Life Lessons

I took the weekend off. Sometimes, when you have out of town friends around for 48 hours, it's ok to take a break from your job. Only if it's unpaid, though. If you're getting paid, then your life is at its mercy. It was so nice to have my friends around. It's so frustrating that some of them live so far away. Like in other countries.

We had a night shoot yesterday, and I did something pretty stupid. We needed more ice, and I volunteered to go down to the gas station two blocks away and get some. Now, keep in mind that for the first two weeks of filming, girls weren't allowed to sit security to the entrance of our set with everyone there behind a fence during daylight. And I just half volunteered half was asked to go down to a gas station at 1 AM by myself in downtown Detroit.

As soon as I got in line to pay for the ice, these two men walked in after me, and one stood on one side of me and one of the other, and they started talking, same time, nonstop. You know, "What's your name, girl?" "You're so pretty" "Give me your number, I'll call you sometime" "You got a boyfriend?" This is actually pretty overwhelming when it's coming at you in stereo while you're trying to do something else. I even got, as I was walking away, "We could start a family!" Which would have been kinda funny, if I hadn't been so creeped out. I came back to location, closed that barbed wire fence behind me, and nearly ran upstairs to hang out with the G&E boys. Because basically they're the most bad ass crew members.

I don't scare easy and I'm pretty good at giving the F-off look, but never, in my life, anywhere I've traveled, no matter what area I've been in, never have I been approached like that. And as much as I hate hearing that I can't do something because I'm a girl, sometimes it's legitimate.

I fell off the wagon

Write every day. Even if it's just a sentence.

Advice frequently given to new/aspiring writers. A rule that is not to-the-letter followed by all writers. Here's how I found out that maybe it's a maxim worth designing your entire writing life around.

About a month ago I got fed up with my lack of productivity and decided to actually get some stuff done. Every day for the next 90 days I was going to make progress on my writing, whether it was outlining, rewriting, brainstorming, notecarding, character sketches, whatever. I had to do something to push a project forward, even if it was as small as writing a sentence in my off the books fiction story. And for the most part, actual progress was minimal (except on that fiction piece). But it was the habit that was important. Every day I'd have to make time to write, no matter how busy or tired I was. And sometimes, once I got started, I would actually make some progress. Keys to the Garden has been restructured and is now ready to undergo the next rewrite. This wouldn't have happened if I hadn't made a little effort every day.

And then something happened this week. I was really busy one day, and I just forgot. And then the next day rolled around. I was annoyed that I had forgotten to write the previous day, and I was really busy again. Forgot AGAIN. And when the third day came around, I was busy or not in the mood or something, and it was so easy for me to say, "Heck no way am I writing today. It's not like I've been keeping up with my goal anyway." (This is how dieters gain weight.)

But the next day, I climbed back on the wagon. I wrote. But I had lost my momentum. It's like starting back at Day 1. Write a sentence here, there, make it count as progress, fulfill the (oh so difficult) quota and move on. Putting in too little effort on projects that will never amount to anything. It might take another two weeks to get myself back to a habit of working for a significant amount of time on projects that might really move forward. All because I didn't write for three days.

Kinda a pain. And now I have to go pick up my pen and jot a few sentences of my story down before I collapse for the night. Gotta fill the quota.

I'm a super slow asthmatic who couldn't out run a platypus.

However, I'm always about five steps ahead of God's plan. And by plan, I don't mean where I'm going to live and what job I'm going to have or anything inconsequential like that. I mean the stuff that really matters, the where am I going, how am I growing, what relationships am I forming. I don't really find myself to be a particularly imaginative person, but apparently I can daydream this stuff away. I get carried away and carried off with my own little plans - usually because I think I've finally figure out what God's doing. Something happens and I make it click like a puzzle piece that doesn't actually fit (our family has an inside joke about this - doesn't everyone's?). Clearly, this is why my life is this way. The past x number of years have been leading up to this moment and I can finally see how God has been orchestrating everything so that everything will turn out a certain way that I've foreseen/daydreamed.

Inevitably comes the moment where I realize this is not the case.

After a couple days of complete delusion, I realize that there's no way my plan matches up with what's really going on. And that fall back to reality really sucks sometimes. I guess because every time I jump ahead with the Plan, I'm looking for a way to make life make sense. My initial reactions to having my proposed logic shot down are not usually very positive ones.

The thing is, this ugly lightning bolt is usually just what I need. It's devastatingly humbling in a beautiful way. It brings me back to dependence on God and *His* plan. His plan which is, of course, so much better than my own. I am not where I would have planned myself to be. I most definitely would have planned the easy way. But looking back on my life, I know now there's no way I can imagine it better. Even my mistakes have been redeemed in a way integral to my place now. If I can trust that God took care of the past, why am I always jumping ahead of Him in the future? Why can't I just stop trying to "catch" Him at work and let Him work it out in His (most mysterious) way?

