I was thinking about the Oldest Storyteller this morning…and other psychological fictions such as Vanilla Sky. That’s a psychological fiction, too, no? So, if this man can realize that he froze himself back in time and it’s not Forever Young where he even has to catch up with his years…then I can feel time bend. It was a real experience, and the degree to which that was true was the point. I have to have a space, a container, to be able to explore what that does to someone. The questions I heard around that…this character, with this idea, they were fine. Death was fine. To make a joke, Cuba Gooding Jr. in What Dreams May Come—what are you doing here? Time bends: where am I? Time doesn’t really exist, and yeah, that experience turned out to be rather large and hard to believe myself, actually, once I was coming to understand, in a manner of speaking, that it was real. It was. It was more…I could never explain it. Time does have a function. I don’t know what that means for someone with Alzheimer’s, if that’s one of the experiences that they have, but I was nine. And I don’t know what to say because I heard all sorts of questions later on…just because of the story. I cannot get caught up in what I do not know. All I know is that I was experiencing some symptoms…and it didn’t sound like it was that unbelievable to the psychologists I spoke to. Maybe I will write about time…a superhero character who can bend time or something. You know, Magneto from X-Men would be on my side. He would definitely come find me. He’ll get me a special hat or something. I’m just playing around. I can now.
I was a child, so they’re sponges….I don’t know anyone as of yet who went through secret Alzheimer’s with a man who was denying it and projecting the problem. That’s a specific psychological space, for sure: dementia. I myself am sensitive, on top of that, and I know there are plenty of people who can relate to being affected by the energy in a room. It’s just that I liked Death’s perspective, this character…in the midst of all that. Dealing with energy ended up being beyond a useful tool. It came from the wise screenwriter, so this character was obviously influenced by real sources…such as my own experience. I do not “know.” But sometimes it might be unresolved energy, perhaps, it’s just that we can shape…we manipulate energy…and that’s coming from a person who can see “thief” flood my senses and it turns out to be true. Someone who can feel physically distraught to find out that I reminded some woman of the woman who her husband left her for. Not me. But I felt that. She obviously didn’t want to put that on me. Death was grounded. I = here. Energy is real. But it’s slightly off topic, it’s just to say that I am sensitive in that. Time-bending, an experience like that, ended up being real enough. In the context of one’s life, repression, and going through a real change, and healing, I liked that image since it took time for me to integrate that. There are points in time that can hold a lot of energy. Patterns. The future being a point of focus, and there are many futures that are possible, though some are more probable than others. Probable future events…I’m thinking about X-Men again….can affect the real past. Obviously there is only the present moment…but in terms of patterns…you can probably understand how in my case, for example, my patterns might have suggested certain outcomes because it was not sustainable. I might have been quite strong, on the one hand, but patterns. And those also might have to do with lineage, too. It’s rather real, no? Now, I know, even if I’m writing from the position of being at a new beginning, that I feel the difference.
Tim O’Brien evidently went through the Vietnam War, so that story was born from a real experience. It’s helped to place that story in a context, because it’s not a memoir. I suppose I could say that, and it would be funny. Could I get to fiction? Yes. I’ve been reading a lot. Once I started uncovering, the tension I had internally just coming out of a framework where you don’t know what the truth is, and people don’t necessarily tell the truth, especially over an innocent, it was too stimulating at first. Now I can maybe imagine superhero worlds, another society out there, or psychological spaces that are not nonfiction. I have already. I can go further. When you have to face, from a real standpoint, delusion, it can be quite shocking. It helps to work it out because it’s a specific psychological space. Psychologically I am a lot more solid…the stream, it unfolded like a dream, at first, but not hard to follow for such a character. But I’m thinking about that journey since cohesion, re-membering, was what it was and I am thinking about a chapter outline right now. I like what this character said—there is nothing without spirit in it. When my feelings started opening up…there were moments of such freedom…internally. I was thinking about The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover…the scene where he pulls her by the hair through a theatrical moving of scenes…so I have to think about how space and time moves in those points in the story, though I already kinda have an idea. It was sometimes these simple moments since these were decisions…that ended up being so full of meaning and feeling. I guess that’s one of the questions: your whole life flashes before your eyes…and what does that mean? Especially since my understanding of my life went through a fundamental shift, especially around my childhood. I know that I’m not alone there.
