"We do what we do because of who we are. If we did otherwise, we would not be ourselves.”
School is fun, and school is interesting. In the span of eight days I saw five plays, two movies, and an improv show, the total cost of which was barely more than a few hours’ pay at my current job (would have been less, but that POS Avatar ate about half that cost). I love that my chosen career path is completely coincident with a medium primarily designed and utilized for entertainment. Due to the nature of a Theatre degree, I have the opportunity to explore everything I do, see, and read under the guise of intellectual stimulation. I can’t imagine having more fun exploring every facet of any entity other than this. I decided to pursue a career in art for three reasons: to entertain, to educate, and to inspire – not necessarily in that order. I adore that I get all three aspects fulfilled every day.
But this path has not been without challenge. My personal life and academic explorations are bouncing my identity around like a pinball in a machine. Over and over I’m being diverted from my usual pattern of habits into the exploration of the physical, emotional, and intellectual trifecta that comprise that which I call myself. I’m learning about which traits combine to make me who I am, many of which I had no idea I had. A small example – I’m a highly analytical person who intellectualizes, plans, and prepares for every conceivable situation regardless of the likelihood of its occurrence. I rarely, if ever, respond instinctively and/or emotionally to any circumstance. Additionally, I attempt to control nearly every situation I’m in, trying to bend the world to my will, instead of responding and adapting to the situations set before me.
I never would have considered myself such a person if asked; but once pointed out to me, this became as obvious to me as it has been to those who have known me several years, or just a few weeks. I quickly came to realize I didn’t mind these things; I’ve accomplished a lot in life, and I can attribute many of those successes to these aspects of my nature. But my instructors have all illustrated that these very things that give me strength are the things which can (and do) harm me just as easily, especially when it comes to achieving the end goals of bringing truth and reality into my acting. And one of my oldest and dearest friends shared that as long as she’s known me, it is these sides of myself that have been at the root of some of the greatest pains, miseries, and failures of my life – especially as it relates to my relationships. My last one most especially.
And these are just the revelations of the last seven days. Not to mention those qualities of myself that I knew already, some I’ve embraced and some I have not, that have caused just as much harm as they have assistance from the birth of my sentience to this very afternoon.
Now I’m beginning to question who and what I am, who and what I need to be to lay a solid grasp on my greatest dreams. I need to balance the emotional with the intellectual. I need to embrace chaos and allow it to offset my predisposed order. I need to display some fucking adaptability, Shaftoe. And in the meantime, a little aspect of me sits on my shoulder and watches me change into something other than myself. It is confusing. It is terrifying. It is sorrowful as things alter, wither, and pass, and it is wonderful as new stabilizing factors form to take their place in the new way of things.
The world changes around us all the time; through the choices we make, the influences of individuals, of groups, of accidents of nature and of acts of God, and a combination of all of these. Add to that our attitudes and reactions to it all, and it’s a wonder we don’t go crazy. Sometimes we do. But in the end I have been taught (and I strongly believe) that one must change, or die. You’ll live longer – and happier – if you increase the limitations of how much you let yourself change.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Sunday, December 27, 2009
In Memoriam
As I begin to write this I’m sitting in Dallas/Ft. Worth airport waiting to board a flight to Chicago, and I’ve begun to feel contemplative. I began reflecting on events of the last week, the last year, and the last time I was here a year ago. As I walk down Destiny’s path I occasionally sneak a look back over my shoulder and see the milestones that marked the most memorable moments of the last year. Seeing old friends. A break up. Applying, auditioning, and acceptance into graduate school. Beginning a lasting exercise routine. Ending the longest job I’ve held since I left Dallas. Meeting new people. Making a few new friends. Living an academic dream. Constantly discovering and challenging my limitations. These were a host of experiences that were more original and dynamic than any I’ve previously had. In these ways and others, this was the year of Despair. It was the year of Determination. The year of Fear. The year of Anxiety. Of Accomplishment. Of Hope.
This was the year of Change.
This year was also the year of visitors in Chicago. Before this, the only people to visit me had been my parents. From June to October I saw everyone but my parents as I entertained both of my sisters, nephews, and brother-in-law. I saw the majority of my closest and dearest friends and tried to expose them all to the life I’ve come to experience, enjoy, and earn. I spent too short a time with each of them.
I came home to Dallas this year as a new man, much altered from the one who was here a year ago. Those who saw me last year validated how much weight I’ve lost since my last visit. I’ve discovered that the ripples of my absence are still being felt, sometimes quite strongly, among the customers, staff and management at Magic Time Machine. While I was here I got new glasses, new shoes, new bedding, and a new tattoo (I’m really getting used to those, this one was the easiest yet). I saw most of the people I haven’t seen since the summer of 2007 just before I moved, and I regret the ones I still managed to miss this trip. Even the visits I was able to make were far too brief, each leaving a footprint in my heart akin to one on a sandy beach. My friends left a hole in the shape of each of themselves, to be filled in only by my ache and salty tears upon my departure.
And on Christmas Day, I ended a fifteen year silence during a sixty-five second phone call.
