STRAWBERRY PARK WE LOVE THEE

Smaller and different and totally the same. That's what it feels like to be here in my home town of San Jose. Got in yesterday, drove to my old neighborhood, past the Winchester Mystery House, down Moorpark, past Blackford High which is now part of Harker Academy but at one time was just another public high school in the Campbell Union School District. Eased past the house I grew up in. So strange to think a different family lives there now, in the same house, the same rooms. And how it's not the same house the same rooms anymore. The trees are there, but look unloved, unclimbed. 

And yet, Mount Hamilton still looms to the East, and the Santa Cruz Mountains shadow the west, like they always have and always will, for at least a few more millennia. The air yesterday had that fresh Bay Area thing going which happens from time to time, where you can see for miles, and just breathing it in feels like drinking a tall glass of spring water. There is a life force in the Bay Area, and it just is.

There is something about returning to where you grew up that reminds you of who you are, who you were, and who you want to be. About seeking out places and people who are still part of your life. And also seeking things that no longer are, and that feeling of how it must be some kind of magic trick, this not having everything being just as it was. Like maybe, Blackford is still Blackford, Carrow's is still Carrow's and not a Denny's. 

Maybe Life really is a dream.

Well, in today's dream, I'm sitting in a hotel that is right where there used to be a 7-11, which was my main place to get comic books when I was a kid. Comic books and Slurpees. Behind it there was a vacant lot that had been turned into a sort of dirt bike track with little ramps we could jump our bikes over. I don't know who, but someone, some Johnny Appleseed of bicycles, roamed the South Bay and turned all the vacant lots into places you could do your best to endanger your life by riding really fast and then taking flight on little ramps made of dirt. 

This same Appleseed seemed to have a penchant for dirty magazines, as there was always a stash in all these vacant lots. We had the one behind the 7-11, another one over near Manor Market, one near the Mormon Church over on Borina Drive, and many others.

San Jose, at least the Strawberry Park area, was a magic realm full of danger and dirt of all forms.

I am here to collect things out of storage from when we sold the house I grew up in last year. Also to see old friends, go to the beach and gaze at the Pacific and hear the Sea Lions, eat the best Falafel sandwich known to man, and wander the past, catching up with ghosts and phantoms, letting them know where I'm at and asking them what it all means and meant, to live and die, to be here, in this town, this world, this motel room that once was a 7-11.

I feel the urge now to take a walk along my old paper route path. 

And to find some coffee.

I remember, when the house on Belvedere was my home, waking each morning very early, and already my mom would be up, and the coffee would be percolating on the stove, and I would lay in bed, knowing a cup of life would be waiting for me downstairs as I started my day.

On.

Here's a song. It's Corral Nocturne from Copland's Rodeo. It makes me think of bicycles and huge oak trees and the cool morning air, of neighborhood cats and the world lighting up as the sun rose, filling our little houses all the same with gold and glory, of a brief moment each day when all the madness of the world was confined to the papers in my bag, and a new day was open. I didn't have the easiest life. I don't think anyone does. But I did have golden mornings and dirt tracks for my bike, and a best friend and a dog, and a mom who made coffee, and music like this.

Enjoy.

I DON'T FIND SHADOWS OFFENSIVE

Ah, that first week of Daylight Savings Time. 

It sucks.

Well, I am being a bit dramatic, but that's what I do. 

This week, I teach my normal classes during the week, a workshop at another school this morning, have tech week for a middle school production of A Midsummer Night's Dream which opens Friday, rehearsals for The Wedding Singer up in Conifer and Little Shop of Horrors and Chamber of Secrets up in Boulder, and leave for San Jose Sunday for a short trip to retrieve things that have been in storage for a long time. On top of that, my company is co-producing a new play which had auditions that past few days, and we are in the process of getting a new venture funded (more on that in future blogs, I'm sure).

So I'm a little groggy. Like toast with no butter that's been sitting on the counter while I take a call, I'm not quite what I want to be. 

But I'm trying.

I did have a good breakthrough with one of my scripts, and enjoyed that feeling of "Aha!" for a day or so. 

