Conscious incompetence

My grandmother compulsively rearranges furniture. Her mother died at twelve of tuberculosis, and she moved around a lot until she fell in love and started a family with a compulsive drinker and storyteller. Boy could my grandpa play a fiddle and spin a yarn! He was an entertaining old fool. His tales were not always the good kind, though. His stories included lies that eventually broke my grandma’s heart into sharp fragments.

I hear in my mind all of these voices.

I hear in my mind all of these words.

I hear in my mind all of this music, and it breaks my heart. 

It breaks my heart.

–Regina Spektor

 I’ve been practicing music more lately because I gave up our AT&T internet for the last month I’m in Knoxville. To save a little money. Find some peace of mind. I inherited an enormous peace lily from a graduating third-year cohort at the end of my first year of school, and she’s become dear to me like a pet.

Once I understood that fostering indoor plants has enormous health benefits, I’ve always longed to have great indoor plants. I never came to keep them because I’ve moved around so much and have killed a criminal amount of aloe. Undoubtedly I’d get smothery and over-water the damned things (and I don’t say damned lightly…they were clearly in-for-it the day I earnestly bought them at some such chain store or farmer’s market or coop), or I’d clumsily burn myself multiple times and overuse the poor sucker(ulent) within months. Was their doomed destiny preventable? Maybe. But they were sacrifices in my education in negative symbiosis…something humans are kind of the worst for being best at.

I think my subconscious is aware of aloe…like the year I had AAA and locked my keys in my car a record number of times. I can’t remember exactly how many, and for a moment I was going to lie to you. I have a bad habit of embellishing, and I even caught myself senselessly, somewhat compulsively lying twice this past month. (Don’t worry, you can still trust me…it was to my sister and my husband, and I later confessed the fibs to both of them…neither of them believed me anyway so the good news is I’m not good at lying to manipulate, but it made me wonder “how much does my subconscious lie for me to preserve other people’s feelings? Or to weave a story… to make a tale more compelling or interesting?”) Umpteenth would have probably been an exaggeration about how many aloes have died at my hands because I doubt it was so bad to have reached teen proportions, but anything is possible.

 I believe.

 I think my subconscious is also aware of peace. The lily (named LilyBell by the cohort’s sweet daughter) has been such company for me these last two years, and she, too, is thriving. In cold months she lives directly next to my alter in my studio where I meditate and write. She has 5 beautiful blooms harkening (heralding?) the variant Spring warmth, and she’ll be ready to move to the front porch this weekend.

Said grandmother has the greenest thumb in all the land. She loves her roses and her dahlias and lilies and other various flowers and the occasional vegetable. Things that need her. Are dependent on her love and attention to live. It’s important to feel needed. 

But not too needed, don’tcha think?

I’m on the cusp of starting a family, and honestly I’m a little scared to be so needed. I think this fear made the first years of marriage extremely hard for me.

A friend of mine I may have leaned on a little too hard during those years wrote a song about urging a friend (who shall remain nameless) to make big decisions based on guts not fear.

And it shook me a bit. That advice (combined with my patient husband’s reminders throughout the years and days) continues to alert me how often I let fear call the shots in my life. Many of us are guilty of it. And somehow I do think women are more susceptible. Worry is the curse of a mother, I've been told. Perhaps men just repress it more due to gender norms?

I sometimes crave surrender in inappropriate ways.

Sometimes I look to people I have deemed “successful” for too much guidance. Too much support. And it gets too heavy, and they prudently distance themselves from me. My siblings look up to me because I’m the tallest, not because I’m the smartest or oldest. Because I’m probably not the smartest, and age is certainly relative. My brother is obviously more responsible and has dealt with far more adversity than I could ever truly imagine. One sister’s clearly an old soul who surpasses my own with lifetimes of wisdom, and the baby has a baby so clearly she’s matured past me in many ways I can’t even yet understand.

Today was my last singing lesson of graduate school, and I still have so much to work on. 3 years of repeating the same practices, identifying habits, attempting to inhibit them to make way for better ones. It was nice. I felt good about my progress, but I felt even better about my potential. Especially when I'll be living closer to my very own uber-talented accompanist...my mother-in-law is seriously the best, y'all. 

I had the craziest dream last night. Probably my subconscious reaction to the conclusion of singing lessons and the fear and stress of graduating, but it was a classic "actor nightmare." I was in a musical, but I didn't know my lines or the music or the dances...my cat was in the audience because I'd unwittingly brought him to the theater. I didn't have makeup nor a costume. And the audience was huge. And fancy. Like black tie gala motha fuckas.
Conscious incompetence is a very important step along the path to mastery. The precursor to competence. You just have mix in the right amount of practice and belief. 

That's the step I'm still on with the avoiding plastic, too, by the way. I thought, "oh, I'll be conscientious and stop buying plastic." Have you ever tried it? Please let me know if you have any tips about saline solution and dishsoap. 

I accepted a lifestyle challenge 11 days ago and have abstained from sugar and alcohol and most caffeine (which I think I’ve weened myself off slowly enough to give up without much thought this week). I’ve also meditated for 20 minutes twice a day (save one day where I only meditated once) and incorporated writing morning pages and drinking lemon/or ACV infused water 1^st thing when I wake up. With the daily practice, and the fact that I am passed on to the next round for The Orchard Project Episodic Lab, I'm finally starting to believe I'm a writer. If I am accepted I'll spend 2 weeks in Saratoga, NY, this summer polishing up my pilot with some incredible writers (including one of my favorite living playwrights, Theresa Rebeck!!!!). 

The one day I was prevented from this morning routine and deprived some sleep, I crumpled into a crying mess. It was an audition day and I had a lot of emotions swirling, and we were dog/cat sitting and I got horrible sleep. It was strange though…as I was unraveling that day, I held in my mind the mantra that has taken over my meditations as of late:
I believe.

It buoyed me because I believed that the difficulty and overwhelm and fatigue would pass. I believed that no matter the outcome of said audition, I was still perfectly safe and protected and provided for.

I would say the majority of my circles are adamant (fervent even) Christians. I am a huge fan of Christ, but I don’t often like to proclaim myself Christian. I believe in many things at the same time. I am not fundamentally Christian. I am human. And flawed. And I surrender to a higher power of good orderly direction. And I recognize the manipulations and lies the Christian faith propagates because of tradition or patriarchy or greed. I praise the Lord, but I don’t pretend to understand what that Lord encompasses. Govinda Jaya Jaya. I think the "Lord" is beyond all comprehension…which I think Jesus said, but Muhammad probably did, too.

