Thoughts on Ghost on a Stick

Hey.

Started pre-production work on my one man show:  GHOST ON A STICK.  One of my tasks was to come up with a nice, short summary of the play for the festival.

That meant rereading the script.  Since I last revised it in January 2012, I hadn't read it. Sent it to tons of people hoping to stir up interest or get it produced somewhere. But over a year had gone by and I avoided looking over the work.

Why?  Didn't want to get my hopes up and revise it another time unless there was a specific goal in sight, I suppose.  But the real reason is that this play frightens the hell out of me. Being a semi-autobiographical account, there's some raw, embarrassing truth on those pages. 

So I read the script. Bawled like a baby. Identified some of the clumsier moments, and expressed disbelief with how wickedly the last third unfolds.

And days passed.  Today, I checked in and tried to figure out why I'd been feeling so shitty yesterday and today. Shut down. Unable to focus or summon the will to do any self care.  Wasn't until I dragged myself outside to go walk in the forest that it finally made sense.

It's a weight of overpowering shame and guilt.

At the time most of the events in Ghost happened, this was me:

I was poor as hell. Felt immensely ugly. Ate unbuttered toast and water for every meal at home for a year. Looking back on 2000-2010, I see how much of a selfish, abusive monster I was.  And it sickens me.  So much time wasted. An acting career stalled by fear and self-doubt.  Thousands of people treated like garbage.  People I loved that I let down in small, irreparable ways.

Like to say that, with a decade behind me, that I wouldn't be so callous now, that I wouldn't treat a job as a license to hurt complete strangers because my life was spiraling out of control. That I'd be a healthy, welcome part of a relationship. But I really don't know if that's true. Since then, I haven't had a relationship last longer than a month and a half.   Today, I strain so hard to be a decent person even when I don't feel like it, but it feels like a rotting mask about to cast off at any time.

And with the news that Ghost is going to be a living thing with a world premiere and a production staff and people to watch it, new levels of fear and shame emerge.  Who the fuck do I think I am to steal together parts of my life and my friends and loved ones and throw it out there for people to see?  How arrogant and selfish am I to go out and beg the world to help me finance this story?  Who really wants to see me and this play anyway?

Finding solid answers to those questions will be my project these next few months.   

 The heart of Ghost On a Stick is this:   We each want to believe, so fervently, in a sense of control and recognizable order. It's what keeps us from screaming and screaming with the realization that we shall one day cease. Yet, there's always that singular moment for each person where it's clear that the construct we've made in no way matches up with the commonplace horror of what we eventually experience.  A healthy person learns to redouble their kindness and appreciate what pockets of love they receive.  Or, in the case of this story, they can become savage, sharpen their skills and enjoy how well they can torture people, burning themselves out with the misguided belief that work will set them free.

 Somewhere in that summary is a powerful, essential piece of theatre.  Got four months and crew of wonderful people to find it.

Word Buddy- new love song

Hey.

Like almost everything I do, this song grew out of an inside joke between myself and a friend of mine, Catherine Fowles. But, as time grew on, I discovered that this concept of "word buddies" - child-like as that phrase may be - really encapsulated the relationships I enjoy.  Raw, open discourse with people who continually remain unsatisfied with small talk.  Kindly beasts who press me to elaborate and who do not blink when I firmly do the same.

And this desired exchange with others, (combined with my deep, abiding affinity for pushing words together like toy cars in a sandbox), resulted in this song.

It's a love song about linguistics.  When it comes to my adult definition of love, Leo Buscaglia continues to shape my muddy thoughts.  In short, my pledge when I love someone is the following: to pay them attention and to fill their humble vessel with kindness and unexpected support. Granted, there are are a multitude of degrees these ministrations can take.

Lyrics and the video are below. There's quite a few odd, informative links in the lyrics, so be sure to poke around!

first verse

triadic relation
stepping out  through the mind's root cellar door
using echolocation
oh joyful noise  im craving more

sure i know im silly
sure i know youre cheeky
got a manicured mind
sure youre salty like a well-timed
epithet
sure i know your ribbing is the generous kind

chorus

but i dont want palaver and prattle
chew the sound and scorn the meaning like cattle
ill challenge you to signify
until i die
youre my word buddy

second verse

etymology hearken
buddy borne from brother kinship galore
see your countenance darken
its not so heady
heres whats in store

sure i know im zealous
sure i know your kidding cuz youre really quite scared
sure your armor is the fold of a syllable
sure i know that terror when your meaning is bared

but i dont want palaver and prattle
chew the sound and scorn the meaning like cattle
ill challenge you to signify
until i die
youre my word buddy