Wow. I think I am griping a bit. Which is never seemly, and all the more unseemly when you take a step back and look at what is going on in the world. The Pandemic still rages, the climate still changes, and it feels like we are on the brink of World War Three.

So, I really can't complain all that much. 

I suppose there are those who would say that complaining about the smaller things in life is a pressure valve of sorts, a way of venting our general anxiety. And I dig that. But I also firmly believe we need to keep perspective, and not be so self-involved that we inflate our problems and deflate the problems we all need to consider.

Deep thoughts, I know.

What fools these mortals be. 

I must say, working on Shakespeare with young people, who for the most part have no pre-conceived ideas about "The Bard", no bardolatry or treating it preciously or familiarity with past productions, is shockingly refreshing. It's like approaching it for the first time. And what is really cool is how, when they simply say the words, honestly and in the moment, how evenly the lines flow. How the language matches the thought process of most of us. 

Makes me happy to be alive. The story, the work, the young actors running around on stage and off. There is magic in this world, and has been since the Big Bang. 

It hides in plain sight, clear as can be, loud and pungent and mysterious and uncomplicated, all at once. 

I think that is my main theme in pretty much everything I write. Life is beautiful, and we all should realize that, but somehow get caught up in our busy schedules, hurt feelings, past trauma, over due bills and so on. Which is tragic. 

All this wonder out there, and we do our best to fuck it up, or pretend it doesn't exist. 

Well, it does. Grab it. Experience it. Share it. Eat it. 

And be cool if others don't. Or if you don't. That's my advice. I know that is a hard thing for some, and not a desired thing for others. 

That's cool too. It just doesn't make sense to me. Maybe I'm crazy. If so, boo hoo. I shall enjoy my straight jacket of joy and padded cell of art and nature and love and friendships, and will take visitors at all hours.

Party on. Game on. Flame on. 

On.

Here's a song. It's Karn Evil 9, First Impression, part 2, by Emerson, Lake and Palmer.

Also, the new show Sasquatch is co-producing is Puerto Rican Nocturne, which will play at The Bug Theatre this summer. More info HERE. 

THE BUY IN; OR LIFE'S RARE JOYS

Ah, Monday and Daylight Savings Time. That's the fun morning. No longer is the sun peeking out, filling the world with that light, that Hour of the Pearl light.

No. 

It's dark, and feels like it's freaking 4:30 am when the alarm goes off. 

Because it is. The clock may say 5:30, but it's lying. And it doesn't even feel bad about it. Just displays its numbers and pretends, and expects you to pretend as well.

Usually, at this moment, I'd be out with Lisa strolling the neighborhood. But that was an hour ago, and here I am in front of my old computer, eyes feeling a little baggier than normal, on an extra cup of coffee, considering what there is to say.

Well, there are a few things, as usual. I find if I just get my butt in a seat, and start writing, things do pop up. And the less expectations I have, the better the writing. Form and function and all that comes later anyway, so there.

We went to a ballet of Wizard of Oz recently. It was pretty great, but there were a few things story-wise that puzzled me. Having just directed a stage version of Oz, I was quite familiar with each scene, as both the stage version and this ballet based the plot on the 1939 movie. And there was one moment that the ballet glossed over. 

A key moment.

When Toto gets taken away by Miss Gulch. 

This has to be tragic and real and horrible. No two ways about it. I realized this while directing the show. Dorothy has to have Toto, her dog and best friend, literally taken out of her hands and given to a woman who has made it very clear that she is going to kill that dog.

That's an awful moment of betrayal and sorrow for Dorothy. 

It also happens to be key to the entire story, The inciting incident that sets her on her journey. Yes, a twister picks her up and carries her off to Oz, but it's the moment of betrayal that sets it all in motion. Dorothy has to run away from home, meet Professor Marvel, realize she needs to get home, and then get torn away by powers beyond her ability to contain, and then spend the rest of the story trying as hard as she can to get home, even though she is finally over the rainbow. 

Maybe this isn't a huge revelation to most people. But for me, it was important. The idea of that moment in the story where we the audience buy in, when we invest our hopes and fears into the main character. 

