My car's in the shop, as it has been all week, sitting, sitting, sitting. The insurance company, dilatory, MIA, leaving me hanging. I have dad's truck to borrow this week, though, because he's on a college trip with Ez. They shop for classes, a campus, that intangible perfect feel. Dad calls and says he has regrets for not pushing me that way when I was 16 and done with homeschooling. He says maybe I could have been great in that world. He says maybe I am anyway, in this one.
Ez will leave, and all kids will have flown the nest. Two off to be brilliant, and me here, meandering down my well worn path. I wonder if I would have excelled at academics, given the chance? Of course not. What is is all that could have been.
But that doesn't mean things can't be. And one thing I know can be is Ezra's success. Seeing him jazzed about philosophy classes and computer classes makes me so happy.
SGL, 11:24am
Wednesday, September 25, 2002
It's Wednesday. This week, this year, is flyin' by. I tried to train 3 classes of Tukong yesterday, but Master kicked me and Ali out of the last one. "Go home. Rest. You train too much." In the last class we practice combo kicking: stepping round house, stepping hook/roundhouse/hook, jumping turn around, crescent, jumping crescent, all in one stream. It was awesome. I was awful, but I loved it anyway. In the class we missed, they were practicing staff. I swear, I ALWAYS miss the weapons classes.
Meanwhile, work is dead. But I appreciate this time to clean up my drive, organize my sound effects, play on freelance/spec sound design jobs. And I get to train at noon class, so it's all good.
I got my scary test back yesterday, the test for which I studied none and the test which I was sure I failed. I got a 96, and have decided to never study again.
Breakfast time.
SGL, 8:48am
Monday, September 23, 2002
It's not quite 5 and I'm already home from work for the day. It feels weird. I'm not sure what to do.
The astounding verdict on my hair is "nuh uh." Goth, young, harsh, "what were you thinking?" Bloody hell.
I've finally really decided against buying a place of my own. I'm devastated. I just want to be secure, adult, a property owner, what's wrong with that?
Return to the weird, the afternoon at home instead of at work, the looking so forward to Tukong tonight. Talking to Meg, to Moo, and suddenly feeling glad that my hair color makes us look like sisters again. There is good in everything.
SGL, 5:16pm
Sunday, September 22, 2002
I just realized that in less than a month, I turn 22.
I'm gonna cry.
SGL, 8:59pm
Sunday. Almost as bad as Monday, because it's so very far away from the next Saturday. But I have nary a stressful session this week, so I'm okay with the week's start. The only thing I need to dread is the morning running.
This weekend we went to a party. It took much cajoling on Ali's part, but finally I touched up my lipstick and off we went. I haven't been to a party in literally years. Not a real one, at least, not one with a keg outside, and lasers, and a fog machine, and a guy in a sideways hat spinning trance albums. I could feel the music inside, the bass shook the walls. I couldn't hear a word anyone said, but that's probably best.
Today I think we'll go to Spiderhouse to read and enjoy this beautiful weather. There will be music there, but no fog machines. I will be at ease.
SGL, 9:55am
Friday, September 20, 2002
I've been all consumed by work lately. I showed the movie sound design yesterday, and they liked it. I'll work a little more on it, burn a CD, and then they said they'll try to work some of it into the movie. We'll see. I'm not holding my breath. It was fun, though.
I'm 30 minutes away from an appointment to get my hair dyed brown. That's right, no more blonde. I'm scared, because years ago when I first started the blonde thing, the reaction was "wow, you look SO much better blonde. Don't ever go back." And now it's time to go back. Ali assures me he'll still love me, but I have my doubts.
I want to buy a suit. A nice black one, pants and a jacket. Where can this be found?
SGL, 11:32am
Tuesday, September 17, 2002
I have this burning desire, this desperation inside, to do well on this sound design job. No, not just well, fabulously well. I want them to come in on Thursday, see what I've done, say "wow, you're amazing," and feel relieved that they can share their burden with me, that I can be part of their team. But I just can't get there. Instead I shrink into myself, I feel alone and disconnected.