bridge

i must confess
ive got a motive nestled neatly
through this song
try to impress
pare down the facile and obsequious
its wrong
no matter if
were friends or sharing whispers in our bed
lets galvanize
cache your cogitations in my head
so one day senses fed
i will confide
i love you
and you will know the timbre of my
tidings
thats all i want

third verse

triadic relation
seeking to understand before i reply
feel that flush of elation
our resonation stronger than you and I

sure i know im silly
sure i know youre cheeky 

sure i know im silly
sure i know youre cheeky
got a manicured mind
sure youre salty like a well-timed
epithet
sure i know your ribbing is the generous kind

chorus

but i dont want palaver and prattle
chew the sound and scorn the meaning like cattle
ill challenge you to signify
until i die
youre my word buddy

youre my buddy 

Two years in NYC

Hey.

The day after I buried my father, I headed back to New York City.

Didn't travel so much as just sobbed cross-country.  I was working off a bad head cold, too. Airline personnel were hugging me. The rubber band stretched tight inside my chest the four months from my father's death until that final moment where they lowered his ashes into the earth finally snapped. Landed in the city, took a taxi to my apartment. Stored my things, went to my computer, printed something that wouldn't shake away, and taped this to my wall:

It's all I think about now.

I may never be commercially prosperous or critically acclaimed or have a healthy, loving relationship.  But I can't let depression piss away what few moments I may have left.  I have got to keep working. Got to give more to myself.

Same as before, I'll break it down into three parts: what I've done this year, what I've learned, and what needs to change.

WHAT I'VE DONE

Performed in 8 productions this year - Even more than the year prior.  The first nine months were a blur.  I didn't even buy groceries for seven months at a time, I was so busy. 

Kept the 30 pounds off I lost last year - my weight's been fluctuating, and I haven't been nearly as good at doing exercise as I should, but still, I'm at 270 at my highest times.

Wrote 10 new original songs this year - it's been crazy.  Writing songs based on dares, writing wedding songs, music made in an effort to keep myself focused during the fallow winter period.

Booked a long term, Off-Broadway show - Saturdays, I perform a two-person version of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, and it's been a lifesaver for me.

WHAT I'VE LEARNED

Giving up and refusing to fight will kill you.

Dating is not my path - after a break of a year or so, I aggressively dated in 2012.  Over a dozen women later, I've come to see that I'm the problem.  It's not my role on this earth.  Hard part now is accepting that.

Any creative, positive boon I've achieved this year is through the efforts of kind, wonderful people who took a chance on me and referred me to others.

I'll eat Thai food anywhere, anytime.

There is art and there is commerce, and I can't hold on to the silly notion that focusing on one will lead to the other.  This started in college, when several of my friends got really tv and movie focused and I (like now, not so wild about my looks) pored myself into theatre and thought that it would be the path to lead me to more lucrative work. It doesn't.  It's wonderful all its own, but will not yield a career.

Don't do theatre for free anymore.  You're 34. You've been doing it for free for a decade and a half.  Doesn't matter if it's a dollar, being paid is a form of respect for any job.

GOALS

1)Weigh 230 pounds one year from now.  I have a gym.  I have the time.

2)Better Self Care - this means so much that I've been slacking on in life.  New clothes, weekly groceries. Home cooked meals. New furniture. Massages. Books. Music. Seeing theatre by myself.

3)More career-minded work - on camera commercial acting classes.  A professional website for acting. Voice-over classes and a demo.

4)Produce and perform GHOST ON A STICK, my one man show - if the festivals I've submitted it to don't pan out, then I'll work with some producers to see what affordable venues I can get on my own.

Thanks to the following people:

the memory of my father
my mom
Jelina Seibert and Dave Seibert
Jeric Jones and Stephanie Girard
Bekki Doster
Mark Kinch
Jennifer Moraca
Tess Suchoff
Bobby Lux
Joe Hogan
Winnie Lok
Shannon Fillion
Ryan McCurdy
Alan Corcoran
April Newhouse
Paula and Emmett
Rob and Maureen
Michael Irish
Ginger Reiter
Julia Beardlsey O' Brien
Catherine Fowles
Tony White
Kristen Penner
Lorelei Mackenzie
Abigail Taylor
Rockford Sansom
Tod Engle
David Mendenhall

Mother Dear - an old song

Hey.

Here's an older song I wrote about a decade ago for my mom.

Another stark winter. This was in Los Angeles, though.  2001.  Moved back to South Central after taking seven months to save up money in Modesto (after college). 

I was impatient, and hungry for change. Let my unease take over my common sense.  Who goes back to LA to try to be a substitute teacher and pursue an acting career without having a car, without possessing a driver's license?  My savings ran out quickly, and I spiraled into debt and misery.

