Tag Archives: Love

The much needed cheesy of Holiday movies.

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While lying on my couch watching a Hallmark holiday movie yesterday, knowing full well that the renovation of the old inn, the connect with the hot lost love, the distance with the parents, and whether or not the grand Christmas show would happen were conflicts that were all going to be resolved in one beautiful shiny package, I wondered why these films are so important to me. 

I write crime thrillers. Stories about badass female cops taking on white supremacists. Women who may be living tragically trying to survive. Adults trying to heal what haunts them from their childhood. My multiple tabs of research on my computer include weapons and FBI profiles on the psychology of killers, impact of intergenerational trauma, history of slavery and how Native tribes grieve losses, the impact of extreme alcoholism on the nervous system and death. I also have tabs opened about shoes, Goodreads, the perfect boyfriend cut blue jean, Facebook and holiday cashmere sales.  And my Pinterest, of course, which is all beautiful homes of the southwest and inspirational photos of nature, or rocky canyons showing how light plays and dances on horizons.

So, maybe I just answered my own question about why these movies.

Maybe it’s because the grief of the missing parent is slight. Dusted like the powered sugar on the cookies. The lead is a widow with perfect hair but has only one or two moments of near tears about her grief. Or one of her parents is dead but she only remembers him or her by staring at an ornament for a second. Just a second.

Maybe it’s because after the hard work where she’s overlooked or almost betrayed by a co-worker or has a tiny but not crushing or memorable even, aggression from her boss, she always has it worked out so the bad guy gets fired, she gets the accolades, the promotion, and the next big gig. 

Maybe it’s because the tiny towns are filled with nice folk who hand out gingerbread cookies and cakes and the trees are decorated so beautifully, I can only sit in awe at the production team, the designers and art department. Maybe it’s because these movies are shot in a bright light so even what could be a shadow is washed out and can’t hurt us. 

Maybe it’s because the music is that sweet mix of musak, pop and holiday classics and since it’s past Thanksgiving I can hear it but come December 26th it must all go away. 

Maybe it’s because I have a new excuse to eat chocolates because they go perfectly with holiday movies. 

Maybe it’s because my childhood Christmases weren’t anything like the trials of the kids whose single parent finds the perfect new step-dad who turns out to be Santa.  

Maybe it’s because these films are about belief and God’s plan woven with sparkly threads of  hope and maybe we need all that these days. And that’s why I’ve made the commitment to watch at least one a day. 

A Toast! to Bird- my daughter. 4/365

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Screenshot 2015-08-27 07.47.08 sunsetselfie_v2

Okay, gonna write this one fast so that I can attempt to contain my emotions.

I am the luckiest, most blessed mama in the world because I am Bird’s mom.

When she was born she was named Lanee Faye, Faye being the middle name of my older sister, Dee Dee, who was my confidante, helper and birth coach. Dee Dee called me Buddha when I was large and round at the end of my pregnancy. She’d feed me chili cheeseburgers and spaghetti. She made me laugh so hard I’d nearly pee my pants. And when I was in labor and they told me that I needed a C-section, Dee held my hand and told me watch her face, focus on her and it was going to be alright. And she stayed there by me as Lanee Faye entered the world.

Bird didn’t get added to Lanee’s name until much later, when she was a teenager, discovering and developing her artistic voice. Bird is actually my grandmother’s name. Priscilla Bird.  But it resonated with Lanee as she dug deep into her Native roots and created soulful art so invoking and intriguing, she got into the prestigious San Francisco Art Institute- self taught and awarded a Portfolio Review Scholarship.  She took her connection to Bird, my grandmother, and created her dream.

So we call her that now and just makes sense.

I think that’s the true gauge of our actions- if they feel right and just make sense.  When I see my daughter and I say Bird, when I get to hug her, which is not often enough now that we’re on opposite coasts of this country, it makes sense. She’s taken her artistic prowess to New York City and making a name for herself there. We’e couldn’t be prouder. I couldn’t miss her more. And even that, as a parent, just makes sense.

