Independent Feature Film

Why so serious?

I'm not quoting the Joker but a voice in my head, "Why so serious?"

Are people running out of reasons to be happy? Or they subconsciously like not being happy so they can have a reason to complain.

I've found myself walking a lot in the last few months and the faces I see in the streets are all the same, sulky and serious. Hundreds of people walking in the same street but they all are alone, they don't even look at each other. Everyone seem so sad, it's strange. They just walk and occasionally bump into others but even then nothing changes. The other day a young woman bumped into me and she didn't even look at me, she made a twirl and walked away, it was so odd.

I wonder how I look when I walk, I think I tend to adapt in the environment and sometimes I catch myself being serious too and then I just smile because, that's simply how I am. I'm positive. I'm thinking, "I'm alive in this moment, standing on this planet, I am just a small piece on this vast puzzle that is the universe," true story. There's nothing wrong with smiling, it makes you feel better even if you're not the happiest person right now.

Everything Changes

Well, it seems like yesterday that we were celebrating the New Year. Time flies so quickly, before you know it you are fifty, married with two children and a grandchild on the way, oh wait. I’m not even thirty yet, I should probably slow down..

I've heard this line so many times, people say “life’s a journey,” I suppose it is, but I keep thinking, why can I jump to the end and see what happens? But the cool part about life is, the journey, right? Ehh, I guess.

Do you remember the second day at school? No. Do you remember the second day at your new job? No. Do you remember the second day at your new-new job? No, no. Exactly, me neither, I remember the first. First day at school, I didn't want to be there and I was crying outside my class and then, it’s a blur. Well I was five. First day at my new job, it was so awkward and again I didn't want to be there. That feeling didn't go away so a year and a few months later I was on my way for the first day at my new-new job. Which was less awkward and surprisingly fun. The second day.. I've no idea how it went.

My brain works in patterns, I don’t know if it’s normal or not but it’s a fact. When I start doing something I have to finish it, I simply can’t leave something in the middle and say that I will get back to it in a month or two. I will have the feeling that I left something unfinished and I have to finish it or else, there’s no way around it, I have to finish what I started.

New beginning, how many times have you heard that before, or said it yourself. I do it all the time, every new month it’s a new beginning for something, I set dates for new beginnings and the top new beginning date, it’s always January 1st, (and yet here I am on the second day of the New Year).

I kind of lost you here right? How does paragraphs 2, 4 and 5 correlate? Paragraph 1 was a silly introduction and 3 was just a fact that maybe nobody but me cares about.

Here’s how. We all believe in fairy tales in our own way, that’s why we count down to twelve o’clock on New Year’s Eve. That's the basic fairy tale rule, when the clock strikes midnight, everything changes. We start a new beginning in our life’s journey and we always remember that first day.

Every year 10 days before Christmas

This Saturday, I mean this pass Saturday was the day. The same day, or rather date, that comes every year 10 days before Christmas.

My birthday, I hate it. I don't tell anyone and when someone asks me when my birthday is, I try to avoid saying. I just don't like the attention that this day creates, it's odd and it's not like I'm winning anything.

I turned 28 and sometimes I think I'm old just because of the size of that number which is not huge anyway, I'm simply acting paranoid about it. I don't feel old, I feel the same, like a stupid twelve year old in an emotionally traumatized grown-up world.

I never liked celebrating my birthday and I never got the point of celebrating it either. I guess people are always trying to find ways to distract their lives with celebrations just to make themselves feel special for a moment, or maybe I'm too melancholic to understand them. I'm not saying it's bad to celebrate, but, take it easy.

A decade ago I would think that being almost 30 it's like being too old, but now I see things the way they are and being almost 30 is not such a big deal. Obviously what matters is the life you live, the way you value your life, if you are happy and if you are doing all the things that you've always wanted to do. Well, I've decided to make a list, a list of all the things I want to do before I turn 30, I'm gonna finish the list by the end of the year and I'm gonna start doing those things in the next two years. Why not, everyone should be doing something like this, it keeps you motivated.

Age is just a number after all.

The Sleepless | Part 2

After excessive studies and hundreds of sleepless hours eating ice-cream, peach yogurt and chocolate bars after midnight, I came up with the reason I believe is the root of, whatever goes wrong with my shutting down system, and that is, I have too much energy and I don't get tired enough during the day to spend that energy resulting to, being sleepless.

I didn't wake up this morning, because I didn't sleep last night. I came up with an idea to force myself to sleep when I want too. I'm trying to tire myself by not sleeping at all at night so the following night I will be really tired and sleep right away, and it works. For that night only. It's always weird though when you go from one day to the next without sleeping, you feel strange like something is not right and you have a sense of confusion, it's odd.

