Life

 Sometimes I feel like I'm sitting at a STOP sign waiting for the light to change.

Let's Begin Again

 

Curtain

 So, the 2nd staged reading of AN UNTETHERED WOMAN was last night and it went well. 

I was worried that no one would come even after I accosted complete strangers on the streets of Helena asking, "Do you like community theater?" then giving them a postcard-sized invitation to the play no matter what they said.

The space in the Myrna Loy Theater was set up for 40 with me pacing back and forth, programs in hand, asking, "where is everybody?" Up until about five minutes to performance when we had a bit of an overflow crowd.

There were a lot of laughs. A few tears and many interesting conversations after the show about grief and theater.

Do you like community theater? 

Yeah, I do.

Carry On

 I might have a tote bag problem.

What Really Happened

Photo by Ashin K Suresh on Unsplash

Back in the days when you couldn’t swing an enchanted cat by the tail without hitting some personage who thought he was a god and was willing to wreck havoc willy nilly on innocent passers by, there lived two brothers.

The brothers were named Prometheus and the other brother was named something that’s only pronounceable in the original Greek so we’re going to call the brother of Prometheus, Unlucky in Love. 

 

Now, Unlucky in Love minded his own business which apparently consisted of behaving thoughtlessly which also apparently makes him the perfect model for certain modern men.

 

While Unlucky in Love was minding his own business, his brother Prometheus was busy giving mankind the gift of fire, in the original Greek, which translates as technology in modern English so we could call Prometheus the father of the Internet, if we wanted.

 

But Prometheus stole the gift of fire from a particularly cranky set of persons who didn’t like to share and who could be quite vindictive as we shall see.

 

For the sin of civilizing humanity, a job that has yet to be completed, if you ask my opinion, Prometheus was tied to a rock and forced to provide a liver dinner for an eagle every day.

 

For the sin of being the brother of Prometheus, Unlucky in Love was given the most beautiful woman on earth whose name was Pandora.

 

Pandora was also minding her own business which probably consisted of lying around looking beautiful and fending off Unlucky in Love’s thoughtless comments when she received a wedding gift of, in the original Greek, a jar, but since there aren’t any original Greeks left, this is commonly translated as a box, from Zeus, the cranky villain of this story.

 

I think I forgot to mention that Zeus is the villain of this story.

 

Zeus is the villain of this story.

 

Along with the wedding present box were the instructions DO NOT OPEN. Not like the cute little tag, ‘do not open ‘til Christmas,’ because Christmas hadn’t been invented yet, just DO NOT OPEN. Which makes Pandora’s gift, jar or box, the worst present ever.

 

Now, let’s be clear, what happened next was not because Pandora was a woman. 

 

In fact, I’ll say without fear of contradiction that NOBODY could keep a box in the corner of the room for long, telling visitors who ask, oh that’s just a box we don’t open. 

 

Everybody who’s anybody is gonna sneak a peek. Maybe after midnight when everyone else is asleep, but still.

 

So, Pandora didn’t peek because she’s a woman. She was set up.

 

How long before Pandora peeks? Nobody knows. But she opens the box and all of life’s miseries fly out. War, famine, pestilence, Republicans, light beer, sitcoms.

 

She slams the lid at the last moment and traps Hope inside. The modern interpretation is that Pandora saved hope for humanity, but an older view is that hope was just another way Zeus had to torment mankind. 

 

One view, in the original Greek, was that Hope hid under the lip of the jar and refused to come out. So, not only an empty promise but a coward as well. However, if you’d been trapped in a jar for who knows how long next to war and Republicans with only light beer for comfort, your courage might be worn to the bone too.

 

So, Zeus goes about his business wrecking havoc willy nilly. Prometheus endures eternal torment. Unlucky in Love continues to inspire modern man. But what happened to Pandora? And what became of Hope?

 

In the epilog nobody bothered to write, Pandora, who besides being beautiful, was savvy to the way of men and gods, went back to the box, opened the lid a crack and whispered to Hope, “Hey fella, we’re about to get blamed for every bad thing that ever happened or will. How ‘bout you and me split this joint. I know a place where the sun always shines and they have Guinness on tap.”