For this post I searched for a photo of an owl because that’s the Bird I think she is. I think she exudes owl spirit medicine. I think she’s wise and intense. I think she’s transparent, direct and sees all. I think she’s touched with something older than this world. I think she makes people see who they are. I think she’s magical.

And she’s here. We’re together. We had dinner with family last night, preparing for my niece’s wedding and I got to sit across from her at the restaurant and watch her laugh with abandonment. I got to feel her showered in love. I got to be there in her space. I got to.

I get to…and I’m blessed so today’s Toast! is to her. My daughter. My Bird.

Toast! to 10 Things Art Does For My Soul

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I’ve been stating to people lately “I”m so grateful I’m an artist.” Which is comes much later than that first statement, “I am an artist.” – which I had to give a lot of thought and contemplation years ago when I did that mid-30’s change of life thing and started writing. But once I embraced that and began to build a life around honoring my writing, I still didn’t feel the gratitude of having this calling. Even when I attended school, working towards my MFA’s, which I know statistically for a COC of a certain age (Chick of Color at 40-something…hee hee) puts me a  small percentage of all people in this country earning degrees at that level, I still didn’t really fully feel the gratitude.

It’s now been 14 years since I started writing. Playwriting, prose, and now screenplays, I’m a storyteller and this is just a short list of what Art Does For My Soul:

1. Art feeds my imagination. Like a child playing make-believe, I get to imagine worlds, people, scenarios, winning wars and creating joy.
2. Art helps me figure shit out. I can give my characters my flaws, my insecurities, my anger, my hurt and let them figure it out on their journey so I can live a life in reality in peace.
3. Art gives me a vital purpose. This is a calling. It is. Just as we all need doctors who love to heal, lawyers who believe justly in the law, teachers who love a student’s mind, I’ve been really blessed to hear this calling, I love writing and knowing what I”m suppose to contribute to this world.
4. Art teaches me about who I want to be. The layers of my complex characters show me what I want to change in myself and what needs nurturing.
5. Art has created a community. For as much as writing is an individual act, in my head, at the page, for the amount of time I spend in my robe with tea by my window in the mornings, I also have an incredible community of writers, filmmakers, poets, novelists, journalists, painters, designers, musicians…the list is long of the creative minds in my life.
6. Art simmers down the prickly past. When old wounds burst open, or an old fear grips onto my heart, hijacking my day, art gives me a way to work it out. I write letters, draw, paint, fill journal pages with stickers and swirls of crayon marks. I write stories of badass women who kick the shit out of the bad guys while they heal their own pains.
7. Art lets me be selfish, in a healthy way. I’m a caregiver. Loyal to a fault and that hasn’t been a healthy trait. Extreme caregiving was about seeking approval and intense need. My art makes me explore what’s happening in my head, what’s making my heart ache, what’s bringing me joy. And helps me balance what’s self-care and what’s for everyone else.
8. Art means daydreaming’s cool! I never got in big trouble in school as a little girl for daydreaming in class. I was a pretty good student. But I do remember times being told to pay attention. I remember being asked where my head was and the shame of that. I never told anyone what I dream of- about my mom, about my family not being so damn poor, about being someone special and important. One of the hardest thing for me when I was a little girl was admitting I even had dreams. How dare I, right?
9. Art sustains my family. Art brought my husband into my life. We met as members of the same theatre company and our friendship grew out of working together with kids, telling stories over beer. And years later, when my daughter chose art school for her education and SFAI chose her, we couldn’t have been prouder. Art is woven into the foundation that holds my family together. And that same art has made us all better for our extended families. And now art, making films, has created Through the Wilderness, LLC, our film company.
10. ART IS PLAY! In this photo the lamp illuminates the little girl spirit who hangs out on my desk in the mornings, waiting for me to show up and play.

I am so grateful for being an artist. So today’s Toast! is to Art And What It Does To My Soul.

What does art do for yours?

