Friday, November 7, 2008

A Little Homesick, A Little Regular Sick


My cold is still hanging on like a persistant itchy booger, and it's making me even less of a productive unemployed actor than ever before. Not that I'm not being productive, because I actually am, but...I just wish I was getting paid for my productivity.

One of the weirdest things about LA is, of course, the weather. It's beautiful. All the time. The reason it's so weird is that because every day is sort of the same, and it hasn't really gotten that much colder since I've gotten here, there is a strange sort of time lapse. What month is it? What day is it? Who am I? It's the WALL-E effect: if every day is the same, you are apt to lapse into a sort of coma in paradise. You eat, you doze, you can't quite look at yourself objectively. You watch a lot of tv. (Although, to be fair, ALL of my tv watching is done on Hulu, so at least I've gotten myself hooked on internet rather than cable.)

I'm trying to find more blogging jobs, because it makes me royally happy. Could you imagine that? A job that pays you AND you love it? I can't do what I've done, and wake up every day to spend 9 hours in Hell, blackmail my soul for a paycheck. I have a varied skill set, but it can be a curse: sure, you want me to what? Okaaaay. Fuck that shit! I don't want to be unhappy anymore. I want to look for joy in everything I can, and I need a job, and I need a job that makes me happy. It's out there somewhere...

The only problem with blogging is that you can't be completely open. What you write will love on in cyberspace, festering in 1's and 0's, and do you really want everything you think to be open for all the world to read forever and ever? Which is why I need the acting. It can be terrifying to do, but sometimes, you get to play a character where you can open up all your dirty little sweaty pores to the world and unleash yourself. I need so much.

I went to this networking event at AFTRA last night with an actor/coach named Scott Mosenson, and he quoted "Franny and Zooey." Franny's boyfriend says, after she says maybe she'll be an actress, "Acting is the business of wanting." It is. I think about that a lot. Sure, it's wanting, wanting, wanting parts, money, agents, casting directors, but it's also about characters' wants and objectives, stories full of wanting passions and hidden needs. It's all a want. How can I turn that into a positive thing? How can I, as Scott says, reframe for the positive?

I miss you guys. I know that there are probably only three people reading this, and it might not be til January til you do, but I miss you. (Brian also might be reading this. What up, Bri.) I wish my heart wasn't always so torn up across wide spaces, but it is, and probably will be for the rest of my life. Reframe: I love you. How lucky to be me.

3 comments:

Erin Reilly said...

Is this blog the place for sisters to converse? Becaues I'd like to riff off the so-insightful comment that acting is wanting. There's also the saying: Whatever you want, you already have it. Theatre Horizon really WANTS a space of its own. What we HAVE is an electrical closet - literally - in the musty back room of the Centre theatre in Norristown, for which we will be paying rent starting Nov 15 (so long, Mom and Dad’s basement office!), plus an agreement that we can produce 3 shows a year at the Centre if we pay yet more rent. In no way is this Theatre Horizon's longed-for, cozy, artistically inspiring home. But I sent out a press release anway that said HEY! Look how successful we are! We have a space of our own ! (if not the theatre itself, then at least we can definitely call the electrical closet home sweet home!!) And the funny thing, people have been congratulating me on our “new home” so much that I actually now feel really good about it. Somehow, my spin became my reality! Wanting and having: two sides of the same coin. The coin that’s probably already in your pocket! Wow…that metaphor is getting funky. Anyhoo, writing this comment is making me realized that I am OBSESSED with Theatre Horizon. This business is also obsession. And if we weren’t obsessed with this, we’d be obsessed with something else, I suppose. Anyhoo, miss you like crazy, blogger babe!

Lauren said...

I miss you too Bling Bling!!!! Sooooooooooooooo much.

But I love you and I'll go say a prayer for your homesickness right now. ;-)

Unknown said...

I miss you!!!!!!!!! And I love reading your blogs!