Staying true to your Big Truth

I didn't know Loretta Palazzo personally back in her L.A. days, but I knew who she was. Most of us on the commercial acting circuit probably did, when your day job is casting director, a lot of Beer Chicks, Gen-Y Geeks and Gap-Casual Moms tend to know your name. But Loretta was memorable even in our world, and not just because she stood out in a sartorial sense. Putting aside her cat's-eye glasses, red-red lipstick and fantabulous retro-cool wardrobe (which, seemingly, held no duplication of outfits), Loretta was Loretta in spades. I have no idea how happy or unhappy she was with her life here, but she seemed centered in herself in a way that 99.99% of the people you meet here in Hollywood do not. And as far as I'm concerned, that puts you ahead of the game no matter where you're parking your carcass.

So I guess I wasn't especially surprised when I cracked open my new-favorite magazine, Budget Living, and saw Loretta's new life far, far from Hollywood splashed across its pages. There's a lot of churn here in The Place That Isn't A Place; most of us who come out here to pursue some Hollywood-y type of activity end up getting out sooner or later, and the high-tailing-it is pretty evenly distributed across the zero - to - medium-high success levels (although if you ever have the misfortune of screening a film with an auditorium full of SAG members, you'd think that every scraggly-ass background freakazoid who never worked was still living here).

Still, I was impressed by the manifestation of the life which Loretta and her now-husband, Matt Maranian (former character actor and co-author of the excellent off-kilter guide, L.A. Bizarro), dreamed up for themselves. It's aesthetically pleasing, yes (frankly, I'm ready to move in if the happy couple will have me) but what really knocks me out is the way their energy crackles off the page, both in the text and the photos. Clearly, these two remarkable people will settle for nothing less than exactly what they want, albeit in a quiet, self-assured way.

Compare that to the lives of not-so-quiet desperation led by so many of the denizens of La-La, and you start to see how radical Loretta and Matt and their bohemian, Vermonter lifestyle really are. They are in clear and firm possession of their own truth, it would appear, and were even before they piled their stuff in a truck and headed East.

I'm sensitive to this, you see; for a proponent of change, I'm often woefully slow to embrace it. It took me ten years to leave a business I knew I loathed after the first six months; similarly, I've overstayed my welcome in too many relationships out of a fear that to do otherwise would be an admission of weakness. Or maybe just out of fear, period.

Of course, the universe loves to use the ego-driven as its own, personal punching bags. After a series of blows to the head, heart and guts, I'd like to think I've taken the note, as we say in the trade.

But just to be on the safe side, I'm clipping these fine pages and slipping them into my 3-ring Super-Virgo binder of reminders. And if I ever feel myself forgetting the importance of checking in to see where I really and truly am (not to mention the magnificence of what can happen if I'm brave enough to be true to it) I can flip to those pages for a little reminder.

Of course, sometimes I think it'd be more expedient just to whap my big, fat, stoopit head with the thing. But you know, I'm also working on another little virtue called "patience."

Hopefully, as the saying so wryly goes, I'll hurry up and get some.

xxx c

PHOTOS: Douglas Friedman

MORE ON THE MOVE from Renaissance Matt in this article from SouthernVermont.com.

Working 'clean'

In the end, the people who do what they believe in, who have something to believe in... in the end, they last longer.—Hugh MacLeod

Hugh MacLeod posts a little story today about a smart guy who lost his job for the right reason: he stayed true to his beliefs rather than the party line. The details of the story, and of Hugh's post, have to do with marketing and PR and the future of both; that's nominally what Hugh's about, and he's much better at defining his niche and sticking to it than I am (unless you can call "crazy generalist" a niche, in which case I'm on target 100% of the time).

But the nugget, the juice, the moral of the story is universal: in the end, the people who stay in touch with their own truth and make sure what they're doing aligns with that truth... in the end, hell, in the beginning and middle, too, although it may not seem so by traditional markers, they win. Maybe not at a particular job or relationship or pursuit, but in the über-sense: at work, at love, at life.

I talk a lot about how much I hated being in advertising; even more often, I club myself over the head about all those wasted years writing copy and sitting in stoopit meetings. But the truth is, up until my last few months as an employee, I always believed fervently in some aspect of what I was doing. (What can I say? I'm a dazzling mix of optimist and asshole.) And so really, on some level, I was right to stay; there was something still to be gained from the experience. (I am also a dazzling mix of 'slow' and 'learner'.)

To keep myself honest about where things sit on my own appropriateness spectrum for dharmic happiness, I've adopted a mantra that's also a helpful metaphor: work clean.

