Small Things

The bear box swings open as my little niece's high pitched voice says, "Who knew you could have so much fun without technology!" I laugh, pausing for a moment as the cooking stove and pots and pans are pulled out of the box, and respond, "Yes, who knew!"

It's moments like these in the wilderness that are why I choose to bring my Silicon Valley raised niece and nephew camping.  Right now, it's car camping, but when they're a little older, I hope to take them back country.

Some of the first phrases from my nephew's mouth included, "Youuuu Tube" and "ahhh phone." These are children who have grown up in technology: iPads, gaming systems, and digital conveniences galore.   And although these conveniences are great, there is nothing like interacting with the Earth to help you understand the world and why it's worth protecting.

Some people go the farming route.  I thought I'd introduce them via camping -- since I grew up running through the woods and going camping with my family -- it is my comfort zone.

The smell of pine and earth relaxes me.  Once, when microwaving some corn on the cob, a woman who grew up in the city complained that the break room smelled like chemicals.  "Chemicals?" I asked.  "That's not chemicals, that's earth.  It smells like soil and corn."  I pulled out the corn on the cob and showed her.  She sniffed the husk and she pointed and said, "THAT smells like chemicals."

Shaking my head, I let her know it was organic corn.  No chemicals.  I grew up in Wisconsin surrounded by corn fields.  Corn husk and soil are common scents.  So is pesticide. I know the difference.  She wouldn't believe me.

So, how does a community entice members to respect and protect the world they live on when they're now distanced from it?  When they don't realize the cause and effect of their actions comes back to them because they can't see it right away?

I don't know.

But I believe small things make a difference.  And right now, a small, squeaky voiced little girl is realizing she can have a lot of fun in the woods, unplugged, sleeping on the ground. I'm good with that.

A Different Pair of Eyes

mentor -- men·tor \ˈmen-ˌtȯr, -tər\ - someone who teaches or gives help and advice to a less experienced and often younger person as defined by  Merriam-Webster's dictionary. Dictionary.com's version of  mentor  [men-tawr, -ter] is defined as a wise and trusted counselor or teacher.

"So what is it that you want?" my mentor asks.
"To be a working actor who can live off of acting work along," I replied.
"Let me ask you another question.  What if you were working and making a living off of one-liners. Off of co-star roles alone.  Would that be enough? Would you be happy?" he asks.

I pause. I know the answer to that but didn't I just say I'd wanted to be a working actor? And in his scenario I'd be a working actor...

Months earlier when the email came through from East West Players A.C.T.S. organization letting members know that applications were being taken for those who were looking for mentors I paused.  Having lived and worked in Los Angeles "in The Industry" for years I've been lucky enough to be a mentor to many newbie actors myself. But what about those of us who aren't new and had a good bit of experience?

Now, I'm so glad I just bit the bullet. The benefit of having someone more experienced that you is that sometimes they are asking the "right" questions.  You think you are -- but then you get stuck and their years of experience beyond your own help give you new eyes.  I wanted to move into the next level of credits, guest stars, from my plethora of co-star credits and I felt stuck.  This mentorship has provided a chance to move through this feeling.

My time with my EWP ACTS mentor gave me a new attitude towards a lot of different things. My personal passion (writing and directing) projects, my acting, the business of acting (which is totally different from the craft of acting), and the balance they take in my life.

Even though our official mentoring time is over.  My mentor and I are still friends. We check-in with each other now and again.  Great things are happening for him and he's so grounded and generous I know it couldn't happen to a better person. And when I feel like I'm not moving forward or I don't know how to approach a problem this mentorship has taught me to remember that sometimes a shift in attitude can make a HUGE difference.  Sometimes, all you need to do is take a look with a different pair of eyes.

Honestly

The audience sits in the little theatre watching and as the performer on-stage works really hard -- too hard to play the character. I exit the theatre exhausted. It was supposed to be a relaxing night out. Why am I so exhausted? Sometimes I feel this way when I go to stand-up shows too. I used to do bubble shows for birthdays and feel the same way afterwards.


My sister is getting married and she's pulling quotes from Anne Morrow Lindbergh.  I've collected her books since high school and recently came across a quote that made a light bulb go off in my head:

Whether we're trying to be supportive audience members for horrible performances & shows, or trying too hard ourselves -- in conversation, in presentation, on-stage, or in life -- the energy it takes to do that drains us.  We walk away from great films and shows and conversations with people fed and full of energy.  We're being authentic. We truly liked the performances, or the story or the people and the conversation.

