Being a Writer in the Real World Kinda Sucks

Earlier today a friend was telling me about a new project she is working on and after very excitedly talking about it she ended things with a statement that she assumed I thought she was crazy. My response? "You're not crazy. You're just a writer."

While it may be true that many artists, writers, musicians, comedians, etc. do have some serious issues, in reality... who doesn't? The thing is that anyone that does anything which is creative tends to be a little more passionate about things. Plus, with creativity comes the things that are created. To me, her descriptions weren't weird because I've been spending my spare time working on my "Once Upon a Mushroom" project. I've been writing about a gnome going on an adventure with a talking dog, and that really isn't that insane compared to other works out there. Furthermore, it isn't even subject matter which makes the creative types seem a little nutty, it is the insane amount of research, note-taking, and even doodling that occurs in conjunction with it.

So while she was telling me how vast the amount of notes she has for her project it just seemed normal to me since, well, I created a wiki for OUaM because I had too many notes myself to keep track of. Heck, part of why I have so much junk in my house to sort through is because I have over 18 years of journals, sketch books, note pages, and so forth of my creations laying around. Knowing me, there's probably even a notepad tucked away in the kitchen somewhere that has the description of the main villain from "Shadow in the Mirror" (and don't get me started on how many dot matrix printouts and type-written pages that probably still exist at my parents' house).

However, the biggest issue with being a writer is that you tend to also wish you could write out your real life (and since I also used to do a lot of work with video editing and directing, I tend to also think of things in screenplay form many times). I have sadly found that I can (generally) figure out major and minor plot details in most movies and television series I watch just based on the tried and true devices as well as the writer's (and director's) styles. Sure sometimes I'm happily proven wrong, but more often than not I find myself realizing I could see the story unfold just from a mere plot summary.

Valentine's Day is right around the corner right now, and with it comes so many movies and shows about hardships in love. In the end, it is almost always a happy ending. Guy/Girl does something stupid to push other guy/girl away, a bunch of stuff happens, either guy/girl meets another guy/girl who starts out as a foil but ends up their "true love," or the original couple get back together. There is almost always a misunderstanding, but in the end people tend to live happily ever after (unless there's a sequel, or badly written fanfiction). Real life, sadly, doesn't work that way, and even the movies where it shows relationships more realistically still have the whole condensed-timeline thing working for them.

While pretty much everyone I know thinks "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" is one of the funniest movies they've seen, I ask them to imagine if it unfolded in real time. (By now, you should have seen it so I don't care about spoilers!) If we actually had to live through the time she was apart from the man she loved, because her own family didn't like the idea and wanted her to be with a "nice Greek man," would we still have laughed as hard? Being forced to not be with someone you love is not exactly a pleasant feeling. And yes, "Titanic" (again, you should have seen this already) didn't exactly have a happy ending but imagine how much worse that'd be living not only through the disaster, but going on all those years not being able to tell anyone the truth and knowing your (for all intents and purposes) "true love" died before you could spend your lives together. Every day, people deal with relationship roadblocks, however big or small, that they can't get over right away. I know people who were together over thirty years ago, remarried and had kids over the years, and then found their way back to each other recently. Sounds like good fodder for a story, right? Well, of course, but no one is going to want to wait thirty years for that pay-off in a movie (even soap operas don't spend much time on things anymore).

Right now, I'm going through one of the most adult things I've ever had to deal with in my entire life. Something I can't run away from, even though it'd be so easy to do it. How it makes it "adult" is the fact that I'm owning up to all the facts and dealing with it instead of being a coward. My entire life is changing, some for the better and maybe some for the worse, but the rest is still up in the air. There are certain things which are known to be true, and other things which are variables that could destroy that. Since no one can predict the future, no one knows how to proceed because at this point any answer could be the wrong one. Hindsight is 20/20, right? That is part of the problem: We can look back and figure out where things went wrong and how they could have been fixed, but since we're in the now that is impossible. All that can be done is to move forward and see what happens. Day by day, little by little, until the answer reveals itself. Now, if my life were a movie, I'd already know the ending. Of course, depending on the genre there would be several possibilities, but I'd have it figured out already. I'd know the outcome based on everything that has been given so far. Sadly, real life isn't some cliche (well, not usually). Plus, if you just edited out the time it takes between decisions and occurrences, these moments in life would still be a movie you could figure out.

Maybe I'm just rambling now, but to me at least it all makes sense. Trust me, there is not a moment that goes by in my life that I don't have set to music somewhere in the back of my head, with narration going and an idea of where I'd possibly take things if it were actually a story I was working on. That is just how I roll.

