My sister returned to LA on Saturday, so I tagged along to the big city to see her off. Mr. Show Biz picked her up from LAX airport, dropped her off at home and gave her our dog he's been taking care of for the past week. He's the best. He just left this morning for an out-of-town business trip. He said he's using the garment bag I made for him in sewing class.
In Portland, I stayed at my brother's house on Friday and Saturday night and two of his three kids stayed the night, too. His seven year old daughter wanted me to help her make a movie, so she and I wrote a two page script for a short film about super hero kids and then shot it on my brother's iphone in about fifteen minutes. While co-writing the script, I was really impressed with her creativity, humor, decisiveness and fearlessness. Granted, our little script was by NO means a masterpiece, but it was fun and I'd rather write with her any day than with most adults.
I told her that I'd edit our little project once I got home and put it on youtube. This excited her for about ten minutes, and then she got bored with it and pressed me about getting it on television. She wanted to know how we could get it on t.v., so I gave her a brief breakdown of the submissions-meetings process, and she listened intently, her wheels turning. Watch out for this one!
I've had semi-insomnia... trouble sleeping at night and waking up uber early, so then I end up taking really long naps during the day. Think I'm about due for today's nap...
Monday, July 27, 2009
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Grandma Continued
My brother wrote a beautiful piece about our Grandma. I was going to write a piece about her for next week's post, but hadn't sat down to write it yet. He touched on the things I wanted to say (the mystery around her, her surprising youth), but wrote it much more eloquently than I ever could, so I'll just share what he wrote in his blog here. The below personal essay was accompanied by a photo of my grandma and him playing on the beach, in his original posting:
"Photographs are profound and strange little things. When I look back on my life and the events it has contained, I do so in a way inescapably intertwined with the visual records imprinted on the 3x5 papers stored in the dusty and old family albums. I cannot imagine my mother as a child existing in anything but black and white, frozen with a knowing grin that would, from time to time, surface in my interactions with her as an adult. And though my memories of being in Africa as a young child with my older brother, are far too distant to be anything other than a manufactured memory, I have in my mind the sepia-toned recollections of him and I loving life and each other on a dusty apartment complex on rue de Site’ Vert.
My grandmother died this morning. The event, we are told, took place in her sleep. Though this manner of exit is perhaps most merciful, I get the distinct impression that she would not have liked it. Though quick with jokes, she could be a difficult and cantankerous woman, and as such I cannot think that she would have liked going softly into the night without one last rage against the light’s dying.
I did not really know her until lately. Sure, she was around me growing up, but I knew her as a small child knows a grandparent. Only lately, when recent visits had given her the comfort that I was progressed enough in life to be treated as something more an equal did I learn the circumstances of her life and, by extension, the true contours of her character. In some long conversations over Yahtzee, she told me of her youthful days and her move to Los Angeles, where she had planned to be an actress. She lived off Melrose, and worked hard to improve her singing, performing around the city while waiting for her big break. Her photos from those days, cracked, brown and only slightly resembling the woman I knew, show a young beautiful woman seeming on the verge of something.
Then, she met a tall thin man some two decades her senior, with a fiancée to boot. A major studio had recently given her a screen test, and with Homer, my grandfather, soon to leave town on his railroad job, she faced a decision: stay for the screen test, and perhaps be in the movies, or join him on the next train north to Oregon. My existence is evidence of the choice she made. My grandfather died while I was still quite young, and the only real fact that I truly remember about him is that he liked to eat oatmeal and watch Good Morning America. He was simple, in the best sense of the phrase. Excavated photos of their life together always show him with an easy country smile, always thin, always tall; her, with more active and squinted eyes, clearly the more intellectual nimble of the two, with a sharp tongue to match.
These stories surprised me, and for some time afterward I had a hard time reconciling the young beautiful actress living alone in the big city with the old woman who went to church daily and bought me over-sized Hanes underwear for birthdays and Christmases. But, I suppose such is life: none of us are really ever all one thing or all the other. We are amalgams and chameleons. Though my grandmother told me about that sassy 19-year-old would-be starlet, I could never really know her. She was gone, left behind on a train platform in Glendale, California, exchanged for a life with Homer, three daughters, nine grandchildren, seven great-children and innumerable schnauzer dogs, replaced one after another when they died, and all named Sweetie.
