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Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Darth Vader would suck at Hide N' Seek




Just watched the original Star Wars movies. Episodes four, five and six, Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi.

First of all, they still hold up.

Secondly, I'm glad I watched the trilogy on vintage VHS, because I loathe the majority of the plot and physical changes made to the original movies.

Though I appreciate George Lucas removing those very thin lines around images, a relic of special effects from the time period, the other changes - like the added Jabba the Hut scene, the added monster mouth in the desert monster-hole (what the frack was that?), and the Hayden Christensen ghost instead of the old dude at the end of Jedi, are all just wrong. Please take them back, Mr. Lucas. Yuck.

But has anyone else noticed how inconveniently loud Darth Vader's breathing is?

(Read the following aloud with Darth Vader's distinct breathing sound: Phuuuhhhhh on the inhale and the Khuuuhhhhh on the exhale.)

Phuuuhhhhh Khuuuhhhhh

Phuuuhhhhh Khuuuhhhhh

Very hard to sneak up on somebody. Just listen for Phuuuhhhhh Khuuuhhhhh and you'll know exactly where he's at. Sure, he can choke people with his mind, but forget trying to punk or prank someone. And he'd be shit at hide 'n seek. 

I'm just saying.

Darth Vader would suck at Hide N' Seek.






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Saturday, May 14, 2011

Optimistic Birds

I must be getting old, because I actually caught myself enjoying bird watching the other day.

Firstly, in case you don't know, I'm hanging in Minnesota for a bit. Marcus and I are finishing our book, What Women Never Tell You, without all the distractions that Los Angeles provides. Plus, we wanted to spend some time with my family.

Secondly, my awareness of birds in Los Angeles was limited to seagulls at the beach, crows outside my window (very early on a Sunday morning CAAAaaah! CAAAaaah!), and once in a while a nightingale, I think, in the evenings when I lived in Los Feliz. I've lived pretty much all over Los Angeles, and that's what I remember of the birds around me.

But here, we have bright-red cardinals and royal-blue blue-jays hanging outside the very large front window of my family home. The home where I grew up, actually.

Not only do they hang out for us to watch, munching on the bird-feeder my Dad put out. They sing and seem to be having a good time. The weather here isn't exactly balmy yet. In the last ten days, we've had sunny, 65° days, and we've had crisp, 40° days. More of the latter. Oh, and sometimes with rain. It actually snowed here in mid-April!

Even though I grew up in Minnesota, my blood thinned after all my years in Southern California. In other words, I'd put on a coat at 55° in LA.

But what struck me about these birds, is that they're so optimistic.

I realize I'm anthropomorphizing a bit.

And I'm sure the bird population here has nothing to do with their sunny outlook on life. Literally, sunny. They're trusting the sun will eventually come to northern Minnesota and stay, at least for a few months.

I'm sure it's some long-ingrained bird instinct, passed on and cultivated over many, many generations of aviary genetics.

But to me and my non-bird-brain, they just seem optimistic.

So, I'm taking a queue from the birds. Today, I'm going to just trust that the sun will come out tomorrow. I'm going to be optimistic that things will just work out. Optimistic that mother nature, father time, and sister christian actually know what they're doing and I can just follow my instincts.

Which is what, I guess, I'm doing here.

Know that I miss and love all my cherished friends in California (or wherever else my friends might be). I'm writing, singing, bird watching, and doing all I can to stay optimistic.

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Making Decisions is Easy

Alright, sarcasm is hard to convey in written form. My title today is laced with sarcasm.

Making decisions, for me, is often not easy at all.

Until it is.

Let me explain. There is too much. Let me sum up.

You see, I realized something this morning.

I'm just pretending to be in charge of my own life/mind/choices. Something else is going on. How do I know? My big life decisions have never really been made by me.

You see, I'll spend days, sometimes weeks (or in one unfortunate relationship situation - years) agonizing over a decision. The agony usually correlates to my perception of how big the decision is - the bigger the perception of the thing in my life, the greater the agony.

But here's the kicker. Once I do make the actual decision, it never is about weighing the pros & cons, or about all the permutations I've looked at on paper or in my mind. It's always just a clarity, a feeling, an intuition that just washes over me, usually after a good night's sleep, and often after an experience that is unrelated to the decision!

Now I've studied enough about psychology, the subconscious, and spirituality to know that we don't know jack. But we do know that the subconscious mind uses sleep and dreams to vent and work things out.

So here I am, 98% clear on a decision that has been haunting me for weeks. The type of haunting where I wake up in the morning thinking about this. Oftentimes I didn't even have a breath between sleeping and waking before thinking about what I needed to do next to figure this out. The type of haunting where I've had emotional breakdowns on a weekly basis, like clockwork. (The decision is related to investments and land and things that might bore you if I went into the details.)

And now that I'm on the other side, I can't believe I didn't see this more clearly before. Argh, the agony of hindsight!

Let me back up a bit. Years ago I went to boarding school. Now that may sound all rulers-on-the-wrist and catholic school girly, but this is me folks. It was a very un-catholic school girl experience. It was closer to Fame, without all the singing and dancing in the cafeteria. (We sang and danced in our performance space, thank you very much.) It was a residential arts school in Minneapolis, about 3 hours from my home town. I had to apply and audition to get in and it was a two-year program. Junior & senior years of high school. Once I did get in for my junior year of high school, I knew I would go. But my first year was hard being away from family and friends and in a completely new environment. I knew without a doubt at the time that I wanted to be a professional musician/singer/songwriter, but I didn't know if continuing at this school was a) the best way to do that or b) for me.

During summer vacation between junior and senior years, I did all the figuring out I possibly could. I weighed the pros and cons. I talked to some trusted friends and family. I stewed and stewed and stewed some more.

Then one night, at a party, I found the guy I'd been dating off and on in his car with my good friend Tara. If memory serves, walking by the car, I saw a bare ass lit-up by the moon light.

It was not a pretty sight.

I walked away and knew, right in that moment, that I was going back to Arts High for my senior year.

From the outside, it might've looked like I was merely reacting to my friend fooling around with the guy I liked. But that wasn't it at all. Maybe that was the catalyst, but ultimately, that wasn't what really did it for me.

Something beyond me, something older and wiser and calmer than I was at that time, made me know, as sure as winter in Minnesota, that I didn't really belong here anymore.

I spent my first year at Arts High feeling like I didn't belong there, but it was exceptionally confusing and frustrating because I didn't feel I belonged anywhere - not in this new place, but not in my old place either.

That night with the moon-lit-bare-ass was the catalyst for me to realize that all the discomfort of my first year was me growing into belonging in this new place.

My senior year at Arts High went by in a blur, but it was one of the best times in my life. I bonded with friends there that I still have to this day. I had experiences that inspired songs, and grew into the woman I am now in large part because of that decision.

What's it like for you? How do you come to your most life-altering decisions? At what point is it easy?

I do believe in following your gut. Problem is, I'm notoriously too impatient for my gut to chime in.

Guess I still need to learn more patience.