An old born-again friend of mine immediately associated her belief of God with my mantra. She’s been challenged with some health issues and her surrender is rightfully in His hands, she says...with a capital H.

I believe in the power of Mother Earth. I believe in my own power to change. I believe in love (and Cher’s life after it). I believe in the healing power of humor. I believe in creation. I believe in peace.

I believe in bravery in the face of fear. And I believe I’m finding it.

slow down jo

Anybody ever tell you that you move too fast?

Anybody ever tell you how to make a good thing last?

'Cause it ain't like that. 

-Monsters of Folk

Now that I've established a few priorities with you guys (my blog audience...blodience?), we can really get down to it. Accountability. But...

No buts.

We're doin this.

Together.

I mean, you're here. So we're doin this.

Ahhh, shit.

Don't freak out.

We can go slow.

I practice slowing down time.

Mainly by riding my bike. It's pretty gray and rainy today and I had to come to the library to get some things done online. I canceled my AT&T home wifi service slightly earlier than my departure date with purpose. I often waste less time on the internet if I have a limited amount of time to get things accomplished, and I sleep better not having tv to watch with the Roku or interactions with screens before bedtime. 

There can also be a loneliness to quietude, but it's not a loneliness I fear.
It's a din that drowns out the song I'm trying to hum. The story I'm trying to tell.

Anyway, I biked here even though it was far more appealing to drive.
Especially since I'm getting over a nasty cold and I went out drinking with my cohorts last night as we finished up some data entry/organization for our digital showcase we're launching tomorrow. But I forced myself to gather the poncho and appropriate gear, and it felt so good. It always does. And daily it makes me mourn the society we could cultivate but don't.

I've been somewhat successful at creating some new habits, and I have to say starting the day with writing and meditating and [more often than not] making my bed has been lovely and helpful, but my relationship with time is bigger and more complex than a few good days. Or even a few bad ones for that matter. I say somewhat successful because there was travel and a wedding and cohabitation with a large group of people last weekend, and I have not yet mastered taking these habits with me on the go.

They're my home habits. But I'm looking to change that.

I want you to hold me accountable, but who are you?

And why in the hell would that be your job?

I gotta do this myself.
And that can be overwhelming. 

Having my own back was sort of the theme of my thesis project, and a "lifestyle challenge" I'm taking on for the next 30 days. I am abstaining from sugar and adding an evening mediation to my daily habits. 

I have not successfully avoided plastic altogether as I'd hoped, and I admittedly got a little depressed about the futility of my paltry attempt at avoiding it when yesterday, I not only forgot to say "no straw" at the restaurant, someone at my table requested a straw. If I weren't sick, I would've insisted he take mine, but I am so...and earlier in the day I used plasticware when it was offered because I was unprepared and happy to accept free food and didn't want to be that person eating with my hands. And I witnessed someone unnecessarily use extra plasticware. 

It seemed a glaring reminder that not only am I not living the way I feel it is important to live (in this case using less plastic), I am having little to no affect on the people with whom I'm closest on their decisions around this topic.

Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. 

I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be.

This is the interrelated structure of reality.

-Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

The "lifestyle challenge," is part of a network marketing brand, and I hate that I have such strong reticence in joining these campaigns, but I do. They inspire folks to spread healthy habits, require the planting and regard for many plants, and aspire to create wealth among networks through sharing eco-friendly products.

And yet, I can't dive in. Join the club. Get others to join the club.

Club.

This was one of our favorite games to play as kids. Giving each other roles ("You're treasurer." "But I wanna be President, I'm always treasurer!"), pretending to have influence or control. I watch modern politics and realize it's the same with these grown-ass men in their red ties and their blue suits. Pretense. 

Of control and/or influence.
We all know commerce is king.

And so I guess the hard thing to swallow about these network marketing companies is just that. I don't need more things to buy. I need less. It doesn't matter that their products are often the ones I wouldn't mind having, that they may be healthy or enhance my life...they still seem beyond my most basic needs and therefor a bit of a...well, a sell. 

And I'm in the process of distilling exactly what it is I have to sell here.

So you'll buy it.

(Not the blodience you, the figurative you.)

I think after three years of growth, I'm ready to sell myself as an actress. So I'm trying not to get distracted by the side-hustle of "easy money" networking, but if I were, you could click here to buy some Norwex or Doterra or Rodan and Fields products.

I happen to think these companies are doing great things for women in business, and the history of this type of commerce is rife with badass women like Madam C.J. Walker, so I am far from knocking them. I recently had a heart-to-heart with my sister about why these companies seem so annoying at times, and I think it has to do with blurred lines between personal connection and professional ambition, but if you can mix it up just right in a network marketing cocktail that tastes good to you, I say DO IT! And I might be in your downline once I have 2 pennies to rub together, but until then, I'm gonna work at making my living at what I've invested the most in...and for now it's this acting schtick.

And writing. My reach? My aim? My message? Buy less, not more. And don't forget to say "no straw, please."