It’s been a remarkable year. Sometimes wonderful, sometimes terrible, always difficult, and never dull. You, Constant Reader, have heard me bemoan and whine my circumstances all the while. If you’re reading this now it’s because you either just picked up reading, or you knew one day I’d crawl out of it and start acting like a whole person again. For my fellow Dallas friends and family, I want you to know how crucial your influence over me has been in my recovery. Whether I saw you all week, the briefest of hours, or made a promise I wasn’t able to keep through text messages (you know who you are), you each lent me a rope I used to pull myself out of the mire. I couldn’t have done it without you, and I look to the new year with eyes that seek to repay your kindness.
And though we’re very, very close to the end, there’s still one more thing to happen this year that I’ve never done before – I have a blind date sometime this week. So if it goes well, I have something new and hopeful to transition me from the old year into the next (of course if it doesn’t go well, I suppose this will be the last you’ll read of it).
Mark Twain said, “Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.” I love the climate and atmosphere of Chicago; I adore the people and relationships I have in Dallas; yet n’er the twain shall meet. In this way I will always be unsatisfied. For this reason I will always be ill at ease. For all time I shall be wanting more. Yet it is precisely because of this that I will always feel an ache in my heart for the beauty of those fleeting, transitory moments of happiness and perfection that will never last. That is their tragedy, and that is their triumph.
“Touched by her fingers, the two surviving chocolate people copulate desperately, losing themselves in a melting frenzy of lust, spending the last of their brief borrowed lives in a spasm of raspberry cream and fear.”
This was the year of Change.
This year was also the year of visitors in Chicago. Before this, the only people to visit me had been my parents. From June to October I saw everyone but my parents as I entertained both of my sisters, nephews, and brother-in-law. I saw the majority of my closest and dearest friends and tried to expose them all to the life I’ve come to experience, enjoy, and earn. I spent too short a time with each of them.
I came home to Dallas this year as a new man, much altered from the one who was here a year ago. Those who saw me last year validated how much weight I’ve lost since my last visit. I’ve discovered that the ripples of my absence are still being felt, sometimes quite strongly, among the customers, staff and management at Magic Time Machine. While I was here I got new glasses, new shoes, new bedding, and a new tattoo (I’m really getting used to those, this one was the easiest yet). I saw most of the people I haven’t seen since the summer of 2007 just before I moved, and I regret the ones I still managed to miss this trip. Even the visits I was able to make were far too brief, each leaving a footprint in my heart akin to one on a sandy beach. My friends left a hole in the shape of each of themselves, to be filled in only by my ache and salty tears upon my departure.
And on Christmas Day, I ended a fifteen year silence during a sixty-five second phone call.
It’s been a remarkable year. Sometimes wonderful, sometimes terrible, always difficult, and never dull. You, Constant Reader, have heard me bemoan and whine my circumstances all the while. If you’re reading this now it’s because you either just picked up reading, or you knew one day I’d crawl out of it and start acting like a whole person again. For my fellow Dallas friends and family, I want you to know how crucial your influence over me has been in my recovery. Whether I saw you all week, the briefest of hours, or made a promise I wasn’t able to keep through text messages (you know who you are), you each lent me a rope I used to pull myself out of the mire. I couldn’t have done it without you, and I look to the new year with eyes that seek to repay your kindness.
And though we’re very, very close to the end, there’s still one more thing to happen this year that I’ve never done before – I have a blind date sometime this week. So if it goes well, I have something new and hopeful to transition me from the old year into the next (of course if it doesn’t go well, I suppose this will be the last you’ll read of it).
Mark Twain said, “Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.” I love the climate and atmosphere of Chicago; I adore the people and relationships I have in Dallas; yet n’er the twain shall meet. In this way I will always be unsatisfied. For this reason I will always be ill at ease. For all time I shall be wanting more. Yet it is precisely because of this that I will always feel an ache in my heart for the beauty of those fleeting, transitory moments of happiness and perfection that will never last. That is their tragedy, and that is their triumph.
“Touched by her fingers, the two surviving chocolate people copulate desperately, losing themselves in a melting frenzy of lust, spending the last of their brief borrowed lives in a spasm of raspberry cream and fear.”
Sunday, December 13, 2009
No Excuses
I can’t remember what prompted her to do so, but shortly after I met one of my classmates she asked, “Were you a fat kid?” I answered most honestly, “I’m a fat adult.” Being fat isn’t just a physical state, but a mental one as well. Though I’m in decent shape these days, I still consider myself a fat person – just one who happens to be exercising a lot lately.
My whole life I’ve had a big belly. When I was a child my parents once tried to put me on a diet, which lasted about as long as a snowflake in a frying pan. Only one glass of milk at dinner? Bloody hell no thank you.
They encouraged sports instead; I played basketball (poorly) and baseball (horribly) for the YMCA throughout elementary school, and occasionally went for a run around the neighborhood with my dad. I remember sitting with him at the kitchen table at the end of one of these runs, some cookies my mother had just baked cooling on a rack in front of me. Legs shaking, weak and exhausted but feeling better about myself, I ate one. My father told me, “You just ate up that whole run.” I was shocked and discouraged by the fact that something as small and quick as a cookie completely counterbalanced the effort I had just put out.
