Once upon a time… in the time before E-mail, before blogging, before texting and the wide distribution of cellular phones… I wrote letters.
Actual pen-to-paper-stick-in-an-envelope-and-pay-for-a-stamp LETTERS.
The first one of note that I wrote was a response to a “Pen Pal Ad” in this publication called “The 21st century” (even though it was the early 90s). It was a paper that went around to a bunch of high schools in New England (only, I think), and one section was something that resembled “personal ads” in a regular newspaper, only it was limited to requests for Pen Pals. Not having a lot to occupy my time in those days, nor a lot of people to talk to… I took a chance and answered a few, hoping they would find me interesting enough to write back.
The first was a girl about my age in Massachusetts. She was on the Girl’s Basketball Team, and her father was a Sports Coach, and she had a dream to get accepted and to attend Harvard. She wasn’t sure if she was good enough or if she would be able to afford it. Her first letter back to me was one piece of ruled paper, hand-written on both sides. The cursive was small, not only on the letter itself, but also on the envelope and return address… and she put a “y” instead of an “i” at the end of my name. :)
It proudly became the first of my collection… all lined up by date received in a shoebox that I’ve had since. Twice I’ve upgraded to bigger shoe boxes. (Good thing I was getting bigger shoes)
Our correspondence didn’t last that long… I received a total of four letters from her… each one longer than the last. I tried my best to write back swiftly, and she did the same. But Senior Year is a busy one for all. We even exchanged pictures, and I really enjoyed those letters, but they stopped. A few years later, when I went away to college, and just started to learn about e-mail and UNIX and all that early Internet stuff… I actually got to see a list of e-mails of students at Harvard University, and her name was among them. I wrote to the address, giving the details she had written to me, and asked if she was the same person. Sadly, it wasn’t… just someone with the same name. Oh well… it was worth a shot. I would’ve liked to congratulate her for making it to Harvard like she wished. Though I don’t know if the real one ever did… but I hope her dreams got bigger, and she is still able to pursue them.
I did get a few other Pen Pals. I was quickly addicted. Learning and meeting new people… with none of the immediate judgment and blunders that can mark an introduction. A letter from a Pen Pal is simultaneously revealing and mysterious… it really makes you want to write back quickly, so you’ll get their next letter that much quicker.
The second, I thought was my most memorable. She actually lived in the next town. It definitely didn’t take long for our letters to reach each other, that’s for sure. She too had placed in ad in that 21st Century paper, and from what she told me, she got about 75 responses. She wrote back to the ones that interested her, and kept eliminating the ones she didn’t like. After 3 months… I was the only one that she still wrote to. (Even if it was an exaggeration, it’s a nice compliment) We even exchanged phone numbers, and started chatting on the phone. We would literally chat for hours on end… often times talking about absolutely nothing. That was where I learned talking about nothing could be so much fun.
I know my parents were a bit *ahem*… “concerned”. They believed her to be from a “bad part of town”, and the one time I did introduce them to her, they didn’t like her air of “non-normalcy”, I’ll just say. For one: It was New Hampshire, not freaking Beirut! If I couldn’t be expected to handle myself in a “bad section” of NH, I obviously haven’t been raised to be competent in ANYTHING. As for the “non-normalcy”… I remember my Mom actually telling me a few days after they met her, that “she didn’t want me to see her again” and she thought that “She was a bad influence on me.” Gee, Thanks. Its always nice when your parents consider you to be an easily-swayed Sheep. Sheesh… the whole thing was starting to sound like “Romeo & Juliet”… except that neither of us had even considered actually dating. I was just happy to have a friend. Was she considered “weird”? Sure… but it was apparently forgotten that *I was too*! As for her being a “bad influence on me”?... Apparently the concept of me being a “good” influence on her wasn't an option. (Which wasn't even needed, as she was good peeps) The aspect of “non-normalcy” would turn out to be a similar characteristic throughout several friends I would come to know throughout my life. We weirdoes tend to seek each other out. I learned that when I finally went away to college. And even today, I *rarely* introduce my friends/dates/anyone to my Parents… pretty much because of all that fallout.
As far as my Parents knew… I obeyed their lame wishes and never had any contact with her again. In reality, we stayed in touch for a good few years after that. Eventually, the letters and calls did stop… but I would relish an opportunity to re-institute contact again. (I’ve looked… can’t find her anywhere. *shrug*)
The only other person I think I would have considered as a steady “Pen Pal”… was my cousin. When she went away to college, I was starting classes at a local Community College… and we started writing to each other. I had particular fun writing to her, because I recruited help. I would get friends, or fellow cast members of shows I was in, to write to her as well. I’d hand them the paper and say, “Here! Write to my Cousin!” More of an order, granted… but everyone would at least write something without objection. Sometimes I’d have to use an extra stamp, because the letter got to be 7 pages long. (Hey, I like to give something substantial to read.) I actually consider our correspondence to be an interesting point in my life… because even though we’re family, and our extended family was always close… I think we really started to know each other more that way. I mean really got to know each other. Whenever we had “known” each other previously… was always in the presence of other family members. And even though we were the same age… she was always considered more on par with my one-year-older brother… because they were both “middle children”. Then one day, over the summer at a family function, we were chatting, and at one point, there happened to be no one else around. She then remarked to me at how surprised she was at me. I asked why… and she said that through our letters, and these times of honestly, truly talking to each other… she’s realized that I was a completely different person than I was when I was around my brothers. I was being witty, intelligent, dare I say, even cool… and showing all these pleasant qualities that for some reason weren’t able to come out when in the presence of my brothers or even my parents. To this day, I still don’t have a fully satisfactory answer as to why that phenomenon occurs.
That was the first time I actually felt truly understood. And I was seeing how my letter-writing was helping me to find Me.
I continued to write letters. I would gain “e-mail pals” at school, using that funky cool new thing called e-mail, but as the summers approached, and everyone had to return home… where e-mail didn’t exist… we all exchanged addresses, and wrote. I’d write to people across the country who I technically had never met… and to the friends I couldn’t wait to see again at college. At the end of the summers, I’d exchange addresses with old co-workers who didn’t have e-mail, and try to keep in touch while I was away at school. I was really good at writing to people. Usually, I’d get at least one response. Sometimes more. Occasionally, I didn’t get any.
I look through that shoe-box of letters, and I see names that I hadn’t thought of in so many years. And several names I don’t remember at all! A couple were Crushes. Some weren’t exactly letters… but odd newspaper clippings from one of the “eccentric” ones of our group. :) Several people eventually started having some fun with the return addresses and envelopes. There would be brand-new nicknames lying between my first and last name… such as “Dishboy” (a reference to an old job, and obviously from one of those co-workers). One of my favorites was from a friend who, instead of putting his own name on the return address, wrote “The One You Model Your Life After”. (The funny thing is… I still remember who that is.)
Then, I got, what I considered at the time, to be the best set of letters I had ever received. In college, from a girl I was completely head over heels for. We weren’t dating yet… but I was REALLY hoping that we would. The first letter was a Christmas Card (with a very long message inside). Over the few weeks that we were separated due to the Xmas break in college, I got four letters from her before I was able to see her in person again. The next time I got a letter from her was after we left for the summer… and *that* was the first letter I ever received from an official girlfriend. And that was very easily… the first love-letter I ever got. Young love never felt so good.
I look at the dates on those envelopes… 11 years ago. Wow. Seem like more than a lifetime. I actually do occasionally hear from her. I’ve got her AND her husband as friends on MySpace. The husband is ANOTHER friend of mine from college… and I actually introduced them. Granted, when they re-met years later and started dating, they probably didn’t even remember that initial introduction… so I technically had nothing to do with it… but I’m taking the credit anyway. *ppppbbbbbttttthhhhttttt!!!” :P You know, it’s a really neat feeling to know that two people that you find to be very Cool… turn out to be very Cool for each other. :) Rock on, Chaka Khan!
Too bad I never got love letters after that. It’s not that I dated horrible people… I was just never separated from them to give the letters a chance to be written. Though, in retrospect… I should have just written them anyway. Even if I was only minutes away from seeing them. Even if I didn’t get them… THEY should have. Having it in a person’s unique handwriting is special beyond words. The act itself, regardless of any clumsy rendered sentiments within… is permanent. A time-capsule of sorts. Perfectly preserving a feeling in time (even if it’s not eloquently conveyed). I believe it really is “the thought that counts” in something like that. I should have done it more myself. (I wish I philosophized over it earlier than now.) But that’s why I always kept any hand-written little note that I was given. I have them all. Yeah, I never got that many of them… but I kept them all. May not be a full love letter… but it's sure something.
I really think it’s a Lost Art. The whole idea of writing letters. You can go to a library or bookstore and find whole books that are literally the correspondence between two people. Two friends, or two lovers… colleagues… political letters, anything. You can actually read the correspondence of Franz Kafka and the woman he loved. The letters of H.P. Lovecraft and his friend Robert Howard. Even the Griffin & Sabine trilogy… a fictional story told through letters and postcards, where you actually OPEN the envelopes and find the letter inside.
Are we REALLY going to see… in this day and age… a published book of two people’s e-mails? Or “The Collected Text Messages of Paris Hilton 2004-2007 Vol. 1” Filled with ROTFL, TTYL, ASL, BFF, CYA, G2G, HOAS, IMHO, OTOH, KWIM, LMAO, TTFN, WTG and other such inane patter all over? Sweet Jeebus, I don’t even know what half that crap means!
E-mail and Text messages… even though it’s all crap I do MYSELF… does make the world a little colder, I think. Yeah, they’re easy and convenient… simple ways to keep in touch with more people… and that can be a good thing… but we have to be more careful of exactly what we say so that we’re not misinterpreted. Things like emotions, mood, sarcasm, humor… are harder to convey electronically. But in a handwritten letter… If you’re angry or frustrated… even if you don’t use any words to say so, it will still show, as the letters and sentences are darker and bolder… from the pen being forcefully pressed into the paper, almost coming out the other side. It’s harder to hide something like that.
Yes, I’m aware of a certain sense of irony here… as this blog is being TYPED. To its defense, typing does still allow options like italics, bold, underlining, font changes and stuff like that… which can help convey those meanings that sometimes seem to be lost to us. Acting in a manner more like handwriting. Which is a step in the right direction… providing the tools are used. But cursive handwriting will always have the upper hand to me.