I'd rather play tennis than go to the dentist

Well, if blogging were tennis and the dentist were working on my thesis project.
I suppose I could use this blog entry as part of my thesis?
I am at the main UTK library (Hodges) in a grad lounge slightly reminiscent about late night projects of years past trying to achieve the impossible and synthesize countless hours of work in support of a thesis that I am only thinly able to support.
Why only thinly? Well, because I battle age-old habits that make me absolutely terrible at time management. I was ambitious in my proposals, and though I feel like I worked hard on my craft, I fell short of nearly every intention I'd set.
But hey, the good news is I'm learning. So yay. Go grad school.
I truly believe the old adage that if you want something done, give it to a busy person. But I've been so busy with production schedules and academic demands, I lost the part of myself capable of fostering good habits.
She's a wispy one...that part of myself. Or maybe he's more wily than wispy. Ephemeral. Dodgy. Scattered? It's hard to pin down.
I like that about her/him/them.
That's right...I think this part of myself is non-binary. I think maybe all of me is non-binary? But it's hard to keep up. I'm sort of all over the place.
Don't worry. Pronouns don't offend me and for most of my life I've blithely been a she/her/hers. That'll do. But if we're gonna get technical, I'd say it's a bit of a stretch to label myself cisgender, but I play a cis woman on tv. (Ha! Like the old commercial.) But I don't care to shave my body hair (unless I must for a gig), my husband is equally unattached to "roles" we "should" play in our family (though he likes to tease with an occasional faux-Southern accented, "woman!"), and I am a lesbian in my dreams like 87% of the time. A metaphysical analysis might point to my desire to be intimate with the conscious (woke) aspects of myself.
I mean, I remember learning the word "gender" from my Uncle Mike. He was the first adult family member I lost some years later, and he was a trip! He passed away pretty suddenly when I was a teenager, and I feel the loss of not getting to know him as an adult. He was a total eclectic weirdo like me. Maybe it wasn't actually the first time I'd heard the word gender, but I remember him lamenting that his students (I forget what grade he taught...freshmen maybe?) did not know what the word meant. Those same students are likely even more confused today. But confusion isn't a crime. Thank God.
Or Goddess.
I just realized my children will also have an Uncle Mike who is a teacher.
They may also be confused about gender. I mean, gender might just be all the adjectives I previously used to describe that part of myself capable of fostering good habits...trixy. Spectral. Both elusive and a bit of a lie, or at the very least a cheat. A mirage.
I could go on, but maybe you get it? If you don't, do not panic. I am the weird one, and you are probably smarter than me. Sometimes I complicate matters unnecessarily. You know, like compiling basic analytics for a thesis or simply updating a website.
I drove to Chicago this week for an audition and have been listening to Charles Duhigg's The Power of Habit on audio. Definitely not my preferred method of absorption (is my ADD obvious? because it certainly is with audiobooks), but a pretty great read (listen?), nonetheless. It's helping me wrap my head around some steps I need to take to ensure my health and boost my productivity (which is dismal).
Not only did I get to go to an audition, but I was invited by an old friend to join him for the opening night of An Enemy of the People at The Goodman Theatre. Ibsen was a genius and The Goodman is legendary so I was pleased as punch for the opportunity. (thanks Greg Allen!) Of course it whet my appetite for good work and now I'm compulsively checking cheap flights to make it back up to the windy city to catch Sheila Callaghan's Women Laughing Along with Salad. And my Aunt Chris is recovering well from her deep brain surgery and let me use her car for the Chi-town adventure....which saved me a bundle as I'd planned to rent one to avoid running mine into the ground. (thanks Aunt Chris!) Needless to say, I'm a lucky duck.
This week I've been nothing if not grateful. Nothing like a little spring break to make one feel renewed in all interests. That breathing room was just enough for me to fill up with love and gratitude, and gain a little perspective on just how damn lucky I truly am. I've been acting in a short film the last couple of days and the character was a blast. Another film we worked on is finished and being entered into festivals. The horizon looks pretty chocked full of opportunity. Possibility.
I know it was read by far less folks because I posted it in the middle of the night, but I had some feelings about my last blog post. I was beginning to feel like a bit of a downer. Embittered or sore...and I had mixed feelings about sharing that with the world. But if I'm gonna be a writer y'all will have to take the bad with the good, I suppose.
Ugh, I just had to leave the library because it got late. I probably won't post this until I edit/reread it in the morning anyway, so these interruptions don't matter, but where was I...?
Gratitude? The Habit book!
Productivity.
Yeah, I'm definitely living below my capacity in that regard.
I have often struggled to force my unruly ducks into a row.
Hell, y'all are witnessing me chase the proverbial wild geese in this blog exercise (tired of the fowl analogies yet?).
I think this propensity for overstimulation is yet another reason I'm a luddite. My husband is constantly scoffing at how many browser windows I have open. With so many irons in the fire, I tend to struggle when I'm required to actually forge something substantial. We have more coming at us in the form on communication and information than any human beings in history. I don't take that lightly. Nor does my brain.
I hope this blog will suffice as an excuse for why my website may not be totally up to date. I feel like I should start to incorporate a little Twitter into my life, too, but honestly even thinking about it gives me a headache.
I went through and reset my security settings on all the apps on FB (as it turns out, some folks are actually quite good at compiling basic analytics). The whole Cambridge Analytica bs made me want to get off of social media all together...
But it is a tool I shall use for the time being. And I'm grateful.
It could very well be why and how you're reading this right now so I truly can't complain. Well, anymore. I mean, I will complain again someday I'm sure....but I'll try very hard to not make a practice out of it. I'm very familiar with folks who do just that...they've clearly never seen this kid share the wisdom of Prem Rawat.
But I digress (and expression I also remember being explained by Uncle Mike).
The book chats a bit about cornerstone habits, and I'd like to implement some of my own starting tomorrow. And perhaps keep up accountability through this medium of blogging? They're cornerstone habits I've had previously over the years, and I've seen how powerful they can be. I've witnessed how they transform my life and other habits. The ripple. The wave out. Now that my performance and class schedule is tapering off for the school year, I feel pretty inspired to return to these old ways.
Daily meditation and yoga. Not gonna think about any diet or exercise regimen. Just gonna practice some good ol' habits and watch the dominos of the upward spiral fall. I know from my years of practice that these habits lead to better diet and nutrition, more personal responsibility, and a more balanced emotional life. Donc, je commence.
Because we'd like to start a family, I'm looking at health and productivity through a slightly different lens. I'm sure at 36 my fertility ain't what it used to be, but I cannot see myself so desperate to procreate I would result to hormonal treatments or procedures your average Western fertility clinic would follow. I've had many cousins go that route, and I know that it's not for me. Though I am happy it worked for them...they made some awesome humans. So, I'm hoping to kickstart habits that will not only clarify my desire to have a child, but hopefully ramp up my ability to do so.
When one thinks of corners, you might envision a square room like I did. I immediately chastised myself for being so limited (why not 7?), and then swung the opposite direction and chastised myself for not starting smaller (why not 3, the tetrahedron is stronger than the pyrimid, no?). But nonetheless, I have settled on four basic cornerstone habits I will attempt practice everyday. For my health and the health of the world that I might chose to bring a child into.
I would like to create the habit of avoiding plastics. As I write, I am eating walnuts from a plastic bag because Kroger is closer to my house and cheaper than the Coop. But I'm serious about this one. Henceforth, I'll do my part. Not only are there proven endocrine disruptors associated with all plastics, this shit hurts my heart and my head, and totally makes me second guess bringing more human life into the world.
I'm also thinking about keeping wifi off unless I'm using it, and then being aware of my time and usage. Being here (I did return to edit and expand this entry this morning so I am back in a grad student carrel looking out over the Tennessee River, once again waxing nostalgic about my time here in school) reminds me of how much more productive I can be when using the internet outside my home. I think I will save on the AT&T bill and just cancel my internet service at home for the next few months. It's so slow and my computer's operating system is so outdated, I originally came to the library to work on my website/edit video with a rented labtop on with faster service, anyway. I will miss the HBO (provided generously by my mother-in-law), but I'll just come catch up on my stories here at the library.
For those agents/casting directors/writers who would chastise my decision to scale back my tv habit...chillax. I'm not that kind of actress anyway. Not to say I won't work in this powerful medium and indulge healthily...I'd just like to be more mindful when and how I do...and believe me, as far as studying and keeping up with my craft, I just dedicated 3 years of my life to it so I think we're good.
My father-in-law actually used to have a gospel group called The Cornerstone Singers. He had an incredible voice (as do his sons). Though I doubt we practice it very similarly (he was a Baptist minister of music), we both keep the faith. He would have been 60 this week. I vaguely remember meeting him in high school, and ironically one time would've likely been after a performance of Our Town (in which I played Emily and my brother-in-law was George). I wish I would've looked at him like a I really saw him. I wish I would've known how important he would one day be in my life. To my future kids. Or how quickly he'd shuffle off this mortal coil.
The Power of Habit talks about this faith. The belief we can change is the most powerful prerequisite, and practicing believing in a power greater than yourself strengthens your ability to believe. In yourself. In us.
Each day is a gift, even if some of them feel more like empty wrapped shoe boxes/prop gifts like the ones on our film set today (or yesterday). And so are all the people you encounter through said day. The ones there to challenge ya, strengthen you. Even if they're folks you didn't chose with whom you are forced to engage throughout your life (i.e. your family or your cohorts).
I've always loved school and this experience has been no different. I may not have mastered productivity, but I think I learned a thing or two about myself and that has clarified my responsibilities and renewed my passions as an artist. As I head off now to march for our lives, for peace, for a new culture where we acknowledge our fears and anger and transcend through personal responsibility, I just want to thank you. For coming along on this wild ride with me. I have been inspired throughout my life by getting to know so many incredible humans...and you're one of 'em.
The great works begins...now.