Middle and high school were better. My sophomore year I was training three hours a day between football, wrestling, and track. I was the shape of my life (which is much easier to do at age 15 than it is at 30), pushed by the coaching staff. Every time we hit our limit, the coaches yelled and fought for us to try harder, accomplish more, do better. They motivated us and they terrified us, but our capacity for achievement was unparalleled. The boundaries of our limitations were constantly being stretched and redefined. Every day we could run farther and faster. We could lift more. We were conditioned to extend ourselves to the brink of our endurance – and that’s when they really put on the pressure. They expected the most from us, and they got it.
I quit sports at the start of my junior year, and the tubby tummy came back within about a month. The eating habits of an athlete have quite a different effect on one who spent no less than three hours a day playing video games and watching TV. The lack of self-discipline couldn’t get me to change those eating habits any more than I could exercise without the coaches, or without the group of 30 or so others trying to accomplish something together.
Over the years I’ve tried time and time again to discover how to recover the state of mind that would grant me the state of physicality I once was capable of attaining. I could do it for a few weeks at a time. I would track my progress on a calendar, marking the days I was able to push myself into the gym. I would weigh and measure myself, and glow at every little bit of progress. But I always contented myself that I had done enough far, far before I had met the ultimate goal I had set, and months would pass before I would make the decision to pick up and start again.
Half a lifetime later I’ve finally figured out how to hit a limit and break through it, maintaining the pattern for months at a time instead of mere weeks. This past week I stepped up my routine yet again, running six days a week instead of a mere three. Mother Nature is testing my dedication and resolve on a daily basis. On Tuesday it was 28 degrees, and the wind was pushing the sleet at me sideways. My face stung as needles of ice stabbed my face. My eyes were nearly shut to protect them from the pelting, so I couldn’t clearly see the nearly frozen puddles well enough to avoid them. My shoes were constantly being filled to the brim with icy slush, freezing the joints of my toes. Both of the thick, thermal layers of my clothes were drenched to the skin and must have weighed an extra ten pounds. The wind blowing off the lake was strong enough to push me sideways each time both feet were off the ground. I had to run at a slight diagonal to stay on the path – but still I ran.
On Wednesday it was 18 degrees when I got home late from a Christmas party. After eight hours of working followed by three hours of drinking and an hour home on the train I was still a little drunk, and more than a little tired. And still I ran.
On Thursday it was 7 degrees. My sweat turned to icicles formed in my beard, my brow, my chest, my hair. And still I ran.
On Friday I was wiped out. I came home and did some dishes, and laid in bed for a few minutes. One knee was in pain. The tendons in my opposite heel were so tight I could hardly flex my foot. For some reason my back was throbbing. I felt myself start to drift to sleep . . . but I got up, swallowed some ibuprofen, changed clothes, and still I ran.
I can’t say for certain why this kick has lasted as long as it has, compared to all the other times over the years this level of progress was unreachable. Something about me has changed, and not just in my exercise routine, but in all things. I try harder. I do better. I achieve more. When I was growing up I used to fantasize about what kind of adult I would turn out to be, and by the time I was in college I was starting to get frustrated that I wasn’t anywhere close. A few years out of college I got more and more disappointed that I couldn’t live up to the standard I had set for myself when I was a friendless fat kid. But I’m proud to say that here, today, finally, I’ve become someone I can be proud of. I have a measure of self-respect that I’ve never before attained. I finally feel like I’m no longer behind.
And that thought brings a level of contentment, of inner peace, more than anything in my life ever has.
My whole life I’ve had a big belly. When I was a child my parents once tried to put me on a diet, which lasted about as long as a snowflake in a frying pan. Only one glass of milk at dinner? Bloody hell no thank you.
They encouraged sports instead; I played basketball (poorly) and baseball (horribly) for the YMCA throughout elementary school, and occasionally went for a run around the neighborhood with my dad. I remember sitting with him at the kitchen table at the end of one of these runs, some cookies my mother had just baked cooling on a rack in front of me. Legs shaking, weak and exhausted but feeling better about myself, I ate one. My father told me, “You just ate up that whole run.” I was shocked and discouraged by the fact that something as small and quick as a cookie completely counterbalanced the effort I had just put out.
Middle and high school were better. My sophomore year I was training three hours a day between football, wrestling, and track. I was the shape of my life (which is much easier to do at age 15 than it is at 30), pushed by the coaching staff. Every time we hit our limit, the coaches yelled and fought for us to try harder, accomplish more, do better. They motivated us and they terrified us, but our capacity for achievement was unparalleled. The boundaries of our limitations were constantly being stretched and redefined. Every day we could run farther and faster. We could lift more. We were conditioned to extend ourselves to the brink of our endurance – and that’s when they really put on the pressure. They expected the most from us, and they got it.
I quit sports at the start of my junior year, and the tubby tummy came back within about a month. The eating habits of an athlete have quite a different effect on one who spent no less than three hours a day playing video games and watching TV. The lack of self-discipline couldn’t get me to change those eating habits any more than I could exercise without the coaches, or without the group of 30 or so others trying to accomplish something together.
