card I have in my back pocket is that for years, I've explored my life and the world around me mostly alone. I've had only a couple of people in my life who have been right there with me, but for the most part, walking away and doing my own thing has been a briar patch for me. Oh, I know people have complained about me, or even recently in my history, don't quite know how to maintain contact (which could easily make me feel like "tainted goods", but it doesn't), but as a friend once told me, that's not my problem. It's all in the reaction.
If I close my eyes, I can see myself surrounded by nothing familiar, an ocean of indifference and memories in the back of my mind. I've walked away from aging definitions of things I wanted to do and people I wanted to be around, and I wait here in silence. I do have this pickle, though.
Soon, it'll be time to rebuild.
Monday, August 06, 2007
Solo
Lately, I've been into words that mean one thing in one language, and with the same spelling, mean something different in another. Take "once". In English, it implies one time, a singular occurence In Spanish, it is the number eleven. The title of this entry is also in the singular, more often than not describing a person away from everyone else. In Spanish, while it implies one thing apart from other, it is also an expression of "only" or "just", as in "this and nothing more".
Commercial airplanes encounter air turbulence, its pilots never being able to predict where and when it'll happen because, of course, air is invisible and different currents at high altitudes are moving in different speeds and directions. They fly cautiously, holding on and trying to gently move with each bump and push on the fuselage of the plane. Suddenly, from one section of deceivingly clear sky to the next, the pockets of rogue wind fade and the plane slices through the air smoothly and effortlessly. The pilots and passengers who paid attention could look back at a rough patch and ask "what was that?"
That's kind of where I'm at now.
Sometimes I let people in because the timing feels right and for the moment, people are on their thoughtful best behavior. People forget themselves and "I" becomes "We" for - all too often - a short time. Once "We" becomes a fragmented collection of "Me", "You", and "Them", I start struggling with a comfortable place to be, and then suddenly...
...well, this time I've found myself alone in a deceivingly clear section of sky. I found myself in that turbulence, tried to either work against the push of other peoples actions and intentions or try to flow with them into pain and rejection, and then took a step back. I was invested. I was stuck on hope and optimism that things could go back to "we" in a few places, but it just wasn't meant to be. In the past, I held on for years - once for five years, once for eleven - because I valued time and commitment. Never one to say that it was time wasted, I did learn a lesson. With that recent step back, I also revoked investment. On one hand, that means that I'm back to going at some things alone, but on the other hand, I'm doing things on my own terms, and that makes me happy. With solitude comes an opportunity to be creative again and not just pass the time with company. I can keep looking for collaborators, people who are in the same place and time as I am. I can find people who believe in the "we", and the only thing outside ourselves is the thing we create together, be it a song, a story, a funny moment, or a great idea.
My lunches alone have become productive again, filled with writing and seeking, something like the days when I used to know Nons and started writing poetry on the way to creating the musical and huge movements in my creative world. It's kind of funny; In Spanish, if I describe you eating, I use the word "come". It comes from the word "comer". In English, if I want you to meet me here, and in this particular case, I'm talking about being here in this moment of understanding each other, of knowing what both you and I bring to this sentence, to this weird little self-indulgent page on the net, I use the same word. Come.
Commercial airplanes encounter air turbulence, its pilots never being able to predict where and when it'll happen because, of course, air is invisible and different currents at high altitudes are moving in different speeds and directions. They fly cautiously, holding on and trying to gently move with each bump and push on the fuselage of the plane. Suddenly, from one section of deceivingly clear sky to the next, the pockets of rogue wind fade and the plane slices through the air smoothly and effortlessly. The pilots and passengers who paid attention could look back at a rough patch and ask "what was that?"
That's kind of where I'm at now.
Sometimes I let people in because the timing feels right and for the moment, people are on their thoughtful best behavior. People forget themselves and "I" becomes "We" for - all too often - a short time. Once "We" becomes a fragmented collection of "Me", "You", and "Them", I start struggling with a comfortable place to be, and then suddenly...
