The following post is pure brain vomit on paper. It’s frantic, inconsistent and possibly pointless. But I decided to post it anyway. I dared myself to put myself out there and I’m not going to back down from my own dare. So here it is…
I wake up late this morning. Was up till 4am frantically typing to finish the first draft of my screenplay last night.
Went up to La Jolla to meet with Kiki, the director of the film I worked on. I’m working on some more posters from the movie. He tells me that we have to incorporate some cholos into the cover design, even though cholos appear in the movie for all of 30 seconds. He tells me that the distributor he’s working with advised him to put cholos on the cover because at Wal-Mart, one of the potential outlets for DVD sales, research has shown that when there are cholos on the DVD cover, a high number of customers immediately purchase the DVD without even doing previous research on it.
I drive to meet with Bianka at Krakatoa in South Park. It’s a beautiful coffee shop. I’m tired and have decided not to go to the gym today so I smoke. I have this obsessive compulsive belief that I can’t go to the gym after smoking. After I’m done with the coffee shop, on the drive home, I decide to go to the gym anyway. I feel anxiety the entire time I’m driving there.
When I get to the gym, I go to the bathroom first. I barely have to go but I go anyway because I worry that I might have to go later and it will interrupt my workout. Right now, as I type this, it takes me a few minutes to think of the word “interrupt.” It’s a word I use 100 times a day but I couldn’t think of if right now for some reason.
I carry this little notebook with me in the gym so I can write down ideas when they come to me during a workout. Most of what I consider to be my best ideas come to me in the gym, for some bizarre reason. On my way out of the restroom, I suddenly feel like a small child. I grip the notebook as if I’m an abused five year-old and it’s my personal diary. I’m staring straight down at the floor and avoiding eye contact with everyone, fighting back nonexistent tears which have no apparent cause. I have the overwhelming urge to crawl into fetal position right there on the floor. I feel intensely sorry for myself and loose any and all interest in the opposite sex. I force myself to be “normal” and stretch, as I normally do at the beginning of a workout. Next to me, there is what could be described as an 8.5 brunette in tight workout clothes, doing stretch poses that boarder on pornographic. She could put strippers to shame. I don’t even take a second look. As I type this, I feel anxiety about people reading it and feeling annoyed. But I type it anyway. I feel silly for worrying about it.
I drive home in silence. When I get home, I frantically make sandwiches for myself and Bianka. We watch an episode of Firefly. We laugh and have a great time, chowing down on turkey and watermelon. After the episode is over, my mood does a sudden 180 and I become irritable for no apparent reason. She is making jokes and talking to me and I’m irritated for no logical reason. I feel guilty for being irritable because I know how unfair it must be to her, having to deal with this emotional roller coaster. Or she’s used to it by now; I can’t be sure.
There is a helicopter flying overhead, searching for a suspect. Seems to be a regular occurrence in our neighborhood.
I step outside to finish my first glass of wine and have a smoke. This has become my ritual when I want to get in the mind frame to write. If you ever drive through Pershing Avenue on a Wednesday or Thursday night, you might see an unshaven 6’5, 250lbs guy in shorts and cut off sleeves standing on the side walk, wondering around and trying to keep his knock knees as straight as possible. He’ll be holding a glass of red and a long & thin brown cigarette.
I get lost in day dream world, trying to finish the red and the cig as fast as possible so I don’t forget the things I want to write when I sit down. I dream about drinking this same glass of wine on the patio of my mansion on the Hollywood hills, overlooking the city lights. I day dream about my friends being there. In my day dreams, I’m the same age as I am now even though in reality, IF I ever make it to that patio on the Hollywood hills, I will most likely be in my 50s. Key word: IF. I think about how I don’t really dream of vanity and riches. My attraction to that life is simply not having to worry about money. I don’t dream of owning the country, just my freedom to lounge around and create.
I think about all the people I have to call back. My cousin text me earlier tonight, asking how I’m doing but by the time I noticed her text, it’s almost midnight and I resolve to call her back tomorrow. I will make notes as reminders to do so. Tomorrow, I will probably forget. I feel like a shit. I have all these good intentions and want to be a good brother, lover and friend but I seem to keep fucking it up somehow. I used to feel shame and rage. Now I just feel confusion. There is some life equation I haven’t been able to figure out. What is it that others seem to know that I don’t?