Over the years I’ve tried time and time again to discover how to recover the state of mind that would grant me the state of physicality I once was capable of attaining. I could do it for a few weeks at a time. I would track my progress on a calendar, marking the days I was able to push myself into the gym. I would weigh and measure myself, and glow at every little bit of progress. But I always contented myself that I had done enough far, far before I had met the ultimate goal I had set, and months would pass before I would make the decision to pick up and start again.
Half a lifetime later I’ve finally figured out how to hit a limit and break through it, maintaining the pattern for months at a time instead of mere weeks. This past week I stepped up my routine yet again, running six days a week instead of a mere three. Mother Nature is testing my dedication and resolve on a daily basis. On Tuesday it was 28 degrees, and the wind was pushing the sleet at me sideways. My face stung as needles of ice stabbed my face. My eyes were nearly shut to protect them from the pelting, so I couldn’t clearly see the nearly frozen puddles well enough to avoid them. My shoes were constantly being filled to the brim with icy slush, freezing the joints of my toes. Both of the thick, thermal layers of my clothes were drenched to the skin and must have weighed an extra ten pounds. The wind blowing off the lake was strong enough to push me sideways each time both feet were off the ground. I had to run at a slight diagonal to stay on the path – but still I ran.
On Wednesday it was 18 degrees when I got home late from a Christmas party. After eight hours of working followed by three hours of drinking and an hour home on the train I was still a little drunk, and more than a little tired. And still I ran.
On Thursday it was 7 degrees. My sweat turned to icicles formed in my beard, my brow, my chest, my hair. And still I ran.
On Friday I was wiped out. I came home and did some dishes, and laid in bed for a few minutes. One knee was in pain. The tendons in my opposite heel were so tight I could hardly flex my foot. For some reason my back was throbbing. I felt myself start to drift to sleep . . . but I got up, swallowed some ibuprofen, changed clothes, and still I ran.
I can’t say for certain why this kick has lasted as long as it has, compared to all the other times over the years this level of progress was unreachable. Something about me has changed, and not just in my exercise routine, but in all things. I try harder. I do better. I achieve more. When I was growing up I used to fantasize about what kind of adult I would turn out to be, and by the time I was in college I was starting to get frustrated that I wasn’t anywhere close. A few years out of college I got more and more disappointed that I couldn’t live up to the standard I had set for myself when I was a friendless fat kid. But I’m proud to say that here, today, finally, I’ve become someone I can be proud of. I have a measure of self-respect that I’ve never before attained. I finally feel like I’m no longer behind.
And that thought brings a level of contentment, of inner peace, more than anything in my life ever has.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Until I Bleed
The quarter is over, but I’ve found myself with the opportunity to stay as busy as I ever have been. The final hurdle for classes was borne of my own wait-until-the-last-minute attitude; I started writing my final thesis paper at 1:00 a.m. on the day it was due. I expunged my ideas onto the page through a mental shunt, expectorated through the assistance of coffee, cigarettes, peanuts, half a 10” Godiva chocolate cheesecake (thanks Mom & Dad), and a four hour nap on the couch. I could have expanded more on some of my ideas and made the paper a bit longer; but once they were all out of my brain, onto the screen, and deemed coherent by an old friend, a quick reformat to MLA style told me I had hit the minimum page requirement, and the light in my brain flickered out like a candle at the end of its wick. Two days, two liters of Irish, and twenty-two hours of sleep later, I re-read it to find I had done a pretty decent job. I finished the quarter with a 3.43 GPA, which doesn’t disappoint me because I know I could have tried harder and done better. Good thing I have eight more of those to prove this.
We’re technically on a break, but my days haven’t gotten any shorter since it began. I work my usual 9-5, Monday through Friday office job. My current task is to compile thirteen years worth of monthly newsletters (while still putting out new ones) and input the information into one big database. I’ve been at it for about a week, and I don’t expect I’ll be done before the end of next summer. It’s nice to have a guarantee that I’ll be able to work the maximum number of allowed hours to help get the gorilla of credit card debt off my back. Speaking of, only one payment remains on one card before it’s paid off, and transferring that payment to another card for January will pay it off, too. After those two are paid, I'll only have 2 cards, 1 loan, and 1 IRS back-payment to make each month. Until I graduate, and have to start paying back my FAFSA for grad school and the deferment ends for my undergrad loan…
I hope someday between now and then to own a television. I miss watching movies and TV on the couch instead of my desk chair.
I got to capitalize on my income (and my free time) this weekend by picking up a few shifts for a friend who does building security. For three nights I sat in the lobby of the building where Bugsy Moran once lived. It’s cool being in the lobby of history; above me is the penthouse where a prohibition era gangster escaped the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre ‘cause he didn’t get the message about the meeting, and below me are the deep, deep vaults where he hid his liquor.
Then on Sunday I was a child wrangler (yeehaw) for a table reading of A Raisin in the Sun before heading over to the home of an out-of-town friend to play with his kittens and his Nintendo. Turns out the new Punch Out is just as infuriating as an adult as the old one was twenty years ago.
Wow. I clearly remember stuff that happened twenty years ago. Never did that before.