"You heading to Llandudno?" asks the older man sitting on the only bench at this stop. I'm traveling alone throughout Europe and today I'm in Wales.  The signs do not make any sense to me.  They must be in Welsh and it's obvious I'm out of my element.  He's a retired engineer and he's from London but he's headed to the same hostel as I am.  A total stranger -- but we're both authentically ourselves and the conversation flows until we get to the hostel. We're energized as we talk about life, countries, travel, cultures, politics, people and end up having a pint at a nearby pub before saying good night.

These authentic connections are what I most love about travel. It doesn't even have to be someone I know. They're honest. They're simple. They don't take effort and afterwards it feels like I've eaten a whole dinner. I'm not hungry.

It's junior high and I'm on-stage pretending to be a cop.  Working really hard at it. If I'd only known then that the harder I worked at it the harder it would be for anyone who was watching to enjoy. It's the secret to acting that's not a secret. The thing all acting instructors tell you to do -- be.  To be truly and authentically sincere and honest as you play.

Anne Morrow Lindberg's quote clarifies these moments in my life and reminds me that life is too short to spend in insincerity.

The Prairie Dog Life

The tunnel continues for miles linking buildings to other buildings.  People are walking through in a mixture of winter coats and boots and pajamas and shorts and normal casual business wear.

It's negative Celsius outside in Minnesota and my friend and I have a game that we play. A nightly walk from campus to campus through and around the hospital and back again.  It takes a little more than an hour.  How much time can we spend in the tunnels and avoid the bitter cold outside? Each time we try a different route to see if we can add more time indoors whether it's taking the elevator to a different floor or trying a different branch of the building.

In the Midwest I loved the sun.  I loved being outside whenever I could if the sun were out. The tunnels and skyways were built to protect from the bitter cold and you'd find them in downtown Minneapolis and St. Paul and throughout the U of MN campuses.

Now, in Southern California, I find myself thinking that the time in Minnesota made its mark. I have become a gopher or a prairie dog --  hopping between the downtown buildings and tunnels that link parking structures. The opposite of Minnesota, I find myself shying away from the sun. I'll walk indoors even if it's 25 more feet difference.

The sun is so intense I can barely keep my eyes open. I can feel it burning through my skin as I walk across the street. Looking around for an escape there is an escalator into an underground parking lot.  Starbucks in hand and heaving a sigh of relief, I head down an into the cool, dim lot and then through the tunnels into another lot. It's pleasant down here.  I prefer it down here.  My brain runs through all the sci-fi doomsday scenarios as I note this is a great hiding and escape place if so and so or such and such were to happen and I shelve it in the back corner of my brain.

Climbing the stairs to the exit leading to the sidewalk I open the door.  Heads turn, people look, and I look startled. It's as if I'm mimic-ing the prairie dogs peeping their heads out of the ground during the last visit to Devil's Tower in South Dakota.  Squinting into the light, I look back, scurry across the street, and retreat into the next building's nearest door while the dynamic world outside honks, whirrs, and moves and is then silenced as the heavy door clicks shut.

Adventure Awaits...

My legs are pumping hard and fast.  I lean to the right to make the curve, the wind is whipping past my face and through my hair and then I stand on the pedals to get up the hill.  I've taken these turns and circled around this road hundreds, possibly thousands of times.

 It's a time before helmets were even invented for bicycles.  Where a child could walk through the dirt trails several blocks away from home looking for tadpoles and adventure.  When children needed to go home the neighbor kids would ride in on their bikes to let a kid know that their mother was calling for them to come home to dinner.

Years later, the road crunches beneath my feet as I look up and see the milky way above my head and my breath vapors in front of my face.  I like running in the dark.  It's easier to focus on the few steps just in front of you rather than seeing for miles across the plains and fields of Wisconsin knowing you have so much further to go. It's winter and past 11 PM and dark, dark, dark even though we're in the city.  But it's perfectly safe.  Adventuring out after dark is not much of a risk.  Neighbors look out for you and there's a comfort in that.

Now away from the MidWest in modern times my niece and nephew learn to ride their bikes in the few feet between the garages of the complex they live in. They have helmets and are surrounded by adults.  No child ever wanders off on their own.  Adventure has a chaperone.  Children are strapped in, leashed either physically or digitally, and independence has a different definition.  I'm not saying safety is not important.  No.  It is absolutely.  We now have to worry about predators and drug pushers and dangerous elements of the human nature.  I do wonder what will happen to this generation of children who have never had the chance to adventure out on their own -- independent of adult eyes and ears.  To imagine and create and explore with a mind that didn't have to constantly worry about dodging this or that or the other -- but could be free to explore.

