Gift #2 - The Stinky Toe Sandwich Song - for my nephew, CD

Hey.

Running on an hour of sleep and was tempted to make the second gift this week another somber one.

Thought better of it, today.

Today, I want to push past the sad swimming round my guts.

Despite what I'm dealing with, I got up, did a wonderful production of  The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe this morning.  Hugged a few kids in the audience afterwards.  Days like these remind me that making things, making theatre, is ardently bigger than me.  Than my ruddy flaws and fears.  That if I just show up and be present, good things can happen.

Last week, when I was back in California, staying at my sister's home, when I wasn't holed up in bed trying to sweat or sneeze or cry out all the sick and grief, I got to play with my nephew CD (Carter David).  He's two, and the first time I brought out my guitar for him, he started dancing. Then, he rushed to his parents room, and handed me a fistful of dollar bills.

So, it's a given that whenever he wakes up from a nap, or is about to take his evening bath, dance parties with Ole Uncle Jara are gonna be rockin' !  Dance parties consist of him worming around my air bed while I sing and play him my songs.

I wrote this one just for him.  He picked up a habit of saying "No way" to my sister, and this silly tune got him to change it to "no, thank you".  If you have kids, or love songs about stinky toe sandwiches, listen and smile.

I know  - in the same month, I write this song, and the saddest song in the world? 

It's all Walt Whitman up in this dome!

Happy New Year, and thanks for reading my odes and nonsense.

LYRICS

stinky toe sandwich
whats that
stinky toe sandwich
ooo weee
stinky toe sandwich
oh boy
out comes the stinky toe sandwich

one bite
no thank you
one bite
chomp chomp
no thank you
one bite
no thank you
one bite
chomp chomp
no thank you

Gift #1 - 21 shell casings

Hey.

Back in the city.  Spent a week in CA to see my family.  Buried my father Friday.

Still not well. Bad head cold. Sleeping no more than an hour or so a night.

This week, I'm gonna write about seven gifts, ones from past and present, that I've been given or that I've given out.  It's a way to keep moving.

And, to really kick my ass, I'm using the first gift as a chance to write my first new poem in over a year and a half.

Before I was an actor, before I was a writer or a singer or a playwright or a songwriter, I wrote poems.  Thousands of terrible poems. I wouldn't even talk to women.  I'd just write them these impromptu poems and leave them at their table.  Or while sleeping on a train. I thought poetry would forgive me. Minored in poetry writing in college.  For five years, earned more money and awards after college for poetry than I did in acting. And the poems slowly became more cohesive - less second-hand e.e cummings and Russell Edson - and more authentic.

But then I self-published a book of poems, RAMSHACKLE  (it's so cheap and so good and it has poems about people eating suitcases and drunk weathermen - go buy it like crazy) ,  and I stopped.  Acting and songwriting took over.

Here's the poem and the description of the first gift.


FIND THE PEA

The flag, folded and snug,
Slouches against my mother's breast.
My brother, with quiet mercy,
Offers her his hand. 
My nephew paws at the lip of his hoodie,
Trips and shuffles along the grass with his father.
My sister warms her brittle fingers.
She does not cry.      She keeps
Tradition.

I ease out of the wobbly plastic chair
when the honor guard captain
taps me on the shoulder.  I turn,
and see him hold up the shells
from the twenty one gun salute.

He grabs my hand,
slides the metal caskets across my palms.

People keep these.

My father in ashes, not three feet away
boxed in a wooden enclosure the size of a newborn.

He has a shell.

My brother, his humor, his love.
My sister, her son, her resolute strength
My mother, her faith , her determined ability to tell the same story seven different ways
to seven different people.

I'm going rotten
And I know it
If I don't grow some enamel quickly

We've Done So Well - new song, and a call to action

Hey.

This is all I have to say about the past few weeks.

It's a sloppy, raw song.  But it's the only way I know how to process this, how to pry myself away from cynicism and loss of hope.

I really wish change was a tangible force right now. 

I'm so scared it won't be.

Here's a few groups worth your time and money.  But it's nowhere near enough. Our masters need to join together and hear our cries. Not with speeches.  Not with symbols. But with clear compromise and resolve.

But how?

https://newtown.uwwesternct.org/

http://www.bradycampaign.org/

http://www.demandaplan.org/

LYRICS

weve done so well
developed tools to snuff life
quicker and quicker
weve done so well
offered them up like candy
and when the bodies fall
we lift the microphone high
record their screaming
we wear our somber faces
and throw our speeches in the air
afraid
to choke
the beast
of commerce

chorus

there is no bottom
there is no bottom
there is no bottom
for this wondrous
human
suffering

there is no bottom
there is no bottom
there is no bottom
for this wondrous
human
suffering

second  verse
weve done so well
dont have the tools when we get
sicker and sicker
weve done so well
keeping our problems
in a breath
that were holding
til we vomit
and if you dont
youre crazy
and with a word
remaindered
life sentence given
we act like its contagious
so unaware the virus
breeds inside
our silence
and denial

chorus

bridge
i really think weve done so well
that its high time we took a break
arent you proud that weve done so well
its a dream i hope we never wake
for if we really didnt want this
we would have rose up
stared down our leaders
gave em hell
weve done well

third verse
weve done so well
another week well wash our hands
and ignore it
weve done so well
meanwhile in new mexico
a pilot pushes buttons
burns a village
its such a joy to be alive
to see the corpses moulder
we have no power
our songs ephemeral
our voices withering and small
who will protect us from each other

chorus

Taking Your Piece Off the Board

Hey.

Today's my sister's birthday and would have also been my parent's 40th anniversary.

They were married twice.  Eloped on this date in Reno, and then married in a church the next month.

Legend has it that my father only had about twenty bucks on him after the wedding ceremony and couldn't afford a hotel room.  Sidled up to the blackjack table, and through a combination of guts, luck, and thousands of hours of gambling experience, earned enough cash to garner a room for the young couple.

My father loved games.  The ritual of gaming. The patience needed to learn specific rules and patterns each game demanded.  Through him, we children discovered that games taught us countless lessons about ourselves: how we coped with stress, how we stuck through and finished the game no matter what, even if we were losing, and what our character truly was when the elements of being prepared, being lucky, and being crazy came into alignment and we were actually winning. 

These weren't always welcome lessons. I'd often be surprised and embarrassed by my own arrogance, or insanely angry and jealous that my siblings were able to dominate a game over and over again.  But I kept playing, kept paying attention.

Nowadays, I don't really run with a group of game playing friends. The ones that do play extremely detailed wartime strategy games which require a rule book the size of a baby's head. Those aren't fun, to me. If you can't describe the goal of a game in a single breath, I don't want to play it.  It may take my whole life to become good at said game, but the general conceit should be elegant and simple.

So, what do I do?  My Connect Four set hasn't been opened since I bought a new copy after wearing the old one out.  Yeah, I would wear Connect Four boards out,  I would make friends violently angry with me at how fast I'd beat them. My playing cards, my scrabble board, my Munchkin set, my Gloom cards collect dust in a closet.  I play video games and take on fifteen players at a time in Words with Friends, winning 90 percent of my games. 

But there's one game in that closet which makes me sad I haven't got to play with real, living souls in a long while:  Monopoly.

No one is casual about Monopoly.  You either love it or hate it.  It's not a short, conversational game. You don't play it with people you barely know, or the dark truths uncovered will stun you.

But it's my favorite game.  I remember my father teaching us kids the rules, the craft and guile one could use to make trades. It was one of the first games where he stressed to us how important it was to stick through it. Winners and losers were made in seconds, and even the best preparation depended on luck to strike.

And we adored him for it.  Even though he didn't coddle us and beat us time and time again. I started playing him Monopoly when I was about ten and didn't win a single game with him until I was seventeen. That's the sort of person he made me: one who spent years and years reading up on monopoly strategies, playing thousands of hours and not seeing any positive growth.  Just hoping that the time spent doing this made me more proficient, and would proffer success. If that's not a metaphor for my acting career now, I don't know what is.

