Does not Compute

In the old days, moving into a new house was considered the height of stressful.

Well...forget making copies of keys.

Or hanging art on the walls.

Today, getting a new computer has trumped that as the high intensity frustration experience of the century.

If you think about it, moving to a new computer is just like moving into a new house. You gotta find and reinstall your programs, program keys, you gotta transfer your files, docs and bookmarks into the new place.

On top of that, you can’t find anything. In a house move it's: where's the cat?

With a computer its: where's my sanity?

The technology has improved so much you can't figure out how anything works. That's a little, bizarre, no? Things you took for granted now seem like insurmountable obstacles. (Where the hell is the start button?!)

In the old days, a knock at your door was probably the neighbors welcoming you to the 'hood with a pie or plate of cookies.

Today it's more like this:

Knock knock. Who’s there?

Your 67 passwords from various sites and programs...remember us?

NO!!! I don’t! f***ck!

Hell, I'd rather build a new house. From scratch. By hand. By myself.

But instead, I get the distinct joy of jumping through hoops to gain access to the many sites and servers that my new employer needs me to get into.

It's like jumping a security fence at a prison only to find another one that is taller, built of razors and surrounded by angry gunmen.

All I'm saying is: it's kind of frustrating.

I'll get over it...

Someday.

Ground Control to Major Tom

Out my window I see a man wearing a giant, white space suit.

I’m not kidding.

From the office of my new job writing for a technology giant, I can see the laboratory where Space Suit Man does his thing. No clue what he’s got going over there. Something freaky that requires the wearing of space suits, that’s all I got.

I don’t feel so different from him. My space suit is office-friendly. The scientific jargon I speak is filled with acronyms and puffy words like ‘leverage’ and ‘bandwidth’.

My fellow space travelers in this capsule are kind to me. But I can see how life in the Cube can squish out the soul of things. Quietly, non-threateningly. And it happens quickly.

I get home after two long bus rides and enduring whatever weather the skies have shared. It’s dark. I feel confused. I’ve forgotten what it is that I usually do in my own space.

Perhaps it will come to me.

I sit in front of the TV and hope to remember soon. The kitty climbs in my lap and that’s real nice.














What was I saying?

My Word!

I like to make up words.



















It's not that I sit around and think, 'Hmmm...what word can I make up today?'




























The way it works is this:

I'm talking with someone, and in the middle of gabbling (see?!) passionately about something, some non-dictionary sanctioned word pops out of my mouth in the middle of a sentence.
















Out of thin air. (though I don't believe air is thin.)

This weeks words: Creativitude and Creativitating.

Often, these homemade words leave me as soon as I've said them. But these two have stuck with me. Creativitude makes simple sense to me, but after days of thinking about it, I couldn't quite pinpoint what I think Creativitating is.













So i posed the question...



















to my dear Jose.



















Me: If Creativitude is one's aptitude for creativity, what is Creativitating?
Jose: It's when someone is so Creative they can float.

Don't just stand there...

I had a huge realization the other day.







Huge.

Okay, so I'm a writer, right?

Right.

I Write.

Typically, when I send a screenplay out to producers after months or years of toiling on it, there are people who become interested in it. That's nice, right?

Absolutely.

But here's the problem. It's like I'm walking down the street writing, having a nice life. then I send the thing out and after a while people stop and stare at what I wrote. I turn around and see people stopping and staring at my work. so, I stop. I stare....at the people stopping and staring.







The thing is: I stop and everything stops with me. Then I get anxious. And sometimes depressed. I get confused about what life is about. And I wonder why everything goes so slow and dear god will anything ever 'happen' with my work.









i become an unhappy kitty.









Here's where it gets good. The big AHA?

It's not my job to stop and stare at the stoppers and stare-ers. I just gotta keep doing what I do. Turns out if i just put my virtual pen to paper and start writing ANYTHING...



i'm happy as a clam. if clams are happy.

And I'm thinking they are.

Vertigo

There are a lot of rules in our culture and generally I follow them, but I’m not immune to how unbelievably stupid most of them are.

I’d like to know for instance, what genius decided that mustaches on girls are a bad thing?