In the world of contamination control, "working clean" is methodology for keeping product or results pure; in the world of the communicatrix, it's about shining the cold, hard light of truth on anything and everything, then following through with the appropriate action in a timely fashion. (In the world of standup comedy, it's about making the joke safe for Christians and network television, but I'm strictly an agnostic, cable-viewing type.)

Once I'd put the idea of "working clean" in my head, it became harder to ignore the insalubrious and simpler figuring out what to do about it. Not easier, but simpler. (More pain and confusion has resulted from people confusing those two words than any other pair, with the possible exception of "love" and "lust".) Admitting that Being An Actress is no longer fulfilling the way it was 10 years ago has not been easy, but the truth of it is (painfully) clear and defining future actions much, much simpler and even, lord help me, kind of fun. Ending my last two relationships wasn't exactly what I'd characterize as "easy" (or fun, while we're at it), but man oh man, the swiftness and precision with which I was able to do it not only was humane, but downright elegant. You gotta love that.

Especially when you compare it to the exquisite misery I managed to make last for months or even years at a time in my younger, cloudier days. I don't know who I thought I was doing a favor by ignoring the gigantic elephant crapping in the corner, but it wasn't me. And given the volume and potency of elephant crap, it probably wasn't anyone else in the room with me, either.

Of course, this is all a work in progress. Learning where the light switch is (or, in the case of elephant crap, the push-broom and the Lysol) is only half of the equation. And I'd be a big, fat, un-clean-working liar if I said my life was the streamlined, aerodynamic model of zen efficiency I long for it to be. Working clean is a tool, but it's not a magic wand that's changed my life.

It has, however, made me much happier living it, dirt, elephant crap and all.

xxx c

UPDATE: David Parmet, the subject of Hugh's post, found this little entry via gapingvoid and posted a lovely comment below. What a man of grace! And smarts, too!

Anyone reading this who's in a position to help David out, either with leads or a big fat juicy PR/marketing job please do yourself a favor and jump on it. Let us create beautiful blog symmetry: fired for blog, rewarded tenfold by blog.

You can find David via his (non-marketing) blog here, or via email at david - at - parmet - dot - net. Merci!

Sometimes joy is the work

About two years ago, when I'd recovered enough from the Crohn's to get out and about but not enough to do it for more than an hour or so at a time nor in combination with anything physically taxing like breathing, I undertook an experiment of sorts with my friend, Lisa. Lisa, like Debbie, Jan, the other Jan and most friends of great consequence in my life, is very good at lavishing time and money on herself, which sounds like a witty snipe but is, coming from me, the highest type of compliment. The product of a workaholic father who equated financial worth with the personal kind and an alcoholic mother whose money-management skills were so finely honed that she died $70,000 in debt, it took more than a little effort to pry a buck from my hands or me from behind the desk where I made it.

On the other end of the work-play spectrum, Lisa, who at that point would have chosen "chew own arm off" if given the choice between that and "clip coupon," was very good at buying retail, socializing in trendy bars and hosting "Sex and the City" parties at her well-appointed, fashionably-located, cable-TV-equipped bachelorette pad, at least, when she wasn't giving herself stomache aches over where next month's rent was coming from.

You get the picture.

So I'm hanging out with ol' Lisa (who is quite a bit younger than me, by the way, and therefore not old at all, except maybe to a third grader) and we hatch this plan: we're going to give each other assignments. One a week, every week, for an open-ended number of weeks, until we feel like some much-needed good habits are seeded. Lisa got assignments like "balance checkbook" or "find checkbook." I got assignments like "go to bookstore, browse for a minimum of one hour and buy at least one book for entertainment purposes only" because she knew if I was merely instructed to get a book for pleasure I would have opened the "to read" file in my Palm, found the titles of five or six instructive manuals on composting (you know, for when I eventually own a house with a backyard) and ordered them to be delivered to my branch library.

After much initial resistance all around, I'm happy to report that the experiment was largely a success. Lisa turned her hateful job into a career she loves and has her finances so well in hand that she recently added both call waiting and DSL after doing, o joy of joys, a comparative cost analysis of her telephony services. For my part, I not only bought myself a new car, a painting and digital cable (with HBO!!!), I actually got a second box so I could watch quality programming like "The Simpsons," "Law & Order" and reality TV on my G5, sometimes even when i wasn't working!