This is the first time I lived alone. The studio apartment was rife with stiff, brown shag carpeting, and the cockroaches were not afraid. Used to wake me up with tiny time steps on my face.  Determined not to lose myself to depression and self-doubt, I did what all twenty-something creative monkeys do: plowed through copies of THE ARTIST'S WAY and THE VEIN OF GOLD, littered my apartment walls with taped quotes in an effort to inspire me. Harnessed my self-hypnosis skills.  Used them to get past my flaws and finally, after seven years of painful trial and error, procured my driver's license.

Twelve years later.  I'm living another solitary life, this time in New York City. Loved and lost, earned a few minor successes. And I think about this song.

My mother has a fountain of hope and faith brimming inside her which I will never match.  It's such an intense power to witness. She's silly and passionate and wears the quiet strength a lifetime of hardship has tested and tested again. She's always been there to support me and the rest of her children.

Te amo mucho, mama. 

Here's the song:


first verse
mother dear
hear my cry
this januarys gonna
wring
me
dry
send a prayer
double time
my bodys achin
from a
nameless
crime

chorus
everyone should have a mother
borne of tenderness like you
though apart from one another
i still see you
at night when im asleep
a child again

second verse
mother smiles
beacons light
her worlds been ragged
but she still
smiles
right
mother saves
little things
old yearbook photos
invitations
strings

chorus

bridge
and im beginning to stand
on my own
two
feet
crash and burn and cry sometimes
but its all right
yes its all right
oh mother dear
youre the purest
human
creature
one
could ever hope to know
as i live
i sing
your
mothers song

third verse
mother dear
hear your boy
this januarys gonna
bring
us
joy
trouble come
trouble go
what only matters
is the love
we
sow

chorus

Scars

Hey.

Didn't sleep a drop last night and I'm doing all I can to stay up another five hours. Errands, housecleaning. Writing.

Funny how winter always makes your scars tingle. Cold snatches at the taut skin, smooth and bone white. Each one a lesson, a talisman worn to stave off death for another day.

Let's review three of mine (all self-inflicted)

UPPER RIGHT HAND SIDE OF MY SKULL
Size: About the diameter of a nickel
Seen: When my hair's short ( you can see it when I sing the high notes at the end of  Jumping the Shark )
How It Happened: I was about a few months old when my father took me to work ( he worked for Atari in the warehouse department)  Somehow, he was on a forklift, I was always super squirmy, and I fell. Like Humpty Dumpty.
Lesson Learned:  I wish it was "don't be squirmy", but I didn't learn that until I racked up a great many more death-defying leaps and bounds over the next few years.  I guess my father learned not to bring babies on a forklift?

ROOF OF MY MOUTH
Size: About the diameter of a #2 Pencil
Seen:  If you're staring at the roof of my mouth (you weirdo)
How It Happened: In first grade during class, I dropped my pencil on the ground. And, in that instant, I hatched a plan borne of genius.  I would pick up the pencil NOT with my hands, but with my mouth.  Gripping the metal bars of the desk with my bony thighs, I leaned over and deftly cupped the pencil with my lips, point side in my mouth.  And, on the way back up, I lost my balance, and fell.  Shoved it right through the tender skin .  I stood up, the teacher almost fainted.  Kindergarten teacher is called over, and she grabs brown paper towels to mop the rising tide of blood gushing out of my maw. I'm more surprised than anything (though that was probably due to shock)
I'm driven to the hospital, and my father is called, but they can't reach him.  They can't reach him because, at that precise moment, he's in the same hospital with my mother as she's in labor with my younger brother. Finally, the hospital administration pieces it together, and my dad finds me.
Lesson Learned: Pencils are deadly.  Also, don't do anything crazy regarding balance, Jones.  You have none.

LEFT INDEX FINGER
Size: A curved parabola of about five inches, j-shaped.
Seen: Pretty visibly, if you're paying attention.  Out of embarrassment, I tend to keep my left hand in my pocket when I'm not acting or doing things with my left hand.
How It Happened: Sophomore year of high school, Spring semester. I didn't get cast in the school production of West Side Story, so I signed on to work props.  We had a elementary school performance of the show prior to the final dress that evening.  In my efforts to get the votive candles lit in time for the Tony and Maria bedroom scene, I was burning my fingertips.  Wanted to find a smarter way to light them.  Settled on punks (long, thin wooden sticks you light and then use to light narrow glass candles).  We didn't have any, so I chose to borrow a crew member's dull Swiss Army knife and found a spare piece of pine.  While the final dress took place, I was backstage cutting thin strips off the board with the knife. Towards me.  Talking and joking. Got the blade stuck in a knot, and I pulled.  Sliced clear to the bone.  Again, no screaming.  Lot of shock and shame. Sharks and Jets from the dream ballet in their white-t's scurried past me as dollops of blood spattered the green linoleum tiles.  I had enough training in first aid to remember to raise my hand above my heart, and that (with compression) stopped the hemorrhaging.  Drama teacher calls my father. In urgent care, I'm cracking jokes with the nurse practitioner as he stitches the wound (six stitches).  It's only when I get home and it's dark that I realize how stupid that all was, and I sob.  I sob so hard my ribs ache.
Lesson Learned:  A dull knife is so much more dangerous than a sharp one. Always cut away from yourself. A tool mandates holy attention.