I'm a writer, and it does make me crazy sometimes. Then again, you kind of have to be.

He Loves to Cook for Me, Too!

I. have. the. most. awesome. boyfriend. ever! Period. Or well, exclamation point! Whatever, I'm just trying to draw attention to the awesomeness of this: My boyfriend has stated to me, verbally and matter-of-factly, that if he did not have massive amounts of college debt he would, without hesitation, buy me a pair of Manolo Blahniks.

…

Exclamation point!

…

He said “if they made [me] feel good and look good [he] would most definitely get [me] a pair, and it would make [him] happy to do so.” At this point, he did not denounce the rather insane amount of shoes I already own but pointed out his belief that I need high quality (which he said tended to be more expensive) shoes. Granted, the pair in question is from an older collection and thus not as expensive as you'd think (under $300), but that is still a lot for shoes. They are a pair I adore, and while I have never spent over even half that much for a pair of shoes (that is reserved for electronics!) they are certainly one pair I’d almost justify buying at the price.

At any rate, in the magical world of no college debt and cheap utilities (or a lottery win) I would have myself a sexy pair of Manolos. More importantly, the reality is that I have a really great guy, and it really isn’t that he would even buy them. It is that he understands why they are "necessary" and doesn’t think less of me for it. He knows it makes me happy when I wear shoes I think look good and make me look good. It is just a love I inherited (and was encouraged by) my mother. He feels nicer shoes will make me happier only because they'd stop breaking so much and look a lot better than half of them I own do. He even can justify this in the face of the four pairs of loveliness that were bestowed upon me today from shoe sales in Greece and Italy thanks to my amazing parents and their recently-ended sort-of-vacation.

A guy who understands a woman’s shoe collection? It doesn't get any better than this.

Her Story VII

I can't count for you how many blog posts I've written since I last posted here. Unfortunately, they were all done via a personal favorite of Dr. John Dorian. The Internal Monologue. And like J.D.'s silly and sometimes elaborate tangent fantasies, these telepathic blogs that fail to publish to any known server tend to take on qualities of movies and television shows. No, I don't mean I write stories about my life that end up involving actual characters, but rather as I notice there are things in life that really do come up as if they were a last minute plot contrivance I also go into a sort of "scripting and directing" mode. Thus, the blogs start getting way too planned out for my own good (cue music) and don't exactly translate well to the written page, or pixel if you will. Perhaps that is where I fall short of segueing my J.D. into my Carrie.

My other has been encouraging both these sides of me, however, but I believe he gave up some where around New Years. I mean, there's still the occasional "writing is something you enjoy, do it more" spiel to get me motivated, but at this point he's (rightly) left it up to me to decide.

However, I know he genuinely does want this for me, and I'm glad for that. Especially since I wasn't really in total "writing" mode when we first got together so he never actually saw the regularity that I did it, nor the happiness and (cliche, I know) calm it brought me. The funny thing about it all though is that while he understands my want and my need for it, he doesn't understand how I get motivated.

Take tonight, for example. I have been looking forward to this night for a while. Lights down low, speakers on loud. Maybe a nice glass of wine. Time to cuddle up on the couch with a nice blanket, and watch the season premiere of "Lost"! While this may seem silly, this is one of the only shows I've actually followed start to (and this will be true in a few years) finish when it was first airing. I generally watched reruns growing up (I miss the old Nick at Nite, truly "a TV viewer's dream"), and I know this is cheesy but there is something about wondering what the hell is going to happen next that is exciting. Now that I know there is a specific end (oh how "Stargate SG-1" would have benefited with that, among many countless other series. You know who you are.) I can become more invested in the show. As that happens, I enjoy it more, which then... wait for it (yes it has a point, and apparently a lot more comments in parentheses. I'm like my own MST3K! And if you can't figure out what that is by just those five characters, then me telling you the name of it wouldn't matter anyway to this commenting. But I digress, as usual.). ... Okay, where were we? (<-- Comment put in for attempt at humor.) Oh yes, the more I enjoy something such as "Lost," it gets me more excited about creating my own media, and thus beginning to get more excited about writing! So I turned down all the lights, cranked up the stereo and tuned in intensely to watch... and he just thought it was the silliest thing. He respected it, and he watched it with me (he's missed way too much to understand where they are now, and had unfortunately missed the pre-premiere recap), but he did not get why I got so excited about it. And therefore, how the heck could it help me in my quest?