One picture of my grandmother stands out in my mind. My mother took it on a vacation to the Oregon coast some 25 years ago. While watching my brother play, grandma stands, arms crossed, looking out. I don’t know why that picture strikes me. It certainly doesn’t fit with my recollections of her appearance –her hair is quite short. I think it is because, in some sense, she always had her arms crossed. Inscrutable and often evasive about the facts of her life, she preferred not to be known. She resisted divulging where she was or what she was doing before she turned up in Los Angeles, and inquiries into my family’s ethnic past reveal only that she thinks she has some Indian blood. I also wonder if, looking out as she did into the dark waters, she plays out alternate scenarios in her head about her choice to leave Los Angeles. Of course, counterfactuals yield their mysteries even more grudgingly than Helen herself, and she could never know.
Now, whatever thoughts or dreams she had are gone with her, and I, and we, are left with just the memories and mysteries. We will bury her, and a man with a Bible will speak with too much certainty about the places she now is, and the processes she is now undergoing under the protection of celestial beings. That immortality may or may not exist; who am I to know the contours of the shore on the other side of the dark waters? But, she lingers on in photos, and in the bits of her that are in my blood and matter. In time, the photos will fade, the people who are in them will also disappear, and her blood will diffuse. But for now, I will remember a cold summer day on an ocean beach not far from where I now sit, playing in the water with my grandmother, Helen.
Resquiescat in Pace "
Written by LB Woman's Brother. Slightly revised to retain my anonymity ; )
"Photographs are profound and strange little things. When I look back on my life and the events it has contained, I do so in a way inescapably intertwined with the visual records imprinted on the 3x5 papers stored in the dusty and old family albums. I cannot imagine my mother as a child existing in anything but black and white, frozen with a knowing grin that would, from time to time, surface in my interactions with her as an adult. And though my memories of being in Africa as a young child with my older brother, are far too distant to be anything other than a manufactured memory, I have in my mind the sepia-toned recollections of him and I loving life and each other on a dusty apartment complex on rue de Site’ Vert.
My grandmother died this morning. The event, we are told, took place in her sleep. Though this manner of exit is perhaps most merciful, I get the distinct impression that she would not have liked it. Though quick with jokes, she could be a difficult and cantankerous woman, and as such I cannot think that she would have liked going softly into the night without one last rage against the light’s dying.
I did not really know her until lately. Sure, she was around me growing up, but I knew her as a small child knows a grandparent. Only lately, when recent visits had given her the comfort that I was progressed enough in life to be treated as something more an equal did I learn the circumstances of her life and, by extension, the true contours of her character. In some long conversations over Yahtzee, she told me of her youthful days and her move to Los Angeles, where she had planned to be an actress. She lived off Melrose, and worked hard to improve her singing, performing around the city while waiting for her big break. Her photos from those days, cracked, brown and only slightly resembling the woman I knew, show a young beautiful woman seeming on the verge of something.
Then, she met a tall thin man some two decades her senior, with a fiancée to boot. A major studio had recently given her a screen test, and with Homer, my grandfather, soon to leave town on his railroad job, she faced a decision: stay for the screen test, and perhaps be in the movies, or join him on the next train north to Oregon. My existence is evidence of the choice she made. My grandfather died while I was still quite young, and the only real fact that I truly remember about him is that he liked to eat oatmeal and watch Good Morning America. He was simple, in the best sense of the phrase. Excavated photos of their life together always show him with an easy country smile, always thin, always tall; her, with more active and squinted eyes, clearly the more intellectual nimble of the two, with a sharp tongue to match.
These stories surprised me, and for some time afterward I had a hard time reconciling the young beautiful actress living alone in the big city with the old woman who went to church daily and bought me over-sized Hanes underwear for birthdays and Christmases. But, I suppose such is life: none of us are really ever all one thing or all the other. We are amalgams and chameleons. Though my grandmother told me about that sassy 19-year-old would-be starlet, I could never really know her. She was gone, left behind on a train platform in Glendale, California, exchanged for a life with Homer, three daughters, nine grandchildren, seven great-children and innumerable schnauzer dogs, replaced one after another when they died, and all named Sweetie.