Summers with my brother and sister were non-stop Monopoly games. A single round would often last days and days.  We'd fall asleep huddled around the board - a hastily written note tossed in the center to remind us whose turn it was to play.

Through Monopoly, we developed a catch phrase. When someone lost, after all their money and property had been sold and they landed on one rent too rich for their blood, we'd taunt them, saying:  "Well, all we have to do now is just take your piece off the board".  A mere swipe of a hand, and their entire existence in the game, wiped out.

Pretty grim stuff for children.

But, looking back on it now, I think only having your piece on the board left to take shows a quiet, defiant strength. We've all played rounds of Monopoly with less disciplined people who, upon hitting a rough spot of luck, toss their cash and property to the banker and just give up.  That's no fucking way to live. 

The game ends for everyone eventually. 
You must play it completely. 
Even if you're not winning. 
Even if the backhanded deals aren't going your way and the dice rolls don't shine in your favor. 

And, if you find yourself  a lowly shoe clopping onto Marvin Gardens with four houses and twenty dollars left to your name, you smile.  You smile goddamn wide.  You played this wonderful, cruel game well, and I love you for it.  You take your piece off the board.

Fight Dirty - first draft of new song

Hey.

I think I've finally got a passable first draft for a new song for the Hobo Guidebook.

Pass it along- I think it's a silly, fun piece!

Every good hobo has a few tips on scuffling, should the occasion permit.

Gilly is no exception.  Here's his take on the fine art of coming to blows.

Lyrics

first verse
im a peace loving guy
dont want no ruckus or no brawl
but trouble comes
mebbe not today
mebbe not tomorrow
but sure as shootin
youll be pinned down
laid bare
bullied
youre a stranger
what can ya do

chorus
theres a point in everyones life where ya choose
will you be silent
will you respect yourself
its true
if ya got to fight
fight dirty

second verse
keep your back to the wall
their shoulders give it all away
before they swing
counter from the blow
feet apart and ready
just stick your thumb into their eye
i know its crazy
thats why it works so well
thats what you do

chorus

bridge (and me just being a goof)

third verse
for a group
how to fight
forget the flourish and the pride
heres what ya do
find the meanest one
scream and cuss and cry
aim for their groin to save your life
knife hidden in your boot tip
kick em til the blood drips
and run away

chorus

Modesto - first draft of new song

Hey.

As you may know, I'm using the quiet time while looking for acting work knocking out a rough draft of a one man hobo musical called THE HOBO GUIDEBOOK ( for more information and to listen to the title track, click here) While I was writing and rewriting verses for a song extolling the virtues of fighting dirty, this one popped into my head.

I'm trying to find a way to justify why Gilly became a hobo, and temper some of his silly, lusty behavior with something which shook him as a young man.  And then I thought about my childhood,  my experiences with Modesto, CA.

Modesto is the perfect place to be a child.  Lengthy exposure to its customs and sense of justice makes you angry and hunger for more.  Makes you lie on your back and stare at the chipped white popcorn ceiling and daydream about leaving for good and fostering a life infused with vitality, an impolite and demanding need to be heard.  That struggle to endure childhood and promise yourself that being a courageous adult  in a new city is a possibility, (even when you're poor and don't feel like you're worth a damn), it burns.  I spent a lot of time in bed as a kid, full of fantasy, writing scripts for the cosmopolitan life I hoped to live one day. 

It's a town where being biracial marks you as a cultural riddle, neither familiar or resonant with the white kids or the latinos.  You are your own ethnicity. You grow up strong, or else Modesto breaks you so harshly you give in and you cease desire.

It's a city so anonymous that the white man who assembled the first stirrings of the town was offered a chance to have it named after him, and he refused. Straight up refused.  And the locals muttered, "ay, muy modesto", Spanish for "very modest".  It stuck.

I'll be the first to tell you that the only reason I'm not living out my days there now is through a combination of three factors, three precepts which I learned long ago are the only way one can be successful for a lengthy period of time:

1)You must be prepared.   My parents and teachers raised me to love words, and to read as if books could save you. They were right. They encouraged and helped me constantly as a kid, supporting the artistic endeavors I undertook, teaching me to fight with every last breath for the chance to create things.

2)You must be lucky. And goddamn, I was and continue to be.  I'm not a smart or phenomenal artist by any stretch of description, but I was lucky enough to have these parents and teachers and scholarships and to meet other wonderful actors, directors, designers, singers, writers and musicians who helped me grow, gave me work opportunities which let me move on to new and more exciting locales.   I was lucky enough to be born a man. Wouldn't have lasted long in this world if I had all the same challenges I had and have now, but was a woman. It's a cruel doctrine of male privilege, especially with the arts.  I know this. I do not take it as a birthright.  I was lucky enough to finally, after spending a decade tumbling through demoralizing survival jobs, to find a career which complements my acting.  It's a pretty fucking charmed life.

3)You must be crazy.  You have to remain terminally unsatisfied.  Play ends, song's written, story's cooling its heels.  And it's done. You're scrambling for the next chance to stitch something together out of nothingness because there's this sharp, wicked truth in your heart which reminds you that you don't really matter. You are an amusement to people, and at best tolerated.

Nobody loves you, because you're the type of person who sings three seconds of a song you're writing over and over for hours until the exact, impeccable wording is revealed.  You're the type of person who will drop everything, passport in hand, to work on a project.  Nobody will love you because aside from the efforts you spend making things, your mannerisms and personal effects resemble a monk's.  You can pretend to care about people, and you may even help them from time to time, but you have a sickness. Ultimately, you are selfish, and any sane person who is filled with altruism, who seeks a broad, well-balanced life, will come to their senses and stop chasing success.

But that's not you.

Nothing gives you as much peace as the endorphins making things does.

**For those who are in Modesto, or a town like Modesto, here's my advice**

This advice is only for those who are unhappy.  If living there brings you comfort, love and care, you've already won.  If you are unhappy, you need to ask yourself:  what can I sacrifice in order to have the life I deserve?   The only thing I remember from former Mayor Lang's economics class in high school was the concept of opportunity cost.   Essentially, what you lose when making a choice.  I saved for over two and a half years in order to have the funds to move to New York City.  Damn near broke me in the process. I was crazy enough to do it, lucky enough to be able to do it, and mentally prepared to adopt for a spartan lifestyle all for the ministry of a better future.

Also, know that moving doesn't change who you are.  I'm still a pretty plain, humble guy in New York City. I'm still chubby, still dress like an alien just discovering the concept of clothes. I'm still painfully shy when I'm not making things and have to behave with the world. I just get a chance to make more things more often.  I get to act Off-Broadway on a weekly basis.  Every day is growth and experience.

Here's the song!

lyrics
ive travelled all across this nation
but the one place
ill never shine again
its a whitewashed town
modesto
california
place where you settle
'mong the culdesacs
grey women
ruddy men

chorus
and part of life is lettin' go
grab a shovel
fill the earth
and you dont look back
youre not as brave as you think you were
dont have the strength or the money for a new attack
why are you still breathin'
weight of ruin upon your back
its always modesto
in your heart

second verse
arrived there
with my wife and darling son
held my tongue at the notions
neighbors plied
took a job at the winery
it wasnt fun
my families faces
my only comfort
while the noose was tied

chorus

bridge
ran as fast as i could
when i got the phone call
by the time i arrived
the intersection
choked with glass and rubber
two sheets on the sidewalk waving
in surrender

chorus

Yelling in Theatre

Hey.

Saw a great deal of theatre last week, and I wanted to talk about a far too common practice which happens onstage.

Yelling.

It's a flare gun, people.  Do it once, quickly and in an unexpected place, and it is riveting.  As a spectator, your hair will rustle from the back of your head with fright and that primordial cocktail of adrenaline served upon our steady neurotransmitters will crackle inside us.

But keep yelling for an extended period of time, or yell over and over again throughout a play, and it's just painful.  Squeezing and grasping the trigger for a weapon that's spent. And you end up breaking the tool. Wind up with Hamlets who sound like gym coaches.

Why do actors yell?