Peace

Toast! to not knowing what to Toast so toasting…this moment…

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Wow.  I’m sounding sorta vague. “sorta vague”  Redundant, I know.  That’s where I’ve been lately, I think.  In this hazy vagueness…Due to having alot on my plate, many balls in the air, juggling with both hands and feet, running in circles, breathing too fast and too shallow, feeling angst that’s keeping me stuck and wow…how many other ways can I describe what’s up with me? 

See- we have been blessed with good fortune. Good health. Many friends. Family support. Love. Laughter. Confidence in our work. Peace. 

And yet, my mind battles the fear that’s it’s all some cruelass joke, it will crumble and I’ll get hurt. YET….here it comes…YET there is nothing to indicate any of my fears are true. Or will BE true.  Reality is good.  My inability to accept that–is the mind game that is keeping me awake at night.  And it’s exhausting worrying all the time. 

I’m a dramatist. Notice I didn’t write ‘drama queen’??  A dramatist. I create story. A storyteller. And I LOVE A GOOD STORY! But for it to be good the stakes have to be high, like…make your heart hurt, skin ripped at the knuckles from crawling to save your soul kinda stakes. However they’re defined, they have to run deep. They have to be big. They’re the shit good movies are made of.  It’s my job to be able to create these stakes, so in my life, at times like this, my urge is to find these stakes. Not create them. I don’t crazymake any more. I can proudly say that destruction doesn’t happen in my life any more.  I tend to ‘search’ for the stakes now. When I sit, that’s what my  mind is doing. When I’m in spin class, that’s what my mind is doing. When my husband laughs and hugs me, that’s what my mind is doing. I’m searching for what’s going to go wrong if and when something does.  

And now I’m tired of it.

I have multiple story and film projects with a host of characters that are in various states of angst that I can give this energy to. I have the support to create the time to let the characters do this, for them to work out their own shit on their own journeys. I have amazing friends that let me ramble to work things out. I have the gym. If I wasn’t so scared of deep breathing, I’d have yoga (that’s coming…I know…) I have my husband. My family. My shrink. Brene Brown. Elephant Journal. Rebelle Society. Funny girlfriends. Loving girlfriends. Deep philosophical girlfriends. Music. Hummingbirds outside my freakin window! and…AND The Great Spirit.  

Any of these things I can focus on and say “here’s my Toast! to….”  But my feeling. Feelings… My emotions are sorta kinda spread out…not firing off in any one direction. I’ve got some hurt going on because ‘searching’ for stakes mean I peruse my memories for what’s hurt me in the past and COULD blow up now, but isn’t….like…friends who ditched me. Betrayed me. Old grief.  I have no desire to engage them, to pick at those wounds….because… in the midst of all this, I have learned to find my feet. To ground. To come back to here. To now. 

This moment. 

So…as I take up this blog again, pushing to expel what’s holding onto me, creating obstacles to my joy, to making me question my worth and what I deserve… I guess I start here. Now.  

This morning’s Toast! is to Toasting this moment. 

 

Peace. 

 

Toast! to Facebook friends when you’re called the N-word…

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Yeah.  That’s what happened. And I posted the incident to FB as soon as I could. In the parking lot of the post office, ignoring the tingling of fear I felt, wondering about this young man who threw his hatred for me at me. 

I was in line (because there’s always a line at the post office) and was being assisted by this lovely older Black woman in line behind me. I was looking for labels for priority mail. She told me where to look, which stands to check out, so I left the line to go see, with her holding my space. When I came back there were four more people behind her but I stepped into my space, continuing my conversation with her about express mail labels and not finding priority mail labels.  A young man and his girlfriend walked up and stepped right in front of me.  He was white, I think.  I’m going to show my ignorance right now- he had dark skin and was darker completion, not as dark as me, but he may have been Armenian, part Latino, or had some ethnicity somewhere in his lineage, or was white guy with dark hair.  