...well, this time I've found myself alone in a deceivingly clear section of sky. I found myself in that turbulence, tried to either work against the push of other peoples actions and intentions or try to flow with them into pain and rejection, and then took a step back. I was invested. I was stuck on hope and optimism that things could go back to "we" in a few places, but it just wasn't meant to be. In the past, I held on for years - once for five years, once for eleven - because I valued time and commitment. Never one to say that it was time wasted, I did learn a lesson. With that recent step back, I also revoked investment. On one hand, that means that I'm back to going at some things alone, but on the other hand, I'm doing things on my own terms, and that makes me happy. With solitude comes an opportunity to be creative again and not just pass the time with company. I can keep looking for collaborators, people who are in the same place and time as I am. I can find people who believe in the "we", and the only thing outside ourselves is the thing we create together, be it a song, a story, a funny moment, or a great idea.
My lunches alone have become productive again, filled with writing and seeking, something like the days when I used to know Nons and started writing poetry on the way to creating the musical and huge movements in my creative world. It's kind of funny; In Spanish, if I describe you eating, I use the word "come". It comes from the word "comer". In English, if I want you to meet me here, and in this particular case, I'm talking about being here in this moment of understanding each other, of knowing what both you and I bring to this sentence, to this weird little self-indulgent page on the net, I use the same word. Come.
The Fool on the Hill
I've actually written a few blog entries that withered on the vine, attempts to recapture something unemotional but enlightening. Let's face it; It's better to leave enlightenment in words to another forum. As Mark Twain said, "It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt."
My search has become interesting over the past few weeks, travelling up to Ojai, Santa Barbara, and Solvang, meeting people along the way and discovering the completely unexpected. With completely open eyes, no fear of the road less traveled, and a camera in my backpack, I've seen a lot, sometimes asking myself "How did I get here?". Watching an oceanside wedding, being invited to watch a play in an outdoor theater modeled after the Globe, driving along a 150 year old stagecoach route, the list goes on.
As if that wasn't enough, there was a flashpoint of activity with my family that brought on a lot of new information yet to be digested. My family history back in Argentina is a total mystery, which makes my family here in the states my closest friends. Yes, I have that relationship with them as a group and with them as individuals. The momentary re-establishment of contact with Argentina just opened a dusty and nearly forgotten footlocker of history that includes a lot of finger pointing, power struggles, politics, a child born in a convent, and fifty years of silence between siblings. The escape of my family to the U.S. was exactly that: a flight to pursue freedom and a future in a Romeo and Juliet kind of way, and new fertile ground to plant new roots and raise a family. This is just the beginning of it.
Naturally, I needed to get out of the house to clear my mind. Then I got sick and had to go see a doctor. Prescription medicine is not cheap.
My mind, of course, hovered back to the recurring questions and debates over the people who have floated through my life. The interesting thing about being in the state I've been is that I've kept myself away from others, finally quarantining myself with medication and silence. At work, I stayed at my desk, did everything I could to guard myself and keep a steady schedule of remedies. Today's my first day out of the shell, a chance to stand on a peak and look above and across the path I've just come down, even the part that precedes me and is still shrouded in fog. From here I can see some simplicity in the whole thing, even if it escapes me to some extent.
A while ago, a girl wrote her phone number and email on a random blank page in my notebook, and I believed for months that something significant would happen when I arrived to that page. Although absolutely nothing happened and I was eventually rejected and dismissed by the girl, I was sitting on a warm patio in Ojai with a huge margarita in front of me and I flipped back to the page with the phone number and wrote this:
For posterity:
Something was supposed to happen upon arrival to this page. It was a miracle; The sun rose, it set. The moon quietly crossed the sky. Wind blew through leaves and children laughed in the distance. It was a good day.
Yes, getting sick was a blessing, so I could think about the weekend excursions and those other magical moments I've had this year. There are moments so fleeting, that stupid me, as I wait for something significant to come along, they come slowly and fade, hoping that I would notice and appreciate them. I see those moments and won't lose them:
...standing in front of that girl and basking in the glow from her smile...
...sitting in the Hollywood Bowl with a friend enjoying the perfect romantic atmosphere...