And in that story, it's Dorothy, alone against the world, pleading with her friends and family to not lead her little dog be taken away to certain doom. If that scene isn't heart wrenching and terrible, who really cares what happens after that? Then, it's just a story about a kid in a magic land who could just tap her shoes three times and go home. 

She wouldn't have to learn a damn thing. 

In the ballet, the whole moment is glossed over, and it's not really clear that Gulch will kill the dog or that the adults in Dorothy's life bending their knees to Gulch and her demands. 

As I chewed on this idea yesterday, I started going over all my stories and scripts, especially those on the front burner, and all these possibilities presented themselves. 

Writing can be maddening, frustrating, and horrible, while at the same time filling you with a sense of purpose and wonder. 

Having a little revelation after going to the ballet is one of life's rare joys.

Here's a song. It's Happy Phantom by Tori Amos. 

 

LET THEM DIRECT CHILDREN'S THEATRE

Writing earlier today. Still wiping the sleep out of my eyes, shaking the cobwebs out of my brain, and looking for solace in a cup of coffee. Well, a cup of espresso as I wait for the water to boil. 

I saw several headlines about inflation yesterday, and how we are all supposed to be angry at someone. about it. Biden. The GOP. Putin.

Now, I do think Putin is a horrible person, and the GOP has really become a strange party that either is run by a bunch of feckless liars, or is crazy and actually believes a lot of bizarre notions. Global warming is fake. Trump won. The world is flat. Ted Cruz.

All sorts of crazy shit.

But I don't blame inflation on any of those folks. And I am not really furious about it. Yeah, I pay bills, and gas prices are up, and groceries cost more. They do. But it always feels to me like the market, that mysterious Market that runs the world, is to blame. And who or what is the market? A small group of aliens living in the middle of Iowa? The Illuminati? I don't think so.

I think the Market is just a bunch of greedy, out of touch people who don't really enjoy living all that much and so try to run the world via corporations. People who, like Grand Moff Tarkin, try to grasp theirs hands around the world, but the tighter they try to hold it, the more of it slips through their fingers.

They are the kind of people who want to control everything. And since they are these sad, lonely, out of touch types, they don't really do anything all that helpful for the planet that often. 

It sure seems that way to me.   

I think, for the betterment of the world, every CEO and world leader, every millionaire and senator and member of parliament, every dictator and royal, should have to direct a children's theatre play. One with like thirty cast members, and one assistant. And they can't use any of their money to hire more people or have someone else actually direct it and then take the credit for it. They have to get down in the trenches and work with the little actors. They have to figure out how to make them memorize lines, go where they are supposed to go in a scene, make each of them feel respected and a part of the show. And a to no peek out from the curtains to make sure their parents are in the audience. 

The main problem with this plan is that a lot of them would probably turn out to be horrible at it, and spend the whole time yelling, trying to get the cast to behave itself. Direction by screaming. I've seen it. I've done it once or twice, but it never works. 

Still, it would be a good start. An attempt to humanize the powers that be. 

Maybe they just need to find love for their fellow human beings, and for themselves. 

I don't think, if someone truly felt love, they would engage in price gouging. Or bomb hospitals. Or storm the Capitol. 

Man, I am such a hippie. 

Maybe, instead of directing a kid's show, they should have to write a blog, every day, first thing.

Yeah. 

Here's today's song. It's Stone Cold Crazy by Queen. 

LIFE IS SHORT, MOVIES ARE SHORTER

My last post mentioned Uncle Vanya, one of my favorite plays of all time. I've been in it once, playing the idealistic doctor Astrov; written a stage adaptation of it called Fenway: Last of the Bohemians, which sets the story on a faded hippie commune in the 1980s had a run in NYC in 2007; and wrote a pilot for a series based on Fenway, called Sunny. 

I clearly dig it.

The other day, I went to a matinee screening of Drive My Car, which follows a man in Japan who is directing a production of Uncle Vanya and dealing with loss, grief, infidelity, and life in general. 

I dug it the most.

The movie is three hours long, which I suppose is a long time for a movie.

Even though I can binge watch four or five hours of The Clone Wars in one sitting, no problem. And I can play Contest of Champions on my phone forever. I can also sit on a plane pretending not to worry about crashing for many hours as well. 