Some people have a sleep-switch, as soon as they want to go to sleep, they shut down immediately. They switch off just like that. My explanation is that my brain functions in patterns, so if it's not sleep-time there's no sleeping for me.

I notice this pattern thing all the time, but more of that in another post..

The positive part about being sleepless, yes there is one, is that you're all alone and you can think and analyze staff. It's quiet and moody and for some reason you see things differently, if you go through sleepless nights too you know what I'm talking about.

There isn't a right and wrong time to go to sleep, but when you can't sleep at the time you want to, that's a b!tch.

The Sleepless | Part 1

I looked it up, the dictionary says this,

sleep+less

a. Marked by a lack of sleep.

b. Unable to sleep.

I don't know why I looked it up, I most definitely don't need a dictionary to learn the definition of "sleepless." Well I did it because I was sleepless, I think it was 3 in the morning and I was pointlessly walking around the house trying to somehow excuse my sleeplessness by doing something meaningful, or I was just kidding myself.

On the shelf next to the dictionary I found this book about The ancient legends and mythology creatures, I don't even remember buying this book. I was going though this book and the strangest thing happen, I found a treasure map, dug a hole in the middle of the living room and found a casket full of golden coins.. Ehh.. I wish, at least it would be more interesting than, nothing. So I was going though this book and the interesting thing was a story I read about this Pharaoh in ancient Egypt and his wife and his devious brother that was trying to kill him and take over his kingdom. In the end he made it and killed the Pharaoh but the wife brought him back to life in some kind of a ritual and the brother was exiled from the kingdom and everyone lived happily ever after. I thought only fairy tales ended like that, but what do I know?

I walked round and around the living room furniture a few times and then I tried again going to sleep, but I would just turn just turn over and over for another two hours.

The thing is that, eventually I do sleep, I'm not insomniac, but at 4 or 5 in the morning and then wake up at 11 or 12 at noon. The problem is I can't sleep when I want to sleep, even if I turn off the lights, go to bed and close my eyes, if it's still midnight, I can't sleep. Period.

Continued.. (on Thursday)

I've always wanted a typewriter | Part 2

"Click," "click," "click," pause, "click," "click," "click," "click," full stop "click."

Writing on a typewriter is striking, you have to push the buttons harder and it's noisier and you feel like you're somewhere between the 19th and 20th century, as possible as that may be. I’m loosing the point again, what is wrong with me? Back to the metaphor after the paragraph break.

There's a page on your typewriter, what is the last phrase at the point where you are on that page? Does it say, "today was wonderful," or "today was ok," "interesting day," good day turned bad." You can't have a great day, every day. Does it say, "every day is awful," "worse day of my life" and every sentence has mistypes? In this case, you're in the red zone, put your oxygen mask on because you're going down.

There's a phrase I've always wanted to write but I haven't yet, "I will remember this day forever." I've had good days that I will remember forever, I'm not miserable, just melancholic. But this day that I will write that, it has to be the day to remember. I know I can't plan a perfect day, I don't live in a land far far away and it's not up to me at all to have a great day but if I'm pursuing it hopefully I will find it.

You can always put on a clear page and start writing something new. Begin a new chapter and challenge yourself and do something different. I like to see things my way and I always do way the voices in my head tell me to do, and I say, go for the "A" FIX. Just change the f#cking page and start a new chapter. A new beginning is always hard but staying on the same page is even worse when you don't like it. I've done it quite a few times by now, it's always scary at the start but then, you see the sunshine. I haven’t seen it yet but I’m pretty sure it’s out there.

Your life is like a typewriter and the words you write on the empty pages are the choices you make, so you're either gonna write a one chapter book that will end up on sad dusty shelf, or a happy multi chapter bestseller (full stop "click")

I've always wanted a typewriter | Part 1

I'm afraid of typewriters sometimes, not really but I have a tendency to fear them, not the actual machine but the figurative sense of its portrayal in the following metaphor. I'm not making any sense so far, so I will try to clear things out in just one sentence.

Imagine your life as an empty page on a typewriter, start writing and if you make a mistake, good luck trying to fix it.

THE "A" FIX. You'd have to put a new page in the typewriter and write everything from the start and be more careful this time, you will hear a voice coming from the back of your head whispering "be cautious, be cautious."

THE "B" FIX. You could correct your "mistyping" with a tipp-ex and move on.