 

Now, we might say Hope considered this for a New York minute if New York had been invented yet, but the options being solitary in a box or stout beer with a beautiful woman made this choice no choice at all.

 

Turns out, Hope was the perfect companion for a beautiful woman. Sunny days and Guinness on tap aren’t bad either. So as they say in all the best stories, Hope and Pandora lived happily ever after. 

Talking to Myself

Life is weird, you know.

Sunday morning, finished reading the local paper, or what is left of it post newspapers' demise. Can we call it a paper if it only exists online? 

I had emailed a friend about the difference between being a screenwriter and being a playwright and it got me thinking about what I have said about screenwriting. So, I cruised through my blog to see and found this. 

This is the original link (https://coyoteunderground.blogspot.com/2007/07/life-in-split-second.html ) but you can read the whole thing below.

BEGIN TRIP DOWN MEMORY LANE

After I completed EMT training and started answering emergency medical calls for our fire department, I worried about how I would do when we were called to our first car wreck.

I didn’t plan to be it.

Monday morning, I cruised the Net, checking activities in Portland, planning our vacation next month to the Oregon coast.

I made progress on my current script and liked what I read. Maybe this will be the “one.”

Ate lunch, collected my Dad and we ran errands in the afternoon.

On the way home, at an intersection I’ve passed countless times, a man driving a full-size Dodge pickup, was waving to a friend, and started across the intersection without noticing I was already there.

He hit us at the driver’s door, which sent the Chevy sliding sideways up a hill until it hit the soft dirt at the side of the road and commenced to roll.

Shaken witnesses at the scene said the car rolled three times.

Fortunately, I don't remember the roll.

I clearly remember the scene out the windshield, sliding sideways up the road. Then starting to roll.

Returned to full consciousness after coming to rest upright.

This ceiling center console which held interior lights and a place for the garage door opener, came loose and bashed into my head.

Every window, save the back one over the tailgate, broke out.

Six Good Samaritans ran to the car, all clutching their cell phones, all calling for help, all trying to assure us help was on the way.

One older lady held my hand while trying to call my family, and she was so upset, she couldn’t get her phone to work. The rollover must have been a horrific to watch. No fun to endure.

Neither air bag deployed.

Volunteer fireman, guys I’ve trained with, used the Jaws of Life, to remove the door so they could package me for the ambulance.

Package. That’s what we call it. An intricate set of procedures to insure the patient suffers no further injury before medical help can be reached. I’ve practiced this several times in training. Works slick, but trust me, it’s no fun being the package.

Another team removed my father.

After eight hours, the hospital sent us home. Dad has a broken collar bone. He’s out of commission for six weeks.

I have cuts, strained muscles and a heck of a bruise on my head. (And I later discovered, a torsion injury in my back from the seat belt that saved my life.) Even my hair hurts.

Today’s Wednesday. My aches are fading. I’m a little less stiff. What doesn’t seem to diminish is my memory.

I clearly remember the view through the windshield and having the presence of mind to think, this is my life. This moment. This second.

Not in three weeks on vacation. Or next fall when the Nicholls are announced. Or that fateful day I get it all together and something sells.

This second, I’m rolling a two ton car.

Make your life what you want it to be. Not next week or six months from now.

This second. 

END OF TRIP DOWN MEMORY LANE.

So, here I am on Sunday, wasting time, and always in the back of my mind is a little voice who sometimes whispers, sometimes SHOUTS, Why?  

Why are you still doing this? Writing, submitting, believing?*

Now, a lot has happened since 2007. Some good. Some bad. Mostly just regular life. 

The last two years I've enjoyed a type of career success that I'd never had before. Right now I'm riding something pretty hot, so who knows what will happen? Could be colder than deep space by tomorrow.

Or not.

What my 2023 self needed to know was what my 2007 self learned. 

Your life is what you make it. 

Make it what you want.

And I didn't even need to wreck the car again to remember.

*My latest work has a pivotal moment where the character wonders about the nature of Hope. Why do humans persist in hoping? This morning I paid $40 to get a download of a scientific study that proves there is a portion of the human brain that generates hope. 

