Bleep Bleep
I've heard that No matter where you go you'll never run away from yourself.
It was repeated in the movie What the Bleep Do We Know, a nice starting point in the world of quantum mechanics. Ack, the ex-husband/ best friend, finally has company in which to speak. He's been immersed in quantum theorising for quite some time. Working with intentionality - the creation of one's own life - not feeling like your life or your fate is in the hands of a vengeful karmic god. You're your own vengeful god.
Or loving one.
The thing that struck me most about the movie was the dissection of emotions. Victimisation, anger eruptions, et al. The anger bit often doesn't have a safety. These eruptions have historically exploded in the faces of the men I've shared my life with. Fatty is not exempt. It has to do with the level of comfort I feel with them. I've always said that during the first 6 months of a relationship, no one is to be trusted. We're on our best behaviour. With Fatty it was different. We've known each other very well for 4 years. The level of comfort was established quite early.
I think the root of my anger eruptions is You didn't do what I wanted you to. This is of course stupid. This is also elemental victimisation. Instead of posturing Why me?, which is essentially the same, though seems weak, something I have a hard time displaying, I create an ensuing caustic maelstrom of Fuck you's.
But again, this only comes out in the ones I hold dearest.
So where the hell did I learn that from?
I had a depressing Saturday night. I'd just found out that the short film I was asked to co-author is actually getting shot and sent to Sundance.
There was a moment of over-the-phone hyperventilation when I heard this news.
Writing partner: So, just learn your lines!
Learn my lines.
Years ago I was cast as a day player on a television series. My level of fear of success was at its peak then. The night prior to shooting I thought it was a really good idea to get hammered with some friends. I only have 12 lines sailed through my central nervous system, which had a mandate to consume vast amounts of sauvignon blanc. When I made it to set the next day, on time mind, I had a pounding sieve-like brain that only felt moderately controlled in the position foetal. As I was supposed to play a high-powered military executive (I think), lying prone on one's side was not written in. They didn't go for the suggestion of my character being an opium smoker.
In film, every minute costs $10,000.
35 takes in, I couldn't get my lines straight.
Shame masterminded every cell in my body.
I couldn't run anywhere.
Luckily I have an extraordinary agent who happens to be a very good friend. She told me that Marlon Brando's first role, a part that required him to just say one line, was fudged repeatedly. It took him over 50 takes. Dear Connie. She always makes me feel better.
But still, every time I receive a script then subsequently get handed a role, panic flies rampant like cancer in my body. Consuming. Exhausting. I always need to lie down. Back to foetal. Back to where we don't breathe air. We are surrounded by nourishing liquid.
So I have this emotional reminder, one which takes me back to a time where my behaviour from the night prior both halts the progress bar of the day's schedule as well as halting any progress in my own life. And I think back to the What the Bleep movie.
They said that the responses we muster, these automatic responses to stimuli or situation, are designed to get the emotional response that we're addicted to. To get our fix. Well, that short circuited me a bit. They also said that each time we fall victim to these automatic responses, they form synapses that lock onto neurons, creating a strong hold in the form of a neural net. This of course then forms the idea of who we think we are.
Without giving pause, I don't know how many times I've said: This is just how I react.
It truly taps into my Cave Girl construct.
I don't want to be one of those people who blames other people for her reactionary behaviour. I know it does, however, start somewhere. We are nothing but highly programmable machines. The trick is to learn how to reprogramme.
I was trying to write through some of the depression I was feeling the other day. The source of anxiety that came up was the looming dark cloud of my father's 70th birthday party. It's something I promised my mother I'd attend.
Ack's new girlfriend, the woman whose name translates to Truth/Beauty/Freedom, told me a story about her Italian friends. Well, their families, actually. These old world folk came to this country 50 years ago, say. They hold onto the romantic idea of what they remembered Italy as then. This memory is then housed in a trapezoidal cortex vault with the added value of passing decades and department store sectional sofas covered in thick plastic. These memories and ideals are then foisted upon their children. What no one knows is that Italy, or any people's country of origin, grows and develops. Becomes modernised. Changes in old world views.