I failed my first Chinese History test today. I knew it was today, but I was busy sound affecting, I didn't want to study. I didn't want to even look at my notes. Instead I went, I faked it, I failed it, and I watched the second hand tick by. The sea of students washed together, I sank into myself and refused to be moved. Back at work I stayed in C, brooding, working, feeling passionately, but passionately like a failure.
At Tukong was the tenacious feeling that I don't belong. I felt foreign, though the faces were familiar. I didn't look up to say hello. Now I'm home and not even the new New Yorker short story by Julian Barnes can cheer me.
Ali doesn't want to buy a house anymore, so it's either I do it alone or not at all. What do you think? Should I buy a house?
SGL, 8:10pm
Sunday, September 15, 2002
Yesterday's ADR session went well enough, I guess. From the get go there were problems, all on the other end, and I was sure I was being set up (not intentionally, but set up nonetheless) to look like a chump. I called Ali and nearly cried. Then I pulled together and dealt with things and the session began. It went well enough, and afterward the head sound guy said, "too bad you're full time here, or I'd hire you to cut sound effects together for us on this film." I stared and then started muttering and stuttering about my freedom at TQM and he said "so you'll try it? here." and he assigned me a scene in the movie to sound design, on spec. He says he'll pay me if he uses it, and that there'll be more where that came from, if I'm any good.
I remained collected and calm until he left, and then I jumped up and down for a bit and worked until 11pm on the scene.
I have a sound design job on a real movie. Holy cow.
SGL, 2:22pm
Friday, September 13, 2002
Just finished another big hollywood movie ADR session. I was so nervous. I think it was okay, but not great. It's hard to work remotely with another studio, especially with a roomful of people who just want to get started, and are impatient with technical concerns. Ahh well, tomorrow I'll be better, and tomorrow I'll be working with them again.
I don't feel elation at the weekend this time. Ali wants to have adventures, to travel the world, to see Korea, to learn and grow, and I have a feeling I'll be left behind again. Again because everyone leaves, because that's natural, for people to go out into the world and learn and grow and experience things. Only me, only this freak, stays put in this chair for so long.
I've been feeling on the verge of sick, so I've not gone jogging all week. I've been working through Tukong training. I'm enormous.
SGL, 4:40pm
Thursday, September 05, 2002
The days seem so long. Every morning I hit Enfield from Mopac and think, "here I am again." And for a minute my life seems just a series of trips down that road.
At work I melt into my chair, into my studio, into my computer. The outboard gear seems an extension of my body. It all feels so natural, so comfy, so... safe. And the more I think about creating an entire life for myself sitting in that chair, the more I realize I already have. Since the second I turned adult, I've been sitting in that chair. No wonder it feels so good to do yoga now, to do Tukong now, to get up and MOVE.
Roundhouse, turnaround, hook kick combos tonight. I actually got it. I did good turn arounds. Ali noticed. I was so happy.
But then what happened? Now that I'm settling down for the evening the panic strikes. I have a session tomorrow and already I'm sure I'll fail. The weekend isn't even here yet, and already I'm sure I'll spend it poorly.
SGL, 10:09
Wednesday, September 04, 2002
Why why why??
I want to be buddhist and unattached to material things. I want to be spiritual and grounded and rational and intelligent. But more than any of that, I REALLY want this jacket.
SGL, 10:17am
Tuesday, September 03, 2002
This weekend I decided to give myself some direction. I've been thinking about what I want to do with my life, and have decided that by the time I'm 30 I want to have my own studio. It will be a studio/company solely devoted to the type of work I do in studio C at Tequila now. It will have kick ass ADR facilities and normal radio/sound design rooms. I want Tequila to be a partner in it, and I want to build the facility above the current Tequila studio, so I can stay closely tied to the company I've been a part of since its beginning. I just told WW this and he said "I love it, I love it. But do it sooner rather than later. I think it's far more likely to be successful if you do in the next few years. It looks good for a company to be started by a 22 or 23 year old female entrepreneur."
And then I realize that I'm not sure I want to do it at all. And again I have no direction. And again I'm satisfied to sit in this chair, drinking green tea, going nowhere.
SGL, 10:22am
"Perhaps the essential role of the ego is to mask from consciousness its very spontaneity." - Jean-Paul Sartre
