here is where blogging becomes

slightly uncomfortable: i want to write about something, but i don't necessarily want the party concerned to know it. and although i'm pretty sure he doesn't read any of this, it is on the internet and so i have to assume the possibility is always there. and here it is now - the responsibility that comes with clicking the "publish post" button, usually so neatly curbed by being obtuse in phrasing and intent.

but that kind of goes to the heart of what i want to write about, so i'm going to anyway. it won't be the end of the world. if anything, it might be a useful example just how awkward i feel about it.

so. someone gave me a script to read yesterday.

it was a first draft of something he'd written, based in large part on his own experience. this i already knew. what i didn't know was how far the project had developed, nor just how personal is was. and concidering that he was looking to me for professional feedback on his work, i settled in to read it quite innocently.

ok, i'll admit the first few pages didn't grab me right away. may have been my natural reserve toward something i knew was written from life, as scripts of that nature - first drafts especially - tend to have a handful of very obvious, very typical flaws. besides, i already knew the broad strokes of the plot and was guarding against what i perceived to be its weaknesses. who knows. all i can say is, i was completely thrown by my own reactions the further i got into it.

oh, i'm not saying the flaws and weaknesses weren't there - it was very much a first draft. it was far better than many first drafts i've read; the dramatic structure was solid, the storytelling flowed well, the supporting characters were all appropriately developed. but that's not it, that's not it at all.

you know that awkward feeling you get when you realize someone is using a funny anecdote as a thinly veiled metaphor for something really difficult to talk about? well, this was a gigantic stride beyond that. this was actually saying the very things a metaphor like that would try to obscure, without fanfare or embellishment. it was a story told in such plain terms and so honestly, it made me feel like a voyeur. it embarrassed me. it challenged my professional detachment from the script as a creative product and made me question whether i was at all able to be unbiased in my criticism of it.

because - and i'd like you to know that i use this expression exteremely conservatively - it spoke to me. it spoke to me. it looked me right in the eye and laughed at my discomfort and made me want to be impossibly brave. and the thing is that i hadn't expected this at all. not because i'm such a huge pro, i'm beyond being personally affected by stuff i read - i hope to god i'm never that jaded - but, well...
truthfully? because i never thought the guy who wrote this was going to go there.

i'm a little ashamed of making that judgment, yes. but it almost isn't even a question of depth or artistic integrity. it's just that no one goes there. seriously. no one i have ever known, anyway - and i have many friends who write. i have written scripts myself and even produced a couple, always wanting to say something that was personal and important - of course, why else would anyone write a script? certainly not for monetary gain. a part of you inevitably ends up in every story you tell, and it's just a matter of skill to weave it in gracefully and polish the edges where your ego pokes through.

and some people are great at that, writing deeply personal content that reads both honest and inspired. but always - at least in my experience - a successfully dramatized story based on autobiographical events has a filter of sorts, something to cushion the abrasiveness of real, raw, unstructured emotion. the benefit of writing is that you can guide perception, and the benefit of guiding perception is that you can talk about your own vulnerability without actually leaving yourself wide open and vulnerable.

i've never read anything - well, nothing that wasn't the sort of writing one does in journals meant for oneself only - quite this... vulnerable. quite this gutsy, maybe. and no, this isn't really a professional opinion. this is me feeling shaken by how readily this writer put himself on the line, and by how painfully deeply i identified with many of the not-so-pretty sides of his story, and by how terrified i would be to share myself in that way.

maybe jealous, too. of the grace with which he was able to surrender himself to the script, when i don't even have the grace to do it in real life. before i was three-quarters through reading, my skin was crawling. by the time i reached the last page, i was tearing up with frustration and the craving for catharsis of some sort... the character's predicament was getting to me so much i couldn't stand it.

and i resented knowing how true it all was. i would have been so comforted thinking it was fiction.

so, in the end, i can't actually give a professional opinion. i am too involved. the story is too real to me. and almost without meaning to, i realize why i feel like i've been kicked in the gut by the honesty of his writing: i've lost the ability to deal with words that address too directly. naked, stark words for naked, stark feelings. i'm too used to distilling emotions into academic dissertations or diluting them into abstract poetry. i make things complicated, always excusing this with "...because they are."

but really, they are not. i just lack the courage to face them and handle the fallout.

yes. this is just how i

remember it: the exact moment in the process where you start seeing texture. it's a little oasis of feel-good in a gruelling desert of repetitious work and logistical torture.