1)They don't trust the space.  In New York City, a majority of the theatres (if we're talking Off and Off-Off Broadway) are black box in nature. Now, I started out in Los Angeles, and there were plenty of actors there who only possessed film training and would whisper during a play, their efforts awaiting a kindly boom operator who would never appear.  But that's not the case with NY actors. It's the opposite problem. If you're working a 45-seat house, you can trust the audience to hear you if you have sufficient vocal training.

2)They want to be "real".  Yes, in the real world, people yell.  And, when they do, we tend to tune them out after a time. Any subway rider can tell you that. It's a coping mechanism we've adopted to shut down when faced with constant yelling.  Besides, theatre isn't real. You're not really a king or getting murdered on stage.  Theatre is the human experience ideally and artificially expressed.  People responding in an articulate, complicated fashion.

3)They don't have a wide enough variety of tactics to play in a scene.  This is the big one.  This is why acting is different than real life.  In real life, I only utilize about four tactics when interacting with people before I give up:

 - to tease
- to comfort
 -to compliment
 -to charm

But me in a role?  That's the time when I can seduce or punish or devastate or bleed someone dry or mock or betray or reconcile with them or annoy or stab them with only the words I say. 

Verbs. Devour them like crazy.  Don't hide behind adjectives in any medium - acting, songwriting, stories, poems, whatever. Verbs used with passion and play deliver powerful art.  And if an actor doesn't feel supported by their choices, (and I'm speaking from painful experience in my twenties here), one quick fix is to yell. 

Don't use the quick fix. Challenge yourself to explore tactics in rehearsal and performance, especially ones which frighten you.

Randy- first draft of original song

Hey.

I wrote this song basically as a dare.

See, my good friend Ryan McCurdy had himself a  pretty dysfunctional relationship during the rehearsal for RICHARD III.  It was eating at him, but he pushed through it, and we made some wonderful theatre.

So, here it is. Also, thanks to Winnie Lok for the inspiration behind the song.


lyrics

first verse
i met randy
at a burger shop
ordered medium rare
with a pickle on top
hes the strong and silent type
let the conversation drop
but i knew hed find a way to get
attention

prechorus
and now were side by side together
but are we symbiotic
are you are a parasite
you leave me feverish and weakened
i want to help you
but youre not helping me at all

chorus
randy
youre killing me
your love is blind
randy
your ministrations are unkind
and i dont know how
to change your mind

second verse
tell me
randy
why this cold betrayal
i have nothing
its a sorry tale
just thinking about you
leaves me dizzy and pale
i cant sleep or eat
sure is hard to pay
attention

prechorus
chorus

bridge
ive got a friend named winnie lok
heart like a furnance
mind sharp like a ticking clock
and a wit as sweet
as licorice candy
she named
she named
she named my tapeworm
randy

prechorus
chorus

But I for one, have love maligned/I'm not for whom it was designed

Hey.

Let me tell you a story.

Early September, 2012.  About a week after my father died, and I'm flying to Vegas for my brother's wedding.  Bought a ticket at the last minute.  Sitting in the back row in the window seat, and a couple joins me for the middle and aisle row.  The man has slightly frosted blond tips, wears thick, garish sunglasses inside the plane - never takes them off - and speaks only once during the six hour flight to complain how he's never flown anything other than business class in his life until now.

He's not the story.

Fuck him.

The story is his companion.  Her name is Amanda; she's a paralegal and very tan for the East Coast.  Even after her skin cancer scare (which left her with a five inch scar across her right arm), she's got an eager, friendly quality about her.  We chat almost the entire flight while her male companion sleeps, and as she drinks more and more throughout the trip, she begins to over share.  Tells me that this excursion is a third date for a whirlwind romance between her and the slightly snoring gentleman to her left.  She really thinks he's the one.  Even started joking to him about the two of them getting married.  She even looked up wedding package rates.

But she's only kidding. 
She's a kidder. 

But she says she's not getting any younger, she's 26, and she wants that true, abiding love so badly.  She knows he'll grow to love her just as much as she loves him.  It has to work.  He's from Israel, she's Jewish.  He comes from money.  It's right.

And despite my foul, foul mood, I'm really trying to help her. I keep gently saying, Amanda, you have it to take it as it comes, give it time.  If he's right, you'll know.  But her raw need will not be mollified.

Plane lands, I wish her well.  Meet up with my brother and my sister-in-law.  Tell them what happens, and get a little snarky about it, as I'm prone to do. Puzzles me how someone can be so deluded and self-destructive and corroded by wanting so desperately to be loved, by anyone.

Did my time in Oregon, made it back to New York City.

And I thought about that whole experience with Amanda.  What should have been obvious then only came to light after I did my grieving and I put some time behind it all.

I'm just as broken as her.

Nothing in my life fills me with a hot, burning torrent of self-loathing as much as me trying to be like the normals and date or love or just put myself out there, stripped of all the distracting tricks and games I make with my voice or words or music or whatever is fuck is considered art.

Because the raw, unadorned me is clumsy and boorish and offensive and ugly and nauseating and doesn't want any of the selfless, nice things people are supposed to want like families and property values and pets and marriage and settling.

I want to make things.  Lots of things.
I want the person whom I love and who loves me to make things too.
I want them to be smarter than me and funny and strong.
I want them to find some unit of value within me. To think I am beautiful, even though I am not.
I want them to kick my ass.
I want them to never hate me .I've been hated in this life, and only in those times have I wished for death.
I want them to like what I make, and I want to love and support the making they do.

That's it.
But that's not what this life has afforded me. 
Not a question of deserve.  Because we don't deserve a damn thing.  

One more story.

1994.  November .  I was in a Masonic youth group, and one of the required functions that happened ever so often were group dances with the girls from another Masonic youth group.  I loathed these, but I had to go. I was the one of the key leaders of our group.  I didn't enjoy them because I danced like a cat on fire. I didn't enjoy them because as awkward and shy as I am now, I was even worse as a child.  Wearing black turtlenecks with thick, dirty glasses and terrible, misshapen teeth. 

We arrived at the dance (held in a town several hours away), and the other members of the group hit the dance floor.  I had brought a copy of Studs Terkel's amazing collection of interviews: WORKING.  While the music played, I buried my nose in the book and held my breath to calm my nerves.   Around the first hour, one of the chaperones noticed me, grabbed my book, and told me I'd get it back once the event was over.  And why don't I just go out there and ask a nice girl to dance?

Unprotected, I stood there, tears flooding my eyes.  The first chance I could, I stepped outside, took off my glasses and began to sob.

She startled me when she whispered, You ok?   I snapped back to face the voice (without my glasses, my vision is atrocious), and she laughed softly.

And we talked for about half an hour.  About school and our respective Masonic youth groups.  And it was the first real conversation I'd had with an adolescent girl ever. 

And just as intense as it was, it ended.  She left.  I sat there for about ten minutes, feeling good and right.

But then I realized I never asked what her name was.

 I put my glasses back on, walked back into the cafeteria where the dance was.  But by then, it had ended, and everyone was milling back to their respective cars.  And, since I didn't have my glasses on, I had no clue what this wonderful woman looked like.

And I never found out who she was.

Pretty (the vagina song) NSFW - original song

Hey.

I haven't seen a living soul in oh, about 48 hours. 

Super fortunate to be in upper Manhattan and not have much affected by the post-tropical storm.  Lower Manhattan below 39th got the worst of it.  Subways are out until further notice.  Power is out for about      60,000 in NYC alone.

Posting an updated copy of this older song, Pretty on the site.  I always forgot how it breaks people's brains when I play it.

For more information on the origins of the song, click here.

Took me about seven takes to record it today.  Here's why:

1)Despite my career, and despite a great deal of the audacious things I say or do, I'm at heart a pretty shy boy.  Staring at a camera while singing this song made me uncomfortable as hell at times.

2)I'm not attractive.  Especially with such a direct, open, sexual song like this.  I'm a troll-faced mush and I'd catch myself on film in the middle of a take, and it'd creep me out.  Heart of a poet, face of a prison guard.  I really don't know why any poor lass would find me attractive at all.