Weebles Wobble, Luddites Loddle

I am supposed to be updating my website on Weebly.
Instead, I muse.
Or try and be visited by one.
Because writing doesn't feel so much like a choice anymore. It just feels like remembering something necessary, like picking up saline solution at the grocery store. Which I forgot to do this week. Yeah, so I guess that's a bad example. Well hell, at the very least I'm a better writer than I am a rememberer...
My high school AP History teacher used to reiterate "long term drug use causes short term memory loss." He was the fuggin coolest. We all loved Mr. Johnson because he treated us like adults. He didn't talk down to us, and he inspired you to want to stay up on politics and history. He made you want to continue to educate yourself. Which is the only thing a good teacher's supposed to do, right? Or the #1 thing, at least.
What was I saying? Oh yeah, just about writing and keeping up the blog. I mean, for a minute I was feelin all obligated because I made it part of my "brand" on my website. I mean, whatever the f--- that means. Screw you guys, I might just sign off forever and go live in the woods.
Threats. Hollow, empty threats.
You can't get rid of me that easily.
But I'm supposed to be engaging through the interwebs to make it as an artist. Or as a human, I guess, these days. But I might love the human I am far from technology most. Hence the retreat center longings...though even if those dreams do come true, I will likely still be reaching out to this web of mine through the internet. I mean, God willin and the creek don't rise. (And by that I literally mean if the sun don't flare or the poles don't flip.)
Tons of casting directors in LA want folks with huge instagram/twitter account followers, and I don't engage in either because my phone's too old, but f--- you and your planned obsolescence (thank GAWD for spell check), Apple (incidentally the "most eco-conscious, ethical" technology giant out there)! I just can't y'all.
When is woke really going to mean woke???
I've nearly doubled the time I spend on Facebook these days because somehow I feel threatened by the FOMO on some random opportunity. For what, I cannot tell you. Connection I'm sure.
It's hard living apart from Jake. But not harder than a lot of things by comparison. Like remembering to pick up saline solution...I mean, remembering stuff is hard. Or is it forgetting? I had another great teacher along the way reiterate "you can't unlearn things."
And yet collectively we're so good at it. Myopic from that memory-loss. Or feigned memory-loss, anyway. Short-sighted when looking into both the past and future.
And believe me, I get how funny it is that I feel overwhelmed by Facebook when most of you fools answer the beck and call of multiple social media commitments, but I didn't have Facebook for a couple of years...and it just kept right on keepin on without me so I'm sure instagram and twitter'll do just fine. I mean, I'm willing to bet most folks didn't even recognize I'd signed off. And that is ok. I ain't mad atcha, forreal. I have so many people in my family and am blessed with many close friends...I love community, but I'm a pretty tactile person. I love touch.
Here, I would like to formally apologize to folks who may know that about me and wished they didn't. I try and get a real good read and have a real tight friendship before I start bein silly and inappropriately touching people. I've got a big love tank and I got lots of good friendly folks to fill it (get your mind outta the gutter...I mean with platonic affection).
I may have inappropriately touched people before, but no one's ever been deeply offended to my knowledge. And I've never wielded any real or perceived power over these people. I think I can read the signs when folks aren't int'touching, and thankfully most theatre folks are, but I am a fallible human being. I'm not trying to be glib...I am sincerely sorry if I ever crossed a line. A line that I may not have recognized because maybe my boundary lines have always been a bit fuzzy.
Well not always. My kindergarten teacher expressed concern to my mother because I was so stressed and neurotic about coloring in the lines. I outgrew it pretty fast, but my mom noticed it pretty early on. I was a neurotic cleaner as a toddler (clearly not a trait to which I held tightly). I'm a lot like my Aunt Chris who's been on my mind all day while a doctor's been in hers (she's having DBS for Parkinson's today...if there's anyone to celebrate on international women's day, it's her badass, but that's a whole other story). She still indulges her neurotic cleaning, but I let it go. To which anyone who's ever ridden in my car can attest.
Pretty soon I was coloring all over the damn page and pushin all the boundaries. To show strength and bravery and to lighten up a bit, and not take everything quite so seriously. I found humor. And how good it felt to make people laugh. So I became a bit of a clown. Every teacher after that expressed concern for other reasons. "Emily's quite the social butterfly," they'd say through gritted smiles at conferences. She needs to focus and quit distracting her classmates with chatter. One quarter in 4th grade I had a straight A report card with D's in conduct from talking and disrupting class.
So I guess I've always had some stuff to say...
I like that the lines in society are becoming more defined around the topic of sexual harassment and misconduct so I'd like to color inside the lines on this one. My sincere apology for any misconduct or if I've ever made anyone uncomfortable in the work place.
Someone did that to me recently and it was a powerful man. And I felt like I had to report it as misconduct. I hemmed and hawed (as any good Southerner would...not to imply Southerners are indecisive, just fond of that colloquialism), and in the end, it felt like even though I did not personally feel sexually harassed, the misconduct was affectionate in nature and would have easily made someone else uncomfortable. Also the immediate reaction of his subordinates/my authorities made me feel even higher authorities should know about his behavior. I told 3 teachers about the situation. Both men acknowledged said powerful man had severe boundary issues and often made women feel uncomfortable with his speech or physicality, and expressed fear and empathy for him along the lines of "gee, I hope he doesn't f--- everything up...he's so close to retirement."And the woman was absolutely furious. Because...well, her too, of course.