And being out of extra-curricular tasks for the time being, I’m back to taking my exercise up another notch. I’m at the frustrating point of weight loss where the progress tapers off and becomes barely noticeable. So instead of getting discouraged, I’m working out for 30 minutes in the morning and an hour at night. It’s weird how expending more energy gives me so much more energy. I wake up just as easily as I fall asleep at night (which is to say very easily), and my morning coffee is all the caffeine I need all day. So far I’ve taken 5 ½ inches off my waist at about a loss of something like 30 pounds since the day after my birthday when I started this process. One of these days I’ll have to figure out how to get a shirtless picture of myself that doesn’t make me look like a douchebag.
Fun fact – one can indeed jog over snow and ice when it’s 28 degrees outside. More on this as it develops.
These last two years have been an abusive, torturous Hell of a rich and various nature as I paid for the mistakes of my 20’s. I have been wounded. I have bled. I have despaired. For a while there I was downright pissy (don’t take my word for it, just ask anybody). But I have risen each day seeking the paths of salvation no matter how arduous, faced every challenge that awaited me and those that came unbidden. I have stood victorious as often as I have failed, each win more significant than the last. And I will sleep each night secure in the knowledge that I am better prepared for tomorrow’s trials than I was yesterday. And I will stand and face each one in turn or several at once, and those I do not master today will fall before me as a curtain of ash falls before a windstorm.
Bring it on, motherfuckers.
We’re technically on a break, but my days haven’t gotten any shorter since it began. I work my usual 9-5, Monday through Friday office job. My current task is to compile thirteen years worth of monthly newsletters (while still putting out new ones) and input the information into one big database. I’ve been at it for about a week, and I don’t expect I’ll be done before the end of next summer. It’s nice to have a guarantee that I’ll be able to work the maximum number of allowed hours to help get the gorilla of credit card debt off my back. Speaking of, only one payment remains on one card before it’s paid off, and transferring that payment to another card for January will pay it off, too. After those two are paid, I'll only have 2 cards, 1 loan, and 1 IRS back-payment to make each month. Until I graduate, and have to start paying back my FAFSA for grad school and the deferment ends for my undergrad loan…
I hope someday between now and then to own a television. I miss watching movies and TV on the couch instead of my desk chair.
I got to capitalize on my income (and my free time) this weekend by picking up a few shifts for a friend who does building security. For three nights I sat in the lobby of the building where Bugsy Moran once lived. It’s cool being in the lobby of history; above me is the penthouse where a prohibition era gangster escaped the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre ‘cause he didn’t get the message about the meeting, and below me are the deep, deep vaults where he hid his liquor.
Then on Sunday I was a child wrangler (yeehaw) for a table reading of A Raisin in the Sun before heading over to the home of an out-of-town friend to play with his kittens and his Nintendo. Turns out the new Punch Out is just as infuriating as an adult as the old one was twenty years ago.
Wow. I clearly remember stuff that happened twenty years ago. Never did that before.
And being out of extra-curricular tasks for the time being, I’m back to taking my exercise up another notch. I’m at the frustrating point of weight loss where the progress tapers off and becomes barely noticeable. So instead of getting discouraged, I’m working out for 30 minutes in the morning and an hour at night. It’s weird how expending more energy gives me so much more energy. I wake up just as easily as I fall asleep at night (which is to say very easily), and my morning coffee is all the caffeine I need all day. So far I’ve taken 5 ½ inches off my waist at about a loss of something like 30 pounds since the day after my birthday when I started this process. One of these days I’ll have to figure out how to get a shirtless picture of myself that doesn’t make me look like a douchebag.
Fun fact – one can indeed jog over snow and ice when it’s 28 degrees outside. More on this as it develops.
These last two years have been an abusive, torturous Hell of a rich and various nature as I paid for the mistakes of my 20’s. I have been wounded. I have bled. I have despaired. For a while there I was downright pissy (don’t take my word for it, just ask anybody). But I have risen each day seeking the paths of salvation no matter how arduous, faced every challenge that awaited me and those that came unbidden. I have stood victorious as often as I have failed, each win more significant than the last. And I will sleep each night secure in the knowledge that I am better prepared for tomorrow’s trials than I was yesterday. And I will stand and face each one in turn or several at once, and those I do not master today will fall before me as a curtain of ash falls before a windstorm.
Bring it on, motherfuckers.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Uninvited
It’s been three months now that I’ve lived in my current apartment, and Nuku and I have not been the only ones living in this 5 room vintage abode. Since before I moved in, the kitchen has been claimed by a hive of roaches that seem to be based somewhere behind the stove. I am not a fan.
I didn’t have my cooking gas turned on when I first moved in, so I mostly ate microwavables. I believed the lack of crumb collection and stain production for the first two weeks I lived here would put a damper on their ability to persist, but I was wrong. I still find them creeping around, and the regular cooking habits I’ve been employing have only served them further.
I’ve tried baits. I’ve tried poisonous sprays. I’ve tried seek-and-destroy operations involving a paper towel. I’ve considered napalm, propaganda flyers, converting them to Islam, signing them up for military service, and exorcism. Sometimes they go on hiatus for a week or two at a time, but they always return looking refreshed. Little bastards.
Really, they’re not hurting anything. But they’re supposed to be gross. I haven’t gotten sick or diseased. They only eat what I’m finished with; I’ve never seen them encounter food I hadn’t taken to first. Indeed, when I enter the kitchen, they scurry away immediately, polite as can be. They realize they aren’t wanted, but a bug’s gotta eat.