And look, when you’re repressed, which is a strong word, and I am physically aware of that, and I began to come to feel what my experience was…it would make sense. Sometimes, those feelings could be rather sharp. Where the body stores trauma…too. I was re-reading an interview I did with a man who was on 13 medications and had nothing but physical problems he couldn’t understand. His family was sick, in the sense that his father had back surgeries…he heard about ayahuasca and he got himself off the medications which was an ordeal in itself because he had been on medications for a long time. He understood that the roots of his chronic pain was…it was trauma-related. He even almost died as an infant, and he was able to access these experiences. I don’t know quite what his journey was…but he is no longer on medications. That’s all. In regards to my father, he seemed to be the only one who had that kind of illness in his family. I don’t know enough about that specific condition to say whether or not that’s an important point. The point was, in simple terms, Death could not help that it existed. It’s not delusional. It’s real. And yes, there were different ways it could go. It’s just the feeling I had was one that I wanted. Even connecting to an old woman, me out there, who had maybe written many things…and was looking back on all this with a feeling I wanted to get to, because it would suggest that this moment in my life was a turning point. I reached for myself. The power of choice…in healing that’s a goal. I liked that about that character as well…he cannot interfere. He was naturally an etymologist, which I think makes sense. I can. Death exists though, that I knew. I mean, in the context my life and what I could not get past, an end appeared kind, though what does that mean? I didn’t have the perspective that that it had to mean something harsh and final like that, but then, we can really struggle with the chapters that might be coming to an end and moving on, especially if you’re dealing with the choices that you made, regardless if you were conscious or them or not at the time. I would struggle personally, all the same, with letting go…and emerging into a new world, a bit, because these patterns can take time to evolve out of and changing your idea-set is a physical process, it turned out. And we obviously learn lessons, no, along the way, hopefully being able to share those in one way or another. They enrich our lives. Perspective.
I recently got caught up in the past, for example. Just thinking about the path I took…understanding now what I was doing. When you come into a stronger sense of purpose and of what you have to contribute (also an important point in healing)…it can give you some clarity. I made a transition. And now, right, people change careers, it’s not that, it’s more that I don’t know where to go exactly from here. But then, a wise screenwriter said “I ask for inspiration” at moments like that….talk Sunday. I’m applying for jobs. I don’t see the problem in getting one, it’s just that on paper, my experience is real, but I have done enough of playing against my strengths…I might not be the most gifted journalist, but then, I never worked with an editor or had any guidance in that way. Now, my skills have improved. I did an exercise of taking an old article I wrote and editing it. So I just applied for that job, since it’s something I can do. It’s a real job. I have been spending time with creative nonfiction, even flash, and fiction, obviously with a different perspective. I’m probably more naturally geared in that way…even dialogue. Given…what…I…studied. Good. It’s all good. I have arrived. Could I do a “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” version of the Barbara Harris material? Absolutely. It’s just that Harris is not Sinatra. It’s a different person, and the scenes, I thought, reflected her talent. It was a complete story with a dramatic arc just built in. Rising action, I mean, the whole thing, which was part of what was amazing about it…not having interviewed anyone yet. Sinatra had a cold, so Gay Talese had to get creative in how he approached this piece. Something rather original came out of it. Sinatra is a very very important person in Naples. Very.
I have to write the nice young woman back who reached out to me. She wanted more scenes. It’s one person, obviously, but someone who researched her and had seen everything she had done took the time to look at what I put up and contact me about it. I am interested in her perspective, since belonging, even if she didn’t use that word, was a central question: finding one’s place in the world. And why is that so affecting? Well, it’s all about belonging. And she was really good at what she did. It’s an understatement, no? She was amazing. As someone who began studying acting at like ten years old… a major craftsman. I don’t know what to say about her approach, you see, but she ended up teaching, and I imagine she was quite good at it, which is what she said.
I was thinking about audience last night since it’s essential…and negotiating that, too, because Harris was an original. Which I think is pretty clear. I’ll post some of those interviews. What do people want to see? Now, in the case of Instagram, I didn’t know what to do, because I don’t tend to put my face up, but then, that’s maybe what people respond to…but then, maybe I take nice pictures. Sometimes you have to not take advice, but not reject it either. It depends. In any case, she was drawn to the scenes. It was my instinct, so I appreciated that validation. What she did for me too was really something. I guess that’s what makes a good script, I can imagine, the layers. I didn’t realize it at first…when I reopened it, I began to. Why did watching SUV with her…with that hand-written note….confidence comes from belonging. I don’t know how that phrase might resonate for others who might have performance anxiety or feelings that are stirred….but we’re obviously in a focus. It just so happened it really applied to me. Or, “my character.”