If you like it, pass it around!

Lyrics

youre a woman
what a woman
the hunger that you cant deny
im a lover
like none other
the finest lover eight five bucks can buy
thats why youve come to me
taking a knee
and as you cup my sack
i feel your breath up close
your tongue flickering everywhere

pre-chorus
and when the the hour runs out
well go our separate ways
returning back to making do
but listen lover for a moment
let the moment find its haze
theres something simple
important
that id like to say to you

chorus
youve got a pretty vagina
id give my life for just one taste
i see your labia minor
sitting silent  alone
such a gorgeous waste
my tongue yearns for your touch
youll never have too much
oh yes
youve got a pretty vagina
id love to make her shine

second verse
passion mounting
as youre mounting
straddling me atop my thighs
firm yet gentle
elemental
your breath in syncopation
the thrust you make
attentive i stroke your calf
provoking a laugh
as if youre hearing a joke
no ones spoke
in your eyes
joy flickering everywhere

prechorus
chorus
bridge

third verse
ten years later
elevator
you dont even blink an eye
im forgotten
and its rotten
im just another penis
you cant recall
tears fall from my dirty skin
doors open again
before you walk right out
you turn around and kiss my cheek
my cheek
your scent chocolate
everywhere

prechorus
chorus

The Hobo Guidebook - first draft of new song

Hey.

I landed back in NYC late Thursday night.  It's been a rough month.  I thank everyone for their love and gifts.

This song I'm posting is the opening number for a musical I'm writing which I plan to perform and produce in the near future.  Gonna call the show THE HOBO GUIDEBOOK.  It's about the American mythos of the hobo.  Why it exists in our narrative, and what it really means.  I'll play a charming hobo named Gilly, who will spend an hour and half with the audience, talking about his wild and fascinating life thus far traveling across the nation, living on his own terms.  He's compiled a list of his knowledge into a book he carries with him, and through the course of the show, divulges some of the tips, tricks, and tales he's learned through hobocraft.

It'll be vulgar and sweet and actually contain at least 80 percent factual knowledge - just like me!

This opening song teases the audience with what's to come.  I'm playing it on my new guitar Huckleberry, but for the show, I'd like to get someone to custom make me a cigar box guitar with an electric pick up.  Something really homey...I'll call it Smokey.

Again, thank you everyone.  I'm still feeling very anxious and scared and sad at times. But I've got theatre to do and things to make and  friends and family to love and that's what matters.

LYRICS

First verse

introduction
pleased to meet ya
call me gilly
most folks do
ive lived a rather sort of storied life
and ill share
in my travels
ive collected
words of wisdom sure to help
whenever you could use some picking up
listen well

CHORUS
its the truth
no denying
keep an ear to the ground and a heart that's ripe
find the spark
of creation
in my hobo guidebook
its my work
my life's purpose
wrote it down as it happened
and it suits me fine
there is art
there is humor
in my hobo guidebook
listen well

SECOND VERSE
'fore you leave here
youll discover
how to win your lovers heart
or how to end a fight you didnt want
guaranteed
make cheap liquor
'void the police
how to frame a life worth livin'
find comfort in a single day
'fore the night makes ghosts of us all

CHORUS

BRIDGE

CHORUS

JD - original song about my father

Hey,

I've been meaning to put up this older song for years now.  It's one of the earlier songs I wrote, and it's about my dad.

If you haven't read this post about my father, please read it now.

My dad's mother and father and sister used to call him JD (Jerryl Dwain) for short. I used it for the song because it has such a percussive quality.

The chorus refers to my father's depression.  Sometimes it would get so overwhelming, he'd lie in bed for hours during the day.  It grieved me to see him so sad, so helpless. I'd get in bed with him, and hug him tight and not say a word.

Here are the lyrics:

Chorus

jd wake up
the worlds alright
jd wake up
jd wake up
the worlds alright
jd wake up

First verse

do you remember
the day that i was born
starting out into your kind brown eyes
i wasnt easy
deaf and dumb combined i struggled
but you befriended me
even when i left the cub scouts
when i threw my soccer cleats away
you would always say
son
who you are
is what i love

CHORUS

Second Verse

i still remember
thirty four years have gone by suddenly
your silent boy sings out
no friends with money
wide awake in the dark
so bewildering
the future no one's guess
reveling in these moments
i recollect
the strength you gave me
to make good
to ride pain out
attentive to the quiet peace

CHORUS

Bridge

your smiles so rare
father
wont you let it live for a breath
i know you care
father
but regret settled in like death
all i am
father
is proof of your generosity
now its time
father
care for yourself
like you cared for me

CHORUS

Jerryl Dwain Jones 1950-2012

Hey.

I was sitting in a pizza shop this Wednesday evening around 6:45pm. Got the call from my mother that my father had died. He was 61 years old.

After the call, I stared at my food and I thought: You have work to do. Eat, get your strength, and do not disappoint me, Jara.  I called my brother, tried to call my sister.  Threw food into my mouth, and canceled my plans for the evening. Walked back to the apartment, and as I stepped inside, I felt my stomach curdle and my knees began to buckle, and I choked back a scream, and I stood right up and I slapped myself hard three times because this was not the fucking time or the place for this.

All the shows I had planned to do or were doing, I canceled. I tried to have friends over to lessen the blow, but it didn't work.

Finally, after making preliminary plans with the siblings and mom and getting my affairs in order, I started working.  I need work. I crave work.  Work is what keeps me alive.  I was listening to an album I just purchased (Florence + The Machine's LUNGS) and I stumbled upon the song "Cosmic Love", which cracked it all open.

If you know me, you know I'm prone to slight exaggeration.  In all seriousness , from Wednesday night till now, I've been listening to that song on a near-constant loop and have heard it nigh on fifty times now.  Around the first thirty minutes, I was just tearing up, working on degree plans for my day job and then something in the way the 8th time I heard the song got to me.  It's at 1:20 in the song, when she sings the second verse:

and in the dark
i can hear your heartbeat
i tried to find the sound
but then it stopped
and i was in the darkness 
so darkness i became...

And, if you've heard it, she starts losing it, screaming the notes in "became" all the way through to the end of the second chorus. And, independent of reason, I began to thrash violently, my head jerking in time with the music, and I was keening and wailing and singing in pitch as loud as I could and the hurt would not cease. 

And this happens every single time I hear the song at this part now and I can't stop listening to it.

The stars, the moon 
they have all been blown out
you left me in the dark
no dawn, no day
i'm always in this twilight
in the shadow of your heart 

Before I tell you about the man I have lost, I want to make one thing expertly clear.

I love you all and know you mean well, but I do not want to hear or see these phrases from anyone at this point:

 - I'm sorry for your loss.
 -If you need anything let me know.

Or the equivalent thereof.

That's pity, and we only pity those we find weak.

And I am not weak.

I am simply pushing through this tragedy.   I will be the same old wanton, empathic, kind, sardonic beast as before, in time.

Look, I've been there.  Dealing with people in grief fucking sucks. Forced social coercion regarding an event which claims us all - death - and knowing deep down that nothing, nothing can ameliorate their sorrow devastates people.  Because people want to help.

I'll tell you for free what people in grief might want.

They'll never voice this, because most people in grief like myself would gnaw off their arm rather than ask for help, but this is what they want:

 - Be present and listen. Don't help.  You can't. Just hear.
- Money.  (Tacky ?  Of course.  But death accrues expenses and probate is woefully slow. Money lifts stress - if you'd like - there's a donate button for Paypal on this page)
- Silently help them clean.  
 - Make them laugh.  For the love of all that is dear, please make them laugh.
 - Show them your breasts (bonus points for dude breasts)


My father was a quiet, weathered mid-western voice; expressive and low.  It's from him where my love of story began. From the bedtime stories he'd tell us as kids to the stirring anecdotes he'd tell us about his life, my father made it very clear that the craft of a good story was in the choice of a word and the cadence used to give that word purpose.  Despite his general even-temperedness, we kids knew that his voice had power and fire behind it, that it could fill the whole room and strike fear when angered or surprised.  Even the way he sneezed was so much larger than life and dangerous in tone. I loved his voice so, so much.  I loved the way he said "warsh" instead of wash. I loved his singing voice and tried to alter my tinny, high pitched voice for years in an effort to sound as resonant and rich and calm as him.

