MAGIC, MOJO, AND THE LAND

I am a magic thinker. I see secret signs in birds, trees, if a song comes on the radio or in the store or wherever. I believe all things are connected by The Force, by Cosmic Strings. 

By the power of my mind.

This may or may not be a good thing.

But there it is and I really can't change it. 

I suppose some of my self-styled mysticism comes from my mother, who had many of the same traits. She found "The Land" to have magic. And when she said "The Land", there were always quotations marks around it. You could feel them in how she said the words. And I believe "The Land" to indeed have mojo. There is something in the Earth, in the soil, the trees and flowers and fields of corn. There is always a feeling I get when I look to the West, East, North or South. A connection to greater things, larger ideas that can possibly fit in my tiny little human sized brain. 

I am thinking on this because one of the ways I manifest the magic is in totems. Items. Action figures, show shirts, actual photographs, virtual ones too, coffee mugs. 

And hats.

I just got back from California. And I had just got a hat at Disney's California Adventure. A really good one, featuring the logo for Guardians of the Galaxy. Sometimes you find a hat that just feels right. Like it belongs on your head. This was one of those hats. I wore it every day for the past week.

Then I had rehearsal for Chamber of Secrets. It's a kids show I'm doing up at Reel Kids. And this one has 29 real kids, grades 2-5. 

Sometimes I think it should be called Chamber of Horrors. 

It's just a lot of kids to have in a show. Especially when it's just me and one assistant. Things can get a little hectic. 

And by hectic I mean totally insane.

So yesterday, as I'm trying to direct the final scene of the show, and with no assistant due to college finals, one of my little cast members pulled my hat off my head. I didn't have time to grab it back, as I was trying to keep things in a semblance of control.

And I forgot all about it.

Hours later, after that rehearsal and then another one for a production of Little Shop of Horrors, also at Reel Kids, as I was finally heading to my car for the hour drive home, I reached for my hat, and realized it was still with that kid.

I searched the entire theatre space twice over, hoping that the kid had set it down somewhere. 

No such luck.

So for the next couple of hours, I obsessed over my hat.

Because it has mojo. Magic. Power. The Force.

And around midnight I thought to myself, "I am a magical thinker, and I dig that, but this is too much." And I tried to let it go. 

A hat is just a hat. Nothing to lose sleep over. There are far more serious things in life.

That didn't work.

Then, I realized that the Hat was going on a journey, organized and orchestrated by the Mojo Gods of Headgear; that this was meant to be; that I had actually fulfilled my destiny. 

And sleep came.

Here's a song. It's Magic Carpet Ride by Steppenwolf.

ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN DAY

Monday. Tax day. Day after Easter day. Today. Up early, and listening to the soundtrack to Summer of Soul, which I started watching last night. So good. So different. I watch and listen and feel like I am getting some music that is more about expressing true feeling than about selling me some corporate crap.

Art always flourishes, regardless of who's in charge. Which is cool. The good stuff is always off the beaten path. Usually made by those not quite in the inner circle, the rebels and lost souls and lunatics, who are of a mind compact.

And I think this is true for all types of art, of expression, of doing something that is an attempt to say "this is how I think it is today". Music. Theatre. Movies. Writing. 

Writing. 

That's my place. I act and direct, but writing is the place where I think I feel most like me. 

And I feel good. 

I think the world has a lot of good and bad in it. War, greed, miscommunication, abuse of power, degradation of our planet.  Love, harmony, community, taking care of one another and this miracle we live on. It's all there. 

And when I hear someone sing in a way that connects to that, I feel like there is hope, possibility, a reason to keep on. And I hear a lot of that in Summer of Soul. 

I want to do that kind of thing. To connect, express, and get the love flowing.

Okay. So. Time to dive into the waters again. See what happens. 

People getting possessed by ghosts of selfish souls. Children escaping into fantasy worlds when reality gets a little too hard to take. A kid taken on an adventure to save the world with the help of Sasquatch, Mothman, and the Loch Ness Monster. 

That's my reality. That's the stuff that gets me going. Today, I think I'm diving back into a couple of different projects, but that's just the plan. Once I open up the laptop and start clacking away on the keyboard, it's Anything Can Happen Day.