I was reminded of The Experiment last night while visiting my writing partner, a.k.a. The Other Jan. We'd finished working on our pilot and I was relaxing with a glass or three of wine after a delicious meal (which she cooked for us while I yakked on the phone), and now we were parked on her sofa to discuss the (free) seminar she'd taken last weekend. Taught by our former acting coach, it was, apparently, a compendium of The Forum and Lifestream and a few other all-Kool-Aid-drenched-roads-lead-to-Rome methods of self-actualization, but I was interested because (a) for the first time in the three years I've known her, The Other Jan is actually talking about quitting smoking and (b) I adhere to the tenet "Love the idea, hate the idealogue."

I got the Reader's Digest version, but there was still a lot of planning and thinking and writing, and at the end of our hour, I had a list of no less than 27 things I had to do to make myself a better person. Tomorrow. It's tiring stuff, this self-improvement, so we knocked back a couple of episodes of my new-favorite show and called it a night.

But a funny thing happened when I left TOJ's. Instead of being excited about the program, I felt a little anxious and depressed. They were all good actions, and eminently reasonable ones to take if I wanted to achieve the goals I'd established for myself, but something about them felt wrong. Too familiar. Too much work, not enough joy.

And then it hit me: for my particular goal, they were too much work. If my aim is (HUBRIS ALERT! HUBRIS ALERT!) to become a joyful conduit of truth and beauty in the world, maybe I'd be better served by focusing a little less on working at truth and a little more on the joy and beauty part. Not to say that a plan isn't great and work isn't necessary, but for overachieving micromanagers like myself, sometimes joy is the work and not-planning, an infinitely better plan.

So instead of working on my 27 things this morning, I slept in. And this afternoon, I played (not practiced) a little piano and baked a little SCD bread. I took myself to the bookstore and bought a stack of books. Of course, it was the used bookstore and I "bought" them with a credit, but they're mostly fun books (if you can call Sinclair Lewis "fun") and I spent one whole hour poking around the bookstore looking for them. And no, technically, I'm no closer to my life's purpose for it. But my self feels greatly improved, which is usually not the case at the end of a long, busy Saturday. Which makes me think that there's something to this doing less thing, or at least, a balance of doing-less with overdoing.

And now, if you'll excuse me, my book and I have an appointment with a large vodka-rocks in a long, hot bath...

xxx c

Photo by Tom-Tom via Flickr, used under a Creative Commons license

A home of one's own, Part II.

Several years ago, while I was going though an unusual confluence of broke (career change), unemployed (cataclysmically idiotic SAG commercial strike) and dork (freshly discovered love of computers), I stumbled upon a little time-suckage device called "Epinions." Much like the blogosphere, Epinions was a virtual community where like-minded souls could: (a) "meet"; (b) exchange ideas; and (c) engage in conversation or debate, lively or otherwise (depending on the mindset of aforementioned souls). Nominally, we were all there to provide consumer information in the form of product and service reviews, but for many of us, especially those of us who reviewed less popular and hence, less profitable items, the real draw was (O, Hubris, thy Name is communicatrix) intellectual stimulation.

Of course, Change, merry prankster that he is, swooped in soon enough and decimated our virtual village. Egregious mismanagement and the incessant, petty shitcanning of reviews as "off-topic", off-color, or just plain smart-alecky by the newly established Asshole Majority drove most of the people I liked to go home and take their balls (ha!) with them. Sad, sad, sad. I left my old reviews on the site (ten bucks a year is ten bucks a year) but the joy had gone out of posting and my involvement with Epinions dwindled to the occasional stray email commenting on my most popular review and my subsequent reply.

I suppose there was a blogosphere back then, too, but as a carbuncle firmly planted on the butt-end of the Early Adopter demographic, it was not yet my time to explore it. Plus, the UIs were ugly. (Sorry, but they were.) Besides, the strike ended, I started booking like a maniac and I had a little cashola with which to shop again. (Also, because the Universe is nothing if not generous, my live-in relationship helpfully went on Orange Alert, thereby providing me with a seemlingly limitless source of time-suckage with no lengthy dial-up waits. But that is another story for another day.)

But the demise of Epinions left a void in my life and me and nature, we abhor a vacuum. I threw myself into my theater company (and, as a guest, anyone else's who'd have me); later, post-Crohn's, I became similarly obsessive about my involvement with the SCD Listserv, starting with rapacious reading at the front end of my illness curve, progressing to righteous diatribes on the necessity of "fanatical adherence" and the breathless posting of SCD "convenience food" discoveries (when you have to cook everything yourself, individually wrapped Baby Bel cheeses are indeed, a revelation).