My father wore Old Spice during my childhood, and on him, it smelled like strength and rugged, quiet confidence. It's the only thing I've worn as an adult, and it always reminds me of him and watching him apply it during family vacations.

My father taught me that you can give yourself the opportunity to do what you desire if you are willing to make any and all sacrifices such a ministry takes. His last words to me (this Monday night)  were : "As long as you're doing what you love, that's what matters"  That was his definition of success.

I've told you before about one of my father's greatest strengths : Faking .  He was a master at it.  To just roll up your sleeves and tackle a problem until the solution availed itself.  I'm not saying it always worked, but it always made for a powerful lesson and an amazing story.

This is the perfect story to describe my father, his love, and his care.  I've told it so many times, and I'll tell it again, because he was amazing and it should be heard :

1995. I was about to start my senior year of high school, and we were broke. My grades in school were commendable, I was part of a wide variety of volunteer groups and extra-curricular activities, but that wasn't going to be enough to get me out of my hometown and into college.  My dad knew this.  Because I was aware of how bad things were, money-wise, I asked my parents not to get me any gifts for my 17th birthday, which occurred during the first week of school.

The morning of my birthday, I get a knock on the door, and my dad comes into my room.  I made you something, he drawled.

And then he pulled out a large office calendar and laid it softly on the bed. The calendar was covered with two kinds of ink:  Red for one month prior, and Black for the final due date.  In the back of the calendar, he had included application after application for scholarships.  In the pre-internet world, my own father had spent months researching scholarships, printing out applications, and charting exactly when submissions were due.  For me. 62 scholarships in all.  I still tremble when I think about it.

That year, I completed all but five, and I won five scholarships from that batch.  That, combined with serendipity allowed me to go to college.

He gave me so goddamned much, and now he's gone.

Here's the plan.  I'm headed out next week to see my brother get married in Vegas, and we'll honor dad there as well.  He always wanted a wake over a funeral, and I'd know he'd see me crying and crying over him and think:  Well, son - you've got a choice.  You can choose to let this own you, or you can let it pass and make room for what's to come.   He was the one who taught me self-hypnosis, and the power of suggestion.  To think for yourself, and to challenge any automatic prejudice. He taught me how to play blackjack and texas hold-em and how to predict when traffic lights will turn green and end up looking like a wizard to a group of children.

He had his college acting primer in his vast bookshelf (which I adored), and I still own it. I wish he had the chance to do more acting in his life, to be more confident in his singing.  To have written more, to have dealt with his depression better.  But I know that he loved my mother and his children so fiercely, and that this love gave him a quiet, well-deserved sense of reward.

After the wedding, I'll head to Oregon with my mom, and I'll stay there for as long as she needs me.

Dad, thank you for the time we shared, and for being a wonderful father. I hope I make you proud.

New guitar, and an old song - Jumping the Shark

Hey.

Been one of those weeks where the air crackles with possibility.  So many evenings with dear friends and passionate artists. Auditions and woolgathering and brainstorming about a new one-man musical I want to create. And, in a few short weeks, I'll be 34.

When I was in my twenties, flat broke and working my way through a copy of THE ARTIST'S WAY (which everyone has done, it's like masturbating. Vital, therapeutic.  A window into your own desires. And best not discussed at length out in public) I got to the part there you shape the future of what an average desired day would be like for you.

And about two weeks ago, I realized I had finally fucking pulled it off.  I did it.  I'm not in the union or a success on a commercial level.  But I am disciplined and making things and working with people who are crazy about making things and I wake up without dread.  I haven't woken up with dread since I moved here.

I'd been letting one of my fears (being a shitty musician and guitarist) get the best of me for a while, and I'd been putting off upgrading from the half-size spunky acoustic guitar you've seen in all my videos to something more professional. Something I could take to open mics and plug into amps, something I could use to record my silly songs on a cleaner, more developed level. 

Just like this site, even when it's serious, deep down, I know my songs are silly.  They're simple.  But they make me happy, and if they make you happy too, well, I'm obliged.

So, here's my new guitar.  An Ibanez acoustic-electric.  Gonna call her Huckleberry.  Not for the color, but as a reminder that, no matter my mood or my self-doubt about the quality of the music I make, she'll be my companion and a reminder that somewhere within her body is the clean, clear wonder of music.

Here's me playing one of my cheekier songs.  "Jumping the Shark"

Lyrics  (I'm not gonna cite all the scatting, because that's just annoying as hell to read)

First Verse
watching my favorite tv show
season three
ive started thinking its all going downhill now
but you cant trust me
whatever happened to good old fashioned means
keeping my mind alive
instead of filling me with secondhand bullshit
treating me like im five

Pre-Chorus
will they or wont they devolved to a tired theme
the breakout character is stealing the show
theyve got a catchphrase they use every single scene
no more
i think theyre jumping the shark

Chorus
jumping the shark
damn them theyre jumping the shark
jumping the shark

Second Verse
remember my friends what the fresh prince did
well it wasnt quite nice
see will was never so fond of his old aunt viv
blood running cold as ice
come season four instead of writing the poor dear off
they switched the actress  lame
what were they thinking
its like becky in roseanne
all women don't look the same

Pre-Chorus
Chorus

Bridge
and if you look very carefully
youll see with your own two eyes
i never knew that the fonz could ever suffer
from pale white thighs
and if you look very carefully
youll see with your own two eyes
its not a question of canon
often no big
surprise  

Chorus
jumping the shark
damn them were jumping the shark
jumping the shark
damn them
dont believe it
couldnt see it
it was too good to be true
you know for me
dont believe it
couldnt see it
it was too good to be true
you know for me
dont believe it
couldnt see it
it was too good to be true
you know for me
dont believe it
couldnt see it
oh
it was too good to be true
you know were jumping the shark

By the Bed - first draft of original song

Hey.

Not gonna talk much about this song below.  To do so is to disrespect the parties involved. But I did want to stress the following:

1)Every single word in the song is true. I wish it wasn't, but it is.

2)The verses and the chorus are written in the spirit of the moment  when it happened. The need for detail to explain, to control, to summon strength.  The bridge, however, represent my thoughts on the subject years, years later.

3)If you or someone you love feels suicidal, don't treat it as joke or as something you need to hide. Please, please, please seek help. If you don't want to do therapy, you can call an anonymous hotline like this one:

1-800-273-TALK

www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org

I know it's scary, and I know that mental health is overlooked in the United States.  But you owe it to yourself to find care and comfort. This is a woefully short time we're given.  If you feel out of control, promise me you'll reach out to friends, family, or to an outside source.

Lyrics:

i'm by the bed
i smooth your hair
i kiss your cheek
Neck straining, try to read
the vitals on the screen
and you are sleeping so serene
i'm by the bed
thin ring of charcoal round your lips
from where they pumped you when they found you
when i called them
when you called me
when you let your spirit go

Chorus
Til the day I die
i know the worst thing I've ever done
was failing you
should have seen the signs
should have known your hurt had no ending
that collapse was due
oh, now i'm done with love
don't deserve it
far too steeped in sin, it's true
this is all
i know now

Second Verse
i'm by the bed
attendants wheel you out the door
step right in front of me
and tell me bring your clothes
they must observe you
how long   who knows
i'm by the bed
at our apartment
at the crime
survey the wreckage
there's the bottle
there's the pillbox
there's the letter
there's a suitcase  focus pack

CHORUS

Bridge
several years have passed
several thousand miles between us
you're doing well
found a new love
you're ok
i'm still alone
screaming in the wind to seize creation
feeling stronger
growing steady
i'm ok

but there's times i'm in the dark
recall that night, that bitter bark
how something died
my final hope
that i could help you learn to cope
and still i wonder is it me
who always poisons company
love's not enough
when you're bleeding
i was wrong
i am pleading
i am sorry for the pain you shouldered

Third Verse

i'm by the bed
you haven't slept, your fingers shake
room smells like nicotine
i hold you close and tight
and i am sorry   this isn't right
i'm by the goddamned bed
they wave you out
the doctor comes
he asks me jara
will she be safe
when she leaves here
and i'm sorry
for a second    i didn't know

CHORUS

Hilariously Depressed

Hey.