I don't always have the healthiest boundaries and sometimes find myself comfortable in just accepting what the world throws at me. A yielding nature might be a super power or strength when it comes to bullets or say, in my case, asphalt, but it doesn't help in leading. I am not a leader, so to speak, so I guess I'm ok with so few followers.
Those of you new on the outskirts of my web, or reach, in this blogsphere, may not know but I was hit by a car on my bicycle from behind at nearly 40mph, and came away with a separated shoulder, a concussion, terrible road rash, survivor guilt and acute post traumatic stress. Survivor guilt because my best friend was killed in a car accident on an interstate over a decade ago, and my brother is paraplegic from a car accident in 2002, and I...had road rash?!? Without the protective layer of a car between me and the driver??
Why am I here??
It was 4 years ago, and I've spent 3 of those exploring if I'm here to act. And I believe yes. As a means to an end. An end to having to deal with social media.
Mostly I want to dig deep and connect the dots. The roots. I want to make a difference in my micro that might just reverberate out in waves to the macro. And maybe the channel for this wavelength is this internet realm for some...but for me it could just as easily be a cooperative or hostel circuit of bicyclist and climbers and eco-tourists and artists.
Who am I kidding? It's all still gonna need to be the on the net.
Luckily, there are webs that are fostered enough to withstand social media hiatuses. And you guys know who you are. I'll catch ya outside.
Writing no longer feels like a responsibility to my brand, but more like a self-care thing. I am processing so much right now. WE ALL ARE. I haven't been able to see my therapist in weeks. I am uninspired by my own broken commitments. My own failure in the face of high ambition. I am driving more than biking these days AND eating fast food. Who the f--- am I? Ughhhhh.
The shift has begun. Right? We're waking up right? I just got cold chills thinking about Samatha Bee's (all hail Sam B, and happy international woman's day) recognition in this episode.
I didn't know this "red pill" culture existed. I mean, we joked about the matrix analogy in my yoga teacher training, and I worked with fuggin Morpheus this summer. And I didn't know alt-right bastards had co-opted the red pill narrative to idolize f---sticks like Elliot Rodger?!? I had only read his manifesto to study for my role in the play I'm in...it didn't occur to me so many others had read it and felt kinship with him and camaradarie (f--- spell check!).
And then I heard Barry Crimmin talking about his battle with AOL over childhood pornography on NPR today, and I thought THIS. THIS. This is why I'm a luddite...this is why I hate technology and the internet. Human beings are garbage.
Or as Peña laments in the strangers, "the world is fucked up."
And then I heard about the Florida legislature and saw an ad for an oncologist running for congress on a "science should lead us" platform, and heard my aunt is recovering well from surgery.
And I saw the glimmer of hope.
This week has been all about defining things that are very important to me. Drawing my own lines. I think my vices and pitfalls and weaknesses (hello sugar, hello laziness, oh hey Cook Out) have had a lovely "death throes" display of dominance because I feel like I am waking up. Remembering all the stuff I forgot I forgot. Things that I feel obligated to use this platform to discuss because they are parts of my self pushed aside to practice acting.
PRACTICE AND ALL IS COMING.
It may have taken three saturated years of studying acting to make me desperately miss other previously rich parts of my life, but I am feelin the ache now. My yearning for those aspects of my life currently supersedes any hot pursuit of the successful acting career. Which makes all of the work necessary for finishing up my degree especially arduous.
Sadly, I have not found a yoga teacher here in Knoxville that inspired me in the ways my NY and KY teachers did towards asana. I did go to yoga last night and did a smidge on my own today, but I also had fast food after the show tonight, and I don't even really care about my own personal health that much...it's the overwhelming, disgusting literal garbage that this particular indulgence produces. I felt equally disgusting about left-overs from a nice restaurant the other day...it's not only the fast part that bothers me, though I'm sure my body is less appreciative of the milkshake than the salad, but they both came in styrofoam guilt-containers.
Now, I try to be mindful of the plastic I buy (and clearly steer clear of styrofoam most days), but recycling really only helps assuage my guilt. I have to change more at the consumer level. I have mixed feelings about the efficacy of the recycling industry. Mostly because sometimes well-meaning ignorant people throw bullshit in the wrong bins because they never bother to look anything up (prolly the same people that don't fact check their facebook posts). Truly a large portion of my diet comes from produce, but I am often overwhelmed by short-term frugalities and poor white trash diet tendencies that then take over my control board.
In my defense, cooking for one is a lot harder than two (especially when your husband is a big hungry workin man and eats twice as much as you so it's really like adjusting shopping and cooking for three down to one...love you, boo).
And the world is f---ed up and falling apart.
And human beings are...
Well, except you. You're swell! You made it this far.
To find out that if you are what you eat, I am the garbage I despise.
(I get that this self-loathing doesn't help anything, but don't worry. I needed to go here. To push off and swing back the other way. To relate. To find compassion for those people that get the wrath of my judgement. To get ahold of myself.
To remember me. And start there.)
Maybe I can be more accountable for me and that's what will ripple the wave out? Not my website. Not my instagram and twitter followers. Not my blog. Not even my facebook.
My actions. My habits. My character.
The one I am truly here to play.