Yeah. Anything Can Happen, and usually does. In abundance. 

Here's a song. It's Precious Lord, with Mahalia Jackson and Mavis Staples. It's ridiculous.

THE DAILY RABBIT HOLE

Thinking about writing, my writing, my projects, what I need to do, what I want to do, what I have done, what I haven't done, what I should have done, what I could have done.

The Daily Rabbit Hole.

I started writing long ago. I suppose I started writing the day I learned the alphabet and was given a pen and/or pencil. The memory is a little foggy, as it was long ago, before kindergarten. I do remember by kindergarten being able to visualize a notebook in my brain that had information and words I needed. It was like an old fashioned book from Victorian times. Must have seen it in a cartoon or movie. I can still see it in my mind right now. I have, or had, somewhere, an old journal entry from fifth grade where I put down the words "I want to be a writer". 

I didn't always think that would be the case. I drifted through a lot of school, at one point wanted to be a minister, which I suppose speaks to me wanting to influence people and how they think, which I believe is part of being a writer. 

But I didn't really, truly, think I could say with any sort of conviction "I am a writer" until my first play was written and published. Even though I had been writing all my life, poems and stories and match book poems and part of a novel that still is waiting to be finished- a magic realism extravaganza that will one day make a great anime film when it's adapted.

But I digress.

I am trying to think of why I write. 

What do I want?

I think it varies from day to day, hour to hour, year to year, dream to dream. 

Mostly, I want to tell stories that make me laugh and cry in equal measure. 

Because it feels good. It feels right. 

Yes, I want to be paid for it. And have the right people think this is the shit and the new thing and world changing and brilliant.

But more than that, I want to think it is brilliant myself. I want to find a way capture the world as it appears to me in my dreams, to borrow a quote an old friend who no longer speaks to me used to say Chekov said.

I just looked up that quote. It's from The Seagull. "We should show life neither as it is, nor as it should be, but as we see it in our dreams."

I should have known that, seeing as I was in that play in NYC in the late nineties. 

And I was pretty damn good, if I do say so myself.

Of course, it was a modern interpretation, put together at Expanded Arts when things were still exciting, before excess and madness led to that troupe's demise.

Sounds dramatic, and it was. 

Anyhow, that quote about what to aspire to as one writes is pretty on the mark. I would only add "and it should be either incredibly funny or intense, and make everyone cry at least once."

I am working on two main projects at the moment. Well, maybe three. And when I say I am working on those, that doesn't mean there aren't several other things hovering in the background, waiting for their chance to speak. Those three are just on the front burner.

I'm rambling. I know. Sorry. When I open the door into my own brain, the waters pour out and go where they will and I try to clean up the mess, but what can I say, there's a lot of stuff in me, and the more I write, instead of the clutter going away, I find the palace of my mind expands, sort of like the Winchester Mystery House, getting bigger and weirder as time goes by. 

Each experience this life affords also adds to the fun.

So. Yeah. I am a writer. I have stories and jokes and tales of glory and woe. I will try to amuse you. I will try to amuse myself. 

I have no choice in the matter.

Here's a song. It's Lonesome Fiddle Blues, by The String Cheese Incident. I chose it because one of my projects was partially inspired by String Theory, by the idea we are connected to many different dimensions, by cosmic strings. 

Enjoy.

THE MIRRORVERSE IS OPEN

My new favorite show is Moon Knight. 

Moon Knight is the latest Marvel show streaming o Disney+. Moon Knight is a superhero with some issues. Like multiple personalities which result in gaps of time that can't be accounted for. 

I love it. 

Moon Knight talks to himself in a mirror. A lot. 

I find this exciting because I have a script I've been working on for a while that has people talking to people via mirrors. 

That shows working title: Lunatics and Assholes.

Lunatics and Assholes is about a young woman who discovers that some of her friends have been possessed by a couple of evil ghosts who seem hell bent on bringing out the worst in everyone they encounter. The idea for it sprang to life during the Trump administration, when people I knew and loved were saying and doing really ugly shit.