So I guess three hours isn't really all that much of an ask for a film. I mean, I love movies, stories, images and sound. I love popcorn, sitting in the dark, and losing myself in other worlds. Three hours is nothing, really. 

Life is short, and movies are shorter. 

So I spent three hours lost in a world full of people who have sorrow and regret and joy and hope. People who mourn the dead and are haunted by memories of what could have been, what should have been, and will never come to light now. People who have had their hearts broken, and broken hearts as well. People who makes huge mistakes. Some mistakes are made due to a passion they can't control. Some are the result of a sense of anger that can't be fully articulated and so comes out in unintended ways, with unintended consequences. 

Three hours with people who struggle with their daily lives. 

So I spent three hours in an alternate reality that was shockingly like the one I live in.

Not only is there a lot of Vanya in the film, there is also a bit of Waiting for Godot, another favorite of mine. 

I seem to like stories about life being rough that are supposed to be funny but that lots of people find maudlin.

I think there are some folks in the world who find tragedy humorous. And comedy to be full of sadness and frustration. 

Maybe the theatre masks, comedy and tragedy, should just be called The Masks of Life. 

Now masks are things we put on to present a certain trait or character, to hide who we really are and what we are really feeling. As I think of this, I think of how I present myself to the world. Usually, I wear the comedy mask, and point out all the contradictions that race back and forth over the field of our lives. Other folks I know seem to wear the tragedy mask, and come off as most happy when relating to others the worlds woes, as well as the travails of themselves, their families, their co-workers, the Kardashians, you name it.

We are a strange species, to be sure. 

But we are also glorious. 

I think that is the main thing I got from Drive My Car. That even though we make gigantic mistakes, and don't do what we should; even though we betray one another and ourselves, there is within us a greatness, a possibility for kindness and love, when confronted with the horrors of existence. 

We can laugh and cry and hold each other's hands. And we can have compassion for ourselves and others when we aren't able to do any of that.

And we can sit in a movie theatre for three hours.

Today's song if Frente!'s cover of New Order's Bizarre Love Triangle.

And for today's bonus material, here is the final bit from my play Fenway. Fenway is the Uncle Vanya Character, and Reality is Sonya, his niece.

FENWAY

I can't do this. This isn't my life. It can't be! I don't know what to do. I don't know who to be. How do you go on living in this God damned world? Can anyone answer that for me?

REALITY

By living your life. By trying to make a difference. By trying to do something worthwhile in this world. I know you feel terrible. I know it seems like the end of the world. But it isn't, not really. This is just the hand we've been dealt, pure and simple. I can’t tell you why. But I can tell you that we'll live with it. We'll deal with whatever life throws at us. If we have to, we'll work crappy jobs for crappy people we don’t like or even know. Maybe we won’t find the love we want, or the home we need. Maybe our nights will be long and empty. Our lives might seem nothing more than a sad, lonely parade. So what? We'll do the best we can with what we have, quietly, with dignity. And when we get to Heaven, and I promise you we will get there, we'll talk about all the hard times, the tears and frustrations and injustices. We'll cry for a hundred years if we have to. And God will cry with us and hold us in her arms. We'll just cry for as long as it takes. And then, after we let it all go, we'll realize that we're in Heaven, and all is well. We'll be able to talk about our lives and actually smile. Won't that be something? To be able to smile at our lives? And finally, we'll sleep the sleep of angels and dream dreams that defy explanation. That's what's we'll do. I have faith, Uncle Fenway. I know that sounds crazy, but I do. I believe.

THIS THING WE'RE LIVING IS NOT A LIMITED SERIES

As I was getting ready for  our morning walk, I turned on the news to see what is happening in Ukraine. I think we all do some variation of this throughout the day, usually several times. Mostly, I turn on to see if Zelensky is still alive. And as I was watching the coverage, I realized that in some weird way, a lot of the Ukraine invasion has become a sort of limited series we are all watching. Something we care about, but still can turn off whenever we need to so that we can go to our jobs, or go grab a pizza or whatever. And as I'm thinking about that, the newscaster announces "price of gas above $4 a gallon for first time in years". 