It's been a long time since I've ridden a bike. I think on it sometimes with yearning.  There is something about whipping through the world on your bicycle and daydreaming that sparks the creative mind.  I sold mine when I moved to a bigger city with a car culture. Where it's harder for a bike to share a road with a car without concern for getting hit. It's a freedom that I miss.  Something a stationary bike at a gym can never replace.

My adventures now tend to consist of traveling.  I've traveled the world as a single woman several times.  I've camped on my own.  Hiked on my own.  Gone to countries where I don't know the languages on my own and relied on the kindness of strangers so many memorable times.  Each re-igniting my hope and belief in human kind.  In the goodness innate in each of us.  Sometimes I travel with companions.  Family members or friends or acquaintances.

My sister called recently to let me know she'd been offered a trip to Iran with an archaeology group and asked me if I wanted to come along.  A once in a lifetime offer.  We'd go back to Turkey, a trip we've taken before, and then head into Iran.

As adults, limitations of money and time are what prevent these types of adventures.  Part of me so wants to go.  To see that part of the world from that point of view through the filter of that archaeological experience.  Part of me screams at myself telling me there is a balance between adventure and safety.  That I need to be responsible because I don't have that kind of money to spend -- I'd have to take out a loan.

With these types of trips you never know what you're going to get. Never expect fun, happy, easy. That is never guaranteed when you travel.  Never.What you can expect is learning, growing, exploring and challenge.  It's why we travel.  To see the world outside of our own from a different point of view.  To come home a different person from the start of our journey.

Will this new generation of protected and limited learn to adventure and face their fears?  I don't know.  But we can always help them along the way.  Take them on camping trips.  Give them opportunities to travel whether it's to different countries or on simple road trips.  Help them spread their wings.  We can teach them the balance between safety and adventure.  We can give them the skills to know what to do when they come upon adventure.  Adventure is an attitude and a journey.  Adventure is right in front of our faces waiting.

My fingers and toes are numb from the cold and I shed the layers of clothing and come in from the dark into the warmth of a fire burning in the fireplace.  After adventuring in the dark night it's always best to come back home.  Safe, warm, familiar home -- until the next trip out into the world.  After all, adventure awaits....

Chasing Life

"She's already at mile nine!  We've got to hurry up!"

It's the New York Marathon and I'm the support for my sister who's running.  I have her orange juice in my bag along with other goodies.

But from the beginning when we pulled off of 96th Street and Sepulveda in Los Angeles after the LAX shooting in our terminal,Terminal 3, and were stuck in the triangle of police caravans going in one direction, media trucks, and displaced passengers coming from LAX on foot in the other directions - this trip has thrown loops and challenges our way and things have not gone as planned.

Our plan, was to meet at mile 10 in Brooklyn.  My sister's mutual friend, and I drop her off in Staten Island and we're waiting to take the ferry back.  We're chatted up by a local from Staten Island who came out this morning to support the race.  She tells us that because it's a weekend and there's construction we can't take the subway to Brooklyn.  It's not running.

Uh-oh.

Well, there's this Grey Lines tour that goes into Brooklyn. If we stop at the last stop that'll put us a few blocks from where we need to be.

On the Grey Line tour we're told that due to the marathon there will only be one stop. When we get off we realize the stop is the  furthest possible we could possibly be from the marathon as possible.  Checking out our choices, we could walk -- it would take us 59 minutes. My sister just texted.  Approaching mile 9.  She runs a 9-12 minute mile. Hmmm.

Uh-oh.

We're whipping through Brooklyn on CitiBikes and I'm wheezing, trying to catch my breath while pedaling as fast as I can.The pedestrians on the sidewalk are laughing at me as they walk by because I sound like a dying moose.  But it's imperative to get the supplies to our runner so I push on with everything I have.

Why not a taxi?  Well, four taxis refused to drive us there.

By the time we get there my sister is already out of Brooklyn and on her way to Queens.  We're behind by a half hour.

Uh-oh.

How do we get back over to Manhattan?   Riding our Citibikes up and over the Brooklyn Bridge. I'm still dying and can't help but think this would actually be enjoyable if I could be in the moment and not worry about catching up. Not worry about being somewhere.  Not worry about keeping a promise and letting someone down. Looking back, I realize that the only one keeping me from enjoying the moment was me. My mentality.

(Photo from Twitter feed of @Fascinatingpics)

We spent the entire day pursuing her actively.  For over five hours.  But we missed her the whole way.  How does that happen?  I honestly can say I don't really know.  It doesn't sound logical.  All I can tell you is the day passed running, biking, subway training from one point to another and we'd miss her by 2 blocks or a some other patch of time/distance.  Even at the end, we met back at the hotel instead of the finish line.

It's been a week and I still rack my brain trying to figure out what happened. 