No matter what anyone's goals are, they may have unconventional or seemingly odd ways of getting there. Take the fact that I just spent precious sleep time (7am open, eww) writing here. Writing this silly, seemingly making no sense entry. Seriously, what does any of this have to do with anything? Well, maybe nothing to you, but...

Hey, I wrote something down, didn't I?

"Mamma Mia! Here I Go Again!"

You know your boyfriend loves you when he'll sit and watch "Mamma Mia!" with you without complaint, knowing full well you just finished watching it five minutes before with your mother.

Sure there's nothing wrong with musicals, and he's seen plenty of them, but when it comes to a movie starring Meryl Streep, ABBA music and a singing Pierce Brosnan, you expect some reservations. I can't even listen to ABBA when he's around, he just hates pop and disco *that much* and doesn't understand how I can listen to it. I try to explain that there's a time and place for all types of music, and these particular tracks really make you want to get up and move around but he still doesn't understand. From his perspective I can see why, because it really is hard to understand why there'd be a time and place for ten different remixes of "Toxic" or "Genie in a Bottle." I mean, I still listen to them, but for a guy raised on Zepplin and the Dead... yeah.

As with all couples, we have our discussions about what to watch, what to listen to, etc. As much as you compromise from day to day, there are still those things you just don't want to give in to. I know he loves watching surgeries, but I can't stomach that and he knows it. Heck, I do the half-cover-my-eyes thing when we watch "House" (which we always seem to watch during dinner for some reason), so he knows watching intense medical programs on TLC or whatever don't generally go over well with me. Meanwhile, I know better than to put on an overtly feminine program (or, say, the VMAs) when he's within earshot. About 90% of what we do watch, we watch and enjoy together but never in a million years did I think "Mamma Mia!" would be in that category.

If I recall correctly, it was one of the highest grossing films of the year and I can see why. The island it was primirily filmed on (Skopelos) is simply gorgeous, and it made me long for the beaches in Santorini. The songs were well done, and I was surprised at how well Amanda Seyfried sings. I first saw her as Joni on "All My Children" many years ago, and now watch "Big Love" in which she is one of the children of the polygamist family and have always thought she was a good actress but I had no idea what a beautiful voice she has. So far, the movie has inspired many people I know to make a change in their life, just becaues of the uplifting quality it gives you. Silly, I'm sure, to let a movie do that, but is it really? Is it really that strange to have some form of art cause you to rethink part of your life?

Pierce Brosnan wasn't as bad as people made him out to be, either. He was kind of strained, but it wasn't off-key or anything. There were a few points the segueways into the songs could have been handled better (ie, "Dancing Queen") but the numbers themselves were very well done. I won't go into too much detail about the plot, in case anyone reading doesn't know the story and wants to see it, but it was quite enjoyable all around. Watching Meryl Streep made me remember when I used to watch "Death Becomes Her" all the time, and she seemed so much more comfortable in this role. Sure, she did look similar to what her DBH character did before she took the potion to make herself more youthful (so kudos to the DBH make-up people, they did a good job back then!), although she was definitely a lot happier in her skin in this movie! As always, Christine Baranski was a hoot to watch and now I have a strong desire to watch "The Birdcage" (one of my all-time favorites) again. I have a feeling Stellan Skarsgard's character was who my boyfriend enjoyed watching the most, only because of his adventurous nature and the fact that, well, he wants nothing more than to have his own boat and be able to take an adventure anywhere - especially the mediterranean. Although I'm sure we could have both done without the butt-shot with the tattoos (although hilarious!).

The last movie we watched together before this was "Pineapple Express," which surprisingly I think he enjoyed less than "Mamma Mia!" I believe this was mostly due to the fact that he expected MM to be awful and found it very enjoyable, whereas he had high expectations for PE and found it falling short of that. I personally thought it was hilarious, and not a let down at all like "Tropic Thunder" and "Don't Mess With The Zohan" turned out to be (he was in agreement with me on those two titles as well), although after seeing both of those I was, honestly, expecting less of PE after all the hype it had. James Franco did a wonderful job, and it was very interesting seeing him as Saul and then thinking about Harry Osbourne. And of course Seth Rogen was hilarious as always (I know everyone was praising Rosie Perez, but her character was probably the only let down in the whole movie in terms of what I heard vs. what I saw. I didn't realize Gary Cole was in it, either, but did enjoy his role.).

In closing, I'm glad we got the chance to watch these together finally, and I'm extremly glad he enjoyed the music in "Mamma Mia!" Maybe now I can get away with listening to "Voulez-Vouz" while I clean, although I suspect using the A*Teens cover of it would be out of the question.