Characters Becoming Part of the Family

The girl I am writing about, ‘Trees’ an assassin, which is her birthright, is a lot like me -- compartmentalizing many of the more traumatic episodes in her life along with those that are genuinely good. They share the same storage box, only divided by balsa wood separations, the grooves cut in irregular intervals of the drawers allowing more then one memory to be contained. Think, apothecary cabinet. I still can’t figure out my own filing system until I need to retieve something.

The Grand Canyon is today’s memory and the drawer slides out; cross sections of other memories relating to that surreal place are contained in here. I want to use the Grand Canyon analogously in my book.

(excerpt from book)
The Grand Canyon had looked so surreal, like a backdrop painting in a Western being filmed. As I stood there on the rim, I wanted to reach out my hand and touch the canvas to see if the paint was still wet. Actually, I wanted to drag my fingers across the canvas smearing at it, because I knew in my mind that it couldn’t be real.

That memory now retrieved from its cedar drawer has texture in my mind. I can recall it with clarity, just as I saw it, standing there those many years ago. I didn’t get to close, I still had, as I do now, fears of falling -- vertigo --which my character has also inherited. And with that memory -- another slot in the drawer opened up -- reminding me that a friend of mine Patrick had been with me on that trip. I hadn’t thought about him in… I don’t know how long, that drawer wasn’t opened at the moment.

But I believe that Trees sees things the same way I do at times, a little of the surreal leaking into her imagination -- watching from the sidelines.

(excerpt from book)
“Life is like Billboards racing past at 70mph. They are large enough to make an impression, but pass quickly by, with acknowledgement to the designer -- sometimes -- for their creative insight, if they leave a lasting impression.”

Trees watched the man die -- commit suicide right in front of her eyes with the same fascination she had when seeing the Grand Canyon. The artist had been talented, it looked almost real to her eyes, and her hand lifted to the canvas wanting to test the paint, seeing if it was still wet.

I think that’s what watching someone die would be like, that’s how my mind would interpret it. Life on film or a master’s oil painting hung in the Louvre. Real, but wet with paint.

This reminded me of the first hospital rotation I did while working on the ambulance. I was in the emergency room of Allegheny General Hospital. A gun shot victim was wheeled into trauma and I watched with detached interest, like watching a movie. I didn’t smell it, I didn’t feel it, I was sitting there on the leather seat at the Metropolitan Museum admiring the painting, and how realistically God paints. Could I get close enough to see the brush strokes? Or a stray hair from the sable brush still embedded in the medium?

That was how I viewed trauma, that was how my brain kept me sane in those instances, that is how I kept my psyche in tact and I know that is how Trees does it too.

(excerpt from book)
Her mind shields her from the reality, making it beautiful to watch, and she smiles a secret smile, something no one else would notice or understand as they passed by her in that moment as she looks at the painting. Most people would just flinch and pass on by. But she sees the genius in the brush strokes, the attention to detail. The way the light falls just right, turning what should be bright red into muddy brown and she smiles because she knows the artist personally, intimately, and in the right hand corner of the canvas she sees her name.

Facebook Family

Facebook, I am not sure just how ingenious an application this is, but I am happy to have it available to me. I live nearly 2000 miles away from family and friends I grew up with -- this is how I stay in touch with their everyday lives. Personally, I love it.

I popped on the site this morning after I woke up just to check in on the cousins. My beautiful cousin Holly is getting married in a couple months so I like to keep abreast of the latest happenings -- of course, it is just another family gathering that I won’t be able to attend, which pisses me off. I have missed many of these family events because of work or the general lack of funds. Oh, that demon which is money. My second cousin posted some wonderful photographs of my grandparents (Anna May and Fritz) and my aunt and uncles (Judy, Ronnie, and Wayne -- George (Freddie as I remember him, was away at school or in Germany when this photo was taken) which I dearly love. I had to copy them off the computer so I could print them out and hang them on the wall at my house. I want to be able to pass on the knowledge of my grandparents to my daughter -- she will never get to meet them, they died when I was

pretty young.

Trying to keep family and friends close in this global world is tougher then people would guess and I am glad there are some applications out there trying to make it a little more simple. Still the cost of a stamp still outweighs the price of internet connections. I think I will start writing letters again just so people get something in their mail besides the regularly occurring bills.

