regrets – The Actorvist

PART 4

At the end of September, my BFF Tom moved back to the East Coast. I had a hard time dealing with it through the rest of the month. I was crying on the way home from dropping him off at the airport. It wasn’t the bawling, I-can’t-control-my-car kind. It was more like the angry if-I-could-stop-my-eyes-from-watering-so-you-don’t-get-the-satisfaction-of-seeing-me-cry-I-would kind. I held on to that sadness and even now, still can’t see a blue mini cooper without him popping in my brain. But with the show to distract me and my favorite holiday, I began to deal with his choice.

halloween-movie-poster-1020521707 — My favorite scary movie!!! Along with Poltergeist and The Exorcist.

October, my favorite month! That’s usually when all the fun scary stuff happens, like haunted houses and scary movies. And of course, there’s Halloween. I love the thrill of getting scared. It’s kind of exhilarating. I don’t dress up for Halloween anymore. I haven’t in years! I think I’ve only dressed up for costume parties. And even then, not often. I think I associate the holiday with the cooling of the weather and the crunching of leaves under my feet. I find that sound really soothing when I am out walking in the day. At night, it’s a little like “Shut up!! People are gonna know where I am at!” It’s kind of sad that I always assume the worst about people when I am walking about at night. I think the getting mugged really took a lot of that adventurousness that I had when I was a teenager.

Oh, speaking of scary movies: Paranormal Activity 3 came out…and it sucked!! I think I may have jumped once. The big ending that was supposed to “mess you up for life” (yeah, the commercials really said that) was LAME!!!! So lame that merely typing it in caps and making bold wasn’t enough. It needed to be italicized too! If you were scared by that, I would be shocked. I am the biggest chicken and I really wanted to just scream “are you frakin’ kiddin’ me?!” I regret going to see this movie.

The Purple Gang. And we are SO hard core! So watch it!

Due to the rash of children committing suicide, October became the National Stop Bullying Month. Yay!! It’s hard enough just to walk with your head high for who you are without having people making you feel less than. The 20th was designated as the month to wear purple as a show of solidarity that you are against bullying. Thankfully, I wasn’t alone in that belief.

I went to a cool conference that was all about figuring out ways to bring the theatrical experience to the audience in different ways. It was enlightening and supremely informative. The only downside is that I don’t really have a place to test these ideas out. Also, figuring out the logistics of them would be a pain in the ass as well. I regret that I didn’t get that much audio to make a podcast for it. But I even more regret paying $37 for parking for 5 hours in San Francisco!

The Occupy Movement grew from just Occupy Wall Street into a much bigger force to be reckoned with! Which is good because, this whole gap between the have and have-nots only seem to keep growing and growing. It’s no wonder that all, yes ALL, politicians aren’t in the loop when it comes to what the people really want. Have you noticed that they all promise everything just to get into office and fail to deliver. They got what they wanted, why bother with the rest?

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November marked the opening of H2$ and it’s run began. So many smiles and happy times with that fabulous cast. I love them all. Hot stuff! I’ve heard nothing but good things from the people leaving the auditorium, and read an accurate middle of the road review of the show, but the tickets sales were a bit on the lacking side. I even got to have my first TheActorvist.com contest for free tickets, and got about a hundred hits on that post but only one entry! I don’t know if maybe the show wasn’t something people weren’t interested in seeing or if the prices were too high or if people thought it was a bad show. While the sales were disappointing, it was fun. And as much time as I had the chance to spend with them, I regret that I didn’t spend more. Oh, and I regret that my Podcast isn’t working. It featured a pretty good interview with Brett Carlson.

Aside from the show, the month was slow. Thanksgiving was uneventful, but pleasant.

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NYE_Hong_Kong_New_Year — Hong Kong's Times Square. Do you see what the hearts are saying?

Which brings us to December! It’s currently 4:45 on the last day of the year. People are already starting 2012 and the East Coast begins it’s countdown in about 4 hours. Looking back at this month, there were only two things significant about it.

The first is that we closed out H2$ with a bang! While perfection was never achieved like I so wanted, the attempt, I feel, only made my enjoyment of the show that much greater.