In the end, though, it was no use. These groups I joined were...well, groups. And try as I might to fit in, I'm a freak, I'm a loner, I'm a lover, I'm a fighter, I'm everything but a joiner. Granted, when forced to attend large, festive gatherings I've gotten much, much better at imitating a person enjoying herself, but inside, my heart is gripped by fear and my brain is ticking off the minutes until I can safely escape to the blessed solitude of my car, my cave, or both. Whatever the reason, I just do better one-on-one, if not just plain one.

So here I am, several years later, blogging away. And while I've blogged about why I blog and blogged about my need for a safe space to explore my truth, I don't think it's even occurred to me until this very day how much I blog because it's become my artistic home, a safe house to play in conveniently located in a community full of like-minded souls whom I can visit for inspiration or companionship and from whom I can retreat into solitude as my spirit requires. Evelyn Rodriquez is there with sound advice or food for thought when I need her and cool when I need me some "me" time. (And vice-versa, of course.) Half-Mad Spinster went away on sabbatical for goodly chunk of time (and came back Half-Mad Married Lady!), but good neighbors that we are, we dropped by occasionally to make sure her house was still standing, and then, upon her return, welcomed her with much rejoicing if not a real-live shindig. Blogging is a two-way street (albeit a really long, twisty one that goes on and on and curls back on itself in unexpected ways). And my blog is a little live/work studio on that street.

So I (ahem) bang away here in my little bloggy space, making what I will of it. I thank you all (or, more appropriately, you both) for stopping by every once in awhile, mainly because it's fun but also because it forces me to keep things relatively clean and tidy.

And for those of you who dropped in accidentally, say, on your way to "'WOMEN SLAPPING' AND DOMINATION" or "black camel toe xxx", well, the door's to your left.

xxx c

Illness, wellness and a guy from Cymru

It is hard to undo a lifetime of bad habits. For most of my years on the planet, I favored the power-through method of life management, recklessly using whatever tools I had at my disposal, caffeine, various unregulated pharmaceuticals, my considerable will, to do so. It's a dangerous combination, that mix of stubbornness and not-enough-ness that many of us seem to be gifted with. Very easy to do yourself considerable damage without even realizing you're doing it.

And now, heading into Week Four of being laid low by some virus/bug/whatever, my own stupidity is clanging madly in that space between my ears. Why did I think it was a good idea to hit the gym twice last week when I needed a cup of coffee each time to do it? Why do I say "yes" to yet another project/outing/favor when most days I'm too tired to wash a sinkful of dishes? And mostly, Why am I not well? Why me? What did I do to deserve this?

Well, I know exactly what I did, how long I did it for and even why I chose to do it in the face of all reasonable evidence that I should not. People with weakened immune systems cannot get away with the kinds of shenanigans that people with healthy immune systems can. Period. And yet I insist upon trying to sneak one more infraction by my poor, hobbled body, one more class, one more meeting, one more cocktail with a friend. So, to paraphrase a thousand woo-woo wits, I will continue to receive the same lesson in different forms until I choose to learn it: Crohn's disease, the cold that won't go away and perhaps (oh, please, God, no) ME/CFS.

That would be the chronic fatigue disorder that Michael Nobbs was diagnosed with back in 1999. It crept up on him like the Crohn's crept up on me, but apparently, he kept on pushing through it for a few more years before he hipped himself to the reality that he might have to slow down a bit. I don't mean to sound superior, here; if wasting, fever and shitting two pints of blood hadn't kept me tethered to my bed, I'd have been pushing, too. (And in my way, I pushed, too, believe me.)

Anyway, I've a cold now (as the Brits would say), and have had (as they'd also say) for going on four weeks. I get a little better. I run out and do a million things. I get a little worse. I collapse, then rouse myself with a cup of drug-of-choice (coffee or tea, depending). I run out and do a million things. I collapse and retreat. Cancel everything. Rest. Feel a wee bit better. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

And Michael?

I wonder if I've been out and about just a bit too much and am finally paying for it. I've got a cold which seems to have gone to my chest. I'm hoping it won't last. I've been enjoying my regular visits to the outside world so much of late and don't want to have to give up on them again. No reason to of course. Everyone gets colds. They come and go. It's just I'm always very nervous about a complete health downturn and am hoping this won't be one.

Is it any wonder I fell in love reading his blog? I mean, if the wonderful drawings (that so remind me of the late, great, Louise Fitzhugh's) weren't enough, his deceptively simple, bell-clear descriptions of his heart's map would.