...driving along the rocky coast by Malibu feeling a lump of stress blow away...
...and now, sitting two tables away from a beautiful friend at work who is also eating alone. I think I'll have lunch with her tomorrow.
My search has become interesting over the past few weeks, travelling up to Ojai, Santa Barbara, and Solvang, meeting people along the way and discovering the completely unexpected. With completely open eyes, no fear of the road less traveled, and a camera in my backpack, I've seen a lot, sometimes asking myself "How did I get here?". Watching an oceanside wedding, being invited to watch a play in an outdoor theater modeled after the Globe, driving along a 150 year old stagecoach route, the list goes on.
As if that wasn't enough, there was a flashpoint of activity with my family that brought on a lot of new information yet to be digested. My family history back in Argentina is a total mystery, which makes my family here in the states my closest friends. Yes, I have that relationship with them as a group and with them as individuals. The momentary re-establishment of contact with Argentina just opened a dusty and nearly forgotten footlocker of history that includes a lot of finger pointing, power struggles, politics, a child born in a convent, and fifty years of silence between siblings. The escape of my family to the U.S. was exactly that: a flight to pursue freedom and a future in a Romeo and Juliet kind of way, and new fertile ground to plant new roots and raise a family. This is just the beginning of it.
Naturally, I needed to get out of the house to clear my mind. Then I got sick and had to go see a doctor. Prescription medicine is not cheap.
My mind, of course, hovered back to the recurring questions and debates over the people who have floated through my life. The interesting thing about being in the state I've been is that I've kept myself away from others, finally quarantining myself with medication and silence. At work, I stayed at my desk, did everything I could to guard myself and keep a steady schedule of remedies. Today's my first day out of the shell, a chance to stand on a peak and look above and across the path I've just come down, even the part that precedes me and is still shrouded in fog. From here I can see some simplicity in the whole thing, even if it escapes me to some extent.
A while ago, a girl wrote her phone number and email on a random blank page in my notebook, and I believed for months that something significant would happen when I arrived to that page. Although absolutely nothing happened and I was eventually rejected and dismissed by the girl, I was sitting on a warm patio in Ojai with a huge margarita in front of me and I flipped back to the page with the phone number and wrote this:
For posterity:
Something was supposed to happen upon arrival to this page. It was a miracle; The sun rose, it set. The moon quietly crossed the sky. Wind blew through leaves and children laughed in the distance. It was a good day.
Yes, getting sick was a blessing, so I could think about the weekend excursions and those other magical moments I've had this year. There are moments so fleeting, that stupid me, as I wait for something significant to come along, they come slowly and fade, hoping that I would notice and appreciate them. I see those moments and won't lose them:
...standing in front of that girl and basking in the glow from her smile...
...sitting in the Hollywood Bowl with a friend enjoying the perfect romantic atmosphere...
...driving along the rocky coast by Malibu feeling a lump of stress blow away...
...and now, sitting two tables away from a beautiful friend at work who is also eating alone. I think I'll have lunch with her tomorrow.
Thursday, July 19, 2007
50 Things You Might Not Know About Me
My good friend Soledad created this list in her blog, and I just had to try it out for myself. Truthfully, I don't know that I can come up with 50, but it's worth a try. I do love making lists. I'll try to make this unique.
1. I'm the only person in my immediate family to be born in the U.S. The rest - my parents, my two sisters - were born in Argentina, and are often reluctant to tell me anything about what it was like to live there.
2. I have a crazy fear of roller coasters that, no doubt, comes from a serious car accident I was in when I was 3. My mother's car was parked on a hill, I released the parking brake, and my middle sister and I rode it all the way down as it jumped a curb, flipped over, pancaked, and dumped us out. My sister had the only injury, cuts on her knees from the glass.
3. I used to have long hair shortly after high school, when I was into heavy metal. Garage bands, guitars, bandanas...that was rock in the 80s.
4. I once supplied the voice of Mickey Mouse for Michael Eisner's (he was the prez of Disney) very first personal computer.
5. As a sophmore in high school, I broke my left forearm in a 90 degree angle. That was the easy part. Resetting it was hard.