Sometimes, though, I think I wouldn't even give up these moments, no matter how discouraging they are, because they are the moments that I realize I am limited, but He is not. I am short sighted, but He sees all. I am confused and continuously distracted, but He is focused on loving me. And that's when I can concede. I'm trying to learn about dependency on God, because it's what's gotten me through some difficult times and it's a state of being that has incredible security in His love and faithfulness. And these are the moments when I fall from myself, am humbled by my own ill-conceived designs, and am reminded about His incredible, awesome grace. After I've tripped over my own shoelaces, He's there and He wants to carry me. And being carried by God to the future He's designed is so much more beautifully peaceful than running ahead and getting lost on my own.

Apudne te vel me?

Most important news first:

We finished editing "Join This Group?" last night. I'm really pretty happy with the way it turned out. To hear more about our six hour editing adventure, check over at the Lives Agape Production Blog.

I have decided through this whole experience a couple things.

1. It's not so hard to shoot for fun. We had a crew of three, a weekend of shooting, and all equipment we snuck away from the school for the coproducer's "class" that finished last week.

2. Small cast. Us college students don't need no epics with hundreds (or ten) extras. Cast want characters, not cameos.

3. The new way to abbreviate "special thanks" is "spanks." It's already trademarked, people.

4. I don't like editing. I also need a lot of practice with Final Cut Pro still.

5. I also need a lot more practice directing. My actors were great, but I was still pretty uncertain on set and not focused enough on making sure I got the correct performances out of them. I think that's a self conscious issue I need to work on, and I think spending more time just thinking about the project in preproduction will help with that.

6. Restarting the computer really does help in fixing the problem.

7. Reliability and preparedness are key.

8. You know that you've made a good video - at least for yourself - when you still find the jokes funny after ten hours of editing.

9. It really goes so much better when you have fun while shooting.

10. I picked the best major in the world.

The video itself will be online on the Lives Agape website in a few weeks, once it's built. Once it's there, I'll direct you over.

In other news, I've been wandering around the blogosphere a lot. I think it started with Amanda the Aspiring TV Writer's blog, which I found initially through Jane Espensen and then again through Emily. From there I followed her links, and now I feel like I've picked up enough interesting blogs to start bookmarking them on the toolbar. I need to sort through which ones are active and useful, though, otherwise I'll spend inordinate amounts of time online reading about other people's attempts in the industry instead of making my own.

One thing I've realized though, one epithany I've had from reading these blogs, is that when you're out in Hollywood, one thing you're going to need is really great hair*. There are dress code variations across jobs, especially when you're 1. an assistant and 2. a writer, but amazing hair is like, something you can put on your resume under special talents, I think. All other sins a woman commits outside of her body, but having limp, dry, frazzled hair... Pull yourself together, girl!

Facebook has reached new levels of stalkerness. One of my friends had a status up about the web dating service ads on the side, as if they know that she's single. Looking to the sidebar on my page, I noticed there was an ad that point blank asked me, "Over 22 and Single?" They do know. They know everything.

I'm moving out of the dorms tomorrow, never to return - at least not as a resident. I'm ready to go home and see my family, but I have lots of fun things to do before then (that's meant seriously. I am really super excited for these things). It sucks being an out of state student during move out. Not only do you not have any help, I think it makes the end of the year a bit more melancholy. Maybe I just wish someone would take me out to dinner to celebrate another year finished. Maybe I just want a nice free dinner.

This page needs another layout makeover.

I looked really chic in the coffee shop --

-- until I pulled my computer out of a plastic Old Navy bag. My friend once called me a rich hobo, because I carry my really nice computer around in a plastic bag. I swear, I'm going to go buy a proper carrying case tomorrow.

I wanted to post "Swallowed in the Sea" lyrics, but I just posted them in the past few months. So why don't you just go listen to that song for a couple of minutes and then come back?

In feminist film theory class today, we talked a lot about how the "happy ending" for women in films most often comes in the form of a stable heterosexual relationship, even for women who are portrayed as independent and anti-patriarchal. We used the example of Sex and the City, about how the entire show is supposedly about these four women with fabulous girl friendships, fabulous shoes, and fabulous independence from men. But at the end, they all end up in some sort of "satisfying" heterosexual relationship. It started to worry me at first, because, not being in a relationship right now and not having marriage on my list of immediate post-graduation plans like my best friends (I really am *so* excited for their weddings - they're almost too far away), I've had to think about my life plans in a slightly different way than I used to. I want to make sure that what I do after college is something that I'm passionate about, something that I feel is in God's will, something that makes a difference. Just because I'm not in a relationship doesn't mean that I need to feel like I'm missing anything - but I think many girls fall into the trap of thinking about their lives as what they do - until they get married. As if post-graduate life is a happy, eventful, but empty Act II until they finally meet Prince Charming, have their fairy tale wedding, and live in their happy ending.