The Writer Writes

After taking time away from the friend (and foe) my almighty computer for the better part of a month an a half, I still found myself writing, armed with pen and paper in hand (something that I am never without). I am writing a book -- well actually, a novel (of all the hair-brained ideas -- yes I know what you’re thinking). So even when you don’t write, you write. It may be in your head, it might be in your dreams -- I daydream in the shower, on occasion. But never the less when you write, wow do you write (I am starting to think it’s an illness).

As of late, my daughter has caught the bug of writing, making up stories about her favorite things and writing for assignments at school. She is in the fourth grade this year and writing becomes a major part of that grade’s homework makeup, not only in English (Language Arts as they call it now) but also in mathematics, which I found a little unusual to say the least. You now have to write your process for logic in math. Things have changed since I was in school. I wonder if it’s for the better.

The latest project of writing -- something she does every week -- is to use her spelling words to write a story. They receive 20 standard spelling words for the week and 5 additional challenge words. This past week had the word eerie. Eerie is a great word with Halloween just around the corner, it draws up all kinds of interesting images that I could write about. However, we live in Pennsylvania, we have a town called Erie, this was the definition my daughter equated with eerie… It became a place not a feeling. I had to laugh when she wrote in her story that the Tiger had gone to Eerie. I guess definitions aren’t part of the curriculum accompanying spelling words these days.

All that aside, I think that Erie should change their name for the Halloween holiday, just for fun. Wouldn’t that be a blast. Then we really could go to an Eerie Erie.

Extended Hiatus

Wow, sorry for the delay posting to the blog. It’s been well over a month and a half since I had a chance to sit down at the computer. Argh. Illness, work, and a computer that is so old it doesn’t like to get up in the mornings anymore then I do. I will put an end to this delay today, I hope. Keep your fingers crossed the computer decides not to take a nap on me.

Guerrilla Film Making At Its Finest

The previous post was from the blog spot on the 48-hour film project. This, if you don’t know what it is, is a national film makers project that gives, us (film makers) the opportunity to see if we can hold up under the pressure of creating a 7 minute film in 48 hours. The kicker is you can’t write the film until you get the information from the Producers of the 48-hour film project.

Friday, August 7, 2009

There was a hum everywhere in the air. Artwork sat against the walls as primarily men filled the meeting area. There was a bobbing of heads here and there checking to see whom the ‘new kids’ were. Team members, chit, chatted back and forth with anxious postures -- some of them -- accept those ‘who knew what to expect.’ It is surprising that only 1 in 10 people here is a woman -- filmmaking is still overwhelmingly male dominated.

The crew’s are meeting with the BIG PRODUCERS of the 48-hour film project to get our Genre. Each team pulls from the hat, you get a genre then, or you can put it back and wait for the catch all genres they pick at the end. We pulled Fantasy -- This means that our film has to have the elements of a fantasy film -- something like “Legend,” “Star Wars,” they are flights of fancy films that have elements of myth and magic in them.

A couple of the team members weren’t too sure about doing the fantasy genre, but I assured them it would be fine, and that I could write a script for anything (no matter what the genre was we picked).

So then, we waited for the next elements that had to be incorporated into the film. First was a prop. Each team has to use the same prop in their film. The prop was a “present,” and it did not have to be wrapped.

Next, we had a character that had to be incorporated into each team’s film. The character was Alan or Alana Beaumont and they had to be a Phony. Guess what that means. They had to be someone they weren’t. It was a bit vague to be sure, but okay, I can handle that.

Last, we got a single line of dialogue. It was, “that’s never happened before.”
Okay we had all our elements for the film, we had to make a fantasy film, with a present, which included a character Alan or Alana Beaumont who was a phony and someone had to say the line “that’s never happened before.”

“GO MAKE YOUR MOVIE” the producer shouted at the group of people who were standing around. Everyone and I mean everyone made a B’line for the door. The films had to be turned in completed with all the paperwork by 7:30 on Sunday. That evening with information in hand, I set out to complete my first task, making the script into something “fantasy related” that incorporated all our needed items. By three o’clock on Saturday morning, we had a script and it was emailed to everyone on the team. -- First task completed. It wasn’t a blockbuster-writing job, but it would make them laugh (the audience).

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Saturday morning at 10:00 a.m. everyone (except the sleeping writer) invaded en masse at the Allegheny Country Club swimming pool to shoot the majority of our film. They were kind enough to allow us the use of their pool without payment. I can’t say enough about how wonderful they were to us, and how interested the members of the club were in what we were doing.