6. As a child, I had a recurring nightmare of falling off the roof of a 6 story building.
7. I took piano lessons when I was three but abandoned them shortly after. I picked the piano back up when I took it upon myself to tune the family's piano when I was a teenager.
8. When I started learning how to play the guitar, I played two or three hours a day.
9. I only eat one item on my plate at a time. I don't like to mix up my tastes.
10. I've been to Hawaii over 20 times, made possible by the fact that my dad worked for the airlines.
11. My mother altered just about every piece of clothing I wore, because she was, professionally, a seamstress. Carol Burnett even specifically requested my mom when she wanted a few dresses made.
12. I have fired, due to the generosity of a friend, an automatic .45, .38 snub nose revolver, and a .22 rifle. Ahh hang on - I think Chuck Heston is at my door.
13. I don't know how to swim. Oh yeah, another traumatic childhood incident when I almost drowned.
14. I've played guitar with a band in front of 2,000 people, and solo in front of 500.
15. I attended college twice, once as a music major, then a few years later as a theater major, english minor. I never finished.
16. I memorize music by attributing colors and shapes to it.
17. I've been keeping a journal (now this blog) since 1984.
18. I wrote my first play in about an hour.
19. I can speak Spanish, but not write it correctly. I still think in English and only grew up speaking Spanish with my mother. Oh, come to think of it....
20. I grew up speaking English with everyone in my family but my mom. My sisters speak English with each other but Spanish with my parents.
21. I almost always have a guitar pick on me, for luck.
22. I once worked at the Wherehouse (video and music) for one summer, and that was the only retail job I've had.
23. I was a video game tester at Disney.
24. I was online during the early days of the Internet.
25. When I was in grade school, I was teased and harassed by a group of kids in my class. That lasted for years until I actually started fighting back.
26. My first kiss was in 1st grade. I still remember the nacho cheese on her lips from the Doritos.
27. I was an altar boy (and no, I'm not repressing any memories).
28. I used to drive a Jeep Wrangler and loved everything about it except for the frequency of tow trucks and visits to my mechanic.
29. I've been in two car accidents where I was the driver.
30. I once did a 50 mile bicycle race in Mexico and got my bike up to a little over 65mph on a downhill stretch.
31. I've written over 20 plays and produced six of them.
32. I'm both a neat freak and a pack rat. I think there's something in the pleasure of having so much to clean up. I love throwing things away.
33. I have six guitars and one keyboard.
34. I don't often go to parties. As a matter of fact, I've only ever actually had three birthday parties (not including ones I had as a child).
35. When I was a child, I created illustrated books of poetry.
36. After high school, I wrote a book of just over 100 songs and then five years later, shredded the whole bunch.
37. Thanks to breaking a bone in my left hand in the early 90s, I have seven visible knuckles when I close my fists.
38. I was a football player in grade school and a track athlete in high school.
39. When email was fairly new, I had a pen pal for about seven years. Everything was awesome until she moved out here.
40. My mother was 40 when she had me.
41. My addiction for DVDs has waned only a little bit - I have nearly 300 and can now resist temptation, even when they're on sale.
42. I've been a loyal Laker fan since the 70s.
43. I was once a personal assistant for a brilliant actress.
44. I'm allergic to penicillin. In fact, I'm not even sure I'm spelling it right.
45. I'm the go-to person for creative stuff at work, and I totally don't even see the importance of it. Why? That's just dumb.
46. I'm fascinated by religion but could be described as agnostic.
47. I used to be a Disneyana collector. In my collection: a 1939 record set of Snow White & the Seven Dwarves, a 1969 map of Disneyland, a light from the Electric Light Parade
48. I spent nearly every weekend at the theater for two years, for both matinee and evening performances, PLUS rehearsals during the week at night after a full-time job.
49. (matching Sole's 49) I type nearly 100wpm, once clocked at 98wpm on a 5 minute test, and 85wpm on a manual typewriter.
50. I still have the blanket I was brought home in from the hospital.
Whew! I didn't...think...I could come up with that many things. Are they interesting? Hmm.