Those in the know are aware that I've struggled with depression my entire life.

I was diagnosed with severe depression in my mid twenties.  Did the therapy and the pills for about four years, and then my life really fell apart, and none of it helped, so I quit it all.

I poured myself into my work, saved up thousands of dollars to move to a new place.  I shut down all outside aspects of my life. And, as always, my sheer stubbornness led me to prosperity.

I don't do well with free time.  Once a play/musical ends, or I wrap up a creative endeavor, I collapse.

And, my depression, which has been patiently waiting, decides to take control.

I've been really hilariously depressed this week.   I think it's funny because it's so predictable and insistent and clumsy and familiar.

My depression looks like this:

Behold, the manatee.

Sailors used to believe these "sea cows" were mermaids.  They're lumbering, homely creatures.

My depression is mute and forceful and belligerent.  He slaps against my chest over and over until it's a steady, dull ache. It's hard to focus.

My favorite part about dealing with him are the strange, desperate bargains I make to keep him from undermining me:

Me: C'mon, you have to get out of bed.  There's no reason for you to brood and feel bad right now.
Manatee:  (groans, shakes head, hides under the covers)
Me: Look, if you get up, you don't have to shower, ok?
Manatee: (bleats feebly)
Me: ...and you can have Thai food.  I know you love Thai food...
Manatee: (slaps me hard with a fin)
Me: Dammit - what do you want?  Love?  Do you want love?  Well, you can't get that right now.  We don't have any of that in stock.  Do you want music?  Movies? Games?
Manatee:: (gurgles sadly)
Me:  (sigh) How about ice cream?
Manatee: (wheezes, lifts himself out of bed)
Me:  Ok.

And the two of us have been at it all this week. Making bargain after bargain to be able to do things a normal person can do without blinking: getting out of bed, going to work, going to see a friend sing, just getting out of the house.

I don't know if I'll ever make my manatee go away for good.  I know I'm still miles away from practicing healthy self-care and respect.  But by giving him a face, he seems less scary.  Less in control.

The Curse

Hey.
Something's been eating at me for about a week now. Messing with my sleep.

I was walking out of a rehearsal for this wonderful, sweet, hilarious musical I'm doing called PAGEANT PRINCESS, and I meet a friend of a friend. She recognizes me from a production of ASSASSINS I did with our mutual acquaintance, asks me how long I've lived now in the city.

I tell her it's been about a year and a few months for me. She then quips, So, has the city made you want to kill yourself yet?

I pause, shake my head. The elevator doors open, she smiles this tight, skull-rattling smile, and as she exits, she declares, Don't worry, it will.

And I know it's just a stupid, careless thing people toss out in trite social settings. I know people don't have the same trigger about suicide like I do . I know for many, many people suicide's an abstract, academic kind of fear. I've written before about the quiet path marked out by depression: in me, in others I love and have loved.

Is it wrong to feel like she was trying to curse me?

Look, I've known scores of friends of mine who did NY for a spell and moved away. To call them cowards or weak for doing so is beyond arrogant. There are plenty of reasons to leave this city and seek out more space, more freedom. But their path is not mine. I come to this supercharged small town, Manhattan. This island which (on a map) resembles a butchered chicken. I come here a man in my thirties. Single. Rife with the experience and the suffering and the sense of self my twenties gave me.

You think some town's gonna make me fall? Fuck you. I've been lonely before, I've known far fewer acting opportunities or friends or love or money before. Whatever small amount of sadness which comes now is a goddamn holiday compared to the terror and the collapse I've known in this life. There is a vigor to my creative life and an intensity in my gaze which has not ceased. Which will not cease. It is the altar where I gladly sacrifice comfort and pride and status. And I do not expect anything in return. Just the chance to make the work . To listen and be clear.

Willing - First Draft of New Song

Hey.

It's been a while since I put up a new song.  This one's still quite a bit rough.  But I'm gonna have a lot on my hands in the next month with a new musical (PAGEANT PRINCESS) and a production of Hamlet (I'll be playing Claudius) Plus, I really, really like how the first verse flows...give it a listen.

The song idea came from a really tender moment at Joe's wedding.  Joe's grandma is  getting up there in years, and Joe's brother came over to her at the reception area before the rehearsal.  Gave her a hug and asked her if she wanted to explore the grounds with him.

At that point, she stood up, gently tucked her arm into his and said,

If you're willing to lead me, I'm willing to go.

And I thought:  If that isn't love, I don't know what is.

So, that's the gist of this song.  A shy, patient sort of love.


LYRICS

I'm a open book
But I'm missing pages
and I'm not sure
how it ends

Take a second look
see it all in stages
have a heart that's pure
let's be friends

I know
I 'm not cool
not rugged and lean
but there's fire in the belly
it's a little obscene
all the rivulets
of hope

you think
you're all alone
it's fortune or shame
your eyes on a target
that you never did name
just another way
to cope

CHORUS

If you're willing to lead me
I'm willing to go
Pick a journey and we'll start running
let your smile grow
a steady eye, a secret glance
buck the status quo
if you're willing to lead me
let me know


SECOND VERSE

In the dead of night
when the world is sleeping
every rampant thought feels
portent
jumping out of bed
writing words we're keeping
tacitly we wish
important

I know
that I'm scared
will I fail the test, oh
it's been a long time
since I left Modesto
still I really feel
broken

You think
you've had enough
you're riddled with sighs
you think everybody's
got a human disguise
and you realize
truth is spoken

 CHORUS

BRIDGE

Know your hear is a muscle
and cannot break
for as long as there's a lesson
there's no mistake
I've got arms here for holding you
reach out - take
draw me close
give a grunt, let's be merry 
and earn this life
become impeccable and witty
through this open strife
sing along - join the chorus
Take my breath like a knife

my friend.....

I'm a open book
But I'm missing pages
and I'm not sure
how it ends


Take a second look
see it all in stages
have a heart that's pure
let's be friends


I know
I 'm not cool
not rugged and lean
but there's fire in the belly
it's a little obscene
all the rivulets
of hope

you think
you're all alone
it's fortune or shame
your eyes on a target
that you never did name
just another way
to cope

CHORUS

The Trip - my time back in California

Hey.

I've been reflecting back on the wild time I spent back in California. And, now that the last parts of the story have ended, I'll post my thoughts.  Names in italics have been replaced to protect the innocent. 

THURSDAY, APRIL 26th

Touched down into Palm Springs with practically the whole connecting flight from from San Francisco to here a mad, skipping rout of turbulence.  Plane filled to the brim with drunken women in cowboy hats en route to Stagecoach, the country-western version of Coachella.  And each time the plan hiccups, they are screaming, screaming, screaming.

Me?  I'm in survival mode.  It's how I tend to approach flying days.  Day before a flight, I'll have already showered the night before.  Everything's already packed. Contacts are stowed away;wearing glasses is easier on my eyes altitude-wise. I don't drink coffee or eat too much.  Sometimes I don't sleep.  The goal is to pass out during the flight or listen to podcasts and grind my way to my destination.

Grab my suitcase out of baggage claim, try to pull the handle open, but it's jammed.  For good. TSA has once again destroyed my cheap ass luggage.  Hop outside, grab a cab, and I'm off to the Motel 6.  My dear friend Joe and his husband Matt had group rates at the Hyatt for the "discounted" amount of $300 a night a room.  I love Matt, but his level of income and experience is so wildly opposite mine, it's almost like how Bush Senior had a photo op at a grocery store once.  And they snapped a picture just as he was watching the checkout clerk scan items from the conveyor belt.  He looks so surprised and curious.  Because he's never gone to the grocery store for himself in his entire life. This ritual is a novelty to him.

