Code Red

I've been pretty lax about keeping you up to date with my life. Since I got back from New York I've been keeping busy doing voice-over auditions and the like, and temping for a man named Gordon Rosenthal, who's got a consulting business in downtown Pittsburgh. Luckily, a producer and director I've worked with before, Scott DeNier offered me work in the CMU Summer New Plays Project; in a reading of a screenplay by my good friend Denise Pullen. The screenplay is based on the life story of Judy Resnik, who was the second US woman in space, and "the other woman" on the Challenger crew that died in January of 1986 - with Christa McAuliffe. I may have actually mentioned it before - this is the screenplay for which Denise won a national competition.

Anyway, I only offer all that as backstory to what follows.

I saw the most unsettling thing today. I was leaving Gordon's office and heading out to rehearsal for Riding Fire (you guessed it - the screenplay) and as I was approaching Wood Street downtown, I saw an ambulance parked at the corner. I rounded the corner and, typically for me, I was staring at my feet as I walk, so I saw a large puddle or stain on the street. At first I thought someone had spilled their "Code Red" Mountain Dew or something, this little burst of liquid on the street was that electric and red looking. Must have been the way the sun was hitting it. Because I finally looked up from the puddle and saw the reason for the stain: The EMT's from the ambulance were tending an old man who's forehead was bandaged and whose face was just a mask of dried and partially dried blood. I'm not sure if he'd fallen and hit his head on the sidewalk or what, but clearly the stain I'd just passed was his relatively fresh blood.

The unsettling thing was just how affected I was by the sight. Not so much of the little old man so banged up, but more by the image of the pool of blood that was stuck in my mind. I became, for the first time in recent memory (or long term memory, for that matter - I don't think I've been actually nauseous since I got drunk before all my friends returned to school the summer after my 21st birthday), really nauseous. I literally thought that I was going to throw up. It was a disquieting lesson in the difference between the fantasy of movies and plays, which are so much a part of my life, and the reality of the damage done to human bodies everyday. The closest I've ever come to this feeling before was watching the first 25 minutes of Saving Private Ryan... that was pretty damn unsettling too, but I've never been in such close physical proximity to so much of someone else's blood. I can't really describe the feeling.

Yikes.

Yikes. Long time since I've had the chance to do this. This week's been kinda hectic. Actually, pretty much every week since I've come back has been kinda hectic.

There seem to be some lessons I just don't care to learn. Just for shits & giggles, I went back and read some old journal entries, circa 1998. Many of the same money woes that have been plaguing me recently were also troubling me then. They just happen to be more numerous now - or maybe it's just that the time and distance from the place where I was then just makes them seem somehow... less. Most of those entries were spent discussing how in love I still was with Gavan, despite his obvious "flaws." Which, of course, says two things to me: Three years ago I was a lot more judgemental than I am now (I hope!), and even then, though I couldn't actually bring myself to say so out loud, there were signs that the differences between Gavan and I were going to end up being too big to surmount. Hindsight's a beautiful thing, isn't it?

It was hard to read those entries in light of the last few weeks. Gavan's been fine about me staying at his house while I'm in town, even though I'm sure it would be much easier to move on in his life if I weren't around. It surely can't be easy to have your ex hanging around.when there's always the possibility that you might like to have a date or something.

I guess the truth is that, despite the fact that we've been more than civil to each other through this whole process, our seperation is like a big elephant in the middle of the room that neither of us likes to acknowledge. We want to be able to go on being friends, so I get the feeling there's lots of unspoken stuff floating around right now.

I'm considering a career change, by the way. I want to go back to school and become a librarian (I'm sitting in the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh as I write this).

Which, of course, is bunk. Because of course, I'm thinking about a librarian who's locked away with his books, not having to deal with people. As if real librarians don't have to interact with people. Ha!

I'm just in a mood, I suppose. Antisocial. Worn out. Hmmm... depression, maybe?

PPG Place

One thing about being away from Pittsburgh: Coming back reminds you of just how nice it can be. On those occasions when all the gods are looking the other way and the weather is actually pleasant here, it can be an extremely beautiful city. I had to hang around downtown after work today, because I had an audition at Mosser Casting and had a little time to kill. So I went and hung out at the plaza at PPG Place, the headquarters of the huge glass conglomerate. The complex is legendary. Since it's a big plate-glass company, it built its headquarters out of - you guessed it - plate glass. The complex went up in the center of downtown Pittsburgh sometime during the 70's, I believe, and got reactions ranging from it's-the-ugliest-thing-I've-ever-seen to it's-the-most-stunning-thing-I've-ever-seen.

I happen to think that buildings are very pretty, but that's just my opinion. What I like most about them is that they're sorta like gothic cathedrals, but built out of glass.

So anyway, as I was sitting there in the plaza looking up at these buildings, and the clear blue sky and puffy white clouds were reflected in the glass edifices, I was just in awe of the whole thing. So, being me, I snapped a couple of shots. Now I wish that I'd tried to capture the glass "battlements" at the top of the tower, or the huge gothic-glass archways that are the entrance to the main tower, but the sky reflected in the building's face just really grabbed my attention, so this is what I got:

I especially like the way the light and shadows play on the top of the tower in the first two, and the reflection of that big ol' cloud in the third. There's something about the angle at which I got that third shot that's slightly disconcerting, isn't there? Like maybe the perspective is off or something? Lemme know what you thing.