I'm still trying to get my mind around that concept. It's not a Pollyanna character flaw or silly wishful thinking. Or a socialized construct of the modern mind. It's our brain. Our actual meat and blood brain.

How 'bout that?

Wouldn't It Be Nice ...

 

Caught in a Sun Spot

 

Dry January

Eureka and all that. I did it.

 

Decided on a lark, after being drawn in by a couple of clickbait articles, to do Dry January. Didn’t think I was that much of a drinker and that it would be lots easier than NaNoWriMo. 

Act in haste, repent at leisure.

 

Soon after that national election with those unexpected results, we got in the habit of starting happy hour at 4 PM and once, sufficiently lubricated, listen to the five o’clock news on NPR.* 

Other than a cocktail on dinner out events, I didn’t drink. Alcohol, that is. Much preferred cherry coke, Italian soda, Starbucks Double-Shot espresso, green tea. 

 

Right.

Apparently good habits are hell to establish and bad habits sneak in on kitten paws. 

 

Besides learning to make one hell of a good Old Fashioned,** I got used to sipping an adult beverage while making dinner or listening to the five o’clock news. And silly me, when I didn’t, because of an arbitrary goofy internet decision, I missed it.

 

As in, I really, REALLY wanted a drink.

 

And that was enough incentive to keep me dry all January. 

 

So, what did I learn? 

 

I paid attention to the times when I wanted a drink. Really, REALLY wanted a drink. 

 

Realized an adult beverage could be both a comfort and companion, and brother that could easily go seriously wrong. Decided I wanted a drink to be a treat not a reflex.

 

Were there complications or benefits?

 

Luckily all my no alcohol angst was in my mind. I did notice a bit of better memory this month, but I’m at the age where memory is a come and go event,*** so can’t substantiate that.

And now, EUREKA, and all that. Dry January is over.

Since no reasonable person has a martini with breakfast, I’m planning on a nice juicy cocktail with dinner tonight. 

Dry January is an effort worth making. Live and learn.

 Cheers.

 

*to see how former guy was destroying the world as we knew it. 

** classically made with bourbon, but 16 year old Irish won’t go amiss.

***Alas. 

Signs Around Town

 Promise I won’t.

Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.

Hope springs eternal.

That's What She Said

I am thrilled to announce one of my plays will be produced this season in multiple theaters. 
 Anaconda Ensemble Theater in February.  Rocky Mountain College Theater Arts in Billings with dates as yet to be announced.
 

The play is titled, THAT’S WHAT SHE SAID. It is a short one act with five female characters.

 

The genesis of this one goes like this – 

 

A couple millennials I know were enamored for a while of that double entendre joke – that’s what she said.

 

It won’t fit.

 

            That’s what she said.

 

It’s too big.

 

            That’s what she said.  

 

Etc.

               

Photo by krakenimages on Unsplash

 

It was all the rage at the time and by that I mean, annoying.

 

Since when I was their age we were still struggling to be heard,* I thought surely she has more to talk about than the size of someone’s dick and where it went or should go. So, I decided to see what else she had to say and spent an enjoyable few hours searching famous sayings by notable women and something else occurred to me.**

 

Sometimes, women don’t support other women. Whether this is an evolutionary artifact or social construct, who knows? Adding to that, the fact that each generation seems to look askance at every other generation and there we are. A big mess.

 

The 60s old hippie generation says – we stopped a war. We burned our bras and fought for reproductive freedom and equal pay, just so you girls can stroll into management positions.

 

The millennial generation says – put your bra back on grandma, you have no idea what the job market is like now or what we have to endure and what was that about reproductive freedom and equal pay?

 

They are both right.

Fast moving technological changes, pandemic losses, social upheaval and political unrest have created a world no one expected. And there’s still protests going on. #Timesup and #MeToo show it is still possible to move the needle on popular opinion and there’s a new generation doing just that.

 

But it might not hurt to acknowledge some of us stood across from police lines and got beaten bloody for our trouble or maybe just kept voting and writing and talking until we couldn’t help but be heard.

 

My daughter is committed to recycling. Once in a while I tell her, I was at the FIRST EARTH DAY and if it wasn’t for that, you wouldn’t be fussing at me about plastic water bottles now.

 

So I wrote a play with generations of smart, brave women watching over my shoulder and now she’s going to town.