The woman that was helping me told him that the line was behind the people behind her. He turned, glared and said “you were standing back there so I stepped in here” or something like that. So I said, “oh, no, the line is back there.” I think I started to explain where I was, or something…kindly. He couldn’t have been more than 20 so I’m sure my “mama-ness” kicked in. My girl is 21. But then to my surprise he snapped at me, “then you should stay in line.”  I didn’t respond because I surprised by  his tone. Really? I was being scolded?  

But before I could even fully process that question, he walked to the proper place in line saying “of course you get to go first because you niggers–”  Eruption from the woman and I think somebody else, there were multiple voices objecting to this. The woman said “hey, hey. we’re not going to go there!” And I said, looking at him, “Look, we all have to stand in line and nobody likes that–” but he cut me off by mumbling something about “Black–” And somebody said “hey!” I was shocked. I stared at this kid while he glared at me…with such hatred. Pure hatred.  All I could I say was “wow!” 

I turned away and that thing happened- uncomfortable strangers tried to connect. We got chatty. The woman and I talked loudly about the labels, she showed me her package being sent to her sisters. The man in front of me told me he runs a t-shirt business and mails priority boxes all the time. He lives close to post office. Then we lamented on the length of line- it just takes time, and even though there’s a post office near the woman’s daughter’s school, this one was still more convenient.   At one point I looked at the white guy in line behind the Black woman and he looked…embarrassed. Sad. He lowered his eyes.  But I was extra nice. Extra friendly. I was over the top kind because…I was nervous. And embarrassed and surprised. Shocked.  

It has been a long time since I was called that word. It had been a long time since some bigot showed their true colors to me. I was prepared. 

And yes, we get prepared. I have to. But this was in my neighborhood. Echo Park in Los Angeles. Predominantly brown folk. Latinos. Filipinos. Black -(not alot of Blacks), White…hipsters. Liberals. Funky artists. Nobody looks at me here. Nobody stares at me and my multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, shades of tan family.  Nobody. And yet this kid did this. 

He was in a different line at a different package pick-up window when I left. He glared at me as I walked by. His tiny beautiful girlfriend kept her head down. I didn’t call him an asshole until I got outside the building. 

So, attempting to process this I posted it on FB. Right away. And then as I drove away, I took a deep breath and got emotional. I cried. I called Peter and ranted, quickly processing what happened.  

It saddens me that this kid can wear his hatred so proudly, he could be so bold to hurl it at us like that.  Yes, I was angry. I still am. What the f?? Right??  But I’m more hurt not just because of being called a word that cuts so deeply, but because in this world,  in our world today, hatred flows freely and his privilege dictates his actions- it was okay to him to use that word and step in front of me. 

Now- I’m not taking this heart like this was my fault. I’m not being self-critical. I know I was kind and civil in my tone. That comes naturally. I didn’t have to think of how to address him when he budged. And after he called me the N-word, I was on auto-pilot  and… didn’t want things to escalate? I was so shocked I didn’t think my next step through…? I tried to commiserate with him, about the line, about how nobody likes to wait in line, but we’re in this together.  

But what was intentional, was me posting to FB this incident because my friends rushed to me, bringing me comfort and support. Their outrage, their empathy, their love for me and our community was what is healing from this experience.  I got cyber hugs and rants and wishes of peace. I got confirmation that I not only handled this situation well, but that in no way is this about me. It’s not. Racism, acts of racism, are about the person who fears my difference so deeply, they’ll lash out violently to protect what they think is theirs.  It’s twisted and hurtful. But it’s not my shit.  

Last night, the posts were still coming on my wall, so I drew great comfort reading them before I turned out my bedside light. But I wondered about this kid- did he find pride in his actions? Did he boast to anyone? Did he retell the story so he was the victor? Did he have to make me mean, or uppity to deserve to be called the nigger? Who has been pushing him around? Who taught him that this behavior was okay? And what’s going to happen to him when he exerts his privilege to the wrong person and shit goes down hard on him, because it will.  It will. But that’s not my burden to carry.  I can feel sorry for his pain. I will feel sorry for his pain, when I get there to that point in my processing. If I see him just a kid with his limited capabilities, then I can feel sympathy for his pain and send him peace.  Awww…this is a lesson I’m learning overall in life. As I deal with betrayals, with hurts from people I care about, I keep coming back to this notion about capabilities and how we all function from what we know. It’s simple. And people can’t do more than that so perhaps this is all this kid knows. 

