Night at the Gallery

I'm thoroughly exhausted after the brother's wonderful wedding weekend. Full recap to come...eventually. In the interim I have a few [long] posts in draft I forgot about.

Two weeks ago, I took Shana with me to the Cocoran Art Gallery for a flash fiction workshop. This was my first experience with flash fiction and first experience since college writing about art.

The workshop was led by a writer who works at the Corcoran, who previously worked at MOMA in New York, and has published works. There were fewer than 10 of us in attendance, which made for a comfortable and open setting. The workshop was based around a current exhibit, Shooting Stars: Publicity Stills from Early Hollywood and Portraits by Andy Warhol. Here is a portion of the description from the website:

Shooting Stars features promotional photographs of early Hollywood film stars alongside Polaroid portraits and black-and-white images by Andy Warhol. Made half a century apart, these two bodies of work illustrate some of the ways photographers have contributed to our understanding of celebrity and fame.

The purpose of the workshop was to view the exhibit and then write about a work in the voice of a celebrity. It could be from the voice of the celebrity in the photo, the voice of a celebrity viewing one of the photos, or really anything. We read same sample works, either written about a celebrity, in the voice of one, or dedicated to one, and then took an hour to view the works and write. Then we re-convened to read our pieces aloud.

It was so surreal and also serene to have the gallery almost to ourselves. (There was one other group touring it.) We got to sit (but not lean against the wall, as I learned) and just write, surrounded by all this art.

I didn't expect it to go so well, to be so inspired by the portraits. I shouldn't have been surprised because I do admire and appreciate art, especially portraiture, but I'm a very slow and meticulous writer and can't usually think and execute so quickly. There were actually several photos that inspired me and had me creating stories in my head.

The one that grabbed me the most was one of the early publicity stills. The subject was a Richard Barthelmess, circa 1927. I had never heard of him, but just now looked him up and he was a silent film star. This is the exhibit photo:

 
He reminded me so much of George Clooney that I decided to write in the voice of George Clooney viewing the portrait. And this is what I wrote:

Look at him. Look at me. Same eyebrows, same hair -- or same hair 20 years ago -- same eyes. He's a dashing guy. He's a good looking son of a bitch. Thank, god. That's all that matters here, right?

He has the right look, the right car, the right address. Maybe he even has the right pedigree, not too focused on either collar, blue or white. He did his time in the chorus line, so to speak, before jumping in to the lead role. He probably even has a shiny award or two, or at least he's been nominated. It is, of course, just an honor to be nominated.

But let's get to the good stuff. He's got the girl. He always has the girl. Or a string of girls. Women, actually. He's not Errol Flynn. No one should ever be Errol Flynn. So what if he rotates them every 2 years. Doesn't mean he's gay or asexual. It means he's bored or choosey or a dedicated bachelor. It's a thing. People magazine said so.

He doesn't have a stint in rehab, but give him time; his next film will be a flop.

But let's go back to his look. that perfectly tailored coat with its artfully popped collar.

The cigarette, so close to slipping out of his fingers, but so clearly a vital part of who he is, before the surgeon general has a say.

I could do without the pinky ring, but to each his own.

But that stare, wow. What is he looking at? Do I look like that? Could I look like that?

I want to know what he's thinking. I think I know.

He wants them to stop talking about his love life. To stop referring to his looks in the past tense. He wants to write and direct more. He wants to be asked in interviews about writing and directing instead of why he isn't married.

I think he wants a drink, a large drink to fill his brain with fuzzy thoughts. Happy thoughts. Because they aren't always there. He isn't always happy. Money, fame, awards, isn't always enough. He wants a break, a drink. He doesn't know what he wants.



Image source

Things I Learned This Weekend

Sometimes you just need a Friday to yourself.
I woke up Friday morning very late, with a headache, as it poured outside. So I made the executive decision to work from home. It cleared up as the day went on and I took a long lunch to just be out and run some errands. It was perfect.

Having a craft store accessible by metro is going to change my life.
A variety store re-opened in Bethesda about a block from where one of my close friends lives. I checked it out for us on Friday and OH MY WORD it's got a huge craft section. I didn't have my full list of ongoing craft needs but I did buy fabric, bobbins, embroidery floss, and other things. I'm probably going to be here once a week.

A clean home is a happy home. Unfortunately.
I hate cleaning. Hate hate hate it. But sometimes you just have to. So I picked up a bunch of things on Friday night, made a mess again on Saturday, and then re-cleaned with broom and vacuum and swiffer and spray all over again on Sunday. It sucks but it is nice to come home to.

