photo by me

It is 2:35 in the afternoon, on a Sunday, and I’m still in my pajamas.

Hell, I’m still lounging around in bed.

I’ve gotten up, straightened a few things, done a load of dishes, and eaten, but I’ve come back to bed.

When I’m stressed or tired or bored, I watch movies. They please me. They take me away.

My sister and brother-in-law recently traded me a 48″ widescreen HDTV for a laptop. So now I have the perfect television for movies – and it’s parked in my bedroom, along with my TIVO.

I’m watching movies today. I don’t know if I’m stressed. Or bored. Or anything. I know I’m tired. Mostly because I fall asleep during the movies and wake up, pause, then fall asleep again. When I awake, I rewind and watch until I fall asleep again.

Today’s movies are full of artists. And they are making me think.

I’ve read in all of the blogging “how-tos” that you shouldn’t blog more than once a day. That you should keep to topics. That you should do this or that or whatever. Well, heck, my audience is so dang small and y’all pretty much know me that I’m guessing you’re okay if I don’t follow the “rules” of blogging.

So what does this have to do with movies? Writing, my dears, writing.

The first movie had nothing to do with writing but it was about an artist wanting to break free. Double Happiness (1994) stars Sandra Oh as a would-be actress growing up in a traditional Chinese home but in a very progressive Canadian life. She is trying to come to terms with being true to herself and her family.

The second movie, Bright Young Things (2003) is about a writer who is trying to save up money to marry his sweetheart. In the process of saving money, he becomes a gossip columnist, a down-on-his-luck writer, and a soldier. It is set in 1930s London and has all of the appeal of the decadent ages – lots of drink, money, witty repartee, and covert happenings.

Finally, I just finished watching Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994). It is about the vibrant, amazing Dorothy Parker and her friends of the Algonquin Round Table, set in the 1920s.

And this is what is making me think. If I were alive during that time, would I have been writing and being witty with all of them or am I just not brave enough to do that? Do I live too far from where things are happening to make things happen? Am I not good enough to be recognized for the things I love doing? How do you start? How do you break in? How do you meet the people who do these things and how do you become a part of that inner circle so you can do them, too?

It’s not just about writing or photography or art, in particular. It’s about anything. What is your passion? What have you always wanted to do? Do you wonder how to get that “big break”? Do you wonder how others do it?

It always seems to happen in New York or Chicago or Los Angeles. Do I *really* have to live in a huge city to make it? Aren’t there other ways?

I’m blaming this post on Erin who has gotten me to think more about movies lately. While I’ve often thought about them and their messages, I haven’t often written on that. So I blame her. Heh.

And because it’s Sunday and I always post poetry on Sundays (and there is one directly below, if you haven’t already seen it), here is another. From the formidable Mrs. Parker:

Symptom Recital

I do not like my state of mind;
I’m bitter, querulous, unkind.
I hate my legs, I hate my hands,
I do not yearn for lovelier lands.
I dread the dawn’s recurrent light;
I hate to go to bed at night.
I snoot at simple, earnest folk.
I cannot take the gentlest joke.
I find no peace in paint or type.
My world is but a lot of tripe.
I’m disillusioned, empty-breasted.
For what I think, I’d be arrested.
I am not sick, I am not well.
My quondam dreams are shot to hell.
My soul is crushed, my spirit sore;
I do not like me any more.
I cavil, quarrel, grumble, grouse.
I ponder on the narrow house.
I shudder at the thought of men….
I’m due to fall in love again.