Hell, one time I got a letter from my Aunt… an actual mailed letter. It was when I was living in California, and it was typed. Had no underlines, italics or boldface in it. But within that letter… was something I wasn’t used to seeing. It wasn’t much… just a little hint. You see, it had been a particularly rough year (for everyone I knew it seemed like), and she talked a little bit about it, before going to the normal family stuff. Yet, throughout all the family functions I had been to, from talking in big or small groups… I had never seen what I was now seeing. A small hint… of vulnerability.
Sure, it may seem obvious… everyone has that aspect to them. But in my family, when we get together, it’s a good time. So many people talking at once, whether it’s one big conversation or several small ones at the same time. It’s big, loud, a bit boisterous and most always good natured. And here… I was seeing a side of my Aunt… nay, a side of my FAMILY, that I had never really seen before. Yeah, everyone knows its there… but you never actually see it.
All in a letter. That would never come out in an e-mail. Never would come out at holidays. But there it is. An emotion preserved. That’s a rare, powerful and beautiful thing.
So, I need to get back in my old habit of letter writing. Because I’ll never get letters if I don’t send them. And I’ve got some letters to catch up on. I received one last year, that I never responded to… it’s time I did. Even if I never get a response… like I said earlier, the OTHER person deserves to see that beauty for themselves. Even if it does come from a little ol fool like me. :)
1.23.2008
12.31.2007
Advice From a Homicidal Maniac...
I’m feeling Lost.
That’s really the only word I can think of for this feeling. I know where I am, I know what I want to do and where I want to be, and continually taking little steps to get there. (I’d take larger steps… but its hard to do that with your pants around your ankles. Metaphorically speaking, of course.)
Yet, despite this self-awareness of my situation, I’m feeling Lost.
It’s no secret that the last 2 years have been tough for me. (If I’m trying to keep it secret, I’m doing a bad job.) After my last lousy year in Los Angeles, I came back East… and the past year hasn’t been that much better.
For one… I’m living with my parents. Oh dear Jeebus, I’m a stereotype… a 32-year old man living in my parents’ basement. *shudder* At least I have friends that are kind to point out that I was living on my own for 10 years. (Yeah, I made it to the double-digits. Before either of my older brothers, too. A fact I was kind of proud of.) And before I left, some friends I knew who were from Europe said it was “No big deal. In Europe, everyone lives with their parents until their 30s or even 40s… usually only moving out when you’re married, but not always.” (Oh man, the thought of living with them even when I’m married? Uh… no thank you. Either way, it didn’t really make me feel better.)
Yet, I knew that was going to be the case when I decided to move back. And I accepted it as a “necessary sacrifice” for my Plan. Yes, I had a plan. I refused to swallow my pride and come back without one. Because I was in L.A. for a reason… I’m a storyteller. And I want to tell stories. I’m a writer and an actor, and I don’t feel productive unless I’m creating or presenting. But throughout my time there… I never got noticed. I did several plays, got great reviews from all, compliments up the wazoo… but ultimately nothing. Even the last film project I did there (I even had the title character) has, to my knowledge, NOT seen the light of day… and I actually hope it doesn’t. Not that it was completely dissuading me. Hell, I knew it was going to be a long, tough battle, and I was feeling resilient. That is, until the OTHER reasons I left L.A. came to the forefront… well, it just kind of became the “Anvil-That-Broke-The-Camel’s-Back”. I just came to the conclusion that I needed a “break”.
So, I decided to return to my roots… back near all my family… and make my own stinkin movie.
Yeah, I decided to thumb my nose at the System. (Not that the System would get the insult… face it, the actual “thumbing your nose” cut-down kind of went out of style in Shakespeare’s time. Nowadays, if you try it, people think you’re just picking your nose in public.) I was feeling a bit inspired by Robert Rodriguez (based in Texas), George Romero (based in Pennsylvania), and others that don’t need Hollywood to make their movies. I was particularly inspired by the movie “28 Days Later”… a high-octane zombie movie, made with a Mini-DV camera that cost peanuts (relatively speaking)… and a festival winning Time-Travel movie called “Primer”… made for $7,000. Yeah, for the price of a used car… a guy made a movie… and a GOOD one. Its things like that which really inspire you and make you realize, “Hey… this CAN be done.”
I figured, the best way to show that my writing CAN work (as Hollywood is very effective at keeping out new writers), is to actually SHOW it working on film. And the best option to be able to make it… lay back on the East Coast. With the high cost of living, California was not exactly conducive to saving money. Not to mention that many of the story ideas I was having (mostly for scary movies) were all set in geographic areas “like New England”. Face it, there’s a good reason that Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft set most, if not all, of their stories there. So rather than try to find a half-assed location in So-Cal… it would look better to actually BE and FILM in New England.
So, even though I never set out to be a director… I decided to do it. That was my plan. Well, it was the goal of it, I should say. The actual plan was a bit of a loose one. I was going to get a decent paying job (I was told the market back here was much better, with higher pay)… save up money. Get down the debts, and save for the money and film, while writing a script that is good, and can be done within the resources of myself and friends. And by the time I got to one year after returning I had hoped we could be filming. Well… actually, I was shooting for the Spring of 08… I’m not filming in the freaking cold.
For a good while… it was working. When I finally found something decent paying (through a temp agency), I was socking away a good amount of money. Every week, I put away a portion of my paycheck aside… and that started to build fairly quickly. By early July, I had gotten to just over half of what I needed. My mental time-table was working out nicely… that’s where I hoped to be at that time.
THEN… my car wouldn’t start one day. I took it in to be looked at. Never a good sign, right? Well, in this case, they only needed to replace ONE thing to fix it.
The Engine.
Replacing the engine (a more affordable option than getting a new car outright) took almost EXACTLY the amount of money I had saved up to that point for my camera. I guess I could be thankful that I *had* the money handy to be able to get my car back… because I needed one to get to work… But I couldn’t help feeling a little depressed all the same.
So I went back to square one. Undaunted, I continued. DETERMINED to film come Spring. Every week, putting aside some money (a little more than before to try and catch up)… until I got back to over the half-way point in October. And THEN… the place I was working at (a company in Burlington, Massachusetts that makes medical equipment) has to get rid of all their “contract employees” at the end of the month. Of which, *I* was the last one. I liked working there, everyone was really nice, and they seemed to like me… but the higher ups wanted to pinch pennies at the end of the year. So, I had to go. I was back on the market. No problem, right? Just tell the Temp Agency, and with my record and rave reviews (hell, I made “Temp Employee of the Month” on my FIRST month with them…. I got a mug), something should come soon, right? Well, it did take a few weeks… with the holidays coming, the demand for Temp Employment went down. The only thing I got was a 2 ½ week gig at a Marketing Research company at a neighboring town. (Well, at least the commute was shorter)
2 of us were brought in. One of the clients of this company was having a big trade show and they needed the potential customers (or “leads”) entered into the big fancy database. I was selected for it because I had experience with their big fancy database… the same kind of big fancy database that I worked with in Burlington. This would just be time-consuming, non-difficult work… I didn’t see a problem. So, they were happy to have me there. The other guy seemed intelligent enough… a decent sort of fellow. We were told the whole job would take about 2 ½ weeks with 2 of us working.
When I went in on the third day… I noticed the other guy wasn’t there. I casually enquired as to where he was and was simply told he “wasn’t going to be coming back.” I didn’t push for answers, figured it wasn’t my place. Well… wasn’t my place to get answers from THAT person. I called the agency at lunch… now I didn’t know if the guy just said, “I quit this bitch” or he made a pass at the Boss’s husband or what. Frankly, I didn’t even care, but I was wondering if that meant I was going to have to do this 2 ½ week job by MYSELF, or if someone else was going to come and take his place, or what? Apparently, the Marketing company told the Temp Agency they didn’t want him back… they were just going to go with me. Apparently, they were VERY happy with how I was doing, and the other guy didn’t seem to “get it”. So… I was indeed going to have this 2-man-2 ½-week-job to myself. I figured, “Oh well… I can only do the job at the pace I can. If they get behind, its not my fault.”
Well, they didn’t get behind. In fact… that second Friday, on day 10 of this 14-business-day assignment… I only went in for 2 hours to finish everything up, and then was sent home. I finished a 2-man-2 ½-week-job… by myself, 4 days ahead of schedule. I saved them about $1300 in labor alone (the other guy’s salary, plus the days I was supposed to work, but didn’t need to) and *literally* worked myself out of a job.
Holy Cripes on Toast… why the hell do I have to be so fast and efficient??? I never thought I’d hate having a good work ethic and a high level of competence.
So that brings me to now. The next interview for an assignment is after the New Year, so the holidays are off for me, unintentionally. My savings for the camera was OVER the half-way mark… but then I sprung for a new suit, as I desperately needed one. (Hopefully, it’ll be a good investment to help get a better, more permanent position.) So, now I’m not OVER the half-way… I’m AT the half-way point.
Why do I feel Lost? Partly because I seem to perpetually be at the “half-way” point… and can’t seem to get closer than that. I’ve been “home” for almost a year now… and it doesn’t feel like “home”. This is a town I had at one time promised myself I’d never come back to… not a lot of happy memories for me. I never knew who I was until I left. Yet, here I am.
I often wonder if I made a mistake leaving California. Oftentimes, I hear about things, that feel like reasons I should have stayed there. The idea that “I’m where I’m supposed to be” doesn’t help.
Not to mention the fact that (he says while turning a can-opener on another container marked “Worms”) I have been feeling INCREDIBLY lonely.
When my last Ex and I first started dating, we had a conversation in which I mentioned the fact that I “took a long time between relationships”. It wasn’t a line… and I wasn’t lying. On average, I took about a year or so between a break-up, and starting a new relationship. Its now been over 2 years.
Now, my longest dry spell for sex is about 3 years and 3 months. So that part isn’t such a big deal for me… but its definitely the longest I’ve gone without companionship. During those 3 years 3 months, I did have romantic relationships… and during shorter dry spells, I did date… just nothing came about.
This has been 2 years without really ANYTHING. And I’ve been looking. When I finally got comfortable with the idea of dating again (a little longer than a year), I started slowly looking… and haven’t found anything. I don’t mean that I’ve had interests and they didn’t want to date ME… I haven’t met ANYBODY that *I* want to date. I meet some women… fine, decent people… and I just really don’t give a shit. And by “met”, I mean actually, physically MEET in person. I have tried going the route of the Internet, and I have now sworn it off completely. No more not for me. See the blog entry “I’m tired of this shite” for one such example. There was another after that… someone I was getting along with very nicely online and on the phone… and I wanted to meet, she said SHE wanted to meet. Guess what? We’ve never met. Make sense to you? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
The few people I *did* physically meet from online introductions? Didn’t exactly work out. The two that readily come to mind were both a little on the… overbearing side. Very upbeat, high energy, mile-a-minute kind of demeanors, etc. As I was waiting in a Barnes & Noble café to meet one, she called me on her cell phone, as she was a matter of minutes away, and as soon as I say, “Hello?” I hear in a very peppy tone, “ARE YOU NERVOUS?!!”