I've remarked on my obsessive crushes before; this time was no different. Greedily, I burned through much of Michael's site. Then I ordered a picture. Then I ordered his journal, which arrived yesterday, and which I greedily burned through in about ten minutes. Now I'm re-reading it slowly, the way Michael created it. Call it my zen meditation for today. Since the journal is so delightful, it's not a particularly effortful practice, which makes it a useful meditation for a hard-ass like myself.

I love the Internet. I lose hours here, not minding, stumbling upon interesting sites like Michael's that introduce me to even more interesting people, places and things. I also like the mirrors they hold up for me, complete with wonderful life hacks for crazy folk who have a tough time learning our lessons.

You will be doing Michael a solid if you buy his journal. It is hard enough earning a living sometimes when you are well enough to work; for the ill, it becomes exponentially more difficult. But really, you will be doing yourself a favor as well.

And me. Because I want The Beany to be so successful, the next issue comes out in colo(u)r.

xxx c

All images © 2002-2004 Michael Nobbs

"Stasis" is a four-letter word

While I don't suffer from any paralyzing fears, I do have a few sticky wickets I wrassle with on a fairly constant basis. One is a fear of unwarranted incarceration. While this fear is usually triggered by some random brush with authority (just seeing a police car upends the hairs on the back of my neck), I think I live with a low level of it all the time. And when life gets a little stressful, I know I'm bound for a repeat broadcast of the long-running nightmare where, after a brief trial complete with slo-mo judge's gavel crashing down to an accompanying basso "GUILTY!" I'm cuffed, hauled off and thrown behind bars that slam shut with a creaky, noir-ish clang. When I lived in New York back in the 1980s, I had a fear of getting bonked on the head, losing my memory and winding up wandering the streets with my shopping cart, so crazy I couldn't recognize my own face on the "missing" flyers, so filthy and worn with exposure that no one else could, either.

But my biggest fear (outside of rats eating my eyeballs, thanks a lot, George) is of winding up the female half of a calcified couple like the one I saw at a Palm Springs Denny's almost 20 years ago: more lonely together than I could ever be alone, my style frozen in time, my hair frozen, period. Of course, I know exactly from whence this springs*, I am not now nor have I ever been a daredevil. In fact, what I'd really like is for everything to stay exactly where it is so I can keep an eye on it, and no tricky stuff, either!

Knowing my predilection for stasis, to prevent ossification, I at least semi-regularly try to hurl myself into some perilous venture (acting, blogging, marriage); a couple of times, I've even hurled myself from an airplane (not bad, but really, a bit de trop around the edges).

I know I'm doing something good for me if I get a little of that vertiginous feel when I'm doing it. Walking to my first sewing class I felt mildly excited, but running fabric through the machine for the first time, my fingers mere millimeters from a mechanized needle, I felt my glucose level plummet. Likewise the first time I popped open the door on my G4 to tinker or traveled solo.

Sometimes I take to the change like a duck to water (Geek, meet Computer; Computer, Geek) and sometimes it takes a few trips up the coast to make the dizziness go away. Regardless, I figure the exercise keeps me flexible and the Alzheimer's at bay so like the kids say, it's all good.

Yesterday, however, it was great. With a capital G-R-E-A-T.

I'd run into my friend, David Bickford, at a New Year's Eve party. We'd just closed a show before the holidays and were discussing upcoming theatrical ventures. He's always got some new play going at his theater, but I'd already decided to sit out the next few at mine to work on my own show, #1 & #2, which my writing partner and I are in the midst of turning into a musical.

"A musical?" cried David, who is an excellent musician. "I didn't know you wrote music!"

"Neither did I," I cracked, because really, I don't.

"What do you compose on?" he asked, curious, since he's facile with guitar and piano (and several medieval instruments, too, no doubt).

"Um...I sing into a tape recorder and bring it to Rob or O-Lan," I sighed, because I do, and it makes me feel like an unempowered loser. "I wish I could learn enough piano to compose on."

"I teach piano to beginners!" he cried, following it up with several examples of students who were playing serious classical pieces after only one year starting from zero knowledge whatsoever.

So we hammered out some details, and I made my long & winding way up the canyon to David's little studio yesterday morning. The trip was harrowing, the parking, terrifying (he lives on one of those canyon "roads" that's really more like a bike path) so I was good and dizzy by the time I wandered in. And despite getting an inspirational mini-recital from the aformentioned classical novice (who really is excellent), I was still pretty spinny from all this left-hand/right-hand, don't-look-at-either-of-them drilling (which David did in the nicest of possible ways).