Well, YOU try to do it. There. The gauntlet has been thrown down.
1. I'm the only person in my immediate family to be born in the U.S. The rest - my parents, my two sisters - were born in Argentina, and are often reluctant to tell me anything about what it was like to live there.
2. I have a crazy fear of roller coasters that, no doubt, comes from a serious car accident I was in when I was 3. My mother's car was parked on a hill, I released the parking brake, and my middle sister and I rode it all the way down as it jumped a curb, flipped over, pancaked, and dumped us out. My sister had the only injury, cuts on her knees from the glass.
3. I used to have long hair shortly after high school, when I was into heavy metal. Garage bands, guitars, bandanas...that was rock in the 80s.
4. I once supplied the voice of Mickey Mouse for Michael Eisner's (he was the prez of Disney) very first personal computer.
5. As a sophmore in high school, I broke my left forearm in a 90 degree angle. That was the easy part. Resetting it was hard.
6. As a child, I had a recurring nightmare of falling off the roof of a 6 story building.
7. I took piano lessons when I was three but abandoned them shortly after. I picked the piano back up when I took it upon myself to tune the family's piano when I was a teenager.
8. When I started learning how to play the guitar, I played two or three hours a day.
9. I only eat one item on my plate at a time. I don't like to mix up my tastes.
10. I've been to Hawaii over 20 times, made possible by the fact that my dad worked for the airlines.
11. My mother altered just about every piece of clothing I wore, because she was, professionally, a seamstress. Carol Burnett even specifically requested my mom when she wanted a few dresses made.
12. I have fired, due to the generosity of a friend, an automatic .45, .38 snub nose revolver, and a .22 rifle. Ahh hang on - I think Chuck Heston is at my door.
13. I don't know how to swim. Oh yeah, another traumatic childhood incident when I almost drowned.
14. I've played guitar with a band in front of 2,000 people, and solo in front of 500.
15. I attended college twice, once as a music major, then a few years later as a theater major, english minor. I never finished.
16. I memorize music by attributing colors and shapes to it.
17. I've been keeping a journal (now this blog) since 1984.
18. I wrote my first play in about an hour.
19. I can speak Spanish, but not write it correctly. I still think in English and only grew up speaking Spanish with my mother. Oh, come to think of it....
20. I grew up speaking English with everyone in my family but my mom. My sisters speak English with each other but Spanish with my parents.
21. I almost always have a guitar pick on me, for luck.
22. I once worked at the Wherehouse (video and music) for one summer, and that was the only retail job I've had.
23. I was a video game tester at Disney.
24. I was online during the early days of the Internet.
25. When I was in grade school, I was teased and harassed by a group of kids in my class. That lasted for years until I actually started fighting back.
26. My first kiss was in 1st grade. I still remember the nacho cheese on her lips from the Doritos.
27. I was an altar boy (and no, I'm not repressing any memories).
28. I used to drive a Jeep Wrangler and loved everything about it except for the frequency of tow trucks and visits to my mechanic.
29. I've been in two car accidents where I was the driver.
30. I once did a 50 mile bicycle race in Mexico and got my bike up to a little over 65mph on a downhill stretch.
31. I've written over 20 plays and produced six of them.
32. I'm both a neat freak and a pack rat. I think there's something in the pleasure of having so much to clean up. I love throwing things away.
33. I have six guitars and one keyboard.
34. I don't often go to parties. As a matter of fact, I've only ever actually had three birthday parties (not including ones I had as a child).
35. When I was a child, I created illustrated books of poetry.
36. After high school, I wrote a book of just over 100 songs and then five years later, shredded the whole bunch.
37. Thanks to breaking a bone in my left hand in the early 90s, I have seven visible knuckles when I close my fists.
38. I was a football player in grade school and a track athlete in high school.
39. When email was fairly new, I had a pen pal for about seven years. Everything was awesome until she moved out here.
40. My mother was 40 when she had me.
41. My addiction for DVDs has waned only a little bit - I have nearly 300 and can now resist temptation, even when they're on sale.