And all the things we do to behave, be proper - I wonder if Miss Manners really existed or if, like Santa Claus and Yom Kippur, she was created just to keep us in line.

At this point in my life, I'm sure of only one truth...being a person is a funny thing.

So many rules exist telling you how you're supposed to look, how you're supposed to live and how you're supposed to react to your own experiences.These arbitrary rules reign supreme. But rules can be tricky.

Case in point: I've heard that when you jump out of an airplane for the first time, you experience vertigo.








You can even black out, because your brain has no frame of reference with which to understand the situation it's in. I've got this story stuck in my head; I saw it on the news - or maybe I read it in the paper. It was about a man who took sky diving lessons. The day came for his first jump. He leapt from the plane.

The news report claimed his body made a four-foot deep hole in the cement where he landed. So what happened? He took lessons. He learned the rules - how and when to leap, when to reach for the parachute rip cord on his flight suit. He was drilled and drilled until he was ready. So what happened? He jumped just like he was supposed to. He reached for the rip cord like he was supposed to.

But it wasn't there.

No one taught him what to do if the rip cord wasn't there.

He panicked. Panic, one of the unacceptable human responses, was not part of the lesson plan. The report said the guy scratched a huge hole in the fabric of his flight suit where that rip cord was supposed to be.

Apparently his brain went into overdrive and because of this brain freak called vertigo - He was grabbing and scratching for the rip cord on the wrong side of the suit.

The wrong side.

Some days are like that, you know?

OUT

She watches as the pictures dance in her head
Of all the days and faces and simpler times.

She closes her eyes thinking about
the curse of this freedom
and how unrelenting it is,
Just like being locked up

And the smile on the lips of the people in the street
annoys somebody to distraction.
They ease out of their situation
and reach for a stick or somebody elses purse.

And some small child is eating
something she found on the street
Rachel
Her mouth is full
And her head is spinning
And mommy’s upstairs again
shooting relief into her veins

Though she can’t remember when the last time it felt good was
But it doesn’t matter anyway
As the thought slips from her head
And the jammer slips from her hand
And the sweat slowly winds down her face
And she barely remembers her life today

And little Rachel is in the street long past forgot

There’s a buzzing in her fingertips
But she doesn’t mind
It’s her mind she’s trying to avoid today
But there’s a nagging sound or word or thought
That’s ripping at her gut
So she kicks it out with a final hit
And that feels better
At least she wishes that felt better
It really doesn’t feel like much at all anymore
But that doesn’t matter because she can almost remember
When it felt so good and good god
Where is Rachel little Rachel

In the street
Taking candy from strangers

If only she could sleep.

Flying Through Blue

Something had felt off for a while.
She didn't know exactly what it was,
but she was on the hunt for
the switch
to flip
that would open
whatever it was in her
that had quietly closed.
Yes, her father died.
Yes, her credit card
paid for a tropical trip
to heal, she thought.
to feel, she thought.
Abundant sunshine
worked its magic.
but it was undersea
where she found
her inner fins.
sharing space with
giant sea turtles,
to the sound of
whales singing
she felt at home
in a way she hadn't
for a long while.
flying through blue
she found what she
had lost.
and learned she could
fly through blue
whenever she pleased.
and she pleased.
alot.

Apology to March

You are a fine upstanding month, March.
It wasn't my intention to ignore you
here in blog town.
I am deeply sorry.
Don't worry April.
I know I only have
a few days left,
but I will post something
in the blogosphere
that is more artful
than an offering of
regret.

Today is a Poem

It’s early morning and I’m

Standing in front of a brick wall at the bus stop
Listening to my itunes, trying not to cry.

Suddenly a man comes running from across the street.

He is angry.

He runs right up to where me and this other girl stand,
…waiting for our work day to start.

With a mighty force
He throws himself against the brick wall
He misses the girl by an inch or two.
His mouth is stretched across his face in a frightening silent scream.
His eyes are wild.
He looks like he could explode.

I scoot away.
The girl stands perfectly still.

David Bowie sings in my ear:
Ground Control to Major Tom.

clean slate. fresh start. clear mind. clean house. excavate fridge. sweep under bed. look in closet, make friends with the darkest corners. fold stuff. file stuff. imagine that all these rituals set me up for the optimal experience of the current future.