In truth, I don’t even know that they ARE roaches. They’re little critters who scurry when the lights turn on, and they’re interested in my leftovers and stove stains. They may even be what restaurant managers like to tell customers are water bugs, something to mollify the masses by claiming what crawls in the kitchen are cute little misunderstood Disney creatures that sing and dance when we’re not looking. Personally I don’t find them to be all that intrusive, but it’s not inconceivable that a Pretty Girl will be a welcome guest at some point in my (near?) future, and she may not have a similarly enlightened (slovenly?) attitude about the difference between true tragedies and a pesky nuisance.
Regardless of the reason, the fact remains that I want them gone, and they won’t go. My personal characteristic of perseverance has been presented with a puzzle, just the sort of thing to focus and heighten my deep, inescapable need to solve it. This happens every time I’m faced with a challenge, a dilemma, or just about anything that needs to be corrected, fixed, or untangled. I achieve a state of Attention Surplus Disorder, virtually unable to move on to another task until the current one is accomplished. This focus typically persists to the exclusion of all other stimuli, such as eating, bathing, or being lit on fire. The gauntlet has been thrown down, and I have picked it up and embraced it. I’m going to chew up iron nails and spit out bullets and Hellfire until the only inhabitants not on my lease are the dust bunnies. And those fuckers are next.
Also, I have little to focus my attention upon for the next five weeks while I wait for the next quarter to start.
I didn’t have my cooking gas turned on when I first moved in, so I mostly ate microwavables. I believed the lack of crumb collection and stain production for the first two weeks I lived here would put a damper on their ability to persist, but I was wrong. I still find them creeping around, and the regular cooking habits I’ve been employing have only served them further.
I’ve tried baits. I’ve tried poisonous sprays. I’ve tried seek-and-destroy operations involving a paper towel. I’ve considered napalm, propaganda flyers, converting them to Islam, signing them up for military service, and exorcism. Sometimes they go on hiatus for a week or two at a time, but they always return looking refreshed. Little bastards.
Really, they’re not hurting anything. But they’re supposed to be gross. I haven’t gotten sick or diseased. They only eat what I’m finished with; I’ve never seen them encounter food I hadn’t taken to first. Indeed, when I enter the kitchen, they scurry away immediately, polite as can be. They realize they aren’t wanted, but a bug’s gotta eat.
In truth, I don’t even know that they ARE roaches. They’re little critters who scurry when the lights turn on, and they’re interested in my leftovers and stove stains. They may even be what restaurant managers like to tell customers are water bugs, something to mollify the masses by claiming what crawls in the kitchen are cute little misunderstood Disney creatures that sing and dance when we’re not looking. Personally I don’t find them to be all that intrusive, but it’s not inconceivable that a Pretty Girl will be a welcome guest at some point in my (near?) future, and she may not have a similarly enlightened (slovenly?) attitude about the difference between true tragedies and a pesky nuisance.
Regardless of the reason, the fact remains that I want them gone, and they won’t go. My personal characteristic of perseverance has been presented with a puzzle, just the sort of thing to focus and heighten my deep, inescapable need to solve it. This happens every time I’m faced with a challenge, a dilemma, or just about anything that needs to be corrected, fixed, or untangled. I achieve a state of Attention Surplus Disorder, virtually unable to move on to another task until the current one is accomplished. This focus typically persists to the exclusion of all other stimuli, such as eating, bathing, or being lit on fire. The gauntlet has been thrown down, and I have picked it up and embraced it. I’m going to chew up iron nails and spit out bullets and Hellfire until the only inhabitants not on my lease are the dust bunnies. And those fuckers are next.
Also, I have little to focus my attention upon for the next five weeks while I wait for the next quarter to start.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Culmination
I used to get terrified about doing schoolwork. Anxiety attacks over doing the simplest assignments were crippling, and I had to drop out of college for a semester and deal with it. It was the thing that made me a bad student as an undergrad, it’s the thing that made me miss an opportunity to go to UCLA for grad school five years ago, and it’s the thing that made me terrified I would do horribly at DePaul.
But I guess it’s different when I’m spending my time and efforts doing only that which I want to be doing with my life. I’m not forced to get that well-rounded Bachelor’s degree, taking classes that have little to do with my interests; all the reading and studying I do is for the sole purpose of following my heart’s desire. I go to the theatre two or three times a week, notepad in hand, and I get to go as more of an active participant than a passive observer. Most of our reading materials were designed to entertain the masses, which makes the subject of my fifteen page thesis (due next week, better get started) more of a hobby than a chore. Once upon a time I had one of the secrets to happiness whispered into my ear – find what you love to do, then find how to make your living doing that. I can verify that this is absolutely true. I only wish I’d realized it wasn’t supposed to be easy, so I wouldn’t have been so discouraged by my many failures before I got here. Not that I wasn’t told. I just didn’t realize.