42. I've been a loyal Laker fan since the 70s.
43. I was once a personal assistant for a brilliant actress.
44. I'm allergic to penicillin. In fact, I'm not even sure I'm spelling it right.
45. I'm the go-to person for creative stuff at work, and I totally don't even see the importance of it. Why? That's just dumb.
46. I'm fascinated by religion but could be described as agnostic.
47. I used to be a Disneyana collector. In my collection: a 1939 record set of Snow White & the Seven Dwarves, a 1969 map of Disneyland, a light from the Electric Light Parade
48. I spent nearly every weekend at the theater for two years, for both matinee and evening performances, PLUS rehearsals during the week at night after a full-time job.
49. (matching Sole's 49) I type nearly 100wpm, once clocked at 98wpm on a 5 minute test, and 85wpm on a manual typewriter.
50. I still have the blanket I was brought home in from the hospital.
Whew! I didn't...think...I could come up with that many things. Are they interesting? Hmm.
Well, YOU try to do it. There. The gauntlet has been thrown down.
Current Mood
I find it really ground-breaking that MySpace has given us the power to choose our mood in the new status section. Whether you choose happy or sad, that must be what you want to feel, isn't it? It's alarmingly convenient and effective.
With a couple of very quiet days at work around me like an ocean around a small island, I started doing some maintenance and found myself missing old friends when I ran across their emails.
C: All of your old friends?
S: No, not really.
C: Not the recent ones you broke off contact with?
S: I didn't ceremoniously break contact, Christy. It's nothing as big as that.
C: Do you talk to them any more?
S: No, not really.
C: Are you making any effort?
S: Friendships shouldn't be a lot of work, should they?
C: What I'm getting at is -
S: I was beginning to wonder.
C: What I'm getting at is this. You were trying to re-establish one friendship, another was a daily thing, another hit one snag and -
S: And what? How long is this list? Should I keep every habit in my life whether it's working or not?
C: Meaning?
S: Do I drink soda any more?
C: No.
S: I stopped drinking it for my health. I also eat a lot better. As I get older, I'm beginning to see the difference between just seeing myself in context with the things that make up my life, and having the option to stop doing things that don't work for me. Other people around me more or less believe the same thing, only they try to change the existing things...and people around them to suit their needs and ideas.
C: Damn.
S: What?
C: For some reason, that got all complicated. I thought it was going to be an easier explanation.
S: Okay, umm...maybe it felt more complicated to you because I'm writing both sides of this conversation. Would it have been easier if I just said, "I've had it and don't want to deal any more?"
C: No, that feels...unsatisfying and out of character.
S: Well, I choose to be happy, and that means making some tough choices.
C: So that's it? The very second someone does something wrong you're going to bail and dump them?
S: No! That's kind of harsh and blunt. Look, I love the imperfect perfection of the whole world around me, and...oh, I feel I need to say this: I'm flawed. I do and say the wrong things sometimes and have been lucky to find a few people who forgive me, and know how to share that blame and forgiveness when it's called for. I just...think that...sometimes things work and sometimes they don't.
C: Kind of like a key, right?
S: Maybe not that exclusive, but yeah, kind of like that.
C: I'm a little worried, though.
S: About what?
C: You could shut yourself off completely and go crazy.
S: Sometimes I need to, though. Sometimes I need to climb a mountain without reaching for a hand up.
C: Or dead weight, or the knowledge that anone got up before you did.
S: (pause) Sort of, yeah. (pause) But there are some people I will never shut out completely.
C: Who?
S: They know.
C: Aren't you overthinking this whole thing?
S: Aren't you the one who brought it up?
C: Yeah. One more question. What if you make a mistake?
S: Mistakes...is there such a thing when one doesn't believe in regret? Little things between friends can be healed and mended, but the bigger decisions...well, they are what they are, aren't they?
We're all imperfect, and everything is so temporary. Sometimes we come across puzzling people we're fascinated with until the mystery (ha - I almost wrote misery) either unravels or enfuriates us. Sometimes we just come across people who keep us company for part of the journey. It's easy to accept things the way they are until years pass by and you're standing in the same spot you were, dreaming of change. What I'm looking at is the bottom line, and how the things in my life add up to that. It means not being afraid to change the pieces out and try new ones. It means letting go of things that have been comfortable and familiar.