But then I stop and realize this is a metaphor for life.  When we have this desire to do or be something to get somewhere and we create this pressure on ourselves to get there so much so that we don't enjoy the actual living, the moments of our lives.  When we think, I only have so much time and this ticking clock adds pressure to where we want to go, or what we want to do or be.

I spent a weekend in NYC with beautiful weather and looking back I realize I wasn't in the mental space to enjoy the trip in moments.  All I needed was a mental adjust.

Because who wants to wake up years later in their old age and realize that they were so busy chasing life that they didn't live it?

The End of an Error

WHY!?!? Whyyyyy????  Whhhhhyyyyyyy? The scream echos throughout the cafe.  The person on stage, singing, stops for a moment and stares.  Patrons turn and look at us, the little, but the oh so smart, 10 year old boy sitting across from me is having a giggling fit.  And I, hands at my head pulling my hair at the root, scream in despair as literally 20 white pieces get surrounded and pulled off the board by this child.

I've lost this game of Go because of something I didn't see.  A simple error.  But the mistake cost me 3/4th the board and almost all of my pieces. There's a saying that we are all fine when we make a mistake.  It's when we realize we've made the mistake -- it's at that moment when we find out what we're made of.

Did you realize that our lives are made up of mistakes?  They are defining moments.  We can hang our head in shame, ears burning, embarrassed or we can get excited by them.  What did we learn?  How can I grow from this?  It's an opportunity to make myself, this project, this choice, this day, my next game -- better.  Yes, mistakes can be painful - how long we sit in the pain and how productive we choose to be afterwards is on us.

"I've never seen so many people, who after they're done working, beat themselves up so badly.  They're frozen.  If they make a mistake, it's the end of the world."

My friend, on his time away from his high level, high powered career job, is learning the craft of acting.  He originally started in a stand up class, moved to improv and sketch comedy, then to Meisner, Suzuki/Viewpoints training, and now onto a Stanislavsky based scene class.

"You never get that in improv or sketch.  Can you imagine?  If everyone on stage in improv or sketch stopped the show because they made a mistake? "  We laugh.  We laugh because we know in improv or sketch the mistake is golden, it's what we build the scene around.  It's what we heighten to build patterns and games and it's what often gets the laugh.  But how come, in life, it's so hard to laugh when we make mistakes?  How come, like the scene study class, we often beat ourselves up and treat it like it's the end of the world?

"How many of you, think that the Air Corp training, is the way to go?  That you should take the best of the best pilots and you weed them out, and then take the best of them and then send them off  on a course where other pilots have gotten killed in order to deliver the mail because you want to get government money to become the Air Force?  How many of you think that type of training sounds right to you?"

There's a pause as he looks around.  Almost everyone in the writing workshop has raised their hand.

"Well, you'd be wrong!  They almost all died!"

The writing instructor, Corey Mandell, goes on to explain the example given in the book The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle.  It turns out that a short guy who never even made it into the training program created this device to practice in.  It had a red light that would go off every time you made a mistake.  This device is what made the difference.  It's this device that was the key to success.  Not "talented" people who were the best of the best of the best.

"Mistakes are not an option for success.  Mistakes are REQUIRED and NECESSARY for success," Corey passionately shares with us.  The skills needed for success only happen when we make a mistake and start over again and try again and make a mistake and reassess and try again, and make a mistake....it's this cycle, painful as it might be, that causes us to learn, grow, and become successful.

In the book Mindset by Carol Dweck we learn about fixed mindsets and growth mindsets.  Fixed mindsets experience shame and fear and self abasement during failures.

Growth mindset people experience determination, and excitement, and see failures as a puzzle to be solved.  Their goal isn't often to become successful but they end up successful because of their desire to grow.

Fixed mindset people desire success but often aren't because their fear paralyzes them from moving on from growing and from learning so, ironically, they are stagnant. The "fail" at being successful.

Sound familiar?  We're all a little of both.  But we can choose how we approach mistakes.  Are we going to be improvisers and sketch players who build around it and take a mistake and make it into something else and see mistakes as incredible gifts?

Or, are we going to be "serious" actors who beat themselves up, and tear themselves down, and freeze in fear of making a move when they realize they've made a mistake or just fear making one?

Mistakes will come and go.  They're inevitable. To err or not to err. To miss take or not to miss take.  Those are not the questions.

I look at the actors and the improvisers playing.  As one who has a foot in each world, I can honestly say that it's the laughter that draws me, the joy, the sharing, and the celebration of mistakes that gives me coping mechanisms to push on. To see what's next.  To go and go and go because if we stop, we may stop just before the miracle.  And just like mistakes, miracles are inevitable too.  And sometimes, just sometimes...they're the same thing.