There’s something else I’ve heard many times, many ways; sometimes things go wrong in life so we can tell the difference, and appreciate it, when things go right. By the time I decided I needed to go back to school and get what I’d cheated myself out of the first time around, I had been out of college for longer than it took me to go through college. I had a debt equivalent to more than a year’s pay. I was still going to work wearing a unitard and a cape. I cringed every time a customer was certain I was really a professional actor just moonlighting as a waiter, because I knew the opposite was true. Fear and doubt held me stronger than any ropes or chains ever could.
Inspired by the words of two artists I admire, Stevie Ray Vaughan and J.D. Challenger, I knew if I spent one more day compromising my dreams I’d be doing it the rest of my life. The fire of my soul would have vanished with neither a bang nor a whimper, but rather I’d wake up one day wondering how long it had been since I’d remembered what it once had been like to dream that particular dream. I decided being a failure was far, far more appealing than being a quitter. At least then I could respect myself for having tried. But it turns out I’m not too shabby at this “acting” business. My time spent with MXAT verified this. After that it was just a matter of progressive choices, fortune, perseverance, and patience as the pages on the calendar fluttered away before I found myself landed in the right place at the right time.
Upon reflection, I’ve come to terms with the fact that I didn’t get started sooner, and I may even be grateful for it. I’ve seen the abysmal consequences of quitting without devoting myself fully to theatre, leaving my heart to suffocate under the oppressive weight of a discarded dream. I’ve come to learn exactly how passionately I love what I do. If I had pursued this path before I made these realizations, I may never have had the tenacity to make the most of the opportunity which now envelopes me like a warm blanket.
Failure is a tool. When used incorrectly, it’s nothing more than a dead albatross around a sailor’s neck. When used properly, it defines the edges of capability and provides a map for improvement. Follow the compass within your heart, keep your bearings, and keep propelling yourself, and soon you’ll discover you’re living in the land of your dreams during your waking hours instead of merely visiting while you sleep.
Amen.
But I guess it’s different when I’m spending my time and efforts doing only that which I want to be doing with my life. I’m not forced to get that well-rounded Bachelor’s degree, taking classes that have little to do with my interests; all the reading and studying I do is for the sole purpose of following my heart’s desire. I go to the theatre two or three times a week, notepad in hand, and I get to go as more of an active participant than a passive observer. Most of our reading materials were designed to entertain the masses, which makes the subject of my fifteen page thesis (due next week, better get started) more of a hobby than a chore. Once upon a time I had one of the secrets to happiness whispered into my ear – find what you love to do, then find how to make your living doing that. I can verify that this is absolutely true. I only wish I’d realized it wasn’t supposed to be easy, so I wouldn’t have been so discouraged by my many failures before I got here. Not that I wasn’t told. I just didn’t realize.
There’s something else I’ve heard many times, many ways; sometimes things go wrong in life so we can tell the difference, and appreciate it, when things go right. By the time I decided I needed to go back to school and get what I’d cheated myself out of the first time around, I had been out of college for longer than it took me to go through college. I had a debt equivalent to more than a year’s pay. I was still going to work wearing a unitard and a cape. I cringed every time a customer was certain I was really a professional actor just moonlighting as a waiter, because I knew the opposite was true. Fear and doubt held me stronger than any ropes or chains ever could.
Inspired by the words of two artists I admire, Stevie Ray Vaughan and J.D. Challenger, I knew if I spent one more day compromising my dreams I’d be doing it the rest of my life. The fire of my soul would have vanished with neither a bang nor a whimper, but rather I’d wake up one day wondering how long it had been since I’d remembered what it once had been like to dream that particular dream. I decided being a failure was far, far more appealing than being a quitter. At least then I could respect myself for having tried. But it turns out I’m not too shabby at this “acting” business. My time spent with MXAT verified this. After that it was just a matter of progressive choices, fortune, perseverance, and patience as the pages on the calendar fluttered away before I found myself landed in the right place at the right time.
Upon reflection, I’ve come to terms with the fact that I didn’t get started sooner, and I may even be grateful for it. I’ve seen the abysmal consequences of quitting without devoting myself fully to theatre, leaving my heart to suffocate under the oppressive weight of a discarded dream. I’ve come to learn exactly how passionately I love what I do. If I had pursued this path before I made these realizations, I may never have had the tenacity to make the most of the opportunity which now envelopes me like a warm blanket.
Failure is a tool. When used incorrectly, it’s nothing more than a dead albatross around a sailor’s neck. When used properly, it defines the edges of capability and provides a map for improvement. Follow the compass within your heart, keep your bearings, and keep propelling yourself, and soon you’ll discover you’re living in the land of your dreams during your waking hours instead of merely visiting while you sleep.
Amen.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Shaping Up
I hurt my back in the move. It wasn’t serious, and I honestly doubt I would have noticed if I still worked in an office chair all day without giving myself the opportunity to explore any possible damage I’d done to myself. But the movement intensive nature of an acting program means I’m moving all day in nearly every class; rolling on the floor, running and jumping around a classroom, climbing on and over objects (or my classmates), and that doesn’t even include the intensive movement-specific classes of yoga or Feldenkrais.