I made my way to the pool around 11:30 a.m. just in time for the beginning of major shooting. Aaron our cinematographer filmed much of the opening sequence before I arrived (mostly second unit stuff) -- he has a fabulous eye for beauty in simplicity, and I was happy he was part of the team. Aaron conferred with me when I arrived, they were already ‘off script’ -- shooting things out of order, and so adjustment in the story line had to be made, on the fly. Not a major deal, but an issue nonetheless. I didn’t want to waste another couple of hours trying to re-shoot the opening, so we just adapted. “Be the willow, not the oak.” Bend with the problems don’t cause more. We didn’t have time to re-shoot; we would work around the problem. We shot everything except 2 very small scenes in the 7 hours at the pool. Then everyone was off to eat and finish the last 2 scenes after dinner.

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Editing started that night -- Aaron started splicing shots together. He had the majority of the film done by 1:00 p.m. on Sunday. I came in for final sound check, music placement and to double check continuity -- which I was amazed was exceptional considering no markers were placed for cameras during the entire shoot. Our composer Josh, a one-man wonder, scored the entire film in a single evening while Aaron cut and spliced and worked his magic. 6:00 p.m. Sunday, Aaron burned the film to DVD and flash drive -- and Kirsten our producer (that girl is a genius when it comes to finding things) strolled out the door to deliver our film.

Thursday the 13th of August, at 7:00 p.m. is the premier of our collaboration. 15 Actors and 3 additional crewmembers (I, Aaron and Josh) will see our film on the big screen. 48 hours in the making -- 8 minutes 12 seconds on screen. Not a second of that time is regretted.

This is guerrilla film making at its finest.

I will tell you all about the premier if you are unable to attend.

Recipe for Creative Vision in 48 Hours

8 hours of script writing via email with an hour at eat n' park for dinner where we missed each other (producer and writer). We were each at the wrong eat n' park.

12 hours of shooting at locations

2 dedicated families (feeding the cast and crew)

2 hand-held mini digital cameras (with underwater shots included -- stroke of brilliance on the cinematographers part)

1 mic, no lighting except natural

Throngs of people not in the shot, but making noise enough to be in the shot.

1 composer, writing an entire score in an evening, beautiful and ethereal

15 actors - learning lines in seconds and trying not to crack up during takes

1 cinematographer with a an eye for beauty

4 directors/camera operators, making sure we followed the story -- well pretty close

12 hours of editing, -- with the occasional glitch in the system (save, save, save).

48 hours of little or no sleep, but all seriously fun.

Writing On Robert

“Robert Fulghum?”

“Yes, Robert Fulghum,” I say.

“The writer?” he asked again.

“Duh, of course. Who else?” I answered, again.

A conversation with a friend over who makes me laugh and cry.

I read Robert’s first book on a bus on my way to work. I’m a fan, through and through.

I got stares from people around me. I could guess what they said.
“Why is she laughing? And so loud too.”

I didn’t care, Robert is funny, and then I would wipe a tear starting at the corner of my eye.
“Now she’s crying. What the hell is she reading?”

Robert can make you cry with a pen stroke.

Of course, they would have to guess. Not many people, at the time, had heard of
Robert Fulghum.

My mother wrote this inscription inside a book given to me at Christmas, “Artists and writers see the world differently than others.” That was all, a simple line that summed up my life to her.

She was correct.

Writers, like Mr. Fulghum, see beauty in the smallest of things. A meatloaf sandwich in a refrigerator at 3:00 in the morning -- for instance. The refrigerator is humming to the same frequency his body does. This was ‘Meatloaf in B flat major.’ Something so simple gives us pause to reevaluate the meaning of our life. Slow down, don’t just stop to smell the roses, darn it, smell the entire garden. Then, look at it -- I mean really look at it. It’s a miracle -- sitting in your yard. But we don’t see it, we are traveling at a speed of 60 mph and it’s a blur of red and green. We are missing the miracles of our life for work and appointments, PTA meetings and drive thru value meals.

As I’m writing this my daughter wants to play with me. “Come play with me mommy,” she says. Well, I’m not going to miss time with her just to write for you all. My miracle is waiting to play with me, and she smells like my garden of roses. I’m going to enjoy that garden while it grows. Check back with you all later.

Go enjoy your garden.

Read more about and by Robert at : www.robertfulghum.com