But when we busted out the guitars so he could show me how the scales actually worked, how they were the same no matter what instrument you picked up, how it was mathematical and logical and beautiful all at once...well, I could have grabbed his face in both hands and kissed him smack on the lips. Because while it wasn't all completely clear yet, I had that thrill of Getting It, that exciting peep under the tent at what things would be, could be like a year from now if I kept at it, of the world that might open up to me if I opened myself up enough to let it.

I was so happy, I felt like my heart might explode.

And you know, I wouldn't have been afraid if it had.

xxx c

UPDATE: *Oh, god. No pun intended, truly...groan...

A home of one's own, Part I.

For someone who grew up in the Bicycling Fish days of feminism, I have pedaled a surprising number of miles. Don't get me wrong: as any of my friends from as far back as Montessori will tell you, I've always been an independent cuss, happier playing on my own than with others, refusing assistance to a fault (you don't end up in the hospital for 11 days with 104ºF fever and bloody intestines because you're smart about asking for help). But independence is a funny thing. It's not just about things like making your own way (which I do) or buying your own place (which I have); it's about doing them in the right way, in the right time and with the right spirit. Too often in my past I did great things for lousy reasons. I threw myself into series of jobs I only sort of liked, turning them into a career I definitely didn't like, all to prove...what? That I was capable? That I was extraordinary? And to whom? A nameless, faceless crowd of People who, let's face it, couldn't really give a rat's patootie about my next big advertising move.

Likewise, while it shames me deeply, I've spent far too much time and energy looking for relationships, being in relationships, contorting myself to fit in outdated relationships than I have on my relationship with myself. Not just primary relationships, either, it was just as important to win the approval of a parent or a friend or the mail carrier as it was that of a lover. Even while I recognized this was not perhaps the most salubrious way to waltz through life, I couldn't stop myself: I had to exhaust myself. After 41 years of running, I collapsed. Fortunately, that time I not only let go and let God (or whomever, as I like to say), I let go of everything and I let everybody.

So many wonderful things have come out of the great good fortune of getting sick. I slowed down, for one; really, I had no other choice. I gained an acute appreciation for everything, and I do mean everything, in my life. Fundamentally, I learned to see and experience things in a different way, from the inside out rather than the backasswards way I'd been doing it for so many years.

And remarkably, things began to shift. I was more grateful for less money. My burning desire to Make It As An Actress turned into a profound respect for the ground I had already gained, and then to a respect for the person (um, me) who'd gained it, and then to a total falling away of all the (wrong) reasons I'd lusted after success, money, fame, validation, and yes, love, leaving just this pure but fiercely burning desire to speak my Truth. And my yearning to be in a primary relationship sort of faded away, bit by bit, until I realized that what I really wanted was authentic connection, period, with myself, with my friends, with the mail carrier. My real longing was for home; the "whom" was almost beside the point. (Sex was not, but that's another post for another day.)

Which brings me back around to the title of this rather long-winded rant (with apologies to Virginia Woolf). For too long, I shunned the idea of home as just so much attachment, a waste of time, money and energy. I lived in a series of shitholes I was only too happy to turn the key on in the morning. When I finally bought a place, I did it for Investment Purposes and for the partner who would surely materialize to join me there (he did). When I lived with S.O.s, I furnished (or not) to please them; when they moved out or I moved on, I kept only what was necessary to get by.

This past year, as part of my odyssey of self-discovery, I finally explored the last frontier. I bought a real couch. I took a weekend and painted my (rental) apartment. I took a sewing class and made curtains. I bought a piece of art, my first in over 15 years. I made my place the way I wanted to make it, for no one else but me. For the first time in my life, it's truly an expression of myself: it's my truth, writ in red and yellow and odd eclectic furnishings. I feel as at home in my home as I do in my own skin, and it all feels wonderful.

The funniest part? Everyone else likes it better, too.

xxx c

The Other 0.01%

Describing myself to a new acquaintance in a recent email, I noted that the chief difference between the old me (i.e., pre-Crohn's) and the new me (post-Crohn's) is that New Me is happy 99.99% of the time.

The percentage is perhaps a little generous, I'm no stranger to hyperbole (or litotes, for that matter) in pursuit of my point, but basically accurate. My illness, epiphany and subsequent long, slow climb back to health gave me an appreciation for life that mellowed into a baseline level of happiness that's above the norm. I'm no Buddha, baby, but neither am I the centerless, high-strung, spinning top of whack-job that I used to be.

Still, I have my moments. And there's nothing that will send me down the greased chute of panic to the Dark Place faster than a loose bowel movement.