The idea hit, I started to work on it, and things slowly solidified. There were many drafts, early excursions into alternate versions of the story, but the basic idea of the ghosts, and the souls of those whose bodies had been taken over talking to their friend via mirrors was always there. At one point, some folks at one of the larger production companies in Hollywood took interest, and we kicked it around a bit, before moving on to other projects. 

Their response was pretty excellent, all things considered. It wasn't ready for production yet, and had lots of work to be done. I went on to other projects, and at the time, decided that since they hadn't gotten completely behind developing it right there and then that it was dead in the mirror, so to speak.

Often, I take encouragement the wrong way when it comes to my writing. I was going over some old rejection letters from various theatres I had received early in my career. At the time, all I saw in them was "thanks, but no thanks". But on second reads, I see things like "please keep writing"; "please let us know when you have a new draft, as we'd love to read it"; please keep us on your list of people to send new scripts to"; and so on.

I didn't realize that people who run theatres like Steppenwolf or film production companies like Anonymous Content don't say things like that to everyone. That if they don't like your work, they don't take the time to write personal letters going to great length to compliment your writing and asking to please let them read more.

I still find rejection letters hard to read.

But I am getting better at reading the nice parts more than once, and of keeping those people on my list.

So, today, I am working on latest draft of Lunatics and Assholes. I'm cleaning up structure, clarifying character, eliminating scenes.  Diving deep and finding that balance of mystery, action and comedy. 

And keeping it true to my vision. 

And when I think it's ready, I will send it off to various managers, agents, and production companies. 

And on Wednesday, I'll watch the latest episode of Moon Knight.

Here's a song. It's You're Somebody Else, by Flora Cash. I have it on one of my playlists for when I'm working on the script. I find music opens doors in my mind when I work. Weirdly, once the door opens, I don't even hear the music anymore. 

THE OLD SANTA CRUZ HIGHWAY OF LIFE

Haven't written in a bit. Such is life. Things come and go. We wax and wane like the moon, and a lot of rock bands. Sometimes, we are super geniuses and everything we do is perfect and awesome. Other times, it's a struggle to put together a coherent sentence. 

Today I feel groovy, alive, happy to have baseball in season, flowers budding, sun shining, shows opening, possibilities presenting themselves like friendly cats on a neighborhood walk. 

It's a good day.

So, when last I wrote, I was in San Jose, the world I grew up in, the place where most of who I am was set into motion. I was there to retrieve some artifacts of my life, which had been sitting in storage since the sale of my mother's house. Records, photos, old journals, books, furniture, paintings. Some mine, some my mother's, divided up between me and my siblings. 

That was all good. Loaded up a U-Haul with my brother and my nephew, who is somehow now a young man but at the same time still carries the little boy I would baby sit when he was in diapers. 

One of the best parts of that trip was a car ride with my oldest friend in this universe. A simple jaunt over the hill to Santa Cruz, via the aptly named Old Santa Cruz Highway. Let's call that friend Brian, because that's his name. Met him when I was five. There is something to be said for knowing someone most of your life. Shared history, jokes, stories. Legends, really. But more than that, there are certain friends in this world who you keep close, no matter how far away you live, no matter how long it has been between visits or phone calls. Friends who, when you see them, you say "So anyhow..." and pick up right where you left off, as if not a day has gone by.

And on a cosmic scale, I suppose not a day has.

Of course, life has happened in great quantities to both of us. Triumphs and tragedies, unexpected events, strange adventures like getting a few grey hairs and then a few more. But even so, we are who we are, who we were, and who we shall be, and recognized that in each other, as usual. And so we drove, and chatted, and laughed, and caught up, and had the best damned time. 

It is a rare wonder to have such friends, and I am the luckiest person I know.

My mother would often say a quote I believe is attributed to Robert Louis Stevenson. We all should be as happy as kings. We didn't have the best of times, or the worst. But we had times. And mom would say that quote, often when things were rough. I always assumed whatever royalty she was talking about were truly happy, not like Princess Diana towards the end, or Richard III for most of his existence. 

Anyhow, that's where my mind is on this early Spring day. Grateful for old friends, for a life to live, for days and nights and music and trees and blue skies and clouds. 

Here's one of my favorite songs. It's San Francisco by The Mowglis. Enjoy. And call up some old friend and revel in the fact that there is someone in your life who gets you.