Well, I wasn’t “nervous”, but I was suddenly wondering if I *should* be… and then I actually WAS nervous. That probably wasn’t the best choice of words to use with me at that time… it was a little on the steamrollerish side. Now there’s nothing wrong with upbeat, high-energy… the girl was very lovely, and seemed nice. Maybe it was that first beat that just jarred me off the mood… but since I’ve been out of it for awhile… I don’t want to be steamrolled with a “fantastic, high-energy, extreme Type A personality”… I want the first meeting to be a little on the mellow side. Relaxed, non-pressure… because I’m not wanting to give any pressure, and I’m not looking FOR any pressure. Show me your Type-A personality LATER. For now… take a breath, please.
I do understand that talking about a “dry spell” can start to sound like one is a bit on the desperate side. Hell, I’ve even stopped myself and tried to contemplate if I was in fact being “desperate”. But I think that if I was desperate… I would have probably gone for one of the SteamRollerGirls, or still be in a Binary Courtship with one of the “Never Actually Meet” ones.
I think I *am* desperate… for good conversation. Doesn’t have to be witty, or super-intelligent… you don’t have to be a worldly, well-traveled, go-getter. Just be someone I can talk to. Someone who can be genuine over a cup of hot cocoa… who smiles only when she’s happy. Who knows how to listen… I mean REALLY Listen… and knows how to be listened to.
These days, I don’t get to talk to my friends as much as I like… the ones that are good to talk to, especially. And I actually miss going to therapy… it was so nice to have someone that just listened to you, without giving judgment, advice, or just waiting for a pause so they could talk.
I’m desperate for someone to trust. Because I’ve been having such a hard time doing so for so long.
When I was growing up here in New England, I had so much difficulty finding someone to date.
Then I moved to California… and it got HARDER. Almost a whole new culture to get used to. Then Southern California got even harder than that.
Now I’m back in New England… and it feels harder than ever. Is it my age, my personality, or just too used to Los Angeles? I can’t meet people the “regular way”. I can’t go to bars… I don’t drink. And yes, I’ve tried going to a bar and not drinking. It doesn’t work. The alcohol is actually the noun and verb that brings people together. It makes them vulnerable (in a sense). When I’m vulnerable, I don’t like interacting with people that AREN’T vulnerable themselves. I feel like they have an unfair advantage. I can only imagine that’s a subconscious reason why I’m usually left to my own there.
I’m alone… my destination seems so far off… and I keep hitting delays, detours and speed bumps. Any wonder I feel “Lost”?
Oh yeah… the title. Probably should make some kind of sense of that, huh?
Well… I’m trying to remain hopeful. I force myself to smile and constantly look forward to the future and TRY to remain upbeat about it, no matter how hard it gets, no matter how much disapproval I get from those that disagree with my plan… all of that. Though sometimes it feels that I’m barely hanging on, I have to keep doing it. And to help I try and keep some “inspirational” bits of philosophy around me that are always within sight.
And my inspiration sometimes comes from odd places. Because us true philosophers… True “Lovers of Wisdom” know that you don’t always have to look at Kant, Kierkegaard, Plato, Nietzsche, or whoever to get the best words of wisdom… you take them wherever you find them.
And one of my favorites comes from Jhonen Vasquez, a writer and comic artist who created “Johnny the Homicidal Maniac”… a very bloody, satirical comic book.
A lot of people have told me their own favorite parts of the book… such as “Dear Die-ary, I appear to be dead.” Or other such macabre gag. But my favorite comes at the very end. On the last page… in fact, it’s the last thing written, and frankly, the whole point of the story that Vasquez wrote. And its something I agree with completely… and will leave this blog entry on that. It’s not funny, it’s not bloody or disgusting… its just correct. It helps keep me going, and actually hopeful for the New Year, and that I can make 2008 better than 2007 and 2006.
Here it is.
“Dear Die-ary,
There’s nothing terribly wrong with feeling Lost, so long as that feeling precedes some plan on your part to actually do something about it.
Too often a person grows complacent with their disillusionment, perpetually wearing their “discomfort” like a favorite shirt.
I can’t say I’m very pleased with where my life is just now…
But I can’t help but look forward to where it’s going.”
-Jhonen Vasquez
“Johhny the Homicidal Maniac”
Happy New Year. Take care of yourself, and someone else.
That’s really the only word I can think of for this feeling. I know where I am, I know what I want to do and where I want to be, and continually taking little steps to get there. (I’d take larger steps… but its hard to do that with your pants around your ankles. Metaphorically speaking, of course.)
Yet, despite this self-awareness of my situation, I’m feeling Lost.
It’s no secret that the last 2 years have been tough for me. (If I’m trying to keep it secret, I’m doing a bad job.) After my last lousy year in Los Angeles, I came back East… and the past year hasn’t been that much better.
For one… I’m living with my parents. Oh dear Jeebus, I’m a stereotype… a 32-year old man living in my parents’ basement. *shudder* At least I have friends that are kind to point out that I was living on my own for 10 years. (Yeah, I made it to the double-digits. Before either of my older brothers, too. A fact I was kind of proud of.) And before I left, some friends I knew who were from Europe said it was “No big deal. In Europe, everyone lives with their parents until their 30s or even 40s… usually only moving out when you’re married, but not always.” (Oh man, the thought of living with them even when I’m married? Uh… no thank you. Either way, it didn’t really make me feel better.)
Yet, I knew that was going to be the case when I decided to move back. And I accepted it as a “necessary sacrifice” for my Plan. Yes, I had a plan. I refused to swallow my pride and come back without one. Because I was in L.A. for a reason… I’m a storyteller. And I want to tell stories. I’m a writer and an actor, and I don’t feel productive unless I’m creating or presenting. But throughout my time there… I never got noticed. I did several plays, got great reviews from all, compliments up the wazoo… but ultimately nothing. Even the last film project I did there (I even had the title character) has, to my knowledge, NOT seen the light of day… and I actually hope it doesn’t. Not that it was completely dissuading me. Hell, I knew it was going to be a long, tough battle, and I was feeling resilient. That is, until the OTHER reasons I left L.A. came to the forefront… well, it just kind of became the “Anvil-That-Broke-The-Camel’s-Back”. I just came to the conclusion that I needed a “break”.
So, I decided to return to my roots… back near all my family… and make my own stinkin movie.
Yeah, I decided to thumb my nose at the System. (Not that the System would get the insult… face it, the actual “thumbing your nose” cut-down kind of went out of style in Shakespeare’s time. Nowadays, if you try it, people think you’re just picking your nose in public.) I was feeling a bit inspired by Robert Rodriguez (based in Texas), George Romero (based in Pennsylvania), and others that don’t need Hollywood to make their movies. I was particularly inspired by the movie “28 Days Later”… a high-octane zombie movie, made with a Mini-DV camera that cost peanuts (relatively speaking)… and a festival winning Time-Travel movie called “Primer”… made for $7,000. Yeah, for the price of a used car… a guy made a movie… and a GOOD one. Its things like that which really inspire you and make you realize, “Hey… this CAN be done.”
I figured, the best way to show that my writing CAN work (as Hollywood is very effective at keeping out new writers), is to actually SHOW it working on film. And the best option to be able to make it… lay back on the East Coast. With the high cost of living, California was not exactly conducive to saving money. Not to mention that many of the story ideas I was having (mostly for scary movies) were all set in geographic areas “like New England”. Face it, there’s a good reason that Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft set most, if not all, of their stories there. So rather than try to find a half-assed location in So-Cal… it would look better to actually BE and FILM in New England.
So, even though I never set out to be a director… I decided to do it. That was my plan. Well, it was the goal of it, I should say. The actual plan was a bit of a loose one. I was going to get a decent paying job (I was told the market back here was much better, with higher pay)… save up money. Get down the debts, and save for the money and film, while writing a script that is good, and can be done within the resources of myself and friends. And by the time I got to one year after returning I had hoped we could be filming. Well… actually, I was shooting for the Spring of 08… I’m not filming in the freaking cold.
For a good while… it was working. When I finally found something decent paying (through a temp agency), I was socking away a good amount of money. Every week, I put away a portion of my paycheck aside… and that started to build fairly quickly. By early July, I had gotten to just over half of what I needed. My mental time-table was working out nicely… that’s where I hoped to be at that time.
THEN… my car wouldn’t start one day. I took it in to be looked at. Never a good sign, right? Well, in this case, they only needed to replace ONE thing to fix it.
The Engine.
Replacing the engine (a more affordable option than getting a new car outright) took almost EXACTLY the amount of money I had saved up to that point for my camera. I guess I could be thankful that I *had* the money handy to be able to get my car back… because I needed one to get to work… But I couldn’t help feeling a little depressed all the same.
So I went back to square one. Undaunted, I continued. DETERMINED to film come Spring. Every week, putting aside some money (a little more than before to try and catch up)… until I got back to over the half-way point in October. And THEN… the place I was working at (a company in Burlington, Massachusetts that makes medical equipment) has to get rid of all their “contract employees” at the end of the month. Of which, *I* was the last one. I liked working there, everyone was really nice, and they seemed to like me… but the higher ups wanted to pinch pennies at the end of the year. So, I had to go. I was back on the market. No problem, right? Just tell the Temp Agency, and with my record and rave reviews (hell, I made “Temp Employee of the Month” on my FIRST month with them…. I got a mug), something should come soon, right? Well, it did take a few weeks… with the holidays coming, the demand for Temp Employment went down. The only thing I got was a 2 ½ week gig at a Marketing Research company at a neighboring town. (Well, at least the commute was shorter)
2 of us were brought in. One of the clients of this company was having a big trade show and they needed the potential customers (or “leads”) entered into the big fancy database. I was selected for it because I had experience with their big fancy database… the same kind of big fancy database that I worked with in Burlington. This would just be time-consuming, non-difficult work… I didn’t see a problem. So, they were happy to have me there. The other guy seemed intelligent enough… a decent sort of fellow. We were told the whole job would take about 2 ½ weeks with 2 of us working.
