Alright, I've
rewritten this first sentence 5 times today. Add that
to the myriad of times I've changed the entire entry
in the past 2 weeks it's hardly a suprise. This is a
biggie. I accept that the majority of you skim these
puppies but trust me...not this one.
In the past 4 1/2
years of "The Journey" there has never been a 25 day
span between entries. The most is two weeks, and the
average consistently has been 6 days. Hell in
recent months it's been unprecedented. A few
ofyou in the past couple of days have noticed the gap
and asked if things are alright and the truth of the
matter is...I've just been unable to commit this to
print. This was originally written on April 13th after
a week of pondering it. Then I sat on it some
more. Then I had to rewrite the damn thing
because it was already dated and the events were no
longer last week, yadda yadda. Then I wrote two
versions. Around and around. Now, today - I'm ready.
I've thrown out every other version, and I'm just
gonna type it all. Fuck structure, this is a
journal.
On the 6th Jess
had to be taken to the hospital because of a pain in
her stomach the doctor thought was her pancreas. It
ended up being an ovarian cyst that could be on the
inside or outside of her uterus. They also found a
kidney stone. She now needs to determine if the pain
is intruding enough to warrant removing the cyst or
not, the stone will pass on its own. Her biggest fear
of course is kids and it's understandable. If you want
'em, until you have 'em, you're always scared you
can't. Oddly enough I was more scared that she
was pregnant that day as every fuckin doctor and nurse
kept asking her. After the third person I looked
at her and said: "What the hell Jess?". She
wasn't and I finally understood when I read that sign
where they did the body scan saying:
"DONT DO THIS IF YOU'RE PREGNANT"
that it was precautionary and not that her pain was
indicative of anything. Hell I was mentally preparing
for a Christmas baby for about 2 hours.
Whew.
So you can imagine
what we talked about for the next couple of days. You
can spend a lifetime with no direction when you're
single but it does hit a wall at some point when
you're married. After quite a bit of soul searching
the road ahead came to view in crystal clear form
Saturday, April 10th - sitting at the Wendy's across
from the Outback we saw Nick & Jessica at. So
finally, I friggin' tell you:
This year is it
for 4tvs. I will finish the clean trinitrons, give it
everything I can, make the smaller bits for
TV and push it as much as it can be pushed. I do
believe the cleaner trinitrons has the best chance of
getting the national spotlight but I'm doing it more
because it's a great story that I want to tell
and it's a fitting end to the series. It is also the
peak of 4tvs from any perspective other than artistic,
and I can't just be artsy out here. I have to
find my way in to this industry because it's killin'
me. And the more I thought about it, 4tvs is killing
me. The idea is every positive adjective you can think
of...except successful. A lot of people in this
town have seen it, love it, but it's just great art.
And guys, you know I love great art and creating and
producing fulfills me like nothing else...but the
yearning to make it in this city is a fire that grows
daily and I believe 4tvs may be my biggest
obstacle. I look forward to giving it this final
shot, basically because the show is hilarious, but I'm
ready to move on.
Now I'm not
going anywhere. Let's just clear that up.
Granted I've thought more about going home this month
than I ever have (my dreams have been when one
radio station after the next) but it's just because
the thought of kids always makes me want a more stable
income and my entire professional background is in
radio. I know I can make a good living in
this industry. I'll deal with that when I need
to. Right now, I have to define what the hell
I do in 2005 and beyond.
In 2005 I will be
turning 30 and in all likelyhood Jess will be moving
into the second phase of her job at Panera in Human
Resources. It's been her goal for awhile now to get
out of the actual management aspect of the restaurant
business and with Panera she's found a home. That
position will allow the idea of having a family even
be possible. I am fairly certain that by the summer of
2006 we'll have a kid. So what's gonna keep me from
losing my mind creatively?
Films. It's time.
Technology has gotten to the point that if you know
what you're doing you can create insanely professional
films on the lowest of budgets providing you have
someone who knows how to run sound, light, edit, do
effects...and well - that's one thing that 4tvs has
forced me to learn. So many stages of filmmaking. When
I think about the amount of work that goes into
4tvs and translate that over to film. Whew. It's a
no-brainer. I want to write, shoot, direct, edit and
screen my own films. Hell with digital projection
moving the way it is, it's gonna be feasible for me to
finish and movie rent out a theater back in Columbus
and throw a party. Just like the 4tvs shows have been.
It's kind've a wacky business model that makes it
feasible for me to buy a $3000, 3 chip, HD, 24P
camera. It all also makes it feasible for me to have
the artistic side of me fulfilled while creating a
medium that is MUCH more mainstream than 4tvs
is. Wait, so I'm gonna give up a highly creative
one-of-a-kind show to become what 1 out 5 people in LA
consider themselves? Yup. You make a truly
extraordinary 30 minute 4tvs show, and that's all you
got. You make a truly extraordinary 30 minute film,
the avenues are varied and lucrative. There's a market
for films, there's no market for 4tvs. In the end it's
all storytelling and it's quite obvious I have a
passion for it.
Take last night
for example. Playing Project Gotham Racing 2 (I got a
steering wheel for when my dad comes out in May so he
can finally enjoy how amazing driving games have
become) and I screw up and hit the wall and
decide to go against traffic and fuck someone up. It
was fun, I screwed with them for a bit and then
watched the replay. Well the replay from the other
guy's perspective was quite jarring. I got that
feeling you get when you see an accident when we hit
on the replay. It looks that real. It hit me that
there's a "short" in these shots if you edit it
right.
Boom. Although it
was 12:30 AM and I was fighting a cold and
HAD to go to sleep, I stayed up for 3 hours
making this little film. Now I wanted to have voices,
but time restraints (which I think are one of the
greatest tools in creative ventures) made me have to
do the story with music. I found the story within the
shots the replay provided and ended up with a great
little 2 minute short. Kind've the way
Stability,
Potential,
Success was
created in 2002.
While
shooting all that I had nothing in
mind, but once you put it on an editing
timeline as an editor you have to feel
the piece. The angles speak to you.
It's storytelling, it's filmmaking, it's
an art and I think I'm good at it.
I know it's a big file but I had
to make it 30 fps, stereo and widescreen
to get the point across. Most
PC users should probably
right
click
and
save to your harddrive.
What's great is
this piece has all sorts of hidden meaning. There's
the truth of how it came together, but it could also
mean the two sides of me coming together. The crazy,
frantic, neurotic guy banging into walls, with the
identical version of me slowly, care free, trotting
along right behind. Maybe that's the family man? Maybe
that's kids/domestic life/house. Crazy
MUST MAKE IT car sees that version of
himself coming in the rearview and decides to stop
that shit. He fucks with him but in the end, he ends
up losing out to him. Isn't that cool? I love
storytelling.
Ok, so that's
pretty much it. Please understand that I do
believe in tthe upcoming "Cleanitrons". The show is
absolutely the best yet and I will push this with
all I have. It could very well garner the type of
publicity I need this year...but I'm many steps
ahead. I'm preparing for the future, and the end of
4tvs is in sight.