And Another Thing...

Well, the good news for this week is that I've got a temp job, and it's paying better than I really expected here in Pittsburgh. The last time I temped in the city, the rates were around $9 and hour, but for this gig I'm making a couple bucks more. Better than I expected, and certainly better than nothing! Thankfully, the Talent Group (my agents) went into high gear when the found out I was back, and I've already had a bevy of auditions, with more to come. So life isn't totally desperate, and it's nice to be back here among supportive, loving friends. I think the only thing about New York that I didn't like was the fact that my friends weren't there.

By the way, I don't think I ever shared this with you: Someone (and no, I can't remember who) clued me in to this really cool website, www.globexplorer.com, where you can get aerial photographs of addresses that you plug in. It's amazingly cool, if, I suppose, you happen to be as big a geek as me! Anyway, while I was still there, I plugged in the address at which I was staying in New York, and the picture came up in color! Most of the aerial shots I'd seen were in black & white. Anyway, check these out:

The apartment on Fort George Hill, in NYC.

Gavan's home in Pittsburgh. I used to refer to it as Chateau PamerSchulz. I guess
that's got to come to an end, huh?

The Odyssey

It's been an age and a half since I've journalized here, though I've been doing it in the actual physical journal a lot. Lots of feelings I can't really share with the world at large. Or at least would feel stupid and embarrassed to tell the world at large.

So where do I stand? Pretty much the same place that I did the last time I journaled. My attempts to pawn the computer were shot down in flames. I visited ten pawnshops and the most any of them would offer me was $200. For a computer I paid $2500 just three short months ago. "They're obsolete so quickly," they all said. Well, $200 wasn't going to solve my problems, so I didn't bother.

I'm back in Pittsburgh, now. I flew back home on the evening of July 4th, and doing so ate up the last of my money. Who knew that there was a $75 fee when you book a Dividend Miles flight with less than 14 days notice? Clearly, not me. Anyway, I loaded as much stuff as I could into one piece of luggage and dragged that luggage and my shoulder-bag out of the apartment, onto the downtown 1/9 train, from the 1/9 train to the uptown 2/3 train, and then switched at 125th Street to the M60 bus to La Guardia airport. Said switch involved hauling this huge-ass piece of genius packing job I did up out of the subway and onto the street level before cramming myself onto that bus. My stroke of luck for the day was when the M60 happened to be traveling very lightly loaded, it being a holiday and all.

So I got to the airport, and made my way to the check in counter. I paid my $75 fee, and hauled my bag up onto the little counter to check it, only to discover that the lovely ticket service agent had decided it seemed a little heavy, and wanted to weigh it. Did you know that US Airways limits each piece of luggage to 70 pounds? I didn't. And mine weighed 86. It was an amazing packing job, if I may say so myself. So my dilemma was to lighten it by 16 pounds or pay $75 penalty. It would seem that the airline thinks seventy-five is a nice, round number. Luckily for me, I happened to have packed my knapsack in the bag, so I lightened the load by exactly 16.5 pounds, and sent my bag on its way. Then I went off in search of food, carrying two carry-ons instead of the one I'd planned on.

Earlier in the day, I had gotten a call from Amy Hartman, who was supposed to pick me up at the airport. What hadn't occurred to either of us is that she lives on Mt. Washington, which is the place where everyone in Pittsburgh goes to watch the annual fireworks display. Consequently, there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell that she was getting on or off that mountain, since the crowds start gathering in the early afternoon. So I put in a call to Gavan to see if he could pick me up.

While I was wandering around the airport, looking for something to eat, Gavan called me back. He'd just gotten the message and was already at his friend Kathy's party. I felt guilty about asking him to leave, so I told him I'd take the bus home. Kathy kindly suggested that they come and pick me up and then we all go off to see fireworks, but it seemed to me that by the time they got to the airport, picked me up, and made it anywhere, the fireworks would be long over, so I passed and wished them all a happy 4th.

Eventually, I got my flight and got into Pittsburgh. I collected my bag and went to wait for the ol' 28X bus. It runs from the airport, along the west busway, to a stop just at the bottom of the hill from Gavan's place. Unfortunately, when the bus arrived, it turned out to be one of those commuter jobbies without a luggage rack, so I had to squeeze my luggage (all three bags worth) down a tiny aisle barely large enough for me, and take up a couple of seats. And don't you just know that bus was packed. I can't count the number of people I whacked with that luggage. I wasn't, to say the least, very popular. When I finally got to my stop, I dragged my shit down the aisle, nearly herniating myself the whole time, and started down the steps of the bus. It's at that point that the strap on my knapsack broke, I tripped, and went ass-over-tincups down the stairwell and out the door. The bus driver offered a cursory "Are you alright?" before the bus doors slammed shut and she sped away.

But my tale doesn't end there, friends! I'm still not home!!!

So there I was, with 70 pounds worth of suitcase, 16 pounds worth of broken knapsack, and probably 20 pounds worth of shoulderbag, all of which had to be hauled up the hill to Gavan's house. I never knew that a quarter of a mile could seem so damn far. I've never sweat so much, or cursed so much, or paused for breath so much in all my life!

But eventually I made it, and I settled into a guest bedroom here. I'm looking forward to a fresh start. Wish me luck.