Photo by saeed karimi on Unsplash

Told through the words of women of renown, THAT’S WHAT SHE SAID is a one act play that moves female discourse from a double entendre joke to multi-generational discussion on what it means to be female in America when much of the country wants her to sit down and shush.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*has anything changed? Alas.

**the very best bit of being a writer, when the muse stoops to whisper – here’s a story.

Winter Driving

 Snow covers the lines on the road and suddenly, it's 

Lanes?

LANES!

We don't need no stinking lanes.

Digital Still Life

I want my analog life back. Where a watch just told time. The phone stayed home, and the car minded its own business.

Last night, after dinner out, pulled into the garage and noticed a blue light in the overhead display.

What was that? Closer look – a wi-fi symbol. 

 

I don’t remember ever seeing that! 

Trying to see what pressing the wi-fi light would do, accidentally hit the SOS button instead. The car started calling emergency services and wouldn't stop. 

 

Then Siri heard the car calling emergency services and decided to call emergency services too.

 

Thankfully Montana doesn’t have complete cell coverage so neither call would connect.

Stopped Siri. Sat in the dark paging thru car manual to learn there are no directions for ending Starlink call.

 

Had to drive halfway to town to hit cell service wherein the car said, “Would you like to end this call? Say CANCEL.”

That’s not all I said.

Remember this guy?

 

No Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that.

No kidding.

I’m surprised the watch didn’t chime in. It tried to call emergency once after I jumped down from the pickup bed and it thought I had fallen.

All this tech care-taking is a good idea, I suppose, if and when you need it. 

 

By the by, in spite of Starlink ads that say it works everywhere – that would be where ever there is cell service. Note to self, when planning an emergency, be in town.

When not needed, it’s another potentially humiliating privacy intrusion. I wouldn’t want to unnecessarily add to emergency services workload. Or have to explain to a large policeman that I can’t control my phone. Or car. Or watch.

Big Brother is watching. With the phone. And the car. And the watch.

And I can’t even close the curtains.

FYI - to cancel an accidental SOS call from a Subaru, hold down the SOS button for two seconds.

Holiday Wishes All Year Long

 

Christmas Bells

                                                           Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
    And wild and sweet
    The words repeat 
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
    Had rolled along
    The unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Till ringing, singing on its way,
The world revolved from night to day,
    A voice, a chime,
    A chant sublime 
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Then from each black, accursed mouth
The cannon thundered in the South,
    And with the sound 
    The carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good-will to men! 

It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
    And made forlorn
    The households born
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And in despair I bowed my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said;
    "For hate is strong,
    And mocks the song 
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!"

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
"God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
    The Wrong shall fail,
    The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men."

All That Space

Photo by Casey Horner on Unsplash

 I'm watching Invasion on Apple TV and it is boring. Looked promising. Had Sam Neill. Nice setup. But as a space alien invasion movie it has character development like nobody's business and ... yeah, that's it.

Where are the monsters? I mean, the space aliens? I watched three episodes, I think, saw one peek.

So far most of the show are people behaving badly. Duh. Sorry, but currently we've got more than enough of that in real life.

I'm watching and start thinking, what if * aliens did land on or accost Earth in some way? What would we do? Would we get along with our freaked out neighbors. Do we get along with them now? Would we continue to hide out in the mountains of Montana or make a run for -- who knows where?

Would the disparate personalities of my family manage to meld into a cohesive survivor unit or would we drive each other crazy in new and disastrous ways?

And, I got scared. 

Really.

Photo by Brian McMahon on Unsplash

We'd have some time to adjust because, apparently space aliens always start with New York. Might take them a while to get to Montana. 

 So, I'm sitting there with Invasion playing in front of my face, trying to figure out how to keep the family together in the event of space invaders, scaring myself, and it finally occurs to me.

 

Photo by Guillermo Ferla on Unsplash

The odds of alien space explorers ever finding us in the expanse of space are long. Dare I say astronomical? 

 We're a small planet overrun with with delusions of grandeur. One in billions and billions as Carl Sagan used to say. Those odds are a sucker bet.

Then I felt better. 

