[Sunset on Lake Harmony. You didn't think I would be up at sunRISE, did you?]
I didn't really tell anyone I was coming up to Mikey's cabin, not even Mikey, until I was walking out my door, and he didn't get the message and get back to me until I was arriving at his. Friends with real estate are the best friends to have, I say. He's working, so he's not here, just me and the pups... and the chipmunks, who won't shut up, and the deer, who don't make a peep, and the rain, which makes a much different sound falling on soft earth than it does on harsh pavement. I needed this.
Just needed a few days of nothingness to clear my head and get some work done. On my plate: a contract to finalize with Michelle to grant distribution rights so that our short, The Red-Headed Menace, can be added as a special feature to her DVD of "Unraveling Michelle" when it receives distribution later this summer; a ballpark proposal to PM/AD a short over Labor Day weekend; reading through a 114 page script of a feature for a director who wants to shoot later this summer; wrapping my mind around the direction we need to go in for a sort of historical fiction short I am directing next month, for our rehearsal on Tuesday; ready a proposal letter for a major project of my own that needs to get off the ground in the next 2 weeks and will take at least a year to complete; finalizing a few details for shooting on Steve Yeager's feature, "The Rosens," our biggest and most important scene yet, on Saturday; and finally, Facebook blasting about Monday's Cinelounge meeting at The Creative Alliance. There would have been another feature script to read, but I haven't received the copy yet, so maybe next week on that one. Might need a second retreat to the woods!
My birthday was on Monday, so I had an awesome three-day weekend celebration. Saturday, went to a D.C. United game (first time to a pro soccer game) with a group of friends. My friend Elizabeth's boyfriend Paul is a member of a fan group called La Barra Brava. They are nuts, my kinda people! We had a blast. Sunday we went to the track, Charles Town, a birthday tradition. First time in four years I have not won "big" (apparently, the trick is to go ON my actual birthday), but still had a great time. And Monday, my friend Alvina hosted a birthday/Memorial Day cookout for me which was AWESOME and I have the tub of extra CoolWhip Sunshine Cake frosting to prove it!!! ...minus a few spoonfuls...
Some friends there, and elsewhere, have been asking, "So what about New York?" This is what I have to say about it, something I have thought a lot about: if I can make a living here in Charm City, doing what I love to do, in a city that I love more than any place I have ever lived or even any place I have ever visited, I will stay here. I don't need to be rich, I don't need to be famous. I need to be able to pay my rent, to feed and clothe myself, to afford to have a car and put gas in it, to socialize without regret, and to travel once in awhile. If I can do all those things comfortably, I would rather do that here than anywhere else on the planet. No kidding. If I won the lottery, yes, of course I would buy an apartment in Paris! But that would be my second home.
There are other things in the works as well, but I won't discuss publicly until they gel, for fear of jinxing them. Bottom line is, I am happy. I have moved out of the inn (where I previously worked/lived/got laid off from) and I now have a housemate in Charles Village, Lisa, who is awesome and will likely be mentioned in numerous blog posts (and immortalized in character in future film projects, because she is HILARIOUS - to the point I feel I should be legally able to write off my monthly rent as a business expense, as character research). Life is good. There is a line from a Sheryl Crow song that says,
It's not having what you want, It's wanting what you've got.
At the moment, I feel I have both. If that changes, I'll do something about it. But right now, if you don't mind, there is a chilled bottle of wine in the fridge singing to me its siren song...
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