When I went in on the third day… I noticed the other guy wasn’t there. I casually enquired as to where he was and was simply told he “wasn’t going to be coming back.” I didn’t push for answers, figured it wasn’t my place. Well… wasn’t my place to get answers from THAT person. I called the agency at lunch… now I didn’t know if the guy just said, “I quit this bitch” or he made a pass at the Boss’s husband or what. Frankly, I didn’t even care, but I was wondering if that meant I was going to have to do this 2 ½ week job by MYSELF, or if someone else was going to come and take his place, or what? Apparently, the Marketing company told the Temp Agency they didn’t want him back… they were just going to go with me. Apparently, they were VERY happy with how I was doing, and the other guy didn’t seem to “get it”. So… I was indeed going to have this 2-man-2 ½-week-job to myself. I figured, “Oh well… I can only do the job at the pace I can. If they get behind, its not my fault.”
Well, they didn’t get behind. In fact… that second Friday, on day 10 of this 14-business-day assignment… I only went in for 2 hours to finish everything up, and then was sent home. I finished a 2-man-2 ½-week-job… by myself, 4 days ahead of schedule. I saved them about $1300 in labor alone (the other guy’s salary, plus the days I was supposed to work, but didn’t need to) and *literally* worked myself out of a job.
Holy Cripes on Toast… why the hell do I have to be so fast and efficient??? I never thought I’d hate having a good work ethic and a high level of competence.
So that brings me to now. The next interview for an assignment is after the New Year, so the holidays are off for me, unintentionally. My savings for the camera was OVER the half-way mark… but then I sprung for a new suit, as I desperately needed one. (Hopefully, it’ll be a good investment to help get a better, more permanent position.) So, now I’m not OVER the half-way… I’m AT the half-way point.
Why do I feel Lost? Partly because I seem to perpetually be at the “half-way” point… and can’t seem to get closer than that. I’ve been “home” for almost a year now… and it doesn’t feel like “home”. This is a town I had at one time promised myself I’d never come back to… not a lot of happy memories for me. I never knew who I was until I left. Yet, here I am.
I often wonder if I made a mistake leaving California. Oftentimes, I hear about things, that feel like reasons I should have stayed there. The idea that “I’m where I’m supposed to be” doesn’t help.
Not to mention the fact that (he says while turning a can-opener on another container marked “Worms”) I have been feeling INCREDIBLY lonely.
When my last Ex and I first started dating, we had a conversation in which I mentioned the fact that I “took a long time between relationships”. It wasn’t a line… and I wasn’t lying. On average, I took about a year or so between a break-up, and starting a new relationship. Its now been over 2 years.
Now, my longest dry spell for sex is about 3 years and 3 months. So that part isn’t such a big deal for me… but its definitely the longest I’ve gone without companionship. During those 3 years 3 months, I did have romantic relationships… and during shorter dry spells, I did date… just nothing came about.
This has been 2 years without really ANYTHING. And I’ve been looking. When I finally got comfortable with the idea of dating again (a little longer than a year), I started slowly looking… and haven’t found anything. I don’t mean that I’ve had interests and they didn’t want to date ME… I haven’t met ANYBODY that *I* want to date. I meet some women… fine, decent people… and I just really don’t give a shit. And by “met”, I mean actually, physically MEET in person. I have tried going the route of the Internet, and I have now sworn it off completely. No more not for me. See the blog entry “I’m tired of this shite” for one such example. There was another after that… someone I was getting along with very nicely online and on the phone… and I wanted to meet, she said SHE wanted to meet. Guess what? We’ve never met. Make sense to you? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
The few people I *did* physically meet from online introductions? Didn’t exactly work out. The two that readily come to mind were both a little on the… overbearing side. Very upbeat, high energy, mile-a-minute kind of demeanors, etc. As I was waiting in a Barnes & Noble café to meet one, she called me on her cell phone, as she was a matter of minutes away, and as soon as I say, “Hello?” I hear in a very peppy tone, “ARE YOU NERVOUS?!!”
Well, I wasn’t “nervous”, but I was suddenly wondering if I *should* be… and then I actually WAS nervous. That probably wasn’t the best choice of words to use with me at that time… it was a little on the steamrollerish side. Now there’s nothing wrong with upbeat, high-energy… the girl was very lovely, and seemed nice. Maybe it was that first beat that just jarred me off the mood… but since I’ve been out of it for awhile… I don’t want to be steamrolled with a “fantastic, high-energy, extreme Type A personality”… I want the first meeting to be a little on the mellow side. Relaxed, non-pressure… because I’m not wanting to give any pressure, and I’m not looking FOR any pressure. Show me your Type-A personality LATER. For now… take a breath, please.
I do understand that talking about a “dry spell” can start to sound like one is a bit on the desperate side. Hell, I’ve even stopped myself and tried to contemplate if I was in fact being “desperate”. But I think that if I was desperate… I would have probably gone for one of the SteamRollerGirls, or still be in a Binary Courtship with one of the “Never Actually Meet” ones.
I think I *am* desperate… for good conversation. Doesn’t have to be witty, or super-intelligent… you don’t have to be a worldly, well-traveled, go-getter. Just be someone I can talk to. Someone who can be genuine over a cup of hot cocoa… who smiles only when she’s happy. Who knows how to listen… I mean REALLY Listen… and knows how to be listened to.
These days, I don’t get to talk to my friends as much as I like… the ones that are good to talk to, especially. And I actually miss going to therapy… it was so nice to have someone that just listened to you, without giving judgment, advice, or just waiting for a pause so they could talk.
I’m desperate for someone to trust. Because I’ve been having such a hard time doing so for so long.
When I was growing up here in New England, I had so much difficulty finding someone to date.
Then I moved to California… and it got HARDER. Almost a whole new culture to get used to. Then Southern California got even harder than that.
Now I’m back in New England… and it feels harder than ever. Is it my age, my personality, or just too used to Los Angeles? I can’t meet people the “regular way”. I can’t go to bars… I don’t drink. And yes, I’ve tried going to a bar and not drinking. It doesn’t work. The alcohol is actually the noun and verb that brings people together. It makes them vulnerable (in a sense). When I’m vulnerable, I don’t like interacting with people that AREN’T vulnerable themselves. I feel like they have an unfair advantage. I can only imagine that’s a subconscious reason why I’m usually left to my own there.
I’m alone… my destination seems so far off… and I keep hitting delays, detours and speed bumps. Any wonder I feel “Lost”?
Oh yeah… the title. Probably should make some kind of sense of that, huh?
Well… I’m trying to remain hopeful. I force myself to smile and constantly look forward to the future and TRY to remain upbeat about it, no matter how hard it gets, no matter how much disapproval I get from those that disagree with my plan… all of that. Though sometimes it feels that I’m barely hanging on, I have to keep doing it. And to help I try and keep some “inspirational” bits of philosophy around me that are always within sight.
And my inspiration sometimes comes from odd places. Because us true philosophers… True “Lovers of Wisdom” know that you don’t always have to look at Kant, Kierkegaard, Plato, Nietzsche, or whoever to get the best words of wisdom… you take them wherever you find them.
And one of my favorites comes from Jhonen Vasquez, a writer and comic artist who created “Johnny the Homicidal Maniac”… a very bloody, satirical comic book.
A lot of people have told me their own favorite parts of the book… such as “Dear Die-ary, I appear to be dead.” Or other such macabre gag. But my favorite comes at the very end. On the last page… in fact, it’s the last thing written, and frankly, the whole point of the story that Vasquez wrote. And its something I agree with completely… and will leave this blog entry on that. It’s not funny, it’s not bloody or disgusting… its just correct. It helps keep me going, and actually hopeful for the New Year, and that I can make 2008 better than 2007 and 2006.
Here it is.
“Dear Die-ary,
There’s nothing terribly wrong with feeling Lost, so long as that feeling precedes some plan on your part to actually do something about it.
Too often a person grows complacent with their disillusionment, perpetually wearing their “discomfort” like a favorite shirt.
I can’t say I’m very pleased with where my life is just now…
But I can’t help but look forward to where it’s going.”
-Jhonen Vasquez
“Johhny the Homicidal Maniac”
Happy New Year. Take care of yourself, and someone else.
11.21.2007
I'm Having Fat Days
Now truth be told, I’m not fat.
I’ll be the first to admit I don’t have a 6-pack stomach… never have. Though, when I was a little kid, I was so thin you could count my ribs. (Which, in retrospect, was probably a tad disgusting and a sign of malnutrition… but I digress) Then, when my family moved and I entered 6th grade (or as I called it: The 1st Circle of Hell)… I had trouble making friends. I became a shy loner (another topic for another blog)… and in lieu of “hanging out” after school or on weekends… I watched TV and snacked.
I never got disgustingly roly-poly… but I did get a belly. I sure wasn’t going to be earning any letter-jackets (always thought they looked silly anyway). I didn’t discover any me-friendly after-school activities until the 5th Circle of Hell… and didn’t find reasons to feel good about myself until I went away to college. (Not saying the reasons weren’t there… I just didn’t find them) Yeah… I got bullied at school… but also got some at home. Such is the perils of being the youngest of 3 boys…. Didn’t want to be at school, and I didn’t want to be home.
Part of which… because I felt fat.
I’m going to refer to my 2 elder siblings as A-hole 1 and A-hole 2. Not to paint them as the epitome of Scum… there are times they’ve both, collectively and separately, been very decent. I’m referring to them that way for 3 reasons: 1) To keep my theme of anonymity on this blog. 2) When it popped in my head, it sounded like something from Dr. Seuss:
“Would you like to see something
Dumber than the slime on your shoe?
Then let me introduce my brothers…
A-hole 1 and A-hole 2.”
And 3) On this subject… especially back then… they WERE complete and total assholes.
It sure felt like they took it as their personal hobby to make my life miserable. I dreaded hearing them walk into the room, because I knew I was going to be insulted. More often than not I was right. What seemed like one of their favorites (especially A-hole 1) was calling me “Fat”.
“Hey Tubby, how are those sit-ups working for you?”
“Mmmm… that looks nice and fattening.”
“God, I can hear you gain weight.”
Like I said, I wasn’t fat… there were kids much bigger in girth than I who were still considered part of the “Beautiful People” crowd. So I kept telling myself AND the two A-holes, “I am not fat!”
But what I knew and what I felt… were apparently 2 different things.
I’m sure they would defend themselves by saying they were “trying to help me”. Perhaps that was their idea of motivation; “If he hates hearing it… he’ll lose the weight, so we’ll stop saying it.” But in the several years of using that 1 tactic… it never worked. Looking back on it now, it especially amazes me as that most people, when something doesn’t work… they try another approach. A different one. They change tactics. There are only 2 types of people that will continue to do the SAME thing and expect a different result. The Insane… and the Incredibly Stupid.
