Rejection Song...

Bad Day. Good Days. Some days you're the windshield... yea I've already said it before.

Today was the former. Bad Day. Actually a culmination of a few bad days of bad news that I have been managing for a few weeks to compile and allow to be over shadowed by what I deem more important - GOOD DAYS!

So that compilation of days surmounted into what can only be described as a magnificent perfect storm today.

First and foremost and with sincere sadness I lost a friend last week - a fraternity brother, a roommate, a shining light in my sometimes dark college days, passed away at only 33 years of age. He leaves behind a brother, a sister, a mother and father, a thousand friends and a million happy memories. Skinner you will be sorely missed by many.

As I often do with emotional experiences, I put that into a category of "cry about it later".  I have an abundant apothecary full of that category and today I decided to open up every drawer one by one.

So while allowing those emotions to come forth this morning, I realized - why at that moment I have no earthly idea - that I made an error when depositing money into the bank. I ran to my online banking to find that I indeed did make that error, and that the bank had graciously fixed that error at the cost of about $400.00.  And they were apologetic but really unwilling to take back their repairs or their $400 bill. They knew how I felt though. I seriously doubt it.

Thus the beginning of the storm. That related to a million mistakes in my past and today I was going to take the heat for all of them damnit. In the past three weeks I've gotten three rejection letters from film festivals where I submitted my directorial debut. At first I viewed these as accomplishments. I tried and submitted a completed work to them - this was an accomplishment in itself. I had many times played the role of "If I directed this film..." and then "If my film was done in time for that festival..." Well, I did it, they got it, and they don't want it. Today the glass was so not even close to fucking full.

And when I got home from a one hour session of calorie burning by furiously riding a bike that was going nowhere - which I today consider a metaphor for my life - I set up shop to begin a night of reparative writing on my latest completed script. But before I set up that shop, I checked my e-mail.

Great idea. There was another rejection letter. This from a screenwriting festival which I was egotistically banking on being accepted to this year. I could have shed a tear. I could have replied to their  e-mail with a symbolic middle finger. I wanted to do all of those things. I wanted to act out. I wanted to move to Europe tonight and call the whole career off.

But, for some reason, I didn't do any of those things. Instead, I broke out into a fit of laughter.

This was probably in part due to Bob Marley's Redemption Song - one of the greatest songs of all time - playing in the background. I changed the word REDEMPTION to REJECTION...

"Won't you help to sing these songs of freedom - cause all I ever have - rejection songs".

It's kind of funny, or it is to me but after the lack of general acceptance for my creative endeavors as of late I'm half expecting to be alone on this one. But more than funny - it was poignant. First, this was one of those quintissential college anthems - one that I often shared with that friend of mine who passed. This song was usually accompanied by a group of close friends, a cloud of smoke, what we perceived as a clear mind. But the words rang today - these rejections, they are freedom in a sense. They are growth. My favorite line-

"None but ourself can clear our mind"

Damn you Bob Marley.

I'm in this for the long run - so these are merely mile markers or hurdles, it just depends on how I look at them - how clear my mind is on that given subject or day or minute. Do rejections suck - yes. YES! For me they touch off a whirlwind of negative emotions and fear. But the period for which that fear and negativity doesn't need to last that long.

Today I don't know when I'll sell a script, or get in a festival, or be paid to do what I love doing on a consistent basis, and when I'll be able to keep that money in the bank when I make it. But what I do know, or at least believe today, is that I can do this. I have so much more to learn (clearly) and so much more I can and have the opportunity to learn. And for that I am grateful.

So "Won't you help me sing these songs of freedom"

moving in the WRITE DIRECTION

Okay. I'm sure these puns about writing and directing will expire from my mind soon. At least I hope so. As do the three to four people reading this I'm sure .

But yesterday, after about a month of akward anticipation - I did indeed take a step in the right direction, and informed my boss that I would no longer be able to work for him and we needed to find a replacement for me. I'd been dreading this moment for weeks - I know how pivotal I am and how much he needs me and respects me and fears how his business might not work out without me there. I do, after all, work there almost 15 whole hours a week.

So, at the end of the what I convinced myself would be the day, and after three failed attempts (and a break for an audtion, a catering gig and a meeting) - I finally had the time and gumption to break the news to him. I was waiting with tissues. Seriously.

His response: OK.

Crickets.

My head: What? Ok? That's it? No, please don't go? No, what am I going to do without you? NOPE - OK.

My voice: Huh. Well okay. I've put an ad together.

His response: Great. Good luck. Lots of crazies on Craigslist.

My head: Yea. Guess I'll handle them.  Just let me find my ego first - I think I dropped it down my throat.

So I moved on.

When I left work (to go back to one more catering gig that day) I felt a millon bricks lifted off of my back. But it wasnt the realization that I just got rid of some "day-job" that was inhibiting my creativity. Quite the contrary - it was a pleasant environment with talented and interesting and good looking people who respected and venerated each other. I grew extremely close with the owner of the company and was able to be there for him over a somewhat challenging year and a half - and learned a copious amount about landscape architecture and design. It was great.

The ton of bricks lifted off of me was one that was actually placed there by me over 15 years of working and removed in a simple sentence, two letters, one word - "OK".

See, I am the only one who creates the need for me to be places that are not directly related to my success. It was this realization on the 20 second walk through a gorgeous tree lined courtyard back to my car - one I've been made aware of a million times before but that I actually internalized and owned in that very moment - I am the center of all of my problems. Not my job or my house or my car or my friends or my family or the way I was brought up or the way I haven't grown up or the agent or the manager or the (countless) jobs I've been turned down for - me. I feel like I just figured out nuclear physics.

And the past 36 hours have been incredibly productive and enlightening.

I contacted a friend who is extremely successful in an area I need some help in - he's agreed to take a look at what I'm doing and help get my film moving in the right direction.

I've sent my latest script out to a prospective producer and put it online for all Entertainment Execs in LA to see.

The 24-hour play is gaining ground and I am doing something every day.

I did the legwork for the Tokyo Short Film Festival to get MLC submitted in time in the correct film format.

I got the paperwork together to call the IRS about last years tax debacle. I put it away quickly but soon enough - that will be dealt with

I even made (with the help of Joans on 3rd), an amazing dinner in a house that I cleaned for my boyfriend last night.

The results for all above are more than prodigious.

I think in this move towards doing what I love and making a living doing it - I'm learning the difference between selflessness and selfishness - and learning there is a great deal of beauty in that gap.

So, in taking another step in the WRITE DIRECTION, I return tonight to the blogoshpere.  Looking forward to tomorrow...