The graduate

For Selena

The Graduate 

She walks like poetry

Across a stage

To cheers of family

Diploma in hand

She raises an eyebrow

Behind owl glasses

And smiles knowing 

This is only the beginning

Playin

My MFA online school semester just ended. I need to take the summer off. This semester was a doozy and I just took one class at University of New Orleans. Yes, everything is remote, asynchronous they call it. On a platform called Moodle. I've grown accustomed to it. The technology is not the issue. I am the issue. 

The biggest issue is that I can't give less than 100 percent. Seriously, it's a problem. My "Adaption" class this semester was with a pretty well known playwright from Louisiana. And I decided, on a lark, well not really because it was begging for an adaptation, that I was going to adapt my 200 plus page memoir into a stage play. Everyone else in the class adapted someone else's work. Some people did prose into poetry, and vice versa. And others did shorter pieces. A couple of others did a stage play, but they had very simplified clean concepts.

The teacher/playwright was clear. We could do as simple or as complicated a project as we chose and would be judged on what we accomplished of our goals at semester's end. 

Of course, I chose not just complicated, but downright fucking impossible. Impossible. A three act play adaption of my memoir.

Mind you, I've never written a stage play before although I've always wanted to. I didn't know how to. No idea. No formatting experience. And think about it, my memoir took 15 years, how in the hell did I think I could do an adaption in three months?

So I started writing this adaptation late night and early morning. On weekends, I would wake up early. I don't know how I got myself into this. It just happened. I told myself. You'll do a couple hours a day. You can do it. Then the first weekend, I spent one full day. A full day. 

Physically, it was hard too. I threw my fifty year old neck out writing it. Emotionally, I went through the wringer. Traumatizing myself about my dad's death, which is memorialized in my memoir, all over again. Crying. Hysterically at times. Some days, I felt like Diane Keaton where she portrays a playwright in that movie with Jack Nicholson and Keanu Reeves, the one where she's writing the play at the end sobbing. Most days, I wept into my computer. I'm lucky I did not short it out. Or myself. 

I cursed my ambitious self often. Saying aloud, more than once. Why do I do this to myself? I'm a masochist, a damn masochist. One night, a Saturday, after a full work day on Friday, I woke up at at 3 am, drank three espressos and worked straight through for seven hours. I was obsessed I must admit. Compulsive. A bit manic at times. Pencils in my messy bun. Notes and crumbled pieces of pink post it notes everywhere. Re read my own memoir twice. Or maybe three times. 

In the end? I did it. I accomplished the miracle. A workable first draft. Two acts, not three, but it's cool. Not perfect, but awesome as hell. I have a stage play. I don't know how I did it. Maybe, just maybe, I manifested that shit into being. Seriously. Something was working through me at times.

And importantly too, or maybe not at all really because I'm not doing it for the grade, although my long suffering husband might disagree, I got an A. An A. On my first adaptation. Most importantly, I give myself an A plus for effort and dedication.

Changin

There's a Stevie Nicks lyric that says "Well I've been afraid of changing because I've built my life around you. But time makes you bolder..."

That's how I feel about life in general. Most of us have plans. But what's that old saying? How do you make God laugh? Make plans.

I never thought I would be here. At this crossroads. Loving my writing life so much that it's overshadowing my attorney life. I have merged them to some extent but it's not enough. I'm a creative. A performer. An artist. It sounds a bit presumptuous I know. But I don't care. Fuck it. Because when I'm working on a story, I lose myself. It's not work. It's not. It's persistence. I'm present. And no one suffers, unlike in my work public defender life. It's joy. It's why I'm here. Know that.

So I just keep asking the universe to show me the way. I'm willing to do it. To jump. Maybe it's time to take the plunge. And fly free.

I just don't know what to do with myself...

What am I gonna do with myself? I just don't know. I'm done with school for the semester. I turned my final project in. I have no more readings scheduled or appearances for the near future. My podcast airs only once a month so that's not too bad.

It feels off putting to have nothing on the writing and promotion horizon. Maybe I just need to relax. Take the summer off from running myself ragged. Watch my health and wellness. Focus on work and my hubby and dogs.

Yet, I still need something creative to focus on. Or a performance to look forward to. Maybe just one more performance/reading... 

Why not? Life is short, fleeting, and for me, I love the connection I make when I read. Although I don't always lose myself in it. There are times I'm nervous as hell and self conscious. But when I can disappear, I love it. I get it now. I get it. It's intoxicating to lose yourself in your art. To feel yourself fade away. Yeah. Yeah.  

Better than any libation or drug. It's magic.

Because I do

Last night, we saw the LA punk band X in Riverside. We've seen them too many times to count, but this felt different. After a horrible work day, I felt free. 

It felt pre Covid. Unmasked, I sat outside with the bestie and our husbands in the atrium. My eyes kept drifting to band member (and legend) Billy Zoom in the corner. 

There were two opening bands so X went on late, about 930. I immediately ran to the front. The venue wasn't crowded so it was pretty easy to jostle about halfway to the front. Then, a pretty blond girl said, "I'll help you get up there" and she elbowed and pushed me to the second row of people. How I get so lucky I don't know, but I do. 

Near the stage, about a few feet from the band, I jumped up and down to the songs "Los Angeles" and "Blue Spark". Exene wore a dress and apron with cowboy boots and she was on point dancing and singing as only she can do. John Doe was as brilliant in his harmonies as ever with her. 

When their sad ballad "Come Back To Me" (a grief filled song I reference in my memoir) came on, I moved to the back with hubby and swayed. Teary eyed, I danced in his arms.

It was a night to remember friends. And Saturday is the Cruel World Festival! Rock on!

Truly

So I started writing this blog thinking of nothing. I'm on my phone just typing it out. 

It's been a rough couple weeks. I overextended myself. My work as a deputy public defender has been hectic and even tragic and sad. It kind of took over my mood. But, despite it all, my writing self had to honor her commitments. 

On Wednesday, I took the day off and drove to Pasadena/Altadena for a reading event at LitFest and didn't get home until late. The next day, I had court and after work, I hocked my books at a Cinco de Mayo street fair that took place at the Riverside library. I also got to watch the one man show/monologue play by Carlos Cortes. It was inspiring.

Yes, I was still melancholy but the writing promotion work helped. It lifted me out of my despair. I interacted with other writers and saw some old friends and just took some deep breaths. 

Then, my teacher in my MFA program gave me feedback on my semester long project, an adaptation of my YA memoir into a stage play. It was amazingly supportive feedback and suddenly I was happy again. It made me realize how truly creative I am. And I want to live a creative and artistic life. Truly I do. Truly.