So, yeah.  Hyatt was a no for me, so I booked the Motel 6 instead.  And the lack of comfort is more than a little jarring.  Bed feels like someone threw a blanket over a metal filing cabinet.  Comforter has a slimy texture to it.  Shower is half the size of a port-o-porty. 

I'm unpacking, and start my second traveling ritual:  Showering off the trip.  Wash out the 2000+ miles and clear my head. Put my toiletries in a familiar pattern along the bathroom.  And I spy something which makes me giggle uncontrollably.

I brought condoms. 

Why the hell did I bring condoms?

Granted, I was stressed and tired as hell when I packed my stuff.  Scurried home from a stage reading and had a couple of issues on my mind.  But really, Jones? 

It's an old habit my dad gave me.  We never really talked about sex much.  But, the day he moved me into the dorms my freshman year of college, we went grocery shopping and he came back, handed me a pack of condoms and whispered:  Here.  Just in case.

And since then, I end up buying a box once a year or every time I move to a new place.  Mind you, I didn't even have cause to use the damn things until I was 22.  I'm an odd, furry duck.   I am not physically attractive.  And, at the time I was giggling away in that shitty hotel room, I hadn't had sex in over three years.

What did I think was going to happen?  Was I gonna shack up with some one at the wedding or during my stay in Orange County?  Break out some power seduction moves? 

After I stopped laughing, I dressed, and headed out to explore the city.

Palm Springs has a quiet, somber beauty.  The whole time I was there, though, the dust and the smoke burned my throat. It's a pretty sort of poison, and you don't really see any young people around.

I found an adorable diner near the hotel, settled in and had the best homemade fries in my life.  They crackled and flaked in my mouth, and they were roasted in garlic.  Twenty minutes into the meal, the owner welcomed all of us and began to sing "C'mon, Get Happy"  And she was delightful!

FRIDAY, APRIL 27th

Woke up early, and headed to a coffee shop with wi-fi.  Worked the whole day there,  Even though it's been a year or so working remotely at my job, it still feels weird.  Like I'm cheating. Even though I'm way more effective and produce more work than if I had to be in an office and deal with all the elegant time-wasters there. 

After work,  my friends Rob and Maureen picked me up and we drove to Matt and Joe's house for a welcome dinner.  I had seen pictures of the remodeling efforts from Joe, but nothing prepared me for the experience of actually stepping foot into a mini-mansion.  Lush, open welcoming area.  A private sauna room. A bathroom with a bidet.  Even the sink was ridiculous and wonderful:

Any one who's been to a wedding knows that half of  the stress is the meet and greets with strangers and old friends who haven't seen you in a while.  Days before I left for Palm Springs, I kept role playing these moments, and kept saying to myself: Don't speak your resume. Don't speak your resume.  Just be cool.  
And I did my best.  But I'm nervous as hell, and part of me is hoping that the people I love and care about out in CA think I've gotten better, that I look healthier, that I'm heading somewhere in the right creative direction since the year or more since last we saw each other.  And I'm hoping the same for them. 

Hug upon hugs are given to Joe's brother, his grandma, his mom and dad.  I meet Matt's New Jersey family and we chat for a bit.  It's then that I finally take a look at the one major piece of the house which has not yet been remodeled; the clown pool.

The previous owners had some strange tastes.  Some, like the sink above, win over my heart.  Others, like the clown pool, give me the creeps.  The tile in the pool is covered with clowns, each of them bearing sharp, flat, non-responsive faces.  If my friend Kueberth was here, he'd have pissed himself with fear.  I like clowns, and even these were sketchy-looking ones.

SATURDAY, APRIL 28th

Joe and Matt's wedding day. 

I grab brunch with my friends Rob, Maureen, Paula and her man Emmett (who shall thereafter be named Pooh-Bear) and it feels like old times.  We've all known each other for over twelve years now, and even though a lot's changed, their love, their humor is still effusive and open.

After brunch, I head over to Paula and Pooh-Bear's hotel to get changed for the wedding.  As I'm in the wedding party, I get to wear this outfit (which I really like)

Pooh-Bear and Paula show off the secret outfit he's going to wear for the wedding.  Joe and Matt gave them some of the fabric which the old owners of the house used to decorate the place.  Paula then used it to sew together a cape, vest, and bow tie for Pooh-Bear:

Behold his majesty!

We drive to the wedding site, the historic O'Donnell House, which overlooks the city of Palm Springs.  I'm more than a little acrophobic, so it surprises me that the wedding and reception are pretty much inches away from a sheer cliff. But it's so goddamn gorgeous and resplendent that my fears die down and get replaced by slight heat exhaustion. Because it's the middle of the day in Palm Springs and the wedding planner didn't think to have water on hand for the rehearsal.  The wedding party springs to life and in minutes, water is freely distributed.

After the rehearsal, the bar opens and the guests arrive.  And I'm reunited with some dear, dear folks.  My old Queen Mary friends.

And the wedding begins.  The heat has died down to a quiet simmer, but there's dirt in my right contact, so I give the eternal impression that I'm crying.  And I don't care.  Joe and Matt join us at the clearing, and Rob begins to officiate.  He starts by reading an excerpt of the overturned Prop 8 ruling, which is brave and funny and grounded all the same.  I'm never going to get married, this I know.  But for many, the word holds a raw and evocative power. And, ceremonies aside, there are far too many basic human rights which are denied people who aren't seen as officially married in the eyes of the government.  I hope decency and love find their way into law someday.

The ceremony ends, and it's time for the reception.  Joe and Matt's friend TJ delivers.  He's a passionate, playful, daring man.  The first time I met him, he told me that Spanx now made items for men, and proceeded to show off his Spanx top (which he didn't even need, as he was in far, far, far better shape than me)  I'm sitting at a table with my good friend Bobby, along with my friend Christopher Kueberth (or Kueberth for short) and his wife Allison.   I am over the moon at seeing Kueberth.  Since I moved, I haven't heard anything from him other than his decreasing health.  And, even though he's lost quite a bit weight, the fire in his eyes remains. 

Wedding toasts begun, and I scurry off to grab my guitar.  Joe called me days before the wedding and asked that I play what I wrote for him and Matt at the reception.  If you haven't already heard the song, you can check it out below:

Joe and Matt's Wedding song

As I'm playing the song, I see my friend Rebecca just weeping with joy.  I turn to face Joe, and he's a wet mess, too.  I had to focus, or I was gonna lose it. 

The song ends, and I rush back to put the guitar away and help TJ pass out glow sticks to get people up to dance.  At that point, I'm attacked with praise and thanks for my song. And I know this is pathological for me, but I don't trust positive feedback.  Never have. If you belittle me or criticize me to pieces, you'll have my unending ear.  But if you say I'm good, I just won't believe you.

So the group starts dancing.  Now, I don't dance very often in my life.  But something about this wedding and being with so many wonderful people makes me forget myself, and I spend hours just dancing and meeting new individuals.  About an hour into the dancing, I turn around and I see Kueberth .  And he is on fucking fire, tearing his way through the crowd, dancing up a storm.  In that moment, he is brave, he is healthy, he is glorious.  And I'm forever blessed to be his friend.

SUNDAY, APRIL 29th

Bobby and I drive back to Orange County, and we make a stop at an Indian Casino.  I'm my father's son, and my one real vice is gambling.  But I've learned to bet with less and to do so once a year, if that.  I enjoy gambling, but the worse part of it is the other gamblers.  They're like a buffet of quiet misery.  Strollers and cigarette burns and hacking, dry coughs.  Bobby's been on a lucky streak all weekend, gambling-wise, and it does not end today.  I walk away losing about twenty bucks.

As we head towards Anaheim, we talk about the strange world of online dating, and the merits (if any) to that silly book called THE GAME.  We're in a similar place, he and I , when it comes to starting over, relationship-wise.

I check into the hotel my sister got for me and quickly realize it's not a hotel.  It's a bloody time share.  The rooms are three times the size of my studio apartment and have dishes, a washer and dryer.  It's far, far more than I need...more than a little daunting.  Bobby watches me chatting up the front desk clerk and says: See, you've got game.  And I laugh. 