do you know what i mean? someone out there surely does. putting together a show is such an emotional rollercoaster - from the first wave of excitement over the gorgeous unfamiliarity of a new script, straight through to opening night anxiety attacks. here's the basic structure i have found is rarely deviated from:

stage 1 - unbridled enthusiasm
stage 2 - terrifying chaos
stage 3 - hard fucking work
stage 4 - TEXTURE! hooray.
stage 5 - more hard fucking work
stage 6 - sudden paralyzing fear over timeframe; second-guessing choices made thus far; second-guessing entire vocation
stage 7 - annoying, obsessive nitpickery
stage 8 - mad scramble
stage 9 - pre-opening nerves/excitement
stage 10 - opening night; happiest moment of life; desire to drink all the booze in the entire world.

and today, today today, i realized i've hit stage 4 and there was something so great about that. so reassuring, especially in anticipation of the scary territory from here on in. it just helps remind me that these are all perfectly natural phases of what i do. and that, when i do start losing my mind over deadlines not met and props not procured, that will be natural, too.

but perhaps the most gratifying part is actually watching that texture emerge for the very first time, in a very physical sense. you're never prepared for it. everything takes on a new quality of life and the artificial reality you've been so painstakingly constructing is suddenly so complete, so overwhelming... it sent chills down my spine and made my eyes water. and i was dumbstruck for an entire five seconds, searching for something i could say that was useful direction.

it feels like. well, it feels like. staring at a garden-variety road map and it turning topographic right before your eyes. or something.

so many pictures

swirling around in my head. worse when i close my eyes. i see washes of color, sharp backlit silhouettes, shadows distorting facial features. a geometrical grid glowing neon on the floor. shapes floating along pre-determined lines and continuously recreating their space; molding into something new, yet oddly recognizable. light and darkness punctuating speech.

it's all liquified atmosphere, of course. i don't see anything that is of any real use to me. this wild cacophony of disjointed images is just a byproduct. potato peels flying off the edge of a frantic knife.

it's frustrating, this initial stage, but i've learned to wait it out. i'll hit the eye of the hurricane soon. well... i will at some point. there is always that point, when you've finally beaten the script into submission, when it quits buckling and bending just outside your reach. don't be greedy. wait. keep stretching for it. it's there, closer and closer and closer. closer now.

then suddenly your fingers close around the heart of the words, and it all comes into focus. the world of the play crystallizes, the images become more definite. and you don't let go. you build. slowly, painstakingly. separating moments and seconds and thoughts and concepts into managable little packages, each one pristine and individually wrapped. you build. you build. you build.

it takes forever and it's uncomfortable and your hands get sweaty from the strain, but you don't let go, because you can't. eventually it's just an extension of your skin. you look at it and you see you. you look at you and you are it. and it's as though, it's as though it was never any other way. it was never a marble block in the first place. and all the chaos has long since been silenced and forgotten.

there is nowhere else i'd rather be.

in summary of everything,

i can never decide if i want to be the storyteller or the story.

that's not as convoluted as it sounds. think about it. in the end, you can only be one. live in fame, go down in flame, get used to people talking behind your back, attract passionate waves of love and resentment... but fearlessly, and without stopping to regret a single second. there just isn't enough time. if you choose to be the story, you choose the responsibility to never be dull. even at the expense of... well, everything.

the other option? well, there's always telling the stories. sitting back and observing and editing reality down. cautiously, laborously. it takes forever and is not always worth the output, but it's decidedly healthier and often more stimulating to the mind. not to mention, it's a form of investment in the future and allows for more creative control: after all, the whos and whats and hows of the story are entirely up to you.

and yet. notice how the second paragraph was a yawn to read compared to the first? that's not a coincidence.

some people are probably born knowing they're one or the other. i migrate between worlds, as it were. sometimes i'd gladly trade in my whole bag of tricks just to be able to always live inside my head, where words resonate like symphonies. there are moments when i'm convinced of my own invincibility behind the smokescreen of stories continously being told; i feel protected and ingenious and there is no better feeling in the world. if i can be a tool of myth, and myth is eternal - isn't that the ultimate dream of any indulgently creative mind?

indulgently creative. creatively indulgent. which one am i first? story: i walked down champs-elysees wearing a black catsuit and looking very much like a teenage prostitute in the mid-90's. story: i jumped off a 50 foot cliff into a stormy sea, clothes and everything, just to prove to my friends i could do it even though i was a terrible swimmer. story: i veered off a greek mountain hill road on a scooter at eighteen, very nearly missing being taken out by a tour bus, and sat there shaking for two whole hours, and the scenery was gorgeous.

these really aren't stories worth telling, only stories worth being in. maybe, in the end, i have nothing to say. i guess that would be all right, too. but i can still never decide.

oh god. is this depressing? it wasn't meant to be, i swear.