Got it? Ehh.. Not as clear as I should be yet, I'll try a different angle.

I've always wanted to own a typewriter, but by the time I started writing they had almost been extinct, they're like the dinosaurs of typing and you know what happen to the dinosaurs, they went "bye, bye." You can only find one in a museum, or Jurassic Park. I'm getting out of point again, so I'll jump back to it.

The "B" FIX is the usual choice, no one wants to start over from the beginning because of a small mistake, "a moment of weakness" as they call it or a "thoughtless moment." It's not a bad thing anyway, to give someone a second chance.

The "A" FIX is the daring one, changing the page and starting over, letting go. Life isn't black and white, even if the weather is, don't mind the weather part, I'm just grumbling because I haven't seen a sunny day for a week now. Even so, when the rain is over you'll see a rainbow in the sky, and that means black and white are gone.. Not yet, it's still raining.

Continued.. (on Friday)

"We need to talk" | Part 2

She slammed the door behind her as she left. Hazel. That was her name. Hazel.

Her parents named her after her eyes, Hazel. Yeah, her parents are odd. If her eyes were blue, they would name her Blue. That would a be beautifully odd way to be named after. The odds weren't many on blue though, they both have hazel-ish brown eyes.

There was something about her eyes, if you looked at them up close they've always reminded me of a stunning image of the Milky Way I saw few years ago, but with a black spot in the center of the galaxy instead of light. She always thought it was creepy of me to stare in her eyes like they were a telescope to space.

Wait.. I have to pause and think of something different, or I can call her and.. and what? I should shut up and deal with it. Maybe I have to go somewhere hot and sunny. But I know that's not gonna happen, it's just my mind playing tricks on me, thinking that if I go somewhere else suddenly my troubles will vanish away.

I've done it before, had a nice vacation, but as far as troubles fleeing, nope. Only for a moment when you're sitting at the beach and notice that random beautiful girl in the wet swimsuit with her boobs intentionally revealing the most of 'em, walking in slow motion. (True story, I couldn't have forged that), and then she's gone, and.. "SLAP!" in the face, your troubles are still there.

Some things happen at the right time when you are ready to start something new, or pushed towards starting something new, it's like the perfect timing event that leads you to a new direction. Or it's all just an excuse for everything that happen.

Either way, I have no other choice but to choose, what I'm gonna do, next. So I said to myself, "we need to talk," and we did, we always have good talks together, he gets me in most cases. And we decided not to call Hazel, it was my decision to break it off anyways, so what's done is done. She hasn't called me either, she came and took her staff though at a time that she knew I wouldn't be at home, it's been three weeks, since..

I didn't try fleeing this time, instead I started writing a journal.

"We need to talk" | Part 1

"We need to talk", that's how this kind of conversation always starts right? And then it pretty much goes like this. "Listen, this is the honest truth about us whether you have already realized it or not, or don't want to. You and me, this.. us, it doesn't work. I like you, I really, truly like you but.. we suck together. I'm white, you're black, I'm summer, you're winter, you get the contrast. We can still be friends, (or not, that's my awkwardness talking). I can't be the only one that feels like this, don't you.. feel, the incompatibility, between us?"

And then follows a minute or two of the awkward silence.. I'm stunned, I never thought I'd say these things to anyone and yet here she is, looking at me speechless. I can tell she's boiling inside, ready to explode any second. Her eyebrows are frowned like she doesn't have a clue what I'm talking about.

Her turn. Blah, blah, blah, all the things I did for you, and.. What? What the f*ck is she saying? "I never expected to hear this from you."

What does she think, she has a monopoly on braking up? Ok, I'll back it up a bit, five months back to be more precise, she asked me to give her some time to be alone and think about what she wants to do with her life, bull-crap if you ask me. Yeah, I'm glad you agree. She was at bars every night having fun and flirting with guys, I wasn't spying on her, I was around.. randomly at the same place, the same time, staff like that happen, in movies usually.. Ok, I was spying on her and on my defense she was selling me crap. She just wanted to spent more time with her girlfriends and go out more, well she could just say it, I wouldn't lock her away in a castle. I believe the jury agree with me that, there's nothing wrong with being honest. I'm not perfect, no one is, but I'm pretty close to perfection, (that was a joke).

So, we started yelling at each other and ten minutes later she took her bag and slammed the door behind her as she left.

One year, two months and a dozen hours and in a few minutes it was over. We really were black and white and even though in chemistry they say two opposites attract each other, in our case the chemical reaction went "boom," like comic book style "BOOM!"

Continued.. (on Friday)