No, insulting me never did motivate me to working out. Though, to his credit, A-hole 1 did try to take me out to the garage to work out with him on his weight set… and I’ve never found “working out” to be more Uninteresting. It just wasn’t fun. I did try to honestly get into it… but eventually A-hole 1 would say something insulting (possibly unintentionally) and then the whole thing wouldn’t feel like a “new” approach… but rather a variation on the old one. And a healthy habit would not be formed. And I would go back to feeling fat.
Feeling fat and Being fat are two different things. How else do you explain the mindset of supermodel wannabes the size of sticks looking at themselves and saying, “I’m so fat!”?
When you feel fat… you feel weak. Emotionally and physically. You don’t think you have the tools, the ability, or the right to defend yourself… so when you’re attacked, you do what every Military general does when they realize they are out-gunned, out-manned, out-powered, out-flanked… they retreat. And when the attack is pressed, they keep retreating… until there’s no where to retreat to. And that’s where they get annihilated.
I retreated. Into my room… into myself. I didn’t feel like I was being “helped”… I felt like I was being attacked. My only ally was my cat who loved me for me… and who witnessed many tears before I went to sleep. My family just thought I was anti-social for no reason.
Sometimes, when I’m feeling particularly morbid… I wonder how I actually managed to survive that time through the “7 Circles of Hell”. And I don’t say “survive” to be metaphoric.
When I was left alone at college on that first day… and I was on my own… I felt such a wave of relief over me, I’m surprised I didn’t burst into tears, I was so happy. I soon made friends… REAL friends, not study-hall-acquaintances… friends that I’m still in touch with 13+ years later. I quickly got involved with my major and department… and the extra-curricular activities that went with it. I was going full-force, running myself practically ragged (and keep in mind, I wasn’t a “partier”. I never drank or smoked or anything like that) and I was loving every minute of it. During Winter Break… there was a short session of classes and activities before the Spring Semester began, but most people stayed home. That 1st year, I spent it at home… and hated it. For every other Winter Break, I made sure I was involved in something that required me to be there soon after Christmas.
I was getting at school 2 things I felt I had never gotten before… Encouragement… and Opportunity. Even if I failed at a task… it still felt good to not be berated for doing so, but rather a “we’ll do better next time”. That’s a much better environment to be in.
And I have no idea if I lost weight. I got my last little “growth nudge” of that inch that got me to 5’11”… but I don’t think my weight changed. To tell the truth, I didn’t weigh myself for a good few years going. I had other things going on that mattered more to me.
And I think I was actually eating healthier… especially when I started cooking on my own. I don’t know if I was losing weight… but I sure wasn’t gaining any. When I went to California (the fact that I had an opportunity to go to a place 3,600 miles away from “Hell” sure didn’t hurt my decision), I probably got healthier habits… never before realizing how tasty Spinach, Collard Greens, Asparagus, Avocado, Artichoke, etc… could be.
And during one Spring Break, visiting friends in Los Angeles for the first time, something happened. I was feeling REALLY good about myself… I was doing great at Grad School, I had some plays I wrote that were going to be produced at another college in L.A., and I had my hair colored blonde just for the hell of it. It was like the start of a make-over… and then, for no reason really… I picked up a couple of weights and started to do a little working out.
And… I actually found it FUN.
I did it more… and more often. I was actually finding it FUN and enjoyable. I realized that all the times I had been hearing, “working out will make you feel better about yourself”… were WRONG.
Feeling better about myself… made me start working out.
Suddenly, I found what was missing from all those failed work-out attempts back on the other coast. I wasn’t doing it to impress anybody… I just did it because I wanted to… and I was having fun with it.
And there was a noticeable difference. I got into a nice habit with it, and at the start of the next Fall, after a summer of this… people were noticing that my arms were a little bigger, and more defined. I still didn’t have a six-pack stomach… nor was it really flat… but I didn’t have a problem with taking my shirt off. And seeing as how I was about to do a show that required me to run around in a Loincloth… that quality helped. But it turned out, I actually GAINED 10 lbs… but it was muscle, and I was trimmer than I ever had been. So, I was feeling pretty good about my own body.
Don’t know if the family noticed any differences when I came home for Xmas… but if they did, they didn’t say anything. Either they didn’t want to compliment me… or didn’t care to see anything different from what they knew, and didn’t. Who knows. I had long stopped caring, so not hearing anything didn’t bother me. (Which in some ways, may be a tragedy unto itself)
After Grad School ended, I tried to keep a work-out schedule going… but it didn’t always happen. I think it became one of those things where “life got in the way”… and I was still happy where my life was… even if I was doing the “starving artist” thing.
The only real big change in my weight… came when I got sick 2 years ago. The time that laid me up something fierce. I couldn’t keep anything down, went on a liquid diet for a few straight weeks… nothing but misery. When I finally got on the medication that worked, and I started to recover… they found I had gone down to 138 lbs.
Sweet Screaming Jeebus, I haven’t been 138 lbs since Freshman Year of High School! When I was 5’3”!!! That’s not the BEST way to lose weight… and I don’t recommend it.
After a few months, I was doing better getting that weight back to a healthier place. But from losing all that weight so fast… I also lost some muscle mass. So I was gaining the weight back… but it wasn’t the kind I wanted. I found it difficult to get to the Gym again… my self-esteem had taken a bit of a drop. (Being cheated-on does that to you) And after a VERY rough year all-around and in many areas of life… I decided to take a break from Los Angeles… and I came back home to be with family.
I often wonder if I made a mistake.
So, I’m back up to my normal weight… and then some. I even went up one pant size. I’m none too happy about that… but I also don’t think it’s a big deal. It doesn’t change the person I am… and that’s a damn good person, thankyouverymuch (if I do say so myself). Sure I don’t have a fantastic high-paying job as a corporate drone, nor am I around my closest friends all the time… but I’m still hopeful life will improve. It’ll take little baby steps… for my physicality AND professionally. I try to remind myself often… to keep me going to save that money to continue making the art I left behind… only now controlling it all myself.
And it turns out I *have* to remind myself often, because the other day, A-hole 2 said to me, “You’re eating THAT? Hold on, let me see what’s in this… oooh, just what a growing boy needs. You know that’s thoroughly unhealthy for you, right? And how are those sit-ups working for you?”
Now, I find it an incredible amount of self-control on MY part to not smash the small bowl of melted Velveeta I was stirring for my broccoli, right in his A-holish face. I couldn’t believe he was using the SAME TACTICS from 15 years ago!!! Hell… the same WORDS!!! I tried to push it off (again), saying, “Yeah, sure. Very funny.” And when he kept it up, I (understandably, I think) got a little pissy, saying, “Thank you! You can shut up now.”
And A-hole 2 does what A-hole 2 usually does when I start to get agitated at him. “What’s the problem? Why are you getting upset?”… said in a stern tone.
If I tell him, “it’s because you’re being an asshole.” He gets defensive… saying how he was just kidding… only “joking around” and how *I’m* the bad guy for being “too sensitive about it”… and how he didn’t mean anything by it.
Fine, maybe I’m the bad guy. I’ll be A-hole 3, gladly. But maybe… just maybe… I’m not.
I know I’m sensitive. Too sensitive for most of my family’s tastes, that’s for sure.
But being “too sensitive” is not something I’m going to apologize for.
It is fairly hard for most people to insult me intentionally. It is VERY easy for someone to insult me accidentally. My family seems to have mastered both of these aspects.
But 1 thing that none of them seem to have mastered… is differentiating between INTENTIONS and ACTIONS. What you do… and how its interpreted by someone else… can be wildly different.
If he’s just “joking around”, and I’m getting upset… maybe I am too sensitive. Or maybe… just maybe… his words are being “misinterpreted” (to put it kindly)… and if they’re being “misinterpreted” so often… maybe he’s just not as articulate and concise as he thinks he is.
Or maybe he hasn’t figured out that those are sentiments and implications that I … JUST… DON’T… CARE…TO… HEAR. Under ANY circumstances.
Or he doesn’t care.
You’d think that if you know something upsets someone you’re supposed to be close to… you’d be savvy enough to NOT do it or say it.
Yet when he asks, "What's the problem?"... I *can't* explain it. Because its the kind of thing that if you can't figure it out... explaining doesn't do any good.
He sees it as me just pulling away from the family again. I see it as another reason to not like him. I’ve never felt so far away from my “immediate family”. We were closer when I was 4,000 miles away.
So is this an exploration of my own self-esteem… or of my contempt for immediate family? *shrug* Maybe a little of both. Ultimately, I can only take responsibility for myself… so while I may be able to see the beginnings and sources of my hang-ups… throwing blame won’t do any good. What’s done is done. The family doesn’t seem to care to change… and I’m tired of changing to accommodate their NOT changing.
I think one day… I will find working-out to be fun again. I know I’m going through a rough time… and have been for awhile… but I still remain hopeful for myself. Hopeful that I’ll find happiness on MY terms. Because I’m NOT A-hole 3. I’m just me.
Maybe this “wedge” between me and my family will one day be completely cleared away. Maybe not. I lament the fact that I’m not closer to them… and I’ve tried. I’ve tried to be “not so sensitive”… and it doesn’t work. What that means for the future… for my future family and children… I don’t know.
I can only ever come halfway.
I’ll be the first to admit I don’t have a 6-pack stomach… never have. Though, when I was a little kid, I was so thin you could count my ribs. (Which, in retrospect, was probably a tad disgusting and a sign of malnutrition… but I digress) Then, when my family moved and I entered 6th grade (or as I called it: The 1st Circle of Hell)… I had trouble making friends. I became a shy loner (another topic for another blog)… and in lieu of “hanging out” after school or on weekends… I watched TV and snacked.
I never got disgustingly roly-poly… but I did get a belly. I sure wasn’t going to be earning any letter-jackets (always thought they looked silly anyway). I didn’t discover any me-friendly after-school activities until the 5th Circle of Hell… and didn’t find reasons to feel good about myself until I went away to college. (Not saying the reasons weren’t there… I just didn’t find them) Yeah… I got bullied at school… but also got some at home. Such is the perils of being the youngest of 3 boys…. Didn’t want to be at school, and I didn’t want to be home.
Part of which… because I felt fat.
I’m going to refer to my 2 elder siblings as A-hole 1 and A-hole 2. Not to paint them as the epitome of Scum… there are times they’ve both, collectively and separately, been very decent. I’m referring to them that way for 3 reasons: 1) To keep my theme of anonymity on this blog. 2) When it popped in my head, it sounded like something from Dr. Seuss:
“Would you like to see something
Dumber than the slime on your shoe?
Then let me introduce my brothers…
A-hole 1 and A-hole 2.”