As a psychology, from that standpoint, Harris was rather extraordinary in my opinion. Psychology is not just in one’s head, in a manner of speaking. Just the perfect timing, which says a lot about her intuitive brilliance and formation. She was described as “an unformed genius,” and what does that mean? She started training right out of high school in Paul Sills’ company of players living in a Chinese restaurant.
I studied improvisation at Lecoq; it was not the same school, perhaps. We had ourselves, a frame, and an empty space. Sometimes, there was “a door” or a track in Absurd, for example, but that was the second year once we got to style. The first year was a complete course in itself. We used improvisation as our main tool to explore…”moonlight in the city…” how do you mime that? You aren’t supposed to talk about it, because not knowing, of course, was par for the course. Lecoq came from a sports background. His son said that it wasn’t a theater school, it was all about the movement, primarily, the body. Viola Spolin, originally, developed these games as a means of building community and connection. And sports, the group, is about collaboration as well. In any case, improvisation gets you out of your thinking head…you connect to a higher intelligence, consciousness, perhaps. I just don’t have my books with me. I’ll always remember the man who played a doctor on stage and a real doctor in the audience went to him, shocked. “Are you a doctor?” No. You’re tuned in…
I don’t know what to say about form with Harris, because with Altman, it didn’t work out that well. With Hitchcock, they seemed to have a more harmonious working relationship. So the idea that she was an unformed genius, I’ll continue thinking about it, because it was an interesting observation. The idea that you don’t want to mess with that too much. “A delicate but not fragile talent.” Didn’t Brigitte Auber ask Hitchcock if he had any direction for the two of them in this scene? So, maybe he planned his shots, he was more structured in that way, so it provided a container for her to feel freer in. Whereas, the script itself for Altman’s Nashville, I mean, “It Don’t Worry Me,” was built around the actors themselves…she did mention the fly swatter at the supermarket. She was so smart; I mean, really. And we all have our own types of intelligence…it was fun to play…in real life, I could be on a stage, but on stage, it was a different story. It just had to do with my background. I did understand that line though.
Harris demonstrated a rather important lesson about where you draw your material from. A supermarket, so ordinary and even banal, could be so rich and resonate even full of social commentary. How many towels spoke of wine? Alcoholism as a cute, witty phrase? Sure, you aren’t an alcoholic, but I’m not speaking to anyone specifically. I didn’t know, too, whatever that means. In this case, it ended up serving me…it was authentic. I don’t know why that line “an hour…” right before we…now I do….cross an oceanic parking lot resonated so much. “Don’t delete that!” I heard. Okay, I thought. Looking into stores…taking in this moment in time. I enjoyed that. It was all new, you know, now I can dissect some of these scenes.
It’s not the most dramatic scene, but the stakes, in a sense, are there. What it’s about feels clear. And Harris would be the type to be super honest about it. You know as an audience, now, that she’s approaching the end of her life. Not me. I appreciated the wise screenwriter for reflecting back to me that it was about connection, no? Just post some scenes. Just get started. He was such a rock. Solid. Simple. Clear. I really had the opportunity to spend some time with one of the best at what she did. Austin Pendleton said that she was really a guide for him when he was just starting out…so she was for me, too. Even as a writer, I was with one of the best, too, I think. She had worked with some stellar material.
So fine, I have projects that I can continue to work on. It’s just that at the end of the month, I have to figure out what’s next. And I’m looking for a job…………..and I have to find one……so I’m figuring out where to go in the states, not wanting to go back just yet. I’ve applied for a couple of remote jobs, it’s just that I can’t apply for everything, because I don’t meet those qualifications….
With The Oldest Storyteller, I can apply for that grant—it’s a novel, a fiction, and I can work on an outline and who knows? Maybe I’ll get it; it’s pretty on the pulse in terms of healing and trauma, though it still feels like a strong word in my case sometimes. It’s just honest.
As for Christmas in Naples is a Sport, I’m mostly reading right now. Does it unfold more like a novel? Is it more dialogue heavy, which in reality, it really was. The tradition itself sweeps me off my feet, the amount of sports that I am surrounded by. It’s just that I don’t need to tell my story, basically, twice. It’s about the adopted family narrative unraveling, but it’s a thread through it. Naples is inherently dramatic, and I like that the tradition itself plays a role. You have a touching story about Carmine who is a musician struggling under the pressure of his parents to put it away, and you don’t want him to. I feel like the story is already quite packed. I’m reuniting with my relatives. I just happened to disappear fifteen years ago. I’m just figuring out how to structure that. I have all the pieces more or less. It’s a large cast.
The Oldest Storyteller is a psychological fiction that was inspired by my real experience figuring out my life. I don’t think that’s the same thing.