And I think, how fucking awful is it that while this network is streaming onto our screens images of people who are literally fighting for their lives that the same network felt it was worth mentioning that we might be paying more for gas. 

If the fact that gas prices go up is as important as an invasion that could very possibly set off World War Three, the time, as Hamlet said, is out of joint.

We need to all take a step back and consider what is important.

On a system wide basis. We have really got to find a better way to run this world we live in. It just feels like the current one, where corporate interests run by a small percentage of the population do everything they can solely to make money at the expense of everything else, does not lead us to a healthier lifestyle.

And of course, there's the added bonus of how we are killing the planet.

I would think that would cut into profits, not having anyone alive. But what do I know.

Anyhow, my main thought is that we have to remember, every day, that what is happening in the world is not a limited series on Netflix. It is not an overlong Tik Tok video. It is not a rant by Tucker Carlson or a song by Bob Dylan. 

Those are all reflections, impressions, sales pitches, and ways people express themselves.

But they are not that elusive truth we all seem to inherently want.

This blog is just my what I happen to think and typed three days a week. Nothing more or less. 

I am all for entertainment. For thoughts and ideas being expressed. 

But we have to also balance that with critical thinking. And Experiencing life in the moment, not filtered through the internet or television or a book or blog or poem or song. 

Those are things meant to augment our lives, not replace them. 

As David Mamet wrote in his adaptation of Uncle Vanya before he lost his frigging mind, "This thing we're living? It's our life!"

Watch the news. Read books and magazines and blogs. Especially this one. Listen to music. 

Fuck yes.

But also take a long walk. Meet a stranger and say hello. Go talk in person with someone you haven't talked to in person with for a long time.

Touch a flower. Feel the sun on your face. Tend to your garden. 

Yeah. Tend to your garden, like Voltaire said to do at the end of Candide.

Here's today's song. It's Make Our Garden Grow from Leonard Bernstein's Candide.

And in honor of the state of Florida, please, all of you, Glitter and Be Gay.

  

STAR TREK OR ROAD WARRIOR

Riding home from work last night was scary. Not because of the traffic on 36. Not because it was so warm in early March and seems to be yet another sign that Global Warming or Climate Change or whatever you want to call it is racing towards up at the speed of light. Certainly not because I'm worried about Inflation, which seems to me to just be the greedy raising prices because they can and to keep the downtrodden downtrodden.

No. 

I was frightened because I was listening to reports about the biggest Nuclear Power Plant in Europe being set on fire after getting shelled by whatever you want to call the Russian Army.

That's some scary shit.

Some China Syndrome, Three Mile Island, Chernobyl meets Strangelove kind of scary shit.  

I think most of us like to think that the threat of nuclear annihilation is over, that the possible end of the world due to our own stupidity went down with the Berlin Wall and now we are headed to the future promised to us all in Star Trek.

But we ain't there yet.

First off, we still have all these missiles. And by we I mean: USA, Russia, Chine, the UK, France, and Chine.

Oh, also North Korea, Israel, India, and Pakistan.

Maybe more.

What could possibly go wrong?

Oh wait. I know. You could have a total asshole who seems kind of crazy be in charge of at least one of those countries.

It really feels like we are at this moment of do or die. Either we get our collective shit together and start living that Utopian Star Trek existence, or we go down the path of Mad Max and the Road Warriors of Doom.

I remember having a conversation about this long ago, right after 9/11, on a balcony with an old friend, in Mid-Town Manhattan. 

Star Trek or Road Warrior.

Life or Death.

I happen to think we need to aim for Star Trek. Seems like that would be a. more enjoyable future to live in. Transporters. Space Exploration. The Holodeck.

Bring it on.

I know it's hard to do. I watch the news and I think, let's just go into Ukraine and fuck shit up and wipe out the Russian Army and then march on to Moscow and kick Putin's ass. Right in the middle of Red Square.

If it weren't for the threat of all out nuclear war and mutually assured destruction, this would be choice number one, violent as it may be.

But that threat is real.

And now, Putin the Fuckface shells a huge nuclear power plant. 