This lil' light of mine

We are the wretched.
When I was nine I told my parents I wanted to be an actor. Why is there a deep part of me that wishes I had evolved past that? I mean, besides nutty buddies and science class and recess, I can't remember much else about being nine. There were babies around. Loads of babies. I suppose I was struggling for autonomy and attention. Was, haha.
But my pops drove me across town for drama classes and was a great science fair partner. I guess I was always more interested in the art aspects of the projects more than science, but they're a right little pair science and art. And he encouraged both. As a student he'd done well in science and math, but having started a family he worked on the railroad (yes, all the livelong day) instead of going to college. Whether it be an excavated dinosaur skeleton (made of excavated chicken bones of course), or a glitter volcano, or a cardboard box spaceship, he was always happy to help.
I'm feelin pretty happy.
I'm 2 glasses of sangria in, and I sit on a precipice.
A ledge I've walked a few times.
As I picked up said sangria at my local South Knoxville Kroger, I witnessed a familiar scene. A young girl in blue lipstick was walking in my direction, "Dad, what are you doing?" I turned to see behind me a fifty year old scruffy white guy was squatting on the wall outside the grocery, clearly inebriated. He mumbled something.
We are the wretched.
I saw in the young girl's face...that embarrassment, that shame, that resigned sigh I have felt all too many times. Not to say my dad would ever be squatting drunk against a public building at 10:30pm on a Thurs. I had to word that sentence slowly, and I still don't know if it's quite true. Not when I was the sensitive age of the girl anyway.
My dad prefers art to science, too (but Bud heavy to sangria). S'probably why we were such a good team. He'll take stories over science. Limited experience over universal truth.
I miss feeling like we're on the same team. I mean, it's been a while, but...
Sorry if this blog is even more scattered than usual...I've got my puppy this week (he's been leavin' town with Jake as we transition back to Louisville, but this week I begged to be bathed in attention...it's a bit much when I have a show every night, but we had Sun-Tues off so Jake somewhat reluctantly left him). And now he's a little stir crazy because we didn't get a walk in on this muddy, rainy day. He beckons me every other paragraph with his metronome-like, paint-tip tail and demands a piece of carrot.
Mythology is what he clings to most. My pops, not the pup. Mythology is one of my favorite art forms too. Theatre is mythology. His fav is the story of the fallen man (clearly because of a woman) so bad, somebody holy had to give their life to redeem 'em. He was that bad. He did the bad stuff. He sinned. The original wretched. But the savior came and redeemed us all so now we can reconcile our badness. Our natural badness. And the sincere remorse we have for it, oh yeah and then the promise to try and never do it again.
Remorse.
Comes from the Latin for "I bite back," or "to bite again."
What's latin for "hair of the dog"? Cause I got a feelin this sangria might bite me back tomorrow. Not that I could ever partake in that hangover cure. My hangovers are a bit...extra. I'm a delicate flower. Snowflake. One might wonder why I come back again and again to this fierce medicine so abusive to my body. I can't say. I teeter on the precipice.
The moon is full.
The pup's asleep. I finally got him to settle down. Where was I?
Promise.
Latin for...well, for promise.
Promise is as old as language.
I promise I might have a point.
A former roommate used to have this book, They Have a Word for It, A Lighthearted Lexicon of Untranslatable Words and Phrases.
Untranslatable.
I love how language weaves us all together, but necessarily accentuates our differences. Love letters n language barriers n all that lies between.
I've come to believe the barriers between my dad's team and mine are sometimes just an accent or dialect. A football field...large enough to retreat to opposing ends, but still in the same game. But some days they feel like a battleground. Sometimes it feels like we're up against...a well-armed militia. I pray for grace. In that first drama class final recital I remember singing "Amazing Grace." I'm sure my dad came in support. Sometimes the remorse I have for the impatience and anger I have towards him makes my heart heavy as lead.
We are the wretched.
If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves. ~Lincoln
My dad is a poet. A dreamer. And sometimes he's a drunk.
But I could choose different language to tell you that. I could say he's Dionysian. He does love to dance and sing. I remember being embarrassed at his gusto for hymns in church, and his antics on the dance floor are indomitable. He's pretty laissez faire...and he'll laissez les bon temps rouler.
We've got a lot in common.
His mother always calls him her diamond in the rough. Because he shines to anyone who can see past the stained, sooty coal-like exterior. But sometimes I fear the pressure that's necessary for coal to be turned into a diamond might crush him. He's often in physical pain. And he struggles. And he's addicted to (comforted by?) Fox News and right wing media. He doesn't loudly sing those hymns anymore. And part of me feels guilty for having ever been embarrassed at the beauty of it.
Actually I just had a memory from about age 9. I went to an all white Catholic school and was taking all the ritual steps of a good young parishoner. I liked it. I believed. All the white dresses and parties and ceremony wonderfully theatrical, and I reveled in it. AMEN. But it was the general consensus that singing hymns softly was "cooler" than really belting them out. This precedent was advocated by the middle school kids with whom we participated in Wednesday morning mass. One week they even went so far as to sing out only on the word "come" in all the hymns. Sister Mary Jane was surely disappointed in the restrictions on corporal punishment that morning. That's when I learned the word "innuendo."
But the memory that just surfaced was one such Wednesday mass when our priest had invited a black gospel choir leader (or perhaps a Baptist preacher?) to lead us all in some gospel songs. We sang "This little light of mine," and the heartfelt, repetitive "Amen." His beautiful, booming voice and pearly white smile encouraged us between the phrases, "Sing it over!" It may have been the first time I actually felt the Holy Spirit in church. I remember shedding the prim, cautious self-conscious mores of quietude and boredom in church and truly praising joy for the first time.
I think something in my dad never quite jived with those mores either. Once we made it through the 8th grade in parochial schools, he gave up pretending to be Catholic. But he still believed. He clung to that redemption. Perhaps because he is no stranger to remorse.
We are the wretched.
My father attempts and succeeds at righteousness on many levels. He is generous beyond his means. He is open and kind hearted and the life of any party. He feels the burden of the system that does not support him. A system that has often not allowed him to make ends meet and turns around and calls him privileged. I think we had a meaningful exchange recently where I was able to point up his privilege being not in monetary wealth or lack of work ethic, but in the way the world views him. The way a cop might not bother to pull him over or search his car (even though he might regularly be driving with a BAC above the legal limit with illegal drugs on his person).
I know my own privilege lies in his presence in my life. And that privilege is enormous beyond measure. If we had darker skin I might be receiving birthday letters from prison instead of phone calls from him and my mom singing to my voicemail. I might miss finding him snoring on the couch (Fox News blaring) anytime I arrive home to their house after 8pm. I might never have been driven across town for drama lessons, and I might never have sung "Amazing Grace" in recital, and I would most certainly be a completely different person.
Having this puppy makes me wonder how I might be a different parent.
Can't say (one of my pop's most used responses, rhyming can't with ain't). He did all the important stuff really well. I can only hope.
My mom sees two equally hard-headed, passionate people and laughs at how often we can't see our similarities. And though he never fully supported Trump's candidacy, he voted for him. It makes me angry and sick and sad. But there's hope for us yet. With grace, I suppose.
Sometimes I get a glimpse of light from that shiny diamond in the rough, but other times I just see a wretch.
Like me.