So we're talking about this in class, and even though we talk quite a lot about how women are defined as "the other" in relation to men and how we're the dependent in this patriarchal society, for some reason today more than other days I was seized by this sudden fear that I would define my life by the waiting for and hopefully marriage to some amazing man (he will be amazing, just in case you were wondering). And my defensiveness kicked in - I don't want my life's happiness or importance or fulfillment to be defined by anyone, not a man especially, even he will be my husband. I don't want to feel like my pre-marriage years were any less fulfilled because of the lack of a man. And my independent nature started to question whether I want to be held back at all by any relationships, so as not to define a life well lived by the influence of anybody else -

And this is where something else kicked in. It isn't having a man, really, that makes life worth living - but it is the relationships. Yeah, they're scary and they mean being vulnerable and I can try to get defensive about needing them, but I do. I can't even imagine a life where I didn't have the close relationships I have now. One of the main reasons my life is so different than it was a year and a half ago is because of the openness and intimacy I've had with my friends. Everywhere I look and everything I've learned has reinforced that loving others is a secret key to life. More than my career. More than my comfort. More than my independence.

So yes, I do want my life to be defined by others. By their needs, by their love, by their friendships, by their lives.

Still, until that last love story is written, I'm not living any less.

Why are there strawberries on the Equal sweetner packs?

I wish I had had the *updated* syllabus last weekend...

I had a hard time this week. I kept forgetting what day of the week it was. On Monday I kept thinking it was Tuesday or Sunday, then on Thursday it felt like Friday.

I think I'm coming to know my limits. Whether I respect them or not is something completely different. But I'm starting to realize where I need boundaries, in my schedule, in my relationships, in my health, in my academics. Okay, that last one if probably just a result of poor planning. I think both Emily and Bill have talked about how many pages they can write in a day before they max out. I think I found where I max out, maybe. I was have a really crappy, draining week and was therefore probably not being as diligent as I could have been in my academics. Then it came to Tuesday night around 10:00, and I had the first half of my second act due in screenwriting class the next day. I was *planning* on starting that night, but I crashed again and decided that the best thing to do was another assignment while I watched Walk the Line (that movie always makes me tear up at the end. It's so beautiful. One of those movies that restores my hope in people) and not go to sleep until 3 AM. Which left me only Wednesday until 6 PM to write Act IIa. We have step outlines for this class, but I wasn't sure how many pages it would end up being. So after my class got out at noon on Wednesday, I parked myself in the student Union and wrote. One location change, a grilled cheese, and five hours later, I had the 26 pages of my Act IIa. As I was walking back toward my door to print it out, I wondered if my temples would explode from the pressure.

Besides being draining and head-ache inducing, I think I liked writing like this better than spreading it out, a scene a day or whatever. I've always written well under pressure when it came to classes, but I never *had* a deadline before for creative writing, not really (I don't count Script Frenzy). I felt much more immersed in and connected to the story. It was an intense experience, which I think is good. Writing should be intense. If it's not, you're short changing your story.

I also learned an important idea about condensing story beats. I'm not typically an over-writer; I'm usually *too* concise. Current Draft is completely different, though. My first act was 34 pages. As I was writing the second act, I was working on my step outline and my story beats. I totally killed one that was going to be a huge scene; it was repetitive and boring and the conflict wasn't escalating in an exciting way. Another time I condescend a couple of story beats into one scene, which I think is a great idea because it 1. makes the scene more complicated and interesting, simply plot-wise, 2. makes fun bookmarks that you know I love, and 3. if you can play the conflict of the two beats off each other, it will make the conflict in the scene that much more engaging.

But really - I'm not waiting until the day of to write Act IIb.

Speaking of Script Frenzy - it's in April this year. I think this is better for me, overall, because I start my summer job in the middle of June, and so this year I'll actually have the entire month to work on my script. But April is like, next month. The project I want to do is going to require a good amount of research and I'll still be in the middle of school. Yikes!

I wanted to have the storyboarding for "Join This Group?" done this weekend. I only need to get one more actor signed on. We're going to end up shooting three straight days, I think, which will be fun and intense. I also wanted to watch a lot of movies this weekend. We started on Thursday with the Blair Witch Project, watched An Officer and A Gentleman last night, and will probably watch The Big Chill tonight, since apparently Current Draft is a story in similar vein and we have connections to the writer. Not like real connections. Just connections.

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I'm wearing my Ireland stamp earrings in honor.

Note to self...

Don't wear slippery socks in a house with stairs. Ever.

How I hate goodbyes.

I thought I would wrap up my six months here with a second installment of what I've learned in England:

1. If you wash a spider down the drain, it really will crawl up again.

2. Cutting the grass, like cooking and ironing, is also a waste of time. However, as it is difficult to do with company, it just shouldn't be done at all.