So what to do? 

I have no idea. But I think whatever course we take, right now and in the the future, has to involve changing our whole idea of how the world works, how finance happens, what worth there is to having rich and poor, haves and have nots, and all that.

Like what Jesus tried to talk about before the powers that be said "Fuck that guy" and nailed him to a tree.

I wonder if this is what happened to Atlantis.

We need to stop this. We need to start loving more. Listening more. Giving more. Striving more.

We need so much more, spiritually.

So I write blogs and screenplays and teach theatre and produced shows. 

Hopefully it makes people have a little more hope, a little more compassion, a little more determination to make the world less likely to blow up.

Here's a song. It's Untitled by REM, but I usually call it This World Is Big.

PS: I am co-producing a new play, and we are doing and Indiegogo camapign. If you can, please donate. If not, please share the link:

 https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/higher-ground-presents-puerto-rican-nocturne/x/3385268?utm_campaign=contribution_receipt&utm_content=receipt-campaign_link&utm_medium=email&utm_source=lifecycle#/

PPS: Please take a moment to breathe. Right Now. 

MORE LOVE, LESS YELLING

In the interest of mixing it up, I am writing in a different room today. Usually, for this blog, I sit in my little den, at a desk, and write whatever comes to mind. But today, I decided to sit in the living room, on an ottoman, listening to Iris Dement. 

So far, so good. Of course, it's only a few sentences in, so this could turn out to be a train wreck. I am noticing that my typing is not as good when I'm not at the desk. And my focus wanders. But maybe that will lead me to new insights, different styles, and more. 

I think we all need to mix things up from time to time. When we don't move, we rust. We get stuck. Isn't life movement? Keep the blood flowing. Roam if you want to. Run. Leap. Also, take a different route to work. Call someone you haven't called in forever. Eat something besides the same old toast and butter for breakfast. 

Don't do new things that suck, like becoming a serial killer or anything. Just try something different.

We went to the Oscar nominated animated shorts yesterday before the State of the Union speech. They were a mixed bag. Lots of bleak, sad tales, with only one spark of joy in the bunch, really. They were all beautifully made, and worth the watch, but I do think you should be in the right frame of mind, and ready to be depressed a bit, if you go. Sort of like listening to Pink Floyd's The Wall. An awesome experience, and food for the soul, but a bit rough. The last film, in particular, was just sad. It was sort of a meditation on love, but felt more like a study of loneliness. One of the characters described love as "a secret society". And that to me was very telling. 

If Love, or rather one's perception of it, is a secret society, something to join, something people keep hidden, the Love doesn't have a chance. That makes love a commodity, something kept.

In my experience, love comes from within, and is reflected back to us. 

And it can't be sought, taken, won. 

It can only be given. And given freely.

Life is always a little lonely, a little sad. I've had times of sorrow, of anger, of isolation. And I've had times where I wanted love to be found, to be given to me, to be that last present I open. 

But the happiest times have always been a direct result of embracing the moment, loving life for all that it is, good and bad, up and down. When love is unconditional, for the world, for others, and for myself.

Easy to say, hard to do, I know. But worth repeating, worth thinking on.

It would be nice if there were more love in the world right now. 

I don't think there will be more love by me wanting it to be out there. There will be more love if I put more out there. 

So maybe sitting in the living room makes me write more about what I think on the nature of love. 

One thing about the State of the Union before I go. I think yelling out nasty things from the floor while the President is talking is kind of sad. 

Put another way, I don't think you get much accomplished by yelling. I can't think of any time I've been in an argument with my wife where me blurting out "you lie!" has earned me points.

So let's stop yelling.

Also easy to say. Harder to do. There are plenty of times of late when I've felt like yelling at someone. Especially at the powers that be who seem to not care about the environment or the less fortunate or anything much beyond their own money. 

But the better thing to do, I think, instead of yelling, is seeking ways to help. Maybe donating to a worthy organization, or volunteering, or writing a letter to my representatives. 

So love more, yell less.

Also, the animated short Robin, Robin is amazing a joyous and a must see. Please do check that one out.

Here's a song. It's Our Town, by Iris DeMent.