My first writer's conference was awesome.
On Saturday I attended my first writer's conference. It was held at a Johns Hopkins building in Dupont Circle and was created by Barrelhouse literary magazine. It was an all-day conference with a keynote speaker and three breakout sessions. I learned so much and got a lot of inspiration for my own work. It was very reasonably priced and so close to home that I couldn't not go, and I'm glad that was the case.

Working out and crafting are great ways to end a busy Saturday.
I was very tired on Saturday after a 9-5 day of conferencing, but I still made myself exercise and do things. After a brief nap, of course.

There's just no good way to spray paint indoors.
In this week's installment of Bonnie Attempts Spray Painting In Her Apartment, this is what I tried:

I saw on Pinterest where someone created a sort of spray tent using a cheap hanging garment bag. I attempted the same thing only I didn't want to pay for a bigger one so I got this smaller one. Which, as you imagine, didn't quite work since there wasn't exactly a lot of room to spray. I also didn't take into account how I would hang it. Thank goodness for (UNC) duck tape and bungee cords. On the upside, I haven't been able to spray paint in awhile but I got to use my sprayer and tarp and mask. Yay!

D.C. is confusing, maps suck, and spray paint might hurt your brain.
I was meeting Brandie for brunch and a movie on Sunday and got so turned around and kept going in the wrong direction in roundabout ways. She blamed my spray painting from the previous night. I blamed maps and D.C. and the fact that I move so much faster than the little blue dot on my map app.

All restaurants should be housed in former fire stations.
Whilst hunting for brunch options, I came across Sixth Engine, a restaurant near Chinatown that is housed in a former fire station. 

It had such cool ambiance and decor, not to mention delicious mimosas and chocolate chip flapjacks. (And they were flapjacks, not pancakes, as the waitress corrected Brandie.)

Ryan Gosling is attractive even with tattoos, bad hair, and bad clothes.
But it can't make up for the depressing, heavy handed, and long winded "A Place Beyond the Pines." B and I had to see it, of course, as we do all Ryan's movies, but this was not a good one.

Don't get angry at Barnes and Noble when you can't find the book you're looking for. When it hasn't been released yet.
I have a B&N gift card that I keep forgetting about and thought on Sunday I'd use it to buy the new Audrey book written by her second son. Well, after fruitlessly searching the store for it and about to haughtily ask for it and mention that Amazon had it in stock, I realized it wasn't out yet. Oops. At least I realized it before huffing and puffing.

When you find yourself hand painting the horns on two ram figures Carolina blue, step away from the crafting.
They look adorable though and are going to make awesome bookends eventually. I have no regrets.  

Through the Years

Last week, CNN.com posted a story about five friends who had been taking the same picture for 30 years.

 I was immediately drawn to the story since every year my girlfriends and I take self-timer group photos. (Which I'm sure you've seen either on this blog, my Facebook, around my apartment, or hanging in my office.) After sharing the article with my friends and asking for their permission, I submitted our story and photos as an iReport to the original story.

As far as I know, they post everyone's iReport with no approval process, but I'm still happy to have our friendship on display at CNN.

Things I WILL Blog About...One Day

Lately, work is consuming all my writing ability and creative energy. All the things I want to write about here, for me, turn to jello in my brain and then my fingertips as soon as I get home and touch my laptop. Instead, I find myself watching stupid You Tube videos or going through pages and pages of stupid blogs, just to unwind.

And just now, as I sat on my couch on my work from home day, fighting off a panic attack because I don't see how my current project is ever going to be completed, I glanced at my work notepad to see a list of blog posts to write. I must have written the list yesterday during a break.

I don't usually like any sort of to-do list public because I don't want the public holding me accountable. I've always put plenty of pressure on myself and I think inviting others to do the same might kill me. But, I'm posting this anyway. If for no other reason than I can throw out that sheet from my notepad so no one asks me why "lettuce" and "secrets" are on the same list.

• Cape Party
• National Cathedral Flower Mart
• Mother's Day
• Stuff I found while cleaning out my room at home
• The Asian lettuce bundles I made 3ish months ago
• More secrets
• More fountains
• Thoughts on "crazy" women
• Why I think "Sabotage" could be an appropriate wedding song
• My new laptop
• Colored jeans?
• A quote from last week's "Girls" I really like
• Comfort shopping
• Phobias

Ode to Post-it Notes

I have storyboards for a course I'm writing due by noon on Thursday. What does this mean? Well, it means that until that time, I'm eating, sleeping, and story boarding. That's it. Fine, and I'm blogging this one little thing. (Because I started this on the metro when I couldn't do my work because it was too hard to write during a certain stretch of track.)

As my brain is absolute mush but I needed a break, I'm going to write a post about post-it notes. Please try and contain your excitement.