My mother: You can't tell anybody. How will people look at you having had another failed marriage? If they ask how Ack is you just pretend that you're still together.
I see these people, friends and neighbours of my parents, maybe once a year. Not out of choice but out of obligation.
I promised her I'd go.
And I am a woman of her word.
But I would be expected to lie.
And that's a greater breach of contract to self.
After getting to know Fatty's family - the ones who cared for and nurtured the love of my life, the parents who go along with any hair-brained scheme that either of their sons dream up, the ones who have always created the best most creative and supportive environments in which to thrive, the ones who can easily and readily tell their sons all their best attributes - I began to reconsider my life and where I came from.
"No one knows a child like the mother," my mother has always said.
And I believed her.
Whenever I've asked her to list off the positive characteristics of her children, she is hard pressed to come up with an automatic response.
Fatty's Mom: [during a marathon conversation with the Comrade] I hope he knows how wonderful we (she and the dad) think he is.
The Comrade: Oh, if he doesn't, I'll beat it into him.
I never heard how wonderful I am from any of my family.
I often hear how loud I am.
How irresponsible I am.
How inappropriate I am.
How disrespectful I am.
Never wonderful, though.
That I had to find out in the real world.
And it took me a long time to believe it.
Supposition this:
Take a man who has never recognised the birthdays of any of his children or his wife,
Who then requires a massive blow-out for the celebration of reaching the age of septuagenarian, as mandated by past cultural dictates coupled with an elevated sense of self,
Whose only demonstrative kindness is displayed for friends and neighbours,
Never for his family.
Who taught his children a bastardised version of honour and respect under a totalitarian state,
Who repeatedly pitted his children against each other,
Who only wants his children at this celebration as evidence of being the perfect father.
His children who have spent tens of thousands of dollars in therapy.
Who has ignored his last born child for the past 20 years...
Is it forgivable to not want to learn the lines to this scene in Act III?
Even if promised?
There is a neural net that needs an explosions expert in the art of defusing.
Look at that. I gave myself permission.
The entire family will be receiving a minced-free version of exactly why I will not be attending this farce.
This isn't running away.
It's saving myself.
It was repeated in the movie What the Bleep Do We Know, a nice starting point in the world of quantum mechanics. Ack, the ex-husband/ best friend, finally has company in which to speak. He's been immersed in quantum theorising for quite some time. Working with intentionality - the creation of one's own life - not feeling like your life or your fate is in the hands of a vengeful karmic god. You're your own vengeful god.
Or loving one.
The thing that struck me most about the movie was the dissection of emotions. Victimisation, anger eruptions, et al. The anger bit often doesn't have a safety. These eruptions have historically exploded in the faces of the men I've shared my life with. Fatty is not exempt. It has to do with the level of comfort I feel with them. I've always said that during the first 6 months of a relationship, no one is to be trusted. We're on our best behaviour. With Fatty it was different. We've known each other very well for 4 years. The level of comfort was established quite early.
I think the root of my anger eruptions is You didn't do what I wanted you to. This is of course stupid. This is also elemental victimisation. Instead of posturing Why me?, which is essentially the same, though seems weak, something I have a hard time displaying, I create an ensuing caustic maelstrom of Fuck you's.
But again, this only comes out in the ones I hold dearest.
So where the hell did I learn that from?
I had a depressing Saturday night. I'd just found out that the short film I was asked to co-author is actually getting shot and sent to Sundance.
There was a moment of over-the-phone hyperventilation when I heard this news.
Writing partner: So, just learn your lines!
Learn my lines.
Years ago I was cast as a day player on a television series. My level of fear of success was at its peak then. The night prior to shooting I thought it was a really good idea to get hammered with some friends. I only have 12 lines sailed through my central nervous system, which had a mandate to consume vast amounts of sauvignon blanc. When I made it to set the next day, on time mind, I had a pounding sieve-like brain that only felt moderately controlled in the position foetal. As I was supposed to play a high-powered military executive (I think), lying prone on one's side was not written in. They didn't go for the suggestion of my character being an opium smoker.
In film, every minute costs $10,000.
35 takes in, I couldn't get my lines straight.
Shame masterminded every cell in my body.
