🎼 And I Wish You Joy and Happiness, But Above All This, I Wish You Love… 🎶

Hello Gentle Reader!

Happy New Year! We are one week into 2023 and I am hoping you are all doing things that you enjoy. I have been working from home this week, so I have had the chance to catch some shows while answering emails. I have been watching a lot of the charming show, We’re Here and getting such a kick out of watching Hot Ones. And I have been loving them enough to watch more than one episode at a time. I don’t normally binge anything because I get antsy and NEED to do something or grab a yarn project to work on to pull my attention away cuz I get bored. It is crazy. With so much stuff to watch and enjoy, I get bored. I don’t think I know any other actors who say they are bored with an outlet of their craft. I should shut up before I get in trouble. 🤭 I really think it is an attention thing, but that is just a guess.

But, back to the topic at hand. Whenever I work on building a character and look to find my motivations I always try to base every decision from the perspective of love. I do this because I honestly, personally, believe in life, there is nothing worth fighting for more than love. It doesn’t have to be physical love; it could be anything.

I know I have mentioned this before in a past post. I just can’t remember how far back or how often (I try not to be too repetitive, let me know if I am, ok?)

I love my life. With all its hardships and challenges and chaos, it is pretty good. The problem that I am struggling with, Kind Reader, is that I can’t look in the mirror and say that I love myself.

Don’t get me wrong, I have accepted myself in all my flawed glory, from the dried skin on the heel of my left foot to my bum knee to my slightly lazy right eye to the annoying frizzy greying hair on my head to my tendency to obsessively worry about thing to my battles with memory. I don’t mind these things about myself, but I do wish that I didn’t have the worry and memory issues. So I continue my journey on figuring out the best way to get better at adapting to them.

Please don’t think this is a New Year’s resolution post. I don’t believe in them and hold them in the same low regard as Thanksgiving. I know that people often say ‘it a time for giving thanks for what you have and your friends and family.’ Shut up. Just stop it with that nonsense. If you aren’t grateful every single day of the year for what you have and the amazing people in your life, you need to rethink that life right now, Resolutions are the same, why do you need to wait until the start of a new year to put all of this pressure on your shoulders? ‘But it is a clean slate… blah blah blah’ If you really want to do it, why wait? You have the motivation now, why wait until January 1, every day is a clean slate as is the beginning of every week, month and heck hour if you really wanna get into it. Not to judge anyone’s decisions, but those ideas that society holds up is so limiting and should be thrown out like trash. But I digress…

One of the things that I did happen to watch was the Lizzo concert for her latest album “Special.” I had the biggest smile on my face the whole time and was in the best mood after. As a fan of her music, I was just happy to be hearing the music, but to watch her and see the joy she has sharing her creations with the audience was a bonus. Not only that, there were a couple of times where you can see that moment where she is still grateful for these moments. Her music is filled with positivity and encouragement to love yourself and sometimes a it can be a little therapeutic. 😂 The inclusivity she brings to the table is a breath of fresh air and her audacious notion that being in love with yourself is the best kind of love because then your are unstoppable. This idea is beautiful. I love it. I am fascinated by it. I am intrigued by it. I want to know if she is right.

So I am going to use my curiosity and try and find the answer. I will keep you posted on what I find. Who know? Maybe I will even end up actually loving myself and to quote the singer “it’s about damn time!”

Thank you, Dear Reader, for continuing to follow along on this journey with me. I always appreciate the chance to bend your ear.

Until next time, stay safe and alert. Be kind and take care of yourself and those you care about.

❤️

🎼I Wanna Be Where The People Are…🎶

Hello Gentle Reader!!

I hope you have been keeping safe and healthy. I have been hermitting (is that a verb?) {I guess since “friending” is a verb now, I don’t see how hermitting can’t be far behind thanks to quarantine.}

Turkey Day has come and gone and Christmas is right around the corner. Have any of you had a hard time finding footing this second round surge of COVID cases? I will be fine for two weeks, very nearly productive and everything, but then I hit this wall of “tireds” that seems to come from nowhere. I don’t know if it is just a shut down because I have TOO MANY choices of what I can do, or if it is another form of depression. I just lay on the couch and sleep. My head screams, get up and get going, but my body just wants to be still. The cold is not really an issue for me, so it isn’t because I am all warm and cuddly as I am vegging out. As I write this, I have all the windows wide open welcoming in the crisp cool breeze that is softly circulating through the apartment. There was even a handful of times that I had inspiration to write, but then I found myself on the couch surfing TV but not really watching anything.

I marvel at the battle that was within.

I am fascinated that my very nature of not wanting to waste time doing nothing gets defeated by this “something” that I don’t even comprehend. I am sure I have mentioned that I can’t binge stuff because I feel like I am wasting time. After two, MAYBE three episodes, I have to get up and do something, anything. Yet, I wasn’t “seeing” things on TV and I wasn’t feeling anything other than lack of feeling. The amount of apathy that I had while on my own was astounding.

Dear Reader, it makes me wonder what is going to happen when the world finally returns to something similar to what we used to know. Will I want to get back out and do the activities that I used to enjoy? Will I want to go out and have drinks? Will I want to spend any more time outside that I absolutely need to? All of these questions make me REALLY apprehensive of the big question that looms in my brain… Will I want to audition anymore?

Honestly, I don’t even know.

The future is full of unknowns. That is really scary.

It is also full of potential. That really gives me hope.

“I wanna be where the people are. I wanna see, see them dancing.”

I wanna be dancing too! One thing I never give up on is love. I honestly believe that when there is nothing, we fight for love. Not just physical love, but any kind of love/passion, and as we head into a new year, with a NEW PRESIDENT!!!! YAY!!!!, and the potential for two vaccines, I have hope. My fingers are crossed, Kind Reader, that with hope comes that drive that I had before my world got lonely.