To normal people, a little diarrhea, or "D" as it's affectionately referred to on the SCD Listserv, is just the natural result of a bug or stress or a bad piece of chicken. For me, it could be any of those things...or it could be the trusty Crohn's trumpet tooting an old tune called "Bust Out the Big Meds, Baby, I'm Comin' Back to Staaaaay!"

It's hard to explain to people who haven't been through it, but the worst thing about any illness is, I think, the not-knowing. I was much more scared about the diarrhea I suffered alone in my apartment pre-diagnosis than I was shitting two pints of blood out of my ass at Cedars-Sinai. Don't get me wrong, it was not without its alarming aspects (mmm...litotes...). But hey, if you're gonna shit two pints of blood, there's really no better place in the world to do it than the IBD ward of a clean, modern, teaching hospital in an industrialized nation. Especially if you have good insurance.

So the long climb back really was about information gathering. The more I learned, about Crohn's, about treatment, about my own body, the less I feared. And one of the things I learned is that shining the light of truth on something, living really and truly in the present moment and not where you were or where you'd like to be, really does turn that monster in the corner back into a coat on the back of a chair 99.99% of the time.

That's the lesson of one of my all-time favorite books, Bedtime for Frances*, which I first had read to me some 40-odd years ago. I'm not the fastest learner on the block (hyperbole alert!) and I'm sure in no small way my legendary stubbornness played a role (litotes! litotes!) but let's face it: human beings are wired for fear, and 0.01% of it is probably always gonna linger no matter how sanguine you are or how brightly your Mag-Lite® beams.

And now, if you'll excuse me, it's time to call my doctor.

I think...

xxx

c

The wonderful drawings illustrating this post are by Garth Williams from Russell Hoban's brilliant and hilarious Bedtime for Frances, one of the many delightful books in the Frances the Anthropomorphic Badger series. If you have a kid, buy it now. If you don't have a kid, buy it now anyway.

Saying thanks, dammit!

I am unofficially on Day 3 of my first cold of the New Year, and, with the exception of getting the paper yesterday, am going on three days housebound. Honestly, I was so hungover on Saturday from whooping it up on Friday night with a bottle of Burgundy and my boy, Harry, that I've no idea whether I was sick with the actual cold that day, too. But I'm pretty sure my asshole move of Cup of Coffee #2 that afternoon marked the onset, although it might also have been my insistence on catching up with three weeks of email or researching HTML coding websites or working on a design job instead of adding a few much-needed hours to the sleep bank.

Anyway, I'm nothing if not an overachieving Do-Bee, and I'm pretty sure now that sickness is my body's way of making me do the things (e.g. read and catch up on movies and sleep) that normal people (i.e., those who find recreation enjoyable) look forward to. You'd think that the five months I spent ill and/or recuperating from my Crohn's onset would have made me better at this Enforced Relaxationâ„¢ thing, and you'd be right. But I'm guessing the recidivism rate is about as bad for workaholics as it is for other -holics, and good intentions notwithstanding, I tangle with my demons all the time.

Worse, I starting slipping down the woe-is-me slide this time, too. I mean, it is the new year, and we're all supposed to be at the fucking gym and scrubbing our grout with bleach and a toothbrush and all that other crap. And here I am, barely able to distill an Adobe PostScript file because I am so sick and brain-fogged and achy. Loser.

Well, enough. Enough, I say. Get a little perspective, I also say. Every part of me knows this is the road to nowhere. So I let it go for five seconds and damned if the Universe didn't grab my attention immediately by shouting the answer: THANKS.

THANKS ?!? For being sick!? This is an answer?! FUCK YOU, Universe!!!

To which the Universe replied, in the nicest way possible: no, asshole, GIVE thanks. Or maybe it was, "No, asshole, give. Thanks!" because the Universe is nothing if not polite.

So I went to Oxfam and donated $15. It's the minimum donation via credit card, but it's a lot of money for me these days, what with most of my TV spots in payment cycles 3 & 4 and nothing new booked since, oh, June, and a big copywriting job that I was kinda counting on whittled back to 1/3 of the original contract. (Ugh. See how easy it is for me to go down the dark path? Scary.) And I'm going to go back and give (gulp) $15 every time I feel myself dressing up for the pity party.

Result?

While I'd be lying if I said I felt like the fabulous, new, 2005 Colleen I long to be, I felt a lot better. I have friends and a home and even a little family left, which is more than a large chunk of the world has right now. And the cold? Well, this, too, shall pass. And probably pretty quickly.