And 3) On this subject… especially back then… they WERE complete and total assholes.
It sure felt like they took it as their personal hobby to make my life miserable. I dreaded hearing them walk into the room, because I knew I was going to be insulted. More often than not I was right. What seemed like one of their favorites (especially A-hole 1) was calling me “Fat”.
“Hey Tubby, how are those sit-ups working for you?”
“Mmmm… that looks nice and fattening.”
“God, I can hear you gain weight.”
Like I said, I wasn’t fat… there were kids much bigger in girth than I who were still considered part of the “Beautiful People” crowd. So I kept telling myself AND the two A-holes, “I am not fat!”
But what I knew and what I felt… were apparently 2 different things.
I’m sure they would defend themselves by saying they were “trying to help me”. Perhaps that was their idea of motivation; “If he hates hearing it… he’ll lose the weight, so we’ll stop saying it.” But in the several years of using that 1 tactic… it never worked. Looking back on it now, it especially amazes me as that most people, when something doesn’t work… they try another approach. A different one. They change tactics. There are only 2 types of people that will continue to do the SAME thing and expect a different result. The Insane… and the Incredibly Stupid.
No, insulting me never did motivate me to working out. Though, to his credit, A-hole 1 did try to take me out to the garage to work out with him on his weight set… and I’ve never found “working out” to be more Uninteresting. It just wasn’t fun. I did try to honestly get into it… but eventually A-hole 1 would say something insulting (possibly unintentionally) and then the whole thing wouldn’t feel like a “new” approach… but rather a variation on the old one. And a healthy habit would not be formed. And I would go back to feeling fat.
Feeling fat and Being fat are two different things. How else do you explain the mindset of supermodel wannabes the size of sticks looking at themselves and saying, “I’m so fat!”?
When you feel fat… you feel weak. Emotionally and physically. You don’t think you have the tools, the ability, or the right to defend yourself… so when you’re attacked, you do what every Military general does when they realize they are out-gunned, out-manned, out-powered, out-flanked… they retreat. And when the attack is pressed, they keep retreating… until there’s no where to retreat to. And that’s where they get annihilated.
I retreated. Into my room… into myself. I didn’t feel like I was being “helped”… I felt like I was being attacked. My only ally was my cat who loved me for me… and who witnessed many tears before I went to sleep. My family just thought I was anti-social for no reason.
Sometimes, when I’m feeling particularly morbid… I wonder how I actually managed to survive that time through the “7 Circles of Hell”. And I don’t say “survive” to be metaphoric.
When I was left alone at college on that first day… and I was on my own… I felt such a wave of relief over me, I’m surprised I didn’t burst into tears, I was so happy. I soon made friends… REAL friends, not study-hall-acquaintances… friends that I’m still in touch with 13+ years later. I quickly got involved with my major and department… and the extra-curricular activities that went with it. I was going full-force, running myself practically ragged (and keep in mind, I wasn’t a “partier”. I never drank or smoked or anything like that) and I was loving every minute of it. During Winter Break… there was a short session of classes and activities before the Spring Semester began, but most people stayed home. That 1st year, I spent it at home… and hated it. For every other Winter Break, I made sure I was involved in something that required me to be there soon after Christmas.
I was getting at school 2 things I felt I had never gotten before… Encouragement… and Opportunity. Even if I failed at a task… it still felt good to not be berated for doing so, but rather a “we’ll do better next time”. That’s a much better environment to be in.
And I have no idea if I lost weight. I got my last little “growth nudge” of that inch that got me to 5’11”… but I don’t think my weight changed. To tell the truth, I didn’t weigh myself for a good few years going. I had other things going on that mattered more to me.
And I think I was actually eating healthier… especially when I started cooking on my own. I don’t know if I was losing weight… but I sure wasn’t gaining any. When I went to California (the fact that I had an opportunity to go to a place 3,600 miles away from “Hell” sure didn’t hurt my decision), I probably got healthier habits… never before realizing how tasty Spinach, Collard Greens, Asparagus, Avocado, Artichoke, etc… could be.
And during one Spring Break, visiting friends in Los Angeles for the first time, something happened. I was feeling REALLY good about myself… I was doing great at Grad School, I had some plays I wrote that were going to be produced at another college in L.A., and I had my hair colored blonde just for the hell of it. It was like the start of a make-over… and then, for no reason really… I picked up a couple of weights and started to do a little working out.
And… I actually found it FUN.
I did it more… and more often. I was actually finding it FUN and enjoyable. I realized that all the times I had been hearing, “working out will make you feel better about yourself”… were WRONG.
Feeling better about myself… made me start working out.
Suddenly, I found what was missing from all those failed work-out attempts back on the other coast. I wasn’t doing it to impress anybody… I just did it because I wanted to… and I was having fun with it.
And there was a noticeable difference. I got into a nice habit with it, and at the start of the next Fall, after a summer of this… people were noticing that my arms were a little bigger, and more defined. I still didn’t have a six-pack stomach… nor was it really flat… but I didn’t have a problem with taking my shirt off. And seeing as how I was about to do a show that required me to run around in a Loincloth… that quality helped. But it turned out, I actually GAINED 10 lbs… but it was muscle, and I was trimmer than I ever had been. So, I was feeling pretty good about my own body.
Don’t know if the family noticed any differences when I came home for Xmas… but if they did, they didn’t say anything. Either they didn’t want to compliment me… or didn’t care to see anything different from what they knew, and didn’t. Who knows. I had long stopped caring, so not hearing anything didn’t bother me. (Which in some ways, may be a tragedy unto itself)
After Grad School ended, I tried to keep a work-out schedule going… but it didn’t always happen. I think it became one of those things where “life got in the way”… and I was still happy where my life was… even if I was doing the “starving artist” thing.
The only real big change in my weight… came when I got sick 2 years ago. The time that laid me up something fierce. I couldn’t keep anything down, went on a liquid diet for a few straight weeks… nothing but misery. When I finally got on the medication that worked, and I started to recover… they found I had gone down to 138 lbs.
Sweet Screaming Jeebus, I haven’t been 138 lbs since Freshman Year of High School! When I was 5’3”!!! That’s not the BEST way to lose weight… and I don’t recommend it.
After a few months, I was doing better getting that weight back to a healthier place. But from losing all that weight so fast… I also lost some muscle mass. So I was gaining the weight back… but it wasn’t the kind I wanted. I found it difficult to get to the Gym again… my self-esteem had taken a bit of a drop. (Being cheated-on does that to you) And after a VERY rough year all-around and in many areas of life… I decided to take a break from Los Angeles… and I came back home to be with family.
I often wonder if I made a mistake.
So, I’m back up to my normal weight… and then some. I even went up one pant size. I’m none too happy about that… but I also don’t think it’s a big deal. It doesn’t change the person I am… and that’s a damn good person, thankyouverymuch (if I do say so myself). Sure I don’t have a fantastic high-paying job as a corporate drone, nor am I around my closest friends all the time… but I’m still hopeful life will improve. It’ll take little baby steps… for my physicality AND professionally. I try to remind myself often… to keep me going to save that money to continue making the art I left behind… only now controlling it all myself.
And it turns out I *have* to remind myself often, because the other day, A-hole 2 said to me, “You’re eating THAT? Hold on, let me see what’s in this… oooh, just what a growing boy needs. You know that’s thoroughly unhealthy for you, right? And how are those sit-ups working for you?”
Now, I find it an incredible amount of self-control on MY part to not smash the small bowl of melted Velveeta I was stirring for my broccoli, right in his A-holish face. I couldn’t believe he was using the SAME TACTICS from 15 years ago!!! Hell… the same WORDS!!! I tried to push it off (again), saying, “Yeah, sure. Very funny.” And when he kept it up, I (understandably, I think) got a little pissy, saying, “Thank you! You can shut up now.”
And A-hole 2 does what A-hole 2 usually does when I start to get agitated at him. “What’s the problem? Why are you getting upset?”… said in a stern tone.
If I tell him, “it’s because you’re being an asshole.” He gets defensive… saying how he was just kidding… only “joking around” and how *I’m* the bad guy for being “too sensitive about it”… and how he didn’t mean anything by it.
Fine, maybe I’m the bad guy. I’ll be A-hole 3, gladly. But maybe… just maybe… I’m not.
I know I’m sensitive. Too sensitive for most of my family’s tastes, that’s for sure.
But being “too sensitive” is not something I’m going to apologize for.
It is fairly hard for most people to insult me intentionally. It is VERY easy for someone to insult me accidentally. My family seems to have mastered both of these aspects.
But 1 thing that none of them seem to have mastered… is differentiating between INTENTIONS and ACTIONS. What you do… and how its interpreted by someone else… can be wildly different.
If he’s just “joking around”, and I’m getting upset… maybe I am too sensitive. Or maybe… just maybe… his words are being “misinterpreted” (to put it kindly)… and if they’re being “misinterpreted” so often… maybe he’s just not as articulate and concise as he thinks he is.
Or maybe he hasn’t figured out that those are sentiments and implications that I … JUST… DON’T… CARE…TO… HEAR. Under ANY circumstances.
Or he doesn’t care.
You’d think that if you know something upsets someone you’re supposed to be close to… you’d be savvy enough to NOT do it or say it.
Yet when he asks, "What's the problem?"... I *can't* explain it. Because its the kind of thing that if you can't figure it out... explaining doesn't do any good.
He sees it as me just pulling away from the family again. I see it as another reason to not like him. I’ve never felt so far away from my “immediate family”. We were closer when I was 4,000 miles away.
So is this an exploration of my own self-esteem… or of my contempt for immediate family? *shrug* Maybe a little of both. Ultimately, I can only take responsibility for myself… so while I may be able to see the beginnings and sources of my hang-ups… throwing blame won’t do any good. What’s done is done. The family doesn’t seem to care to change… and I’m tired of changing to accommodate their NOT changing.
I think one day… I will find working-out to be fun again. I know I’m going through a rough time… and have been for awhile… but I still remain hopeful for myself. Hopeful that I’ll find happiness on MY terms. Because I’m NOT A-hole 3. I’m just me.
Maybe this “wedge” between me and my family will one day be completely cleared away. Maybe not. I lament the fact that I’m not closer to them… and I’ve tried. I’ve tried to be “not so sensitive”… and it doesn’t work. What that means for the future… for my future family and children… I don’t know.
I can only ever come halfway.
11.01.2007
Reflections on Hallows Eve...
I love Halloween. I always have… people that know me would not be surprised by this. Yet, for some reason, I don’t think I’m enjoying Halloween as much as I used to. Now, the last 2 Halloweens have flat-out sucked for me… but through no fault of anyone’s, really. One was surrounded by personal drama, and the other, I just didn’t get much of a chance to do anything for it. Oh well… c’est la vie. I’ve had bad Halloweens before, so I always just looked forward to the next year.
I’m not saying I had a BAD Halloween this time around… it was actually okay. For the first time since 1998, I’ve been in New England for Halloween. And in my opinion it’s the absolute best place to be at this time of year. For one, the Autumn leaves are all changing colors, lots of orange, red, yellow leaves around… and it is very pretty. There is a reason people come to see the leaves change, and it’s a good reason. But it also helps provide a nice backdrop to the idea of “Halloween”… there are many areas throughout the whole 6-state region where you actually feel like you’re living in a horror film. There is a VERY good reason why Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft set most of their stories in New England.
This year… I went with some friends to Salem, Massachusetts. Now, logic would tell you that it is the perfect place to be for Halloween. The site of the Salem Witch Trials… all that creepy history… what would be better? Well… this time around… “Logic” is arguable. I think it depends on what you want out of Halloween to figure out if Salem is a great place to go or not. Cause I’m not so sure it’s the place for me anymore.
I’d been there once before… back in 1998… my last Halloween in New England before moving to California. The friend I went with back then had her boyfriend coming into town that night through Boston… so we didn’t stay THAT long in Salem before heading out to South Station to pick him up. But there were literally hundreds of thousands of people all walking around in costume. They shut off all traffic through several streets because there are so many people walking around. It really is a sight to see. The other place I would say is comparable to it is Halloween in West Hollywood… with probably just as many people walking around in costume. The primary difference is that in West Hollywood… most of the costumes are people in Drag.
The only personal qualm I have with THAT has nothing to do with the fact that they’re in Drag… it’s the fact that most of the people there dress in Drag *anyway*… you know, they’re practicing transvestites… so doing it for Halloween is redundant, and just an excuse to do what they do on a normal night out… just with more participants. Halloween is more than that, frankly. I’ve always seen it as an opportunity to dress as something DIFFERENT. To look how you normally wouldn’t look. And preferably… it should also be scary. While dressing in drag might make you scary in several parts of the Midwest… I myself think you can try a little harder. But that’s just me. Anyhoo…
One of the first things we encountered, was the creepiest thing we saw all day or night... I thought. The parking lot attendant. No… he wasn’t dressed in costume. Just an older gentleman sitting by a sign that advertised $10 dollar parking. We pulled in, and he approached us saying meekly and with a very wobbly voice, “You guys know that we charge for parking here?” No problem with that… we knew as we were pulling in… but then I noticed that he had that “just off the medication” look in his eyes and was constantly, blatantly ogling the females in our group… most of whom were dressed pretty conservatively. Hell, they could be dressed as Eskimoes, and this guy still would have been overly-excited. THAT creeped the hell out of me. *shudder* Eww….
Salem was very much like the last time. Roads closed off… hundreds of thousands of people… vendor kiosks all over the place… police driving around these nifty little scooters (okay, they didn’t have *those* last time, but they were neat.)… generally speaking, it was one big party. It kinda surprised me how many stores there were with the “Witch” or a Spooky theme to them… and I’m not talking about the temporary kiosks that people put up… I mean the PERMANENT stores and fixtures. Sweet Jeebus, there were a lot of them… and I *was* expecting several of them, but by gum, that was a LOT. I also know there are several places where practicing Pagans and Wiccans and whatnot gather for their own little ceremony, to pay tribute to all those that were victims in the Salem Witch Trials, etc.
Now… something about that bugs me. Really just on a conceptual level. For one… if you want to talk history… back then, the spot of what is now Salem, Massachusetts… all the way up to around Meredith, NH… (a good 100 mile stretch or so)… that was ALL “Salem, Massachusetts”. So the place where we think the Trials took place… most likely they DIDN’T take place right there. Secondly, I’ve yet to see any evidence that showed that anyone who was executed as a witch from that time… was ACTUALLY a witch. You see, back then… if you accused someone of being a witch, and they were convicted… you got their land. And they pretty much had a 100% conviction rate… due in large part to the “court of public opinion” (all too influenced by gossip)… so if someone said you were a Witch… face it, you’re screwed with no way to defend yourself. So, if some guy was eyeing a nice piece of real estate, and the young widow/single woman didn’t react to your advances for marriage… you call her a Witch, you get her farm. And not just women… men too. No one was safe, quite frankly. If they WERE witches… you could at least say, “Well, it was against the law to be a witch, so they were just acting in accordance to the law.” In which case, you simply say, “The Law Blows”, and we say, “Yeah, they figured that out… that’s why they changed it.” But if they were never breaking any law to begin with… well, that seems a little more heinous to me.
Either way, it’s pretty F-ed up, I’m sure everyone will agree… but now looking at today… with the majority of the town industry being BASED around the perception of these trials (not even the facts)… just seemed kind of… I guess “Sell-out” would be the term. Even all these “spiritual tributes” from modern-day witches (as nice as the idea behind them is)… seems kind of pointless if the accused were never even witches themselves. But I’m always willing to be wrong.
I guess I was expecting/hoping to see something that basically said, “Yeah, our town has this bloody history… so once a year we break it out on Halloween night and try to have a fun time. You know, turn a negative into a positive. Why Halloween? Well, it seemed appropriate.” But to realize that people are trying to cash in on this every day of the year… Yeah, that’s where I start to think “Sell-out”.
But having the Halloween celebration there, despite all this… is not a bad thing. Hell… *I* went. Twice. And it is really a sight to see… so many people in costume. Just the logistics of the gathering is worth seeing. And a lot of people do put some imagination into their costumes… some go all out with the blood and gore, etc… and others… not so much.
You know, on one level, there is *nothing* wrong with “Sexy” costumes… dressing as a sexy nurse, sexy cop, sexy firefighter, sexy army girl, sexy cowgirl, sexy cabaret dancer, sexy schoolgirl, sexy sexy, sexy Nintendo character, sexy hand-lotion… whatever. The (large) part of me that appreciates the female form will admire happily… but I will STILL make one complaint: Not scary.
Though what IS scary is when parents who are accompanying their children to things like this… Letting their 7 year old dress as a sexy/slutty nurse… is F-ing wrong. Just flat-out. I believe that as a general rule for ANY girl whose outfit title contains the word “Sexy”… they shouldn’t wear it unless they’re old enough and big enough so that if they aim for the genitals of sexual assailant… they will double him over, not annoy him. Hell, there should just be a plain test for women… you’re not allowed to wear a slutty outfit, unless you know how to throw a solid punch. Because while freedom of fashion is important… it WILL eventually bring unpleasant consequences… so unless you’re equipped to deal with those consequences, don’t go asking for trouble. Common sense, people!
Alright, alright… coming off the soapbox…
Kids dressing as sluts… it’s like the creepy parking attendant… scary in the wrong way. And Halloween has to be about SCARY. I truly believe that.
I love horror movies… I always have. Truth be told… I hate real-life violence. I’m not crazy about the sight of blood. I don’t like needles. I generally avoid fights, and I’m more apt to put a spider outside than squash it. But I’m fascinated by horror stories and horror films. I think its because it’s a “safe violence”… an artistic expression that helps get frustrations out. Its such a powerful form of art, because someone ELSE can feel expressed or cleansed from witnessing a presentation of that art… the art of horror. If you’re pissed off about something… so much so that you feel the need to hit something… sometimes watching a violent or horror movie can relieve that. It gives and performs the revenge that we wish we could give ourselves… and no one really gets hurt in the end. And all you have to do… is sit and watch it. It releases an “active” urge in a “passive” way.
It can also actively engage your imagination… by NOT showing you certain things. The great filmmakers always knew this. They let your mind fill in the blanks, and next thing you know, you’re in an adrenaline rush of fear… and you never physically moved. Your heart is pumping, you’re breathing quicker… experiencing the thrill of an adventure and danger you’ll thankfully never have yourself.
Some of the best horror movies… are the ones that do just this… and they DON’T show you any blood or gore. One of my favorites, and what I think is one of the best horror movies every made… is The Haunting (the b&w original from 1963). There’s not a drop of blood anywhere in that movie… just story and atmosphere all the way through.
And I think that’s what was missing for me from Salem… Atmosphere. A dark, ominous, moody background… a set stage for a good scary story. Salem is… well… commercial. Stores, kiosks, sausage and pizza vendors, port-o-potties and TOO many people. Really… it was overwhelming. We even left fairly early, and it was getting hard to walk there. And when I think of my favorite horror movies… it was always involving small groups of people… even singular people. It plays on the theme of isolation… being all alone. 400,000 people walking around 1 town at the same time… conceptually doesn’t seem very “isolated”. No real spooky Halloween-type horrors can happen to you when you’re surrounded by people. Even obnoxious drunk ones.
Which becomes ANOTHER qualm of mine. St. Patrick’s Day is for drinking… it was a whole holiday set aside for getting blitzed. So people that use Halloween as just another excuse for getting drunk… doesn’t impress me. Its like the excuse to dress “sexy”. Nothing wrong with it, whatever gets you your Slack. Go for it… Free Country. For me personally… I like to think there’s *more* to it. You can get drunk anyday… this is a day to get “Scared”.
Maybe I consider Halloween to be a chance to actually BE in a horror film… to experience that type of amazing extreme adventure that we can’t get in this world. Not only a chance to imagine going against the fantastic and unknown… but to act out being in it.
That could be why I have such a hard time making Halloween costumes for myself. I didn’t even dress up this year. I put on a “Day of the Dead” shirt I have, loaded up my camera, and just wanted to be a spectator and people-watcher. I always LOVE doing decorations… and being in and making environments to walk through and experience… but dressing up… that won’t scare ME. And if I were in those extreme supernatural situations… I wouldn’t be wearing an annoying, cold, constrictive costume with smelly cream makeup on my face… I would be… Me.
Maybe that’s it… I don’t want to scare. I want to BE scared.
I think the best Halloween I ever had… was very simple. While I did dress up that year, I kept it very simple… and I sat around with a small group of friends, and we told scary stories. I was in undergraduate college… and its one of the fondest memories I have. Even though I was asked to read the most stories (being the “actor”)… telling them was still a way to live through them… and experience those stories like all of those friends that were there to listen. I loved every second of it.
So, I don’t think Salem is for me. Maybe I’ll go back next year… who knows? But right now, I know what I’d prefer… a cloudy night, with the moon peeking through… sitting by candlelight with a select few… reveling in the gloom… savoring the chills up your spine… feeling the heartbeat increase ever so slightly… and then laughing in relief along with good companions.