Later that night, I call her up and see if she wants to grab dinner, but she's engaged.  So it goes.


MONDAY, APRIL 30th

Monday morning, I did a time share presentation so my sister and her husband would get some extra points added to their account.  It was supposed to just be an hour and a half  I stayed there three hours.  Why? At some point in the presentation, the sales rep, Wanda and I really hit it off and it devolved into a bleeding, vulnerable therapy session about how I feel I really need to just give up trying to find someone to share my company with and give up wanting trips or any other pursuits and just focus on my work.  And, her mothering nature kept countering that I was just boxing myself in and that I can have a career and still have love and other comforts. It was clear that she pretty much stopped selling anything to me about an hour into the presentation. She felt she had to save me, from something,

After that, I had lunch with my friend Rebecca and we talk about how acting recently came back into her life.  And I'm glad it did.  She got hit hard with the crap and unpleasantness hustling in LA can do to a person.  She went back to school, got another degree, moved back to her hometown for a spell, but that desire to act was just tucked away, waiting.  And ignoring it will ruin you.  I've seen it happen to too many folks.  Just then, she gets a call to sign with a big agent that day. 

That night, I hitch a ride with Pooh-Bear to have dinner with Rob, Maureen, their kids, and Kueberth and Allison.  Rob and Maureen's oldest, Maureen is quivering with energy.  She does this move which I call the Apathetic Monster.  She runs towards you, arms out, zombie-style and growls "rawrrrrr".  Then, about two steps in, she stops growling, but starts to swing her arms.  And their youngest son has this precious, penetrating stare.  It's a dubious, distrusting look which makes me grin.

Dinner is fresh carne asada and salsa, among other sundry delights.  Rob and Maureen have been eternally kind to me, and it cheers me to see them as a family enjoying their world.

TUESDAY, MAY 1st.

My old Partner in Crime picks me up and we head over to my onsite office for work.  I plan to spend the day there and get some equipment updated.

As soon as I walk in there, I immediately feel depressed.  The desperation and impotent rage is so fucking palpable.  It's like a bomb went off and the survivors have turned to eating the dead in order to cope.  The office is crested in this office park where everything's hazy and a dirty color of white and it smells like stale soup.

And then I saw you, Samantha.  You've always had it rough, even when I used to live in CA and be a supervisor for this company. I tried to make your work life as bearable as I could, and I kept urging you to find your joy, to leave this place if it was killing you.  And I saw you and you were as white as a sheet and your eyes burned with desolation and you didn't even stop to hug me, you just whispered that you're not doing well right now and you're busy and I had to choke back a sob and I just nodded and I walked away.

And you weren't weren't the only one who was scraping by like this.  The whole building was filled with the shells of my former friends and colleagues, trodding along.  There was a meeting that day to discuss a policy which needed to have been established over a year ago, and the boss looked like a combination of a horse and a gym coach and the plans he had in motion didn't make sense and I spoke up, and all eyes were on me, this alien from the east who didn't care about being polite.  We had lost untold hundreds of students and dozens of good people because new management didn't understand how to keep things going and going well. 

My work day ended, and my former Partner in Crime picked me up and we headed to the Upright Citizens Brigade theatre to see some stand-up comedy. Waited in line and the show started.  The actual roster of guests is a secret and you don't know until the moment they appear onstage.  Just then, Paul F Tompkins arrived behind the curtain and I lost my shit.

Any one who knows me has had to suffer through my feverish declaration that Paul F Tompkins is bar none my favorite comedian.  Why?  He's spent decades evolving and adapting his work.  He's suffered in ways which I've shared and I guess his career path gives me hope that maybe one day I'll prosper on the level he has as an artist.  Plus, he can outriff anyone under the table!  On that taping of Doug Loves Movies, he did the episode as himself, as reality TV show celebrity CakeBoss, and as Ice-T, and it was wonderful.  Just wonderful.  You can hear the episode for free on ITunes if ya like.  And, if you haven't already picked up his work, I urge you to do so.  His newest special:  Laboring Under Delusions just came out a month ago and you can pick it up on Amazon.

Next, came Comedy Bang Bang's standup show.  And the surprise guest of all surprise guests came out: Mr. Patton Oswalt.  His set was a fast fifteen and it was painful how savagely funny it was.  Like, unable to breathe, stabbing my ribs in the seat, funny.

As we tried to leave Hollywood and get back to my hotel, an old wound opened up between my former Partner in Crime and I .  I'm super shitty at directions. And I got her lost driving back to the freeway.  Naturally, due to the late hour and the stalled city traffic, she was furious.  She began to yell at me and claimed that I must be telling all my friends that she's the reason why we broke up.  And I began to cry.  I said: Don't you think that I've told everyone, my friends, my new acquaintances in New York, even goddamn strangers working at a goddamn time share that I'm the one to blame for things falling apart between us? Look at you.  You've prospered.  You've grown and found new love and sharpened your skills as a artist.  And I had to get the hell out of your way to do this.  For eight and a half years, I failed you. And I'm sorry. 

WEDNESDAY, May 2nd

I hop a cross town bus back to the office to pick up the new laptop they've given me.  CA transit just feels more desolate than NY transit.  Takes longer, too. 

Spend an early evening hosting Paula, Kueberth and Allison for dinner.  I play them a few songs I've written and they politely oblige.

After dinner, we explore the game room in the time share and discover an incredibly creepy cotton candy machine which plays a theme more suited to the last five minutes of an after-school special than vending food.

They leave, and as I head back to my room, I get a call from this girl, Mary, who's been chatting with me sporadically on OkCupid.  She's cute, but we're very different people.  It's the first time she's called me on the phone instead of texting me, and soon it devolves into a six hour conversation and we go too fast way too soon.  But I'm just swept up in loneliness and anger and it's nice to feel even a little appreciation.


THURSDAY, MAY 3rd

Checked out of the time share and spent most of the work day with the new laptop in the lobby.  My friend Greg picks me up and we grab dinner before seeing the production of Sherlock Holmes he directed.  It's a Thursday show, which for some actors can be as good as seeing a Wednesday afternoon stripper.  But, there are a few really solid characters, and Greg did well with the vision of the tale. 


FRIDAY, MAY 4th

The former Partner in Crime picks me up and we head over to Disneyland, where we meet an old college friend, Anna.  And it's a calm, serene time.  Just a short six hours in the park, not enough to make one feel sluggish or stressed.  I ride Mr. Toad's Wild Ride and tease my cohort for driving us into Hell.  I ride Pirates, I ride It's a Small World (and proclaim that , for such a happy ride, the song alludes to quite a bit more tragedy which is woefully underrepresented by the puppets.  Where are the tears?  Where are the fears?)

After Disneyland, we drive back up to the Upright Citizens Brigade theatre to see Paul F Tompkins do this incredibly funny show called The Dead Authors Series.  In it, he plays H.G. Wells (who has used his time travel machine to bring authors from the past back to the present to interview them)  and he interviewed the Brothers Grimm (played by two gentlemen from the Superego podcast)  It was non-stop amazing and brutally hilarious.


SATURDAY, MAY 5th

The entire time I'm flying back to NY, I keep thinking:  Why did I schedule a first date with Mary two hours after my flight lands?   Granted, I wanted to see her, but that's just a lot of pressure.  She was the one who wanted to see me sooner. The airplane lands, I hop to a cab and I'm racing the clock.  Sending texts back and forth to her.  Cab arrives earlier than I'd planned, which is great.  Run inside, shower off the trip, and await Mary.    And again, things went too fast, too soon.


PS - A week and a half later, after another too fast, too soon date, I ended things with her.  We had too many differences and she smoked like crazy and I discovered that I can't date someone who constantly smells like cigarettes and pot smoke.  I just don't like the way it tastes.  And I'm sorry my behavior led to the situation which took place between us.  Just as I tried to shut down my OkCupid account, someone emailed me asking if I wanted to grab coffee.  I agreed.

Today, that person stood me up.  At  a place which took an hour to get to each way.  Time to focus on just the work now, you know?