Sometimes it means whispering a little goodbye and not trying to take everything with you.
I clicked on happiness.
With a couple of very quiet days at work around me like an ocean around a small island, I started doing some maintenance and found myself missing old friends when I ran across their emails.
C: All of your old friends?
S: No, not really.
C: Not the recent ones you broke off contact with?
S: I didn't ceremoniously break contact, Christy. It's nothing as big as that.
C: Do you talk to them any more?
S: No, not really.
C: Are you making any effort?
S: Friendships shouldn't be a lot of work, should they?
C: What I'm getting at is -
S: I was beginning to wonder.
C: What I'm getting at is this. You were trying to re-establish one friendship, another was a daily thing, another hit one snag and -
S: And what? How long is this list? Should I keep every habit in my life whether it's working or not?
C: Meaning?
S: Do I drink soda any more?
C: No.
S: I stopped drinking it for my health. I also eat a lot better. As I get older, I'm beginning to see the difference between just seeing myself in context with the things that make up my life, and having the option to stop doing things that don't work for me. Other people around me more or less believe the same thing, only they try to change the existing things...and people around them to suit their needs and ideas.
C: Damn.
S: What?
C: For some reason, that got all complicated. I thought it was going to be an easier explanation.
S: Okay, umm...maybe it felt more complicated to you because I'm writing both sides of this conversation. Would it have been easier if I just said, "I've had it and don't want to deal any more?"
C: No, that feels...unsatisfying and out of character.
S: Well, I choose to be happy, and that means making some tough choices.
C: So that's it? The very second someone does something wrong you're going to bail and dump them?
S: No! That's kind of harsh and blunt. Look, I love the imperfect perfection of the whole world around me, and...oh, I feel I need to say this: I'm flawed. I do and say the wrong things sometimes and have been lucky to find a few people who forgive me, and know how to share that blame and forgiveness when it's called for. I just...think that...sometimes things work and sometimes they don't.
C: Kind of like a key, right?
S: Maybe not that exclusive, but yeah, kind of like that.
C: I'm a little worried, though.
S: About what?
C: You could shut yourself off completely and go crazy.
S: Sometimes I need to, though. Sometimes I need to climb a mountain without reaching for a hand up.
C: Or dead weight, or the knowledge that anone got up before you did.
S: (pause) Sort of, yeah. (pause) But there are some people I will never shut out completely.
C: Who?
S: They know.
C: Aren't you overthinking this whole thing?
S: Aren't you the one who brought it up?
C: Yeah. One more question. What if you make a mistake?
S: Mistakes...is there such a thing when one doesn't believe in regret? Little things between friends can be healed and mended, but the bigger decisions...well, they are what they are, aren't they?
We're all imperfect, and everything is so temporary. Sometimes we come across puzzling people we're fascinated with until the mystery (ha - I almost wrote misery) either unravels or enfuriates us. Sometimes we just come across people who keep us company for part of the journey. It's easy to accept things the way they are until years pass by and you're standing in the same spot you were, dreaming of change. What I'm looking at is the bottom line, and how the things in my life add up to that. It means not being afraid to change the pieces out and try new ones. It means letting go of things that have been comfortable and familiar.
Sometimes it means whispering a little goodbye and not trying to take everything with you.
I clicked on happiness.
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
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 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.
Sunday, June 03, 2007
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.
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.
Thursday, May 17, 2007
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.
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.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
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?
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?
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
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.
Friday, April 27, 2007
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 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
Saturday, April 14, 2007
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.
Monday, April 09, 2007
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 stand here, mixed and conflicted,
So here I stand, ripping inside,
I see my friend leaving
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.
Saturday, April 07, 2007
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.
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.
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
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.
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.
Monday, March 19, 2007
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)
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)
Sunday, March 18, 2007
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.
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.
Sunday, March 04, 2007
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.
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.
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