remember the movie called impromptu with judy davis, julian sands & hugh grant? it was about georges sand, franz lizst & frederic chopin. i loved that movie...mainly because i had a thing for julian sands after seeing a room with a view. but it was also educational. you know, it was a place to start if you didn't know anything about any of them but wanted to because you're artistically inclined or hoped to be (me). or more to the point, if you're into vintage gossipy scandals (also me).

today i began anne rice's book called out of darkness and in it she mentions a lot of her favorite things as a child, things that sort of defined who she became as a woman and a writer. she says that her mother was a great influence on her because of the poems she read to anne & her sister, the radio programs they listened to and the movies they saw. she especially loved this movie, which was a precursor, in my wacky mind, to the judy/julian/hugh movie, called a song to remember. in her book she says, "i was so taken by this film, so taken by the emotions of the young chopin, when he clutched a handful of polish earth and swore to remember it, that i wanted nothing more than to have such meaning in my own life, something that precious to me, something to which i could give my whole soul." the movie came out in 1948. she was, as far as i can figure from google, seven years old.

the biggest thing i wanted when i was seven was a barbie dream house. xo

shit grows things

"mastery does not come from dabbling. we have to be prepared to pay the price. we need to have the sustained enthusiasm that motivates us to give our best." -- e'knath easwaran

sometimes the writing comes easy, you're just taking dictation. your mind relaxes like your eyes do when you gaze off into space daydreaming. you just have to show up & the feeling in your belly (fire? hunger? whatever you personally call it) drives this writing; you just have to keep your fingers moving & the thing writes itself. when it's finished (and it does tell you it's finished, you don't have to ask or wonder) you wake up out of savasana, refreshed and eager to read what all went on.

sometimes you feel as if you have to put on your miner's hat with the light and delve into that closet of feelings...such a nice door on that closet, good and sturdy. this writing takes awhile, after you make it through the pile of stuff on the floor, and down through the secret door under the closet, you still have that labrynth in the cellar to explore. you should set aside days, uninterrupted for this writing. and bring tissues. for the dust.

the worst (or best, most cathartic--like running a marathon; you finish & you're sweaty & contentedly exhausted) is the hairshirt writing. you have found your hairshirt in the back of that damn closet & just for kicks, you try it on to see if it still fits. you haven't had it on since you gave up torturing yourself a few years back--and yep, it still fits. light some candles, cue up the sad music & put that sucker on. this is the heavy monster writing that will either end up genius or crap, depending on if you've also had wine and, too, depending on how you handle wine. set aside days for recovery from hairshirt writing.

it doesn't have to be complicated and it doesn't have to be good. my goal is to write because, quite simply, writing begets writing. i mean, even if it's shitty crap...a basic law of the universe states that shit grows things. thich nhat hanh put it better: the lotus can grow only from the mud. garbage = flowers.

so...write. create. teach. SOMEthing. xo


"if your everyday life seems poor, don't blame it; blame yourself; admit to yourself that you're not enough of a poet to call forth its riches; because for the creator there is no poverty and no indifferent place." -- rilke

"objectivity, and again objectivity and expression: no hindside-before-ness, no straddled adjectives (as "addled mosses dank"), no tennysonianness of speech; nothing--nothing that you couldn't, in some circumstance in the stress of some emotion, actually say." --ezra pound

what's your excuse?

"now my suspicion is that the universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we CAN suppose...i suspect that there are more things in heaven & earth than are dreamed of, in any philosophy. that is the reason why i have no philosophy myself, and must be my excuse for dreaming." -- john burden sanderson haldane (1892-1964)

are you in?

i've made a committment to myself to finish one of my screenplays this april. i have started five, and for my own edification and satisfaction, i will endeavor to finish just ONE by the end of april. script frenzy sounds like a way to stay on track with my goal.

this month the new yorker has an article about how the elite in hollywood get unstuck and stop being held hostage by their own negative mindset. outside the box thinking helps so you won't have to pay a $364/hr therapist. but i do like his ideas.

there's still plenty of time to sort out your notes & get a few ideas on paper before april 1st. join me?

maybe....

this blog is a repository for the stuff that blows the dust off of everyday life, as picasso put it. hopefully it's stuff that blows the dust off of everyday life for you, too. maybe i'll keep up with it.