I just hope it leaves the lesson behind.

xxx c

P.S. That tissue box above left is available here. Although I think the real Shakers would be cool if you put the $25 somewhere else. (Lots of old images didn't make the move during my migration from TypePad. Because TypePad, while excellent in many ways, is not great with the moving of images.)

ComforTV

I love TV like I love an ever-evolving list of items (peppermint tea, salted cashews and heavy blankets) that make me feel safe and comforted. Perhaps as I grow more adept at comforting myself in other ways (meditation? yoga? naps?), TV will lose its luster as my psychic pacifier, but for now, I've got it on a goodly chunk of the day, Judge Judy, King of the Hill, The Simpsons. And now, Monk.

This tidy little detective series has all of the elements that make a TV show comforting to me, predictible outcome, earnest characters, great theme music, and lots and lots of episodes. While I still love previous comfort shows, Dragnet, Mary Tyler Moore, Columbo, The Brady Bunch, I make it a policy to rotate my TV crack to avoid comfort show burnout.

Of course, I allow myself the occasional comfort binge, too. Every once in a blue Monday I'll indulge in an L&O jag and in my first cable days, I'd hunker down for a Labor Day switch-a-thon between Jerry Lewis and The Twilight Zone. New Year's Day is a notorious putter & butterâ„¢ day for me, one of the few times a year when I'll allow myself unfettered, guilt-free indulgence in whatever makes me happy that doesn't harm anyone else.

I must not be the only one who finds comfort in immersion; the episode that just ended (which, coincidentally, features two fine actors with whom I've worked in the past, Patrick Breen and the magnificent Jane Lynch) is part of a 24-hour Monk marathon on USA Network. So all the other addicts and I can watch crazy Adrian Monk set the world to rights in 60-minute increments and not do anything else. Except maybe move the party to the bedroom.

Lots of heavy blankets in the bedroom.

Happy New Year!

xxx c

Home, sweet home

Yes, I had a good time in Chicago. Yes, it was great seeing my peeps and scarfing down my chicken Kalamata and seeing the Christmas decorations in the windows of Field's Macy's on State Street (brought to you, like everything else, by Target). Despite my fears going into it, I also had a good time at the (god help me) debutante ball that was my nominal reason for flying back to single-digit temperatures during the worst travel time of the year: the girls looked beautiful, the Chicago Hilton and Towers looked beautiful, even the Cardinal looked rather fetching in his lovely ruby robes. (Note: when meeting a cardinal of the Roman Catholic church, do not kiss his ring or bow to the ground, but shake his hand and greet him either as "your Eminence" or "Cardinal So-and-so." Also, put down your drink before you approach the White Wall of Deb Gowns, or suffer the wrath of a really scary Deb Mom. No, I'm not kidding.) But I've got to face facts: I just don't like hassle anymore, and traveling by air, especially in the post-9/11 universe to a cold-weather destination during a peak travel time, is a gigantic hassle. Too much unzipping of too much luggage filled with too many coats and sweaters and everything else in your closet because your L.A. tenure has outlasted the life of your Chicago winter wear. Enough, I say! (And I did say, to all my beloveds: see me in L.A. or see me some other time of the year. Buh-bye.)

I also don't like people encroaching on my space. Maybe it's a form of mild claustrophobia (I still have nightmares about the time I was carried off in a crush of people waiting for a city bus in, you got it, sub-zero temperatures in Chicago). Maybe it's the noxious omnipresence of mile-high flatulence, that peculiar cocktail of disinfectant and methane filterered through foam cushions into poorly recirculated air. Maybe it's the loss of control (I'm always working on the control thing). But about halfway through the FOUR HOUR Chicago/L.A. flight, packed to the gills with people who never see the inside of a plane except on the four highest-volume travel days of the year, I wanted to beat the vodka-swilling, armrest-hogging pituitary case in the seat next to me senseless with his own oversized Dell laptop. The only thing that stopped me was the realization that if I did, he would not suffer the slow torture of hearing loss brought on by listening to Top 40 Pop at full volume on his shitty headphones.

Yes, I know I'm being unreasonable. Yes, I have a sense of my own intolerance and foolishness. (A healthy one, so back off, Jackson.) But last night, I also had the first really good night's sleep I've had in a week. I like my 12.5 cubic feet or whatever it is of personal space and I'm not zen-mistress enough to be a good sport when it's encroached upon and the reward at the other end is either a week of insomnia and cold extremities or a fruitless half-hour at the baggage carousel (nimrods stuck my bag on an earlier plane without telling me) and an hour in an overcrowded SuperShuttle ("no more than 3 stