Monday, January 5, 2004

Driving home tonight, after a successful sojourn to my local Trader Joe’s (the only thing California has on New York, by the by) I surprised a pair of deer and a bouncing jackrabbit as they trekked up my hill. It was Wild Kingdom Lite. I then came home to Dolce who busied herself barking at shadows.

I could never live in a house this size unless I had about five other people there at all times. It’s too big, too roomy, too many closets where the boogeyman might be hiding. It fits when the rightful owners are home, but right now it seems to be expanding, giving me House of Leaves-like jitters. Maybe I’ve spent too much time in studio apartments, but at least when you live in a box, there are no dark corners. I’m tempted to bring Dolce up to the den to sleep next to me, but I’m afraid that if the boogeyman keeps yogurt on hand, she will forsake me for a lick of acidophilus goodness.

It’s odd to be 31 years old and afraid of the dark, I guess, but my overactive imagination rarely misses a chance to freak me out. I think I started reading Stephen King at a very young age and it’s done little good in my later life. My first book was Pet Cemetery, back when I was in the 6th grade, and I remember staying up all night reading it while visiting my best friend Anastasia in Cedar Rapids, IA. I would get too scared to put the book down, to put the lights out, and certainly way too scared to shut my eyes. I know better now, but the intro to an “X-Flies” episode was enough to set me off tonight.

I think I’ll shut (and maybe bar) the door to the den and throw an extra blanket on the pullout bed. After all, the boogeyman’s knife has a hard time cutting through covers. And maybe I’ll put on the extended “Two Towers” DVD, because only that will last longer than I will.

I’m pretty sure I locked all the doors…

Sunday morning in Napa Valley, and the world sleeps. There was not one car on the Silverado Trail this morning, except a truck with horse trailer. I was tempted to follow it, as there was only a driver in the truck. Surely he would need a companion to ride the second horse.

I’m reading “The Artist’s Way”. It’s basically a self-help book for would-be artists, but it’s not nearly as kind of awful as that sounds. However, in the introduction, the writer spends a lot of time telling the reader why it’s okay to be an artist. She describes parents who told their children to “get their heads out of the clouds” and “buckle down” and “get a real job” when their kids said they wanted to be a painter, a writer, a dancer. She says that many people think art is only an expression of ego, and that living life as an artist is simply not viable, not possible, not even real as a concept.

I haven’t gotten past the first chapter. “The Artsit’s Way” is a course in creativity, a twelve-week commitment to living a more creative life. I bought it without knowing this exactly- I thought it was just a book about living as an artist. However, I never had a parent telling me that life as an artist was not an option. On the contrary, I got in trouble if I didn’t practice my cello for the full hour. In the sixth grade, I was writing a poem to honor the principal of my grade school during English class, and when my teacher called on me to answer a question I snapped,”Don’t bother me. I’m on a roll”. Better yet, my teacher smiled at me and let me keep writing. (I still have the poem. It rhymes.) If art is an expression of my ego, well, fine. That doesn’t bother me at all. My ego must be a common ground for a lot of people, because my experiences and therefore writing are appealing outside of my own need for validation. I don’t know why I sound defensive; art as life is the only thing that has ever made sense to me. I’ve never believed anyone who told me I would not “make it” as an artist, but that is largely because “making it” has a different definition to me. If I can write things that don’t make me cringe, if I can affect people by singing to them, if I can find truth in a character, and that character has meaning to the audience, then I’ve made it.

I’m not done yet, either. I know I haven’t been on stage for almost two years. If all goes well, I have another sixty or so years left in my life. There is time.

Allright, okay, call off the dogs, obviously my life isn’t miserable. As I’ve said before, a blog is a snapshot of a moment, and that moment passed quickly. And I got a good story idea from my boring New Year’s, so ultimately it was for the best.

I’m back at work, and on the mend, and it’s a beautiful day. It’s strangely quiet here in the valley, which is why I have time to post this. We had a freeze last night, and frost on bare vines is even more beautiful than summer’s full glory. There is not an ugly season in this valley.

I want to be a better tennis player.

That’s all I have to say today.

January 1, 2004

When writers sit down to write about their own sadness, what is it they wish to accomplish? I’ve been wondering this about myself today as I composed the first line of tonight’s blog: “I’d write about the rather sad and uneventful New Year’s that I had last night, but let’s gloss on to bigger and better things.” This is the line I’ve been thinking all day, but as I crept down the steps, lit a candle, and sat down to write, I seem unable not to write about the last twenty-four hours. I’m not sure why. I’ve written of so many embarrassing moments, so many unsightly ailments and ugly disappointments and I’m just wondering exactly why. Or is it many things? “A lot of things” like my old friend Russ used to say? I know that by writing them down I also work through them. I also admit to them, call these evils by their name, even put a spotlight on them. Do I do this so publicly because that is the only way I’ll own up to what I’ve done? And if so, isn’t that rather false? Isn’t that marching down the street and blowing horns to show my faith?

Or, by writing them down, do I hope to create change? I think there is a part of me that would admit to this. It’s an odd hope, because nothing has ever changed as a result of posting my issues in this tiny slice of cyber-space. And yet, if I write about going to bed alone at 10:30 PM last night for want of anything better to do, do I at the same time make a grand wish that this will never happen again? Is that what is written between the lines? Or is it a more subtle despair, a quiet “maybe” that I won’t have to go through that particular trial again? I don’t know.

My dad once said that when he stepped off an airplane into Anywhere, California, he could suddenly breathe more easily. This state, be it southern or northern, is his home. This state is quite clearly not mine, and so I have to find a way to make it okay for the duration of my time here. I didn’t go to that party last night because 1) some of the people have disappointed me and 2) I didn’t actually want to talk to anyone who was going to show up. I spoke this past summer about wanting to meet people outside of the restaurant and theatre world. What I didn’t realize is that some of the best people I’ll ever know were seated at the kitchen table where I spoke those very words. I came out here to escape my life and am still stuck with myself. (Good company, I mean, I’m not complaining, but still.)

Honestly, the only real problem here is my incapacitating level of self-absorption. But that is one of the dangers of spending New Year’s Eve with only the company of a bad cold.

It seems as though I’m almost proud of my misery. I’m not. Ultimately I guess this is the way I deal.

I dated a man for over five years who thought sadness was weakness. At least, that is how he saw it in others. For him to be sad was poetry, in his eyes. “I never cry. I haven’t cried in years,” he sobbed in my arms, easily the third or fourth time that month. Naturally he was drunk and probably had already bruised me somehow that evening- never with a direct hit, but I bet you I could find the print of his hand somewhere on my body. But if I was feeling blue, or even if he walked in the room and I was staring off into space, he’d call me on it and say, “What is with you today?” with a half-smile reeking of malice and disappointment.

Man, oh man, FUCK YOU, icky dude from my past.

Maybe that’s it. Maybe because I spent my twenties with a man so utterly full of shit, a man who approved only when I was sunshine and light and butterflies. Lucky for both of us that I often was that happy. But he didn’t want a rounded human being, he wanted a reasonably attractive fuck doll who would laugh at his jokes and hold him when he was drunk and sad.

There I go again, detailing my failures. But I know I’m not the only one, so by god, I’m going to keep writing.