Yeah… simplicity is what it’s all about.
I’m not saying I had a BAD Halloween this time around… it was actually okay. For the first time since 1998, I’ve been in New England for Halloween. And in my opinion it’s the absolute best place to be at this time of year. For one, the Autumn leaves are all changing colors, lots of orange, red, yellow leaves around… and it is very pretty. There is a reason people come to see the leaves change, and it’s a good reason. But it also helps provide a nice backdrop to the idea of “Halloween”… there are many areas throughout the whole 6-state region where you actually feel like you’re living in a horror film. There is a VERY good reason why Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft set most of their stories in New England.
This year… I went with some friends to Salem, Massachusetts. Now, logic would tell you that it is the perfect place to be for Halloween. The site of the Salem Witch Trials… all that creepy history… what would be better? Well… this time around… “Logic” is arguable. I think it depends on what you want out of Halloween to figure out if Salem is a great place to go or not. Cause I’m not so sure it’s the place for me anymore.
I’d been there once before… back in 1998… my last Halloween in New England before moving to California. The friend I went with back then had her boyfriend coming into town that night through Boston… so we didn’t stay THAT long in Salem before heading out to South Station to pick him up. But there were literally hundreds of thousands of people all walking around in costume. They shut off all traffic through several streets because there are so many people walking around. It really is a sight to see. The other place I would say is comparable to it is Halloween in West Hollywood… with probably just as many people walking around in costume. The primary difference is that in West Hollywood… most of the costumes are people in Drag.
The only personal qualm I have with THAT has nothing to do with the fact that they’re in Drag… it’s the fact that most of the people there dress in Drag *anyway*… you know, they’re practicing transvestites… so doing it for Halloween is redundant, and just an excuse to do what they do on a normal night out… just with more participants. Halloween is more than that, frankly. I’ve always seen it as an opportunity to dress as something DIFFERENT. To look how you normally wouldn’t look. And preferably… it should also be scary. While dressing in drag might make you scary in several parts of the Midwest… I myself think you can try a little harder. But that’s just me. Anyhoo…
One of the first things we encountered, was the creepiest thing we saw all day or night... I thought. The parking lot attendant. No… he wasn’t dressed in costume. Just an older gentleman sitting by a sign that advertised $10 dollar parking. We pulled in, and he approached us saying meekly and with a very wobbly voice, “You guys know that we charge for parking here?” No problem with that… we knew as we were pulling in… but then I noticed that he had that “just off the medication” look in his eyes and was constantly, blatantly ogling the females in our group… most of whom were dressed pretty conservatively. Hell, they could be dressed as Eskimoes, and this guy still would have been overly-excited. THAT creeped the hell out of me. *shudder* Eww….
Salem was very much like the last time. Roads closed off… hundreds of thousands of people… vendor kiosks all over the place… police driving around these nifty little scooters (okay, they didn’t have *those* last time, but they were neat.)… generally speaking, it was one big party. It kinda surprised me how many stores there were with the “Witch” or a Spooky theme to them… and I’m not talking about the temporary kiosks that people put up… I mean the PERMANENT stores and fixtures. Sweet Jeebus, there were a lot of them… and I *was* expecting several of them, but by gum, that was a LOT. I also know there are several places where practicing Pagans and Wiccans and whatnot gather for their own little ceremony, to pay tribute to all those that were victims in the Salem Witch Trials, etc.
Now… something about that bugs me. Really just on a conceptual level. For one… if you want to talk history… back then, the spot of what is now Salem, Massachusetts… all the way up to around Meredith, NH… (a good 100 mile stretch or so)… that was ALL “Salem, Massachusetts”. So the place where we think the Trials took place… most likely they DIDN’T take place right there. Secondly, I’ve yet to see any evidence that showed that anyone who was executed as a witch from that time… was ACTUALLY a witch. You see, back then… if you accused someone of being a witch, and they were convicted… you got their land. And they pretty much had a 100% conviction rate… due in large part to the “court of public opinion” (all too influenced by gossip)… so if someone said you were a Witch… face it, you’re screwed with no way to defend yourself. So, if some guy was eyeing a nice piece of real estate, and the young widow/single woman didn’t react to your advances for marriage… you call her a Witch, you get her farm. And not just women… men too. No one was safe, quite frankly. If they WERE witches… you could at least say, “Well, it was against the law to be a witch, so they were just acting in accordance to the law.” In which case, you simply say, “The Law Blows”, and we say, “Yeah, they figured that out… that’s why they changed it.” But if they were never breaking any law to begin with… well, that seems a little more heinous to me.
Either way, it’s pretty F-ed up, I’m sure everyone will agree… but now looking at today… with the majority of the town industry being BASED around the perception of these trials (not even the facts)… just seemed kind of… I guess “Sell-out” would be the term. Even all these “spiritual tributes” from modern-day witches (as nice as the idea behind them is)… seems kind of pointless if the accused were never even witches themselves. But I’m always willing to be wrong.
I guess I was expecting/hoping to see something that basically said, “Yeah, our town has this bloody history… so once a year we break it out on Halloween night and try to have a fun time. You know, turn a negative into a positive. Why Halloween? Well, it seemed appropriate.” But to realize that people are trying to cash in on this every day of the year… Yeah, that’s where I start to think “Sell-out”.
But having the Halloween celebration there, despite all this… is not a bad thing. Hell… *I* went. Twice. And it is really a sight to see… so many people in costume. Just the logistics of the gathering is worth seeing. And a lot of people do put some imagination into their costumes… some go all out with the blood and gore, etc… and others… not so much.
You know, on one level, there is *nothing* wrong with “Sexy” costumes… dressing as a sexy nurse, sexy cop, sexy firefighter, sexy army girl, sexy cowgirl, sexy cabaret dancer, sexy schoolgirl, sexy sexy, sexy Nintendo character, sexy hand-lotion… whatever. The (large) part of me that appreciates the female form will admire happily… but I will STILL make one complaint: Not scary.
Though what IS scary is when parents who are accompanying their children to things like this… Letting their 7 year old dress as a sexy/slutty nurse… is F-ing wrong. Just flat-out. I believe that as a general rule for ANY girl whose outfit title contains the word “Sexy”… they shouldn’t wear it unless they’re old enough and big enough so that if they aim for the genitals of sexual assailant… they will double him over, not annoy him. Hell, there should just be a plain test for women… you’re not allowed to wear a slutty outfit, unless you know how to throw a solid punch. Because while freedom of fashion is important… it WILL eventually bring unpleasant consequences… so unless you’re equipped to deal with those consequences, don’t go asking for trouble. Common sense, people!
Alright, alright… coming off the soapbox…
Kids dressing as sluts… it’s like the creepy parking attendant… scary in the wrong way. And Halloween has to be about SCARY. I truly believe that.
I love horror movies… I always have. Truth be told… I hate real-life violence. I’m not crazy about the sight of blood. I don’t like needles. I generally avoid fights, and I’m more apt to put a spider outside than squash it. But I’m fascinated by horror stories and horror films. I think its because it’s a “safe violence”… an artistic expression that helps get frustrations out. Its such a powerful form of art, because someone ELSE can feel expressed or cleansed from witnessing a presentation of that art… the art of horror. If you’re pissed off about something… so much so that you feel the need to hit something… sometimes watching a violent or horror movie can relieve that. It gives and performs the revenge that we wish we could give ourselves… and no one really gets hurt in the end. And all you have to do… is sit and watch it. It releases an “active” urge in a “passive” way.
It can also actively engage your imagination… by NOT showing you certain things. The great filmmakers always knew this. They let your mind fill in the blanks, and next thing you know, you’re in an adrenaline rush of fear… and you never physically moved. Your heart is pumping, you’re breathing quicker… experiencing the thrill of an adventure and danger you’ll thankfully never have yourself.
Some of the best horror movies… are the ones that do just this… and they DON’T show you any blood or gore. One of my favorites, and what I think is one of the best horror movies every made… is The Haunting (the b&w original from 1963). There’s not a drop of blood anywhere in that movie… just story and atmosphere all the way through.
And I think that’s what was missing for me from Salem… Atmosphere. A dark, ominous, moody background… a set stage for a good scary story. Salem is… well… commercial. Stores, kiosks, sausage and pizza vendors, port-o-potties and TOO many people. Really… it was overwhelming. We even left fairly early, and it was getting hard to walk there. And when I think of my favorite horror movies… it was always involving small groups of people… even singular people. It plays on the theme of isolation… being all alone. 400,000 people walking around 1 town at the same time… conceptually doesn’t seem very “isolated”. No real spooky Halloween-type horrors can happen to you when you’re surrounded by people. Even obnoxious drunk ones.
Which becomes ANOTHER qualm of mine. St. Patrick’s Day is for drinking… it was a whole holiday set aside for getting blitzed. So people that use Halloween as just another excuse for getting drunk… doesn’t impress me. Its like the excuse to dress “sexy”. Nothing wrong with it, whatever gets you your Slack. Go for it… Free Country. For me personally… I like to think there’s *more* to it. You can get drunk anyday… this is a day to get “Scared”.
Maybe I consider Halloween to be a chance to actually BE in a horror film… to experience that type of amazing extreme adventure that we can’t get in this world. Not only a chance to imagine going against the fantastic and unknown… but to act out being in it.
That could be why I have such a hard time making Halloween costumes for myself. I didn’t even dress up this year. I put on a “Day of the Dead” shirt I have, loaded up my camera, and just wanted to be a spectator and people-watcher. I always LOVE doing decorations… and being in and making environments to walk through and experience… but dressing up… that won’t scare ME. And if I were in those extreme supernatural situations… I wouldn’t be wearing an annoying, cold, constrictive costume with smelly cream makeup on my face… I would be… Me.
Maybe that’s it… I don’t want to scare. I want to BE scared.
I think the best Halloween I ever had… was very simple. While I did dress up that year, I kept it very simple… and I sat around with a small group of friends, and we told scary stories. I was in undergraduate college… and its one of the fondest memories I have. Even though I was asked to read the most stories (being the “actor”)… telling them was still a way to live through them… and experience those stories like all of those friends that were there to listen. I loved every second of it.
So, I don’t think Salem is for me. Maybe I’ll go back next year… who knows? But right now, I know what I’d prefer… a cloudy night, with the moon peeking through… sitting by candlelight with a select few… reveling in the gloom… savoring the chills up your spine… feeling the heartbeat increase ever so slightly… and then laughing in relief along with good companions.
Yeah… simplicity is what it’s all about.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