I want to call my brother as well. It seems so easy to just pick up the phone. Come tomorrow, however, I will try to do it and I’ll keep talking myself out of it for some inexplicable reason. He wants nothing but my happiness but I have a hard time accepting his love. I can’t figure out why. Other people call me to ask how I’m doing and I keep forgetting to call them back. I think back to a time when a therapist of mine assigned me homework: Write down a list of your accomplishments, no matter how mundane. Next week’s session comes and it turns out that I have completely deleted the memory of her having assigned said assignment. She laughs and says, “very interesting!” She explains to me that I always remember everything else we talk about and that I even follow up on important points and do research on specific subjects relating to our sessions, and yet, this one simple thing, listing my accomplishments, is the single thing I completely delete from my memory banks.
I get lost in this daze of thoughts before running back inside and sitting at the keyboard, trying to expel them from my mind as fast as possible before they vanish like a shadow you might see from the corner of your eye, turning your head as fast as you can to catch it. But when you turn your head, the shadow’s gone. Maybe your place is haunted, you joke to yourself.
I write best when I’m punching keys as hard as I can. My keyboard can’t possibility have too much life left in it. Will probably have to buy a new one soon.
I type the title: On Being A Late Bloomer.
I want to write an entry about starting out late in life. About how I started working out late, focusing on me late, focusing on art late, learning how to push myself & work hard late, doing more blue collar-ish jobs late, not giving a shit and drinking wine on a weeknight late, letting loose late and... Late. It all feels late. It feels like I should have done all this stuff in my teens but I was too busy being proper and creating a respectable image. I spent all this time being a grown up when I was a kid and now that I’m a grown up I’m trying to be a kid. Life is a book. When you skip five chapters in a row, you’re bound to be confused and feel the need to go back when you realize you’ve missed the introduction of an important character or a plot twist.
I manically race to the restroom, piss as fast as I can and race back to the computer to write. My heart is beating. My pulse is racing.
When I write, I get distracted the instant someone talks to me. Can’t seem to multi task. If I’m writing, and the phone rings, it feels like there is this ridiculous lag time between my brain accepting the information (someone is calling) and switching away from auto-pilot frantic creative mode. Then, it seems to take a long time to switch back.
I envision living in a world where I don’t have to apologize for my emotions. Where I can just say I’m irritable and people will respond with, “cool, I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” Where people can just tell me they’re irritable and I understand without judgment or hesitation.
I write all this and consider not posting it. Then I remember my resolution: I will put myself out there. I will not hide anything anymore. I will share my insides and innards without shame or hesitation. This mask that I’ve been wearing for god knows how long must come off. I can’t be the artist I aspire to be while wearing it. Anyone who looks down on me for doing this doesn’t need to be in my life anymore. I theorize that they must have grown fond of a character which I invented in order to be accepted. The real me is a frantic mess. Take me, the good, bad and the ugly.
I’m convinced that all these idiosyncrasies and eccentricities serve a purpose. I can’t simply be cursed. I’m too optimistic to accept that they’re all weaknesses. They are strengths. They must be. They are what make me an “artist.”
I’m stripping naked. These clothes they put on me are too tight. They’re suffocating. They make me wear a tie when I go to work. I’m a fashion nut and yet, I hate wearing a tie to work. I want to wear a t-shirt. I want to wear whatever I god damn well please. When they tell me to wear a tie, even though I love ties, I hate the tie. I like to wear a tie when I go out to play. Why? Because fuck them, that’s why! I smile at the thought of channeling Matt Damon from Good Will Hunting. Did you know that Ben Affleck and Matt Damon were offered large sums of money to sell the script for Good Will Hunting so that other, bigger stars could be cast? They refused. They fought, stumped their feet and held out until someone would offer them a deal to let them star in it themselves. It paid off. They’re superstars.
I chuckle that today was actually a very very tame day. I know that because on the real dark days, I’m way too lost in the abyss of my insanity to be able to gather my thoughts enough to actually write them down. Today was a very tame day, indeed.
Looking at me from the outside, you see a smiling, happy, sociable guy. You’d never guess. None of us ever do. So many of us look like tame lakes but are, in reality, a stormy ocean complete with lightening and thunder. Maybe that’s the gift of the artist: His utter inability to keep the storm hidden. We put the storm out there so that others may watch, read or listen to it so that they don’t feel alone in the world. If the artists didn’t do it, who would?
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