It kept hurting no matter what I tried, so I decided to try going for a run. I stopped exercising on my own when the quarter started (note – school here is done in three quarters instead of two semesters from early September to mid-June), partly under the assumption that school would give me all the exercise I needed, and partly because finding/making the time to get it done was nearly ridiculous. Running has been known to aggravate my lower back (which is the part I hurt in the move), but I was so sick and tired of hurting all the time, I felt like taking back some control. If I was going to hurt, I wanted it to be because of a specific action I’d taken, something to which I could point and say, “That’s it, that’s the reason.” I wanted to take ownership of and responsibility for my pain instead of simply being affected by it.
I wasn’t prepared for the result, however – the next day I quit hurting at all. No back pain whatsoever. I could twist, bend, flex, raise and lower myself in any direction for any duration. Having spent six weeks in mild to moderate agony, I felt like I had discovered superpowers. I was elated.
So elated, in fact, I found a place in the building of The Theatre School where I could put on my grappling gloves and shadow box again. Punching bags are annoying because they move too much. I have a half-hour routine of hitting something to the beat of the songs I’ve put into a playlist, and a variable, mobile surface doesn’t let me keep the pace I prefer. So I found a support beam in the room where we have yoga three days a week, and on Tuesdays and Thursdays before yoga class, I spend thirty minutes driving my (lightly) padded knuckles into the wall to the music of Korn, Foo Fighters, Nine Inch Nails, and Faith No More. The constantly scraped flesh and gently bruised bone serves as a perfect constant, daily reminder that I’m alive.
And every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evening I spend 34 minutes pounding the pavement in attempt to get as far north as possible before time runs out, and then another 34 minutes coming back. The total distance I cover in this time is just over eight miles.
Between the heavily aerobic nature of these routines and three days a week of yoga, I’m looking pretty good in the mirror these days. I started losing weight almost six months ago, and with the exception of a six week hiatus when school started, I’ve kept it up through sheer discipline, determination, and motivation. I’ve finally lost enough fat that my musculature is showing through, and I’ve been surprising myself about once a week. Last night I even put on one of my favorite suits to go see a play; I haven’t fit into it properly in more than five years (if I ever did; I have no memory of not having to squeeze into it), but now it fits like it was tailored for me.
This is the first time in my life I’ve lost weight purely through self-direction. In the past it’s all been a part of financial circumstance, extreme depression, or a class I’m taking (BJJ or TKD). Admittedly I’m a poor grad student who can’t afford to go out to eat, I did suffer the most devastating breakup of my life earlier this year, and my acting class curriculum isn’t exactly lackadaisical. Nonetheless, these things combined with what I’m doing purely on my own are taking a wonderful toll on my physique, and I’m proud.
Now if I could only quit smoking…
It kept hurting no matter what I tried, so I decided to try going for a run. I stopped exercising on my own when the quarter started (note – school here is done in three quarters instead of two semesters from early September to mid-June), partly under the assumption that school would give me all the exercise I needed, and partly because finding/making the time to get it done was nearly ridiculous. Running has been known to aggravate my lower back (which is the part I hurt in the move), but I was so sick and tired of hurting all the time, I felt like taking back some control. If I was going to hurt, I wanted it to be because of a specific action I’d taken, something to which I could point and say, “That’s it, that’s the reason.” I wanted to take ownership of and responsibility for my pain instead of simply being affected by it.
I wasn’t prepared for the result, however – the next day I quit hurting at all. No back pain whatsoever. I could twist, bend, flex, raise and lower myself in any direction for any duration. Having spent six weeks in mild to moderate agony, I felt like I had discovered superpowers. I was elated.
So elated, in fact, I found a place in the building of The Theatre School where I could put on my grappling gloves and shadow box again. Punching bags are annoying because they move too much. I have a half-hour routine of hitting something to the beat of the songs I’ve put into a playlist, and a variable, mobile surface doesn’t let me keep the pace I prefer. So I found a support beam in the room where we have yoga three days a week, and on Tuesdays and Thursdays before yoga class, I spend thirty minutes driving my (lightly) padded knuckles into the wall to the music of Korn, Foo Fighters, Nine Inch Nails, and Faith No More. The constantly scraped flesh and gently bruised bone serves as a perfect constant, daily reminder that I’m alive.
And every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evening I spend 34 minutes pounding the pavement in attempt to get as far north as possible before time runs out, and then another 34 minutes coming back. The total distance I cover in this time is just over eight miles.
Between the heavily aerobic nature of these routines and three days a week of yoga, I’m looking pretty good in the mirror these days. I started losing weight almost six months ago, and with the exception of a six week hiatus when school started, I’ve kept it up through sheer discipline, determination, and motivation. I’ve finally lost enough fat that my musculature is showing through, and I’ve been surprising myself about once a week. Last night I even put on one of my favorite suits to go see a play; I haven’t fit into it properly in more than five years (if I ever did; I have no memory of not having to squeeze into it), but now it fits like it was tailored for me.
This is the first time in my life I’ve lost weight purely through self-direction. In the past it’s all been a part of financial circumstance, extreme depression, or a class I’m taking (BJJ or TKD). Admittedly I’m a poor grad student who can’t afford to go out to eat, I did suffer the most devastating breakup of my life earlier this year, and my acting class curriculum isn’t exactly lackadaisical. Nonetheless, these things combined with what I’m doing purely on my own are taking a wonderful toll on my physique, and I’m proud.
Now if I could only quit smoking…
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