Until next time… Please stay safe, Sweet Reader. I am wishing all the best to you and your families along with the happiest of holiday wishes just in case I hit that wall again and don’t make it back on until 2021. I send love and positivity to you all.

You Are Love And Loved…

Hello Gentle Reader,

Things have been a bit insane in California as of late. There are still some fires burning, but a lot of them have been contained. The smoke has been just sitting over large parts of the state creating a day long dusk lighting. It made it hard to tell time without looking at a clock.

I tried to take pictures of the strange light, but every image seemed to be color corrected. All of them looked as though it was just a normal regular CA day. So odd.

I still haven’t heard from the doctor for my ear appointment from yesterday’s post. Just waiting and waiting… in this weird light.

While I wait, Dear Reader, I just wanted to take a small bit of time to acknowledge that today, September 10, 2020, is World Suicide Prevention Day. With COVID-19, the upcoming presidential elections, high unemployment rates and the holiday season right around the corner, I know things can seem a little tough. Things can feel like they are suffocating you. Things might seem like they will never get better. You may feel like no one cares or understands you. You may believe that you are not loved.

I want to state very clearly…

Things will get better. It may not be right away, but it will get better. It won’t always feel like you can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. When that happens, PLEASE talk to a friend if you feel comfortable enough. If you don’t feel comfortable, there are many resources to help you. Here are some options.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255 in English and 888-628-9454 for Spanish.
TrevorLifeline, a suicide prevention counseling service for the LGBTQ community, 866-488-7386.
Crisis Text Line is reachable by texting to 741741 (US and Canada), 85258 (UK), and 50808 (Ireland)
Send me an email! I won’t judge and I will listen with every intention to help.

Please know that the world may seem big and vast, but it does still need you. You are loved and there is hope.

There is always hope – even in the darkest of times, there is hope.

Until next time, my Wonderful Reader, stay safe and alert. Be there if your friends need help. Reach out if you need help. Most importantly, have hope!

I love you!

Let’s Create A Hashtag…

Dear Gentle Reader,

When Madonna released her first single for the Rebel Heart album, she made a claim. At her Grammy performance, she said she wanted to start a revolution of love. I was super stoked to hear that. The only problem was that when I got the album, there wasn’t enough of that “love revolution” theme on it.

I use twitter, instagram, and the good ol’ Facebook in different ways because, well, they are different mediums. I try my darnedest to post different things on each. I have a hard time sharing the same thing because (as I have mentioned on several occasions) I don’t like repetition. I don’t know why it bothers me so much, but it does.

But I like idea of a revolution of love. 2017 is going to be a challenge. It is a government transition and there will be shake ups and melt downs. So, I want to set us all on a positive road by dropping a bomb on you. LOL! Well, I am calling it a love bomb.

The word bomb is a horrible name, but I want this to work just like a bomb.

When I think of bombs, I imagine the thing landing and as it bursts, it sends out a wave of destruction. The idea of this particular bomb is to share something I love about you via a social media timeline. Hopefully, you will feel like joining me and post something on someone else’s timeline using the tag. Basically, the feeling is like the shrapnel, the effect, and I hope it makes you want to send a bomb of your own.

It’s a little silly I’ll admit, but why not do it? We could use a little heartfelt silly in the world. The only bad part about it is that for a true hashtag, one must only use words. I think is important to use the icon ❤️ though. Not just because I worry someone may confuse this with the actual spelled out tag of “love bomb” They are essentially the same, but I love the idea of the image of the heart because of the point at the bottom of it. Like it is going to dig in and the rounded ends are getting ready to explode and spread the feeling.

So my dear reader, expect to see a lot of #❤️bomb and #BEDLaM from me in the coming weeks. BEDLaM will show as a tag so if you wanna see all the #❤️bombs I am doing, you can find it with the BEDLaM tag.

To you Gentle Reader, I love you because you choose to share a little bit of your time with me. I thank you from the deepest parts of my ❤️ #❤️bomb #BEDLaM

It Is Finished…

Cast and Crew of SUPERSTAR being goofy! Photo by Edmond Kwong

I have been pussyfooting around the acknowledgement that this show that I have lived with for the last 13.5 months has finally come to an end. On my last two days off of work I was expecting to get hit with a blast of depression that comes with ending a show. One of this magnitude, I was sure would take me out of the game for a while. But it never came.

When we started this show, I said I see this show as a fight for love. Instead of the show being a simple Judas wronged Jesus, it was accidental. There was no one to “blame.” Everything was supposed to happen. Like Jesus sings, “You’re far too keen on where and how but not so hot on why.” I wanted a positive spin on the show. I also wanted Jesus to be as human as everyone else. My hope was that people would be moved to see a fellow human being treated so horribly during act 2. To see that he was afraid and sad but still willing to go through this for his love of the people. I had the white out at the end to ask the audience to look inside and find your love for your fellow man and for hope that this world can be a better place in doing so.

Then I was lucky enough to get this amazing, supportive cast! But my luck didn’t run out there. One of the very first things I fought for was an amazing sound department which was an incredible 3 man team. So John, Dan, and Brett: Thank you for an outstanding job with this difficult show! The crew was small but mighty and headed by an amazing Stage Manager, Ms. Pye! I am grateful to the amazing producers Nancy and Liz, who worked so tirelessly to ensure that the vocal director, Judy, and music director, Jean, and I had everything we needed.

I have realized that there is a reason for the non-depression. As I disassemble the Blooming Wall, I have the chance to read all the beautiful paper “flowers” with things that people love. Simple things. And I understand that we did exactly what we set out to do. We did share the love.

And so did they. With that in mind, what is there to be depressed about?

To ALL of you, I cannot say thank you enough.

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