One picture of my grandmother stands out in my mind. My mother took it on a vacation to the Oregon coast some 25 years ago. While watching my brother play, grandma stands, arms crossed, looking out. I don’t know why that picture strikes me. It certainly doesn’t fit with my recollections of her appearance –her hair is quite short. I think it is because, in some sense, she always had her arms crossed. Inscrutable and often evasive about the facts of her life, she preferred not to be known. She resisted divulging where she was or what she was doing before she turned up in Los Angeles, and inquiries into my family’s ethnic past reveal only that she thinks she has some Indian blood. I also wonder if, looking out as she did into the dark waters, she plays out alternate scenarios in her head about her choice to leave Los Angeles. Of course, counterfactuals yield their mysteries even more grudgingly than Helen herself, and she could never know.
Now, whatever thoughts or dreams she had are gone with her, and I, and we, are left with just the memories and mysteries. We will bury her, and a man with a Bible will speak with too much certainty about the places she now is, and the processes she is now undergoing under the protection of celestial beings. That immortality may or may not exist; who am I to know the contours of the shore on the other side of the dark waters? But, she lingers on in photos, and in the bits of her that are in my blood and matter. In time, the photos will fade, the people who are in them will also disappear, and her blood will diffuse. But for now, I will remember a cold summer day on an ocean beach not far from where I now sit, playing in the water with my grandmother, Helen.
Resquiescat in Pace "
Written by LB Woman's Brother. Slightly revised to retain my anonymity ; )
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
RIP GRANDMA
Sorry for the delay. The last week has been very hectic. My grandma passed away last week, and so I decided to fly home to Oregon to attend the funeral. Because my classes are during the summer session, that means one class is worth like three, so I had to drop my sewing and nursing classes in order to attend. I'll take them again this fall. I'll be out of town for awhile, so I had a lot of loose ends to tie up before Sunday.
Friday. Went out with my boyfriend (Mr. Show Biz). He took me out to a really nice restaurant (XIV) for my birthday. At XIV, you choose whether you want 8 courses, 11 courses or 13 courses, and you pay per person. There are about 30 items on the menu, and we chose the eight course option, so we picked eight items (including dessert, soup, salad, appetizers and entrees), each dish better than the last. They really cater to vegetarians, too. The main menu is meat-beased, but they gave me a separate, nearly identical vegetarian menu. So whatever meat dish he ordered, I got the vegetarian equivalent of that. It was delicious and a very fun experience, somewhat similar to Sushi Nobu.
Saturday. Packing. Also went to a show with my friend, R. It was a small, community theatre performance, so those are always a gamble, but it was hilarious and we both really enjoyed ourselves. We definitely want to go back and check out some of their other shows. We went out to eat at a local Irish pub/ restaurant right before the musical, and that was really good, too. I had some sort of Frangelico-Bailey's drink that was to die for, and a "Ploughman's Sandwich."
Sunday. Packed. MSB picked me and my sister up to take us to the airport. He brought his son along, so I met his son and he met my sister. Everyone got along. He brought me a birthday gift, since that day was my actual birthday. He took my dog and is dog-sitting her until my sister returns this weekend. I won't return until August, however. My brother is getting married at the end of the month, and I can't afford to fly up here twice, so I'll just stay here in OR until after the wedding. I miss him, though! We email and talk everyday, so that helps a lot.
Anyway, my old friend I've known since Junior High picked me and my sister up from the airport, and we all went out for drinks. I called another old friend up, and she met us at the bar. And then once my brother got off work, he and my other brother and cousin joined us there. I ended up having the best time. It sucks that I had to cancel my birthday dinner in LA, but my impromptu birthday party was really great, and I felt like we were laughing the whole time. It was really nice to see everyone again and be around family and friends I've known so long that they're like family, too. It really was nice : )
Monday. Funeral. Saw a ton of cousins and aunts and great aunts and uncles and great uncles, some of whom I haven't seen in like 20 years! It was a sad event, and I'll miss my Grandma, but we had a really great family reunion. My dad said some very touching things about her. He's a great speaker and communicates from the heart... I told my friend yesterday that he's the kind of guy you want speaking at your funeral! And it's true. I'm really glad I came back to pay my last respects and see old loved ones. Family first and all that jazz.