 Glad to know I can continue to ignore the neighbors. Cherish the charming personalities of my family. And be content in the fact that we're hiding out in the the embrace of the Milky Way.

Photo by William Zhang on Unsplash

* Those are the magic words. 

I have my own invader from space script. It's called, George Clooney Saves the Universe, and my space alien is nice. Still causes trouble, but a nice being. That script was the most fun I ever had writing a screenplay. Space is weird.

The Very Best Camera in the World

This is a picture of a bald eagle. 

 

  

Not that you could tell by looking.

 

Does this help?

 

 

The reason for this excellent photography is the only camera I had with me was the one I call the fu*kin phone.

 

I live up a canyon in the mountains of Montana. I saw the bald eagle flying down the canyon, fairly low over the creek. Couldn’t keep up with him, but coming around the corner, there he was perched in a tree. I stopped. I usually at least have an action cam with me, but not today. Plus they have no telephoto.

 

Now, the fact that I had the phone sitting in its holder beside me encouraged me to stop and shoot stills then video so that credit goes to the phone. Also, the 365 day project I did a year ago has me more attuned to what I see.

 

Driving down the mountain to get to town, I’ve seen wolves, bears, mule deer, whitetail deer and mountain goats. Just a week ago I made this picture -- Once again with the camera at hand -- phone.

 

  

A better picture could have been made with the Nikon or Olympus that stayed home. My bad.

 

At a craft fair a couple of weekends ago, I visited with a photographer with art to sell (I bought this one.) 

 

Used with permission. Tom Pallach Photography.

 

We commiserated about how everyone was a photographer now. Yay. But what was most often used was a cell phone. Bummer. He mentioned how he advocated for a camera vs phone to people but cells are just too damn convenient.

 

Feeling guilty, I built a small, so-easy-to-take-along camera bag.

 

  

Small - really small - sling bag from Timbuk2, Olympus camera no longer available (benefit of being old) pen, pencil and notebook.

 

Today’s trip down the mountain, did I see any of my varied multiple wildlife neighbors?

 

Nope. 

 

Saw where the bear got into one of my human neighbors garbage can. Didn’t inspire any art.

 

So, the best camera is not a contest between Nikon, Canon, Sony or Lumix.  

 

The very best camera in the world is the one you have in your hand when a picture making opportunity presents itself. 

 

I guess I have to say, even if it’s just the fu*kin’ phone.

 

Journal Musings

A commonplace book is a type of journal/scrapbook meant to contain ideas, notes, sayings – whatever struck the writer to remember. Less coherent than morning pages or Dear Diary, a compendium of wisdom as one makes their way through the day.

 But what if your commonplace book was a photo journal.

 

I started a little photo journal – made it myself – using a business card printer – and found I was collecting odd stuff that struck my fancy with no rhyme or reason.

The line at the vaccination clinic. The time the neighbors rode by on mules. Rocky and his sweater. Drones at the lake. It became a photographic random access memory file and is quite fun to browse.

 

The business card printers only work with smart phones, but when I use a regular camera, I email or message it to myself to get it in the phone.

 

I started with a polaroid printer which was nothing but fun. However, they kept updating the app until it was virtually impossible to use and absolutely no fun at all. I finally threw the stupid thing away. 

 

Then I tried Fuji Instax – which works well – never a problem with its bluetooth, but it uses actual photo paper and sometimes I like to cut the pictures up and that is a messy no go with that paper. Also a glue stick is required to post with this system.

 

Finally settled on Canon Ivy which uses Zink paper with a sticky backing. No glue stick. Trim however. This one also connects with no problem. The battery life is not spectacular however.

 

A journal with no words (mostly.) 

Music by https://www.bensound.com

 

 

 

Happy Thanksgiving

 About this time every year, the wild turkeys waddle off the mountain and cruise the neighborhood.

 You might think this is the time of the year they would run and hide since most of the humans have their eyes on one big dinner.

I wonder if that's how turkey got to be Thanksgiving dinner? Pilgrims said, "Oh look there! I bet that would be good with cornbread stuffing and mashed potatoes."

Well no, according to the Old Farmer's Almanac.

But venison and oysters don't sound all that yummy.

I wonder if that's how oyster dressing got started?