3. Peer pressure is a "good" thing when we use it on children.

4. Don't go back and read old love letters.
EDIT: Go back and read old love letters.

5. What sleeping ducks look like.

6. If you shave a zebra, it will be all black. If you shave a tiger, it will still have its stripes.

7. Happiness and pain can co exist simultaneously.

8. Sometimes you have to make the mistake, even if you know it's a mistake.

9. If you weighed all the spiders in the world and all the people in the world, the weight of the spiders would be more.

10. People seem to either take life too seriously or not seriously enough.

11. All swans belong to the Queen.

12. I am a loud person.

13. If you're not properly hydrated, your brain goes fuzzy.

14. It's easier to choose to love someone than choose to not love them.

15. Walks at dusk are nice.

16. As Finding Forrester says, "Write your first draft with your heart."

17. The only thing that can make a bad day worse is finally seeing your cute neighbor from across the street... as you're walking home from buying the biggest bar of chocolate ever.

18. God brought me to England for a reason (or maybe more than one), and I should never wish that I was somewhere else.

19. I've been mispronouncing "first" my entire life.

20. Do not stir rice.

21. The British bus system is hopeless (and if trains are down for engineering work, well, good luck).

22. Always take a flashlight and compass when traveling.

23. Don't always play it safe.

24. Glasses don't give the Bug Off look they're supposed to.

25. Slow down.

26. Be careful of making attachments you know you're going to leave (not don't do it, just be careful)

27. The people of Cardiff are terrible drivers.

28. Just because a train is about ready to leave the station doesn't mean you should jump on it; check to make sure it's the one you want first.

29. Don't use your passport as your everday ordinary ID.

30. Life is better when all you have is a good foundation than it is when you have a whole condemned mansion.

doesn't matter, dear heart maker

I think there was one thing I learned in calculus my senior year of high school. I spent much more time trying to distract myself than learning (which was, quite frankly, much more practical). One thing I do remember, though, is the law of mutual exclusivity. If two things are mutual exclusive, it means they cannot both be true about an equation or a problem or whatever, not at the same time. If P is true then Q cannot also be true. It's an either/or principle.

Who said math is not applicable to real life? (Oh, me, right) If Americans landed on the moon first, it means that the Russians can no longer win the space race. You can't be both a Red Sox and a Yankees fan. If you're an insomniac, you can't be a heavy sleeper. There a lots of examples of this law of mutual exclusivity. And sometimes, it happens to people as well. You can't be in a relationship with one person, and friends with another. People swear by this law. I don't particularly like it myself, but I definitely understand why its useful. It's nothing bad; it's just life.

However, if doesn't mean that Russians can't still be interested in space exploration. It doesn't mean that insomniacs never get rest. And it doesn't mean that people can't care about each other even when they're not talking. There's no hope for the Red Sox and Yankees one. And the law is breakable. It just means that you have to make a different choice.

If you want to stick with the choice you've made, that's ok too. "I've mastered the art of dealing." I will look forward to Christmas.

"Til Kingdom Come..."

I was talking to my dad the other day, and I made a frustrated comment about my life. I told him I seemed to have this personality trait that liked to pick the most difficult path in life as the one I wanted to take. I like to do things the difficult way. For instance, I couldn't just stay at my old university through all four years. I couldn't spend my whole time off at home, with my family in a normal boring job, I had to go to England. I just don't like to do things the easy way apparently. And I was just expressing frustration to him that sometimes it made me so stressed out, trying to get everything to work together. And then he said to me, maybe sometimes it's not worth the stress. Maybe sometimes you should just take the easy option. And I thought about that a little (I was a little put off at first, I don't know why). And then I thought, but I don't want to. Every decision I've made, I'm glad I've made it. And I've made a surprising number of things work. Sheer determination has gotten me through some of my trips in England. I managed to get to England in the first place, and I'm being paid to be here. I waited three years, and it was worth the wait. The thing is, all these "difficult" things that I moaned about, they're what I want. In addition to that personality trait, I have another one, the one that motivates it, and I'm sorta proud of this one. I have a hard time being satisfied with good enough, with fine, with ok. I don't really care what sort of blood, sweat, and tears I have to shed for however many hours, days, months.

Fine just isn't fine with me.

If I fail, it won't be for lack of trying. And even if the less stressful option might be "worth it," I'd rather not take it. Sometimes the mistakes need to be made. Sometimes you need to cross the line to know where your limit is. Sometimes you have to know when to risk it all.

And if all my efforts don't work, and things don't follow through in the way I hope or plan or pray, then I'll just go at it from a new angle of making it what I want.

"Doesn't matter, dear heart maker. You decide."

I got toothpaste in my eye this morning. I'm still not sure how it happened exactly, but don't try it. You may end up blinded.