In better news, I got an email today from a professional sound editor who is going to work on cleaning up the sound in my digital movie... for free. I can't say enough how incredibly uplifting this is for me. His kindness is saving me THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS. Thousands of dollars I don't have, and probably won't have for a few years, so it will enable me to wrap this up a lot faster!
See, last spring, I thought I wrapped the movie, and looked for an audio guy. Noone was willing to do it for free. I felt like I was hitting a brick wall, and I wasn't happy with my project, so I went back to the drawing board and re-shot some of the scenes. We just finished re-editing everything, and so I sent it to this sound guy that was referred to me by one of my actors I randomly bumped into at a Starbucks a few months back. The sound guy watched the movie twice, and just today told me he'd love to help out. I really can't believe it. It's something I looked for for months- technically years, but no dice. I think before the revisions the project wasn't ready.
In the making of this project, time and time again, it seems like when things really are where they should be, then my path moves forward. But when things aren't ready, and there's a roadblock, it seems to be there for a reason. I wasn't ready, or the project wasn't ready. Or maybe I'm just over-thinking this and attributing magical movement of the universe to simple, dumb, plain old luck... it finally broke. But in any event, it's great news, and a huge step in moving forward and hopefully soon, wrapping this sucker up!
Friday. Went out with my boyfriend (Mr. Show Biz). He took me out to a really nice restaurant (XIV) for my birthday. At XIV, you choose whether you want 8 courses, 11 courses or 13 courses, and you pay per person. There are about 30 items on the menu, and we chose the eight course option, so we picked eight items (including dessert, soup, salad, appetizers and entrees), each dish better than the last. They really cater to vegetarians, too. The main menu is meat-beased, but they gave me a separate, nearly identical vegetarian menu. So whatever meat dish he ordered, I got the vegetarian equivalent of that. It was delicious and a very fun experience, somewhat similar to Sushi Nobu.
Saturday. Packing. Also went to a show with my friend, R. It was a small, community theatre performance, so those are always a gamble, but it was hilarious and we both really enjoyed ourselves. We definitely want to go back and check out some of their other shows. We went out to eat at a local Irish pub/ restaurant right before the musical, and that was really good, too. I had some sort of Frangelico-Bailey's drink that was to die for, and a "Ploughman's Sandwich."
Sunday. Packed. MSB picked me and my sister up to take us to the airport. He brought his son along, so I met his son and he met my sister. Everyone got along. He brought me a birthday gift, since that day was my actual birthday. He took my dog and is dog-sitting her until my sister returns this weekend. I won't return until August, however. My brother is getting married at the end of the month, and I can't afford to fly up here twice, so I'll just stay here in OR until after the wedding. I miss him, though! We email and talk everyday, so that helps a lot.
Anyway, my old friend I've known since Junior High picked me and my sister up from the airport, and we all went out for drinks. I called another old friend up, and she met us at the bar. And then once my brother got off work, he and my other brother and cousin joined us there. I ended up having the best time. It sucks that I had to cancel my birthday dinner in LA, but my impromptu birthday party was really great, and I felt like we were laughing the whole time. It was really nice to see everyone again and be around family and friends I've known so long that they're like family, too. It really was nice : )
Monday. Funeral. Saw a ton of cousins and aunts and great aunts and uncles and great uncles, some of whom I haven't seen in like 20 years! It was a sad event, and I'll miss my Grandma, but we had a really great family reunion. My dad said some very touching things about her. He's a great speaker and communicates from the heart... I told my friend yesterday that he's the kind of guy you want speaking at your funeral! And it's true. I'm really glad I came back to pay my last respects and see old loved ones. Family first and all that jazz.
In better news, I got an email today from a professional sound editor who is going to work on cleaning up the sound in my digital movie... for free. I can't say enough how incredibly uplifting this is for me. His kindness is saving me THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS. Thousands of dollars I don't have, and probably won't have for a few years, so it will enable me to wrap this up a lot faster!
See, last spring, I thought I wrapped the movie, and looked for an audio guy. Noone was willing to do it for free. I felt like I was hitting a brick wall, and I wasn't happy with my project, so I went back to the drawing board and re-shot some of the scenes. We just finished re-editing everything, and so I sent it to this sound guy that was referred to me by one of my actors I randomly bumped into at a Starbucks a few months back. The sound guy watched the movie twice, and just today told me he'd love to help out. I really can't believe it. It's something I looked for for months- technically years, but no dice. I think before the revisions the project wasn't ready.