I couldn't run anywhere.
Luckily I have an extraordinary agent who happens to be a very good friend. She told me that Marlon Brando's first role, a part that required him to just say one line, was fudged repeatedly. It took him over 50 takes. Dear Connie. She always makes me feel better.
But still, every time I receive a script then subsequently get handed a role, panic flies rampant like cancer in my body. Consuming. Exhausting. I always need to lie down. Back to foetal. Back to where we don't breathe air. We are surrounded by nourishing liquid.
So I have this emotional reminder, one which takes me back to a time where my behaviour from the night prior both halts the progress bar of the day's schedule as well as halting any progress in my own life. And I think back to the What the Bleep movie.
They said that the responses we muster, these automatic responses to stimuli or situation, are designed to get the emotional response that we're addicted to. To get our fix. Well, that short circuited me a bit. They also said that each time we fall victim to these automatic responses, they form synapses that lock onto neurons, creating a strong hold in the form of a neural net. This of course then forms the idea of who we think we are.
Without giving pause, I don't know how many times I've said: This is just how I react.
It truly taps into my Cave Girl construct.
I don't want to be one of those people who blames other people for her reactionary behaviour. I know it does, however, start somewhere. We are nothing but highly programmable machines. The trick is to learn how to reprogramme.
I was trying to write through some of the depression I was feeling the other day. The source of anxiety that came up was the looming dark cloud of my father's 70th birthday party. It's something I promised my mother I'd attend.
Ack's new girlfriend, the woman whose name translates to Truth/Beauty/Freedom, told me a story about her Italian friends. Well, their families, actually. These old world folk came to this country 50 years ago, say. They hold onto the romantic idea of what they remembered Italy as then. This memory is then housed in a trapezoidal cortex vault with the added value of passing decades and department store sectional sofas covered in thick plastic. These memories and ideals are then foisted upon their children. What no one knows is that Italy, or any people's country of origin, grows and develops. Becomes modernised. Changes in old world views.
My mother: You can't tell anybody. How will people look at you having had another failed marriage? If they ask how Ack is you just pretend that you're still together.
I see these people, friends and neighbours of my parents, maybe once a year. Not out of choice but out of obligation.
I promised her I'd go.
And I am a woman of her word.
But I would be expected to lie.
And that's a greater breach of contract to self.
After getting to know Fatty's family - the ones who cared for and nurtured the love of my life, the parents who go along with any hair-brained scheme that either of their sons dream up, the ones who have always created the best most creative and supportive environments in which to thrive, the ones who can easily and readily tell their sons all their best attributes - I began to reconsider my life and where I came from.
"No one knows a child like the mother," my mother has always said.
And I believed her.
Whenever I've asked her to list off the positive characteristics of her children, she is hard pressed to come up with an automatic response.
Fatty's Mom: [during a marathon conversation with the Comrade] I hope he knows how wonderful we (she and the dad) think he is.
The Comrade: Oh, if he doesn't, I'll beat it into him.
I never heard how wonderful I am from any of my family.
I often hear how loud I am.
How irresponsible I am.
How inappropriate I am.
How disrespectful I am.
Never wonderful, though.
That I had to find out in the real world.
And it took me a long time to believe it.
Supposition this:
Take a man who has never recognised the birthdays of any of his children or his wife,
Who then requires a massive blow-out for the celebration of reaching the age of septuagenarian, as mandated by past cultural dictates coupled with an elevated sense of self,
Whose only demonstrative kindness is displayed for friends and neighbours,
Never for his family.
Who taught his children a bastardised version of honour and respect under a totalitarian state,
Who repeatedly pitted his children against each other,
Who only wants his children at this celebration as evidence of being the perfect father.
His children who have spent tens of thousands of dollars in therapy.
Who has ignored his last born child for the past 20 years...
Is it forgivable to not want to learn the lines to this scene in Act III?
Even if promised?
There is a neural net that needs an explosions expert in the art of defusing.
Look at that. I gave myself permission.
The entire family will be receiving a minced-free version of exactly why I will not be attending this farce.
This isn't running away.
It's saving myself.
posted by Comrade Chicken at
2:40 p.m.
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