I am going to stand in the space held by my friends and family that is filled with love and support, with the same daily wish for peace and harmony. 

So today, I Toast! my Facebook friends who came to my aid when I was called the N-word. I am grateful for you all!

Thank you. 

Peace

#healing #racism #community #Blackfolk #harmony #outrageatbigotry #loveheals #theawfulN-word 

Toast! to Marriage...according to the photo booth

Yesterday Peter and I attended the wedding of two of the most beautiful people we know. It was gorgeous! Malibu mountains in the background, flowing wine and love and laughter. Beautiful.

This photo was taken mid-dancing that evening. A copy of this went in a book for the lovely newly wedded couple. We wrote next to it this: 1. What marriage really is. 2. What you think marriage really is. 3. What marriage REALLY is…

It was funny! The first one we were discussing what how we were gonna pose, what should we look like, what message we were going to leave and when do the pictures actually get taken. I was talking a lot and Peter was listening. lol!

The second photo we did what always comes naturally…when all else fails, kiss. I love that.

And then we posed for the third. For fun sake. We didn’t think about the caption until we saw the photos.

Thinking about them now, my first urge is to take our caption back; say this isn’t true and apologize for giving Mireya and Sean the wrong message. But I think we were right..for 1 and 3.. Number 2 has the incorrect caption. Eyes closed, all-heart, full-on love kisses are marriage, too. It’s a blessing, the deepest of blessings (second only to children).

So, this photo is going on our fridge alongside pictures of Bird, family photos. pictures of the babies and children that we’re blessed to have our lives. It will always be there to show us all what marriage is.

Today’s Toast! is the Marriage according to the photo booth!

Peace and love.

Toast! to Friends with Feedback

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I could write this Toast! daily.  I have such amazing friends! I’m so blessed.

Living a creative life for me means that I need them and I need their feedback. Not just on what’s on my page, what’s difficult about that end of Act II, or why my character is doing something I don’t quite understand…I need feedback on life because that influences what happens creativity in my life.

If I am creating a community or the loss of one, I think of my Lit Chicks back home, my Book Club, Writer’s Group, Project Involve Alums, USC SCA friends, college friends, high school friends and all the new friends on Facebook…communities that I hold dear. And I use.  These are the people I go to for story, for clarification, support and applause. 

If I have a character that is dealing with loss, with some pain or heartache, I’ve got my own history to look to, but I have friends who have shared their journeys and from them I see rising to challenges, resilency and healing. I see how they manuever difficulities and overcome obstacles.  Their strength and dedication to life are attributes I straight up steal and layer my characters with. 

If I am stuck…and yes, I get stuck. I actually call it ‘story brewing’ cuz that feels more action-oriented than ‘stuck’…but when this is where I find myself, I go to a friend for a break- you can find me a Larchmont Bungalow or walking the reservoir or riding cycle hard at the Y, with a friend.  We may not even discuss the story but they’re open love gives me respite from the brewing and I can come back to the page strong.

I am blessed to have friendships with my collaborators, too.  I feel love and support as we all work through our roles in development for the films. 

And one of the greatest gifts my husband gives me is his time, support and ‘feedback’ for story which deepens creative growth and makes me love him even more.

Alot of people say writing is lonely work and it can be. Definitely. When it comes down to moments like this…me, my thoughts and this computer, it can be lonely. When I seek deep inside myself to mine a story, hell yes, it can be a lonely job. But life…the creative life…it’s fed by Friends with Feedback.  

And I am round-bellied, deep-breathin’, sighing, gigglin’, slap-happy full! 

Here’s a Toast! to Friends with Feedback.  Go tell yours how much you appreciate them.

PEACE