I'm really serious about my post it notes. As in I can use the brand name because I refuse to buy just "sticky notes." As in I bring my own multi-colored ones to work because my office only stocks the yellow ones. As in the photographic proof that follows.

The first photo contains my permanent notes with illuminating information such as "how to print on letterhead" and "keyboard short cut for m dash." The ones under my monitor are more project specific. And the ones on my laptop have to be dealt with that day. Or, in many cases, moved around for days or weeks like the "gap" one in the corner.

This morning, like most mornings, I spilled tea on myself. But it also got on a few of my post-its and I had to re-write some. My boss was there and, amused by my reaction, added this one to my collection.

Best post-it ever. (Even though I was too busy to follow it. Sorry, Mom! But I did email!)

Writer Girl

One summer day in Chapel Hill, the month after college graduation, I was on campus (force of habit) browsing in the Bull's Head bookshop. The following book cover and author name caught my eye and I bought it: 

Dessen is a Chapel Hill resident, UNC alum, former UNC professor, and a young adult author. Though I'd read her first book, "Someone Like You," some time around freshman year, and seen the movie "How to Deal," I didn't know she had other books, or was a fellow Tar Heel, until "Just Listen."

I read the book in one night, staying up until 3 or 4 in the morning to finish. Though the book is about a girl in high school, and I was a 22-year-old college grad about to move across the pond, something in her story grabbed me. And I hated high school, so it certainly wasn't nostalgia. It was her words, her characters, her story.

Over the course of a year I read all her other books. In the years since, as she has released three more, I bought each on their release date and finished each in a matter of days. So, despite my fear of meeting famous people, when I saw that Dessen was going to be at the Bethesda Library last Thursday, I had to attend. 

She read from her latest book, "What Happened to Goodbye," took questions, and then signed books. Not surprisingly, the room was dominated by teenage girls. And their mothers. But there were a few people my age, so I wasn't completely out of place. One mother even asked Dessen about her intended audience, and why she thought her books appealed to more than just teens. She said that everyone went through adolescence, that it's something we all share, and tend to have passionate feelings about. And she's never met anyone who didn't have some thoughts, also usually quite passionate, about high school. I would add that her books represent a range of human emotions and experiences that just about anyone can identify with. Yes, they are presented through the lens of teenagers, but that doesn't make them less true or powerful.

Even though I was super nervous, I am very glad to have gone. She clearly loves what she does and has worked incredibly hard to get where she is. And the fact that she is a Carolina girl just makes it all the more inspiring to me.

As she spoke about her struggles to figure out her life, to write and get published, to go from waitress to professor to writer to mother, she said something that really stood out to me:

"I think you just end up where you're supposed to be, that's what I believe."

Similarly, I believe that everything happens for a reason, so I wholeheartedly agree with this. (Even though it's incredibly difficult to remember and understand in practice.) 

It was just a fun night and I look forward to spending a few weeks re-reading some of her earlier books.

Day 327: So fancy

I did have a paragraph of rants on why I hate this city sometimes and other things that have made me mad today, but instead, given the less than happy nature of the blog this week, I am forcing myself to think of five things that didn't piss me off this week.

1. A productive day at work yesterday. I get a lot done most days, but I really got in the zone yesterday and got ahead on some stuff.
2. The fact that this time next week I will be home in Carolina, where I bet I will have no trouble finding the basketball and football games on tv.
3. French toast sticks. I've been on a breakfast food as dinner kick this month, and these keep making a re-appearance.
4. Sleeping in without feeling guilty because it's so cold outside I know I don't want to be out there anyway.
5. Today's new thing, trying calligraphy with a little kit.

I'm still old-fashioned in that I'd rather write letters to my niece than email, or send physical cards to my friends instead of an online one. (Though I do love those too.) And though my penmanship is a bit too loopy for most, I still like the physical act of writing, too. So I tried calligraphy for the first time tonite, and it wasn't too bad.
I spent more time practicing the strokes than writing actual words, though you can see I did get a nice jab in at the end. And what better way to class up a slightly derogatory remark, than with calligraphy?

Day 211: Freelance

With a desire to both write more, and save a little more, I have been looking for freelance writing opportunities, and today I applied for my first one. They say the first year is mostly rejection, but at least it's a start. And maybe a year from now I'll finally have a new thing.

Day 179: Now am I qualified to be an astronaut?

Pretend I wrote a long-winded post about my love of the space program. Or read one of my past entries on the subject. And then witness today's new thing, writing with my own space pen, in as many of the environments described on the package as I could. (Sorry, unable to test it at sub-zero and boiling temperatures.)

Normal conditions:
Upside down:Under water (Should have filled sink with water first, but I was lazy. But this worked too!):
See?