In the making of this project, time and time again, it seems like when things really are where they should be, then my path moves forward. But when things aren't ready, and there's a roadblock, it seems to be there for a reason. I wasn't ready, or the project wasn't ready. Or maybe I'm just over-thinking this and attributing magical movement of the universe to simple, dumb, plain old luck... it finally broke. But in any event, it's great news, and a huge step in moving forward and hopefully soon, wrapping this sucker up!
Monday, July 13, 2009
SUSHI-BON VOYAGE-REUNION WEEKEND
What a long week it's been!
Had my nursing test on Thursday. I got my book Monday afternoon, and covered 1/3 of it in three days... that meant doing hundreds of tedious math problems and tons of reading/ memorizing (plus some online homework and a 2 page paper) to accomplish by Thursday. In a normal school year, this would have been accomplished in four weeks, but because it's summer session and everything is condensed, and because I got my book a week later than my classmates, I had to work tirelessly to get 'er done in a few days. I did the homework, accomplished the memorization and feel good about the test (although we'll see this week how I really did... my brain was totally fried, so who knows!).
On Friday night had my usual date with Mr. Show Biz. He took me to a nice sushi joint (Nobu). I think the final bill was around $300.00, which I think is crazy expensive for two people. But so worth it (too easy to say when it's not my cash)! This is how it works: the waiter comes and you tell him what foods/ ingredients you like, what you can't eat and how much you want to spend per person. The waiter relays that to the chef, and then the chef makes personalized dishes for you... around 4 or 5 courses, depending on how much you've chosen to dole out... it was really freaging good! I would have been happy going anywhere with him, because I just love being around him so much, but it was a really nice splurge to go somewhere like that!
Saturday night I went to a going-away party for my old roommate. She's moving back to Washington. Another one bites the dust. I'm not surprised, though. Most of my friends usually move away after a few years. LA is a very transient town. Over the years, I've tried to hone in on and befriend lifers... people I think will remain in LA for life (I never saw her as one, but she was fun, so whatever). I'm hopefully a lifer... I love it here! The machine here is a beast, and if you take LA too seriously, it can chip away at your soul, but if you just take a "whatever" attitude to the ridiculousness of it all, it can be really fun! Anyway, she had a circus theme, so we all had to dress up circus-y. She had a blow-up jumping castle and fried Oreos, fried pickles and fried mushrooms and everything. Fun party, but I left after about 2 hours... very tired.
Sunday an old college friend of mine was in town, so she (very generously) picked me up and we went out for Thai food and caught up on one another's lives. Then we checked out Michael Jackson's star on Hollywood Blvd. (in front of Mann's Chinese Theatre). There was a huge crowd. We bought cheap $5 MJ t-shirts, too. Fun day!
Have a great week!
Saturday, July 4, 2009
HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!
After lunch we drove to Santa Barbara, where MSB had hotel reservations. The hotel was bee-yooo-tiful. All the details were amazing, and it was very lavish. We walked to the beach and checked out the little shops. The weather was beautiful and everything was perfect. Even the homeless people up there are spiffier... most of them are very clean and have their shirts tucked in and their shoes shined and everything... if they weren't carrying their lives with them, I'm not sure I'd know they were homeless! It was pretty amazing. They probably get a lot of tourist guilt money ; ) Anyway, there was no traffic there or back. I thought it would take at least 3 hours, but we made it back in an hour and a half!
We have so many things in common, it's crazy. Like little things... like when I unplug my curling iron, I say "Curling Iron Off" out loud so that I remember I unplugged it. He does the same thing when he closes his garage door- "Garage Door Closed"... it's so funny! We have a lot of things like that.
Oh, and his casual shoes rocked this time. I'm happy I didn't have to resort to hiding his ugly puffy sneakers that he wore on our last date ; ) But I'm sure they'll come out again one of these days! But yeah, he was rockin' some fresh Nikes, so I was very happy : )
Anyway, my little brother is in town, so I'll hopefully spend the rest of the weekend with him. And on Monday, I have to begin and finish reading the first eleven chapters and studying for a nursing test on Thursday. I'm getting my book late (on Monday) because the book store was closed on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday... hope I can get it all done before Thursday. Wish me luck ; )
Happy 4th!!
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