Oh hey! 128!

My last blog has been viewed by 128 folks. Or 128 times? I'm not sure. I don't bother pretending I know enough about technology. I am so ignorant. But I know a thing or two about a thing or two. I guess. And I like the number 128.
Who are you internet voyeurs? Nobody comments 'cept my baby sister because I make her. Drop me a line if you dare.
After yet another tragedy, I was temporarily stalled at the keyboard. What can I say that hasn't been bouncing around my echo chamber? What could my heart venture to express that could make one bit of difference?
8 days ago I was baptized by fire.
Not literally.
Although clearly that means nothing anymore in our post-truth world. The upside down.
Close to literally, tho. I actually suffered 1st degree burns from a cup of scalding hot tea that slipped from my fingers and spilled all over my chest. I am fine. It was painful and lonely. Jake's been in KY, and I had an early night at rehearsal. I'd just settled in with my night-time tea and a good book and was ecstatic at the prospect of getting a good 8-10 hr nap in, and it was a chilly night and was aiming to rest it on my bosom over my thick bathrobe and just hit the steam and warm my hands on the mug as I have done thousands (if not, definitely hundreds...literally hundreds) of times.
In retrospect, I was too excited.
I'm pretty excitable. I think people like that about me. I don't know. Do people really like me? I mean, 128 people like me enough to at least click on my blog link to make me believe they've read my blog. That's certainly enough for any one small human to need.
THEN WHY AM I SO NEEDY??? Why do I want more than I need? Why do any of us? Where does insecurity come from?
I was about to write "human nature?" when Freeman Lovejoy (my feline familiar) started to scratch at the door. He didn't want to go outside so I deduced he could see the bottom of his bowl. He's a fat cat, but not seriously overweight...I mean he likes to exercise the 4 hours/day he's not snoozing. But he is hopelessly insecure. He won't finish a bowl of food before he'll just drive you crazy with scratching and meowing and his weaving thru your legs threatening to trip you.
I've been his human for 7 years and he's never known true hunger. But his instincts say "Wait!!! This might be all you get!" And turn him into a total asshole. A worry-wort. A greedy fat cat. And I can't say I don't get it. We're all insecure assholes unnecessarily worried and greedy. It seems nature cannot be severed from the human, try as we might.
I mean, the knowledge Eve tricked Adam into gaining made them less ignorant, but they lost the bliss of the garden. Greed is what happens when our collective instincts are skewed by the great forgetting. Maybe this is what the early Semites were exploring with their mythology? They imply that what humans had before we became self conscious was gone after that original sin. Lost. Forgotten. Taken away. Forbidden.
I think if people don't like me it's because I can come of as judgmental. I mean, I can recognize that in my past I have spent a lot of time judging. I think I also just struggle with the difference between simply making a choice and judging. I sit down to stream some tv, and I choose the latest HBO series (which happened to have 3! actresses with whom I have directly worked...it's so close I can taste it) because I judge it to be the best thing happenin right now in that realm and my time is so limited. I read Jill Soloway's Tiny Women in Shiny Pants because I judged it to be a solid recommendation from a genius on how to start my career as an actress and writer. Sheila Callaghan graciously has many more scopes to light my path (which I plan to gorge on post thesis project).
But my baptism from the hot tea has me itchy. And that itch is manifesting itself as this blog of wise meanderings. The wisdom is not my own. I'm just open and finding it coming in waves. Perhaps it's the wave in my mind coming from Ursula K. Le Guin's collection of talks and essays?
Maybe it's Brené Brown's On Being episode this week? She brilliantly addresses the cultural amnesia that's temporarily lifted in moments of great joy or excitement with strangers (like hugging the fan next to you at a sporting event). Host with the most Krista Tippet quotes a line from Brown's latest book that advises "Hold hands. With strangers."
Did I mention I'm in a play called the strangers? I have a whole monologue about this exact topic. It's beautiful, and I'm having a swell time making Christopher Oscar Peña's character come alive. Brown eloquently noted a beautiful sentiment that is the heart of Peña's production, "He or she who chooses comfort--over courage and facilitating real conversations in towns and cities and synagogues and areas who need it; when you choose your own comfort over trying to bring people together, and you're a leader, either a civic leader or a faith leader, your days of relevance are numbered."
I pray for this post-post-truth reawakening with every fiber of my being.
Come hell or high water. Or hot water, as it were.
Before we knew there were judgements to make about one another...before we "knew" of this blaringly relative and subjective "good and evil," we recognized the truth underneath it all. That great capacity for love. It is the true North (while there is still one). It is our gift from Divinity. The apple just fooled us into thinking it was about something else because of our basic capacity for hunger. For more always. And subsequently the capacity for a lack mentality. Insatiable and constant it steers us toward greed more often than we'd like. Or like to admit.
But there. Is. Enough. If we go back to the Judeo-Christian mythology (and why not, it is Lent), Jesus completed the cycle or circle of humanity's damnedness to remind us of what we collectively forgot in the garden. That love is the only key we need to unlock redemption.
My sweet, ever-lovin décolletage may be marred for another good week or more, and I'm hoping it doesn't leave a scar. Though I'm no stranger to 'em. (I guess it could help the haggard/prisoner/trashy/victim trope a little better for my future cameos on OITNB and other hit tv shows.) As I sat down at my alter to meditate this evening, a sacred heart my husband drew at it's center reminded me of a time when I felt most insecure and incomplete.
When I first started to meditate with some regularity (desperate for a partner to love), I kept having recurring visions of this sacred heart. I had seen it depicted in many a picture of Jesus and the Mother Mary growing up Catholic, and I thought it was just a memory stamped in my brain that came up in spiritual stirring. From a teacher in the school of metaphysics, I was given a pdf of a spiritual Taraka Yoga practice entitled "The Keys to Your Heart"and I taught and performed the ritual during the return of Venus (remember when she came between us and the sun back in 2012?) on retreat in Upstate NY. Printed on the pdf was this picture of the sacred heart.
When I found this drawing of my husband's, I got goosebumps. It was his "tag" during a brief exploration with street art. These coincidences bring me joy and literally (not literally) set my heart on fire. If I do have a scar from this foible, it will remind me of the baptism or revelation I've come upon in this dark dark time. That somewhere between my heart and throat sits a fire burning in me...and I will use it to LOVE.
8 days ago I was baptized by fire.
2 days ago, a young man forgot how to love.
1 day at a time, we heal. It's itchy and it may scar forever, but we heal.