The second thing that happened was our 3rd annual Pajama/Donut/Game Day! Again a very pleasant success. Basically my friends and I hangout in our pj’s the entire day, doing nothing but having a good time and allowing our childish indulgences come forth. It’s basically our version of Disneyland. With this being our third year, I wonder if we have to now add a new element to it next year. No, no, that’s like a 5th anniversary thing. Nevermind.

SO, that was my year. Not very exciting and filled with regrets. But there were a lot of lessons learnt as well.

I look forward to 2012 and possibly the end of time with optimism and hope that people will change. That the good of very soul will step forth and show itself to everyone else and the world will become a much better place to live.

Thank you all for being a part of my life and I look forward to hearing from you and seeing you in 2012!

All the world’s a stage. Now get out there and Break A Leg!

As is usually the custom, once we reach this point of the year, we tend to review the things we did during the year. Some people look back to see if they’ve accomplished any of the goals that they’ve set for themselves. Some look back in regret. Some people look back to learn from mistakes. Some, like me, do a combination of them.

I am not big on self-promotion. Call me shy. So I’ve never looked for accomplishments. I often review with a combination of regret and what did I learn.

In January, I learned of a cool little indie museum called Empire Seven Studios in San Jose. My friend Kyle had a show there.

I loved that his pieces were filled with whimsy. The volume of pieces that were up in the studio was insane. There had to have been easily over a hundred of them. I scored two works and love them both. The one that is officially mine looks like a bunch of tiny blotches that look like a body with arms and legs painted in. The way that it’s done makes it look like it’s a dancer. The other belongs to Perry and it looks like it could have been part of a Dr. Seuss story if you aren’t close enough. I regret not being able to by more of these cool works.

What I love about Empire Seven is that there isn’t any pretense. As you can see, the walls are decorated (I don’t know for certain if it’s by the Artists or not, but I think it is.) and it reminds me of how I decorated my first apartments. When I walk into other museums, the stark white walls just seem so authoritative. I know it’s so you can focus on the art, but I feel like I am supposed to behave as though I am in a library with whispered tones and a look that says ” I am deep in thought”on my face. This place says, come and check out what some local people have created or just come and chat with some cool cats.

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In February, I began working on my second project with Teatro Vision. It’s a wonderful company, and it provided me with a nice change of pace from musicals or comedies. My love of this company is so much more profound than I remember from my first experience with them. I learned to not only question everything, including my beliefs (are they really mine or what I was taught?) and ask questions. Through them, whether by osmosis or a new habit, I became more informed about the events of the world. That is something that isn’t really talked about in American news. To pay attention to all the things that are happening in the world, not just what the big cable networks are telling you is news. Find independent sources of news like KPFA which has MANY links from which to check out.

This second time around, made me feel more connected with my heritage. I know it sounds like I am being outrageous for the sake of it, but let me clarify. Even after working on “Hero” with Teatro, I was still too self conscious to speak Spanish words. I remember having to learn some Spanish in 1st grade and some of the kids would make fun of us on the playground. I don’t even know why I was in that class. I spoke perfectly fluent English with complex sentences. Maybe it was the brown skin. So, I have made it a point for myself to not be what people believe I am. I didn’t bother learning any more Spanish after that school year, and in high school I learned French.

With this cast being 3 times bigger than my first experience, I was surrounded by all these wonderful amazing incredible people that were an honor to work with. And I began to learn some Spanish. Little by little, I hear a word here and there and I try to remember what it means. But merely speaking a language isn’t all that I am talking about. I am finally beginning to see the beauty in the culture itself and learning about it’s past.

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In March, I decided that I was going to join the AIDS Lifecycle. On a whim, I decided this. So when I look into the details, I find that registration has been closed for like 2 months! I was a little disheartened, but then I figured, well, hell. I can ride next year! So I requested to be added to their early registration alert. So any day now, I will be expecting an email saying it’s time to sign up. So while I may regret not being able to ride last year, I am hoping that I get everything ready and train for it this year!

Also in March, we celebrated our 15 year anniversary! There were no bells. There were no drinks. There was only, wake up and go to work to pay taxes and rent and bills. And there still are no Equal Rights….

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I didn’t have too many things to regret the first part of the year, thankfully. Well, kids, Quarter #1 is over. What did you learn during the first three months of 2011? More importantly, what do you regret and how will you make sure not to repeat it in 2012? Comments are always welcome.