My Coffee Name

Hey.

Let me share a little of my crazy with you.

If I'm at a coffee shop, and I order a drink, I always lie to the staff.

They ask for a name. I give them, "J", and in a way, J has become my coffee name.

It's a disposable moniker. I size someone up, immediately decide whether or not someone's gonna be in my life for the long haul, and  I make that choice.  Random stranger on the street?  Acquaintance of a friend of mine? Another new person whom I'm not going to see again? I'm not gonna invest the time to make some poor person deal with my weird name.

That's some pathological work there.

But I've spent a whole childhood with an odd first name. Four little letters with a host of pronunciations. I've had a smattering of genders and ethnic qualifiers labeled upon me.  As much as I loathe Dale Carnegie's book, How to Win Friends and Influence People (it's such a manipulative, cynical text), one aspect rings true: a person comes alive and responds when they hear their name expressed correctly.

If we're casually acquainted, know that you're taking a friendship test with me.  One which you pass when you can spell and say my name perfectly, unaided.  Most of the time, I won't correct you.  I'll hope you'll seek this knowledge out in an effort to know me.  I do the same with you.

Final crazy name story:  there's a coworker at my day job whom I've known for over eight years. She has crazy amounts of power and has worked with me in various capacities. In the past, she has done some vicious, conniving, misguided behavior (with the best of intentions).  And she refers to me by a pretty common nickname, clanging nasally like a crow when she does so.  Normally, it's a formal utterance, but it just inherently sounds disrespectful when she speaks it.

And I just let her do it.  I do so to remind me on a constant basis that, despite her current behavior today, there's always a sliver of chance that her emotional drunken rage will re-emerge. I hear this affectation she's chosen, wince, and I remember to protect myself.  Remind myself that this is a day job and not the artistic life which occupies the rest of my time.

Playing House - First Draft of new song

Hey.

I remember the first time I heard this phrase. 

I was talking to a conservative acquaintance of mine about seven years ago.  That's not a political label; she's just someone who lives at home and has an older paradigm about some social mores.  Told her about this long term relationship I had and how we didn't plan on ever getting married.  She stared at me, smirked, and said, "Oh, so you're just playing house?"

And that still fucking burns me. At the time, I had every intention of staying in that relationship for the rest of my life. We had been together for five years at that point, weathered so much. Sure, my relationship by no means fit a standard mold of what couples normally did. But I never said I was normal.

When that relationship ended, I reflected back upon those two words:  playing house.   And it saddened me to think that, in a way, I was doing this.  Not by the "traditional tenets of marriage" - whatever those are- archetypes.  But in the small fact that I ignored and masked a great deal of problems while trying to reinforce a construct of peace at all costs.  And that's not fair to anyone.  It's not communication. It's not being an adult and I'm sorry that I hurt somebody along the way while learning these somber lessons.

So, this song is probably the closest I'll come to writing a Placebo song.  It's angsty as hell.  I don't know why it came out this week. Probably just the combo of my mental health being a wee off and still thinking about death far too much.  Has a few cool parts to it.

lyrics

first
like a rubber band thats tethered
see the cold neglect thats weathered me
tell it straight now
watch it as it curls
lock the doors eyes closed and weeping
make excuses tension creeping fast
in my lonely laughter
after all thats passed


chorus
dont want the pills again
cant stomach the thought of those well dressed lies once more
whats the point of feeling fine
theres not a reason at all why somebody outta feel right for
sometimes the floorboards break
sometimes the mortar wont take
stead of playing house ill think ill let it fall

second verse
like a peach so lush and tender
im expected to surrender skin
chew me up and scatter
seeds and matter strewn
scratching at the mold thats spreading
no ones biting winter threading harm
failing sense i flatter
sing this wary tune

chorus

bridge
watch me die in slow motion
to prove i ever lived at all
ill bear the same and rouse your name my friend
a little kindness handmade pall

third verse
like a shudder fore the violence
muscles warning all is silence
cant you see youre hiding
words just biding time
thats enough now tell it plainly
that im frightened fault is mainly mine
that im week and chiding
gussied up with rhyme

chorus