Solar Warrior

A couple of weeks ago, I got a call from the Sierra Club thanking me and giving me the address where I was expected to go to speak at a hearing (or perhaps before at a meeting?) concerning the action being taken against TVA for continuing to dump coal ash into the waters here in Tennessee.
I feel like I am engaged in battles on many fronts these days.
But speaking anywhere in a formal setting on an issue of which I am only peripherally aware (tho clearly against) was not a battle for which I remembered signing up recently. I mean, I'll sign all the petitions guys. I'll make the calls when I can (which I'm pretty sure is how this misled voicemail-leaving Sierra Club volunteer/employee got my number and made the mistake). But I am in grad school, remember?
For a moment it was very much like the actor's nightmare I've had so many times. You're on stage or in the wings about to go on, and you don't know what production it is...
Had I volunteered and forgotten?? I mean, I am vehemently against dumping coal ash into our rivers. But no. I felt pretty confident this kind soul had reached me in error, tryin to reach some other more accomplished activist. One not overwhelmed by and often paralyzed by fear.
One not in his/her/their last year of grad school.
So I called and left a message for the unwitting phone tag opponent, and I suppose she realized her mistake and called the other Emily she was likely trying to reach...but she never called me back.
I bought a domain today to put up my website for school. www.emilykicklighter.org.
.com wasn't available, but I sort of like the responsibility .org implies.
It makes me feel like I'll somehow be held more accountable. More...organized. And I guess that's a comfort zone and a mine field for me simultaneously. Sometimes I question the size of my sense of responsibility. Meaning it can be so large and burdensome, it weighs me down. It slows me. It arrests my action. I can't possibly get it all done so I think I'll just crawl up in this hole with a book (or more often binge watch a tv series...I can always claim research) and ESCAPE from reality. And I question my organizational skills...I mean, do they really even exist?
Because minimizing stress is the best thing you can do for your health, I take great care in identifying and naming stress to weaken n tame it.
I currently have a lot for which I am being held accountable: a thesis project, applications for future writing endeavors (writing labs and internships), audition preparation for a few things coming up, all while rehearsing a brand new play and working with cohorts and our professor to figure out a new digital showcase platform. Mix in relationship maintenances, holiday, travel and a birthday that puts you on the back-side of your 30's, and I think you'll find a little stress to be quite natural. Even necessary.
But the unnecessary stress comes from the overwhelming responsibility I feel to live up to my own ideals. Ideally I'd just like to do no harm, but our infrastructure and cultural mores are unsupportive on this road less traveled. Straws and styrofoam, plastic bags and cutlery, and cars or trucks with noxious exhaust have started to illicit in me a strong physical repulsion or sensation that isn't unlike hearing nails scrape a chalkboard. And I often worry about the fact that most of the people I'm around most of the time don't have any averse reactions to these things.
I happened upon this article a couple of days ago and easily joked with my family about setting up the bunkers and prepping. The article's author, award-winning Canadian science journalist Alanna Mitchell, frighteningly asserts that a magnetic reversal of planet Earth's poles is imminent and natural and nearly due, and all the systems we've built as a modern society do not take this evidence-based hypothesis into account. Technology could be crippled...the Earth could be transformed. Many species may not survive.
I think most people might find this depressing, but there was a deep comfort in it for me. I used to frequent a shaman who would give me the same solace: Pachamama will take care of herself...it's not my personal responsibility to save her. My husband is also a great teacher/neutralizer when I feel burdened or overwhelmed by my aspirations for (and ultimately disappointment in) humankind. But I've said it before and I'll say it again: no one believes they can make a difference, but what if everyone thought they could? Finding the line to walk of accountability and responsibility without stumbling over into self-aggrandizing and false fault is a challenge I'm taking head on.
I thought .org's were only available to registered nonprofit groups and entities, but now I've got my very own. It kind of makes me worry about the validity of things I've read on the web that I assumed to be factual because of their being from .org sites, but mostly it makes me want to tell the truths I know and represent this domain family well.
As I was getting ready to write this, a film director/activist who moonlights as a professional fundraiser called soliciting donations for the Sierra Club. I took the recent snafu as a sign I should contribute to this reputable organization, but I guess there could be a slim chance I just fell prey to a new targeted elaborate marketing ploy to guilt people into contributing by calling them first by "mistake" to remind them of how their physical presence is very much appreciated at this important battle to which they had not actually committed, and then following up with a "would you [at least] like to support us with a financial contribution?" call.
I offered a monthly contribution. Ploy or no, I'll show up when and where I can as the "social justice warrior" I aspire to be. The Sierra Club is a .org afterall! They are on the frontline of many battles against this administration to protect our environment (while we're still lucky enough to be stewards).
That is until the solar flares and radiation win the war.
Gives new meaning to I'm with her.
Leave it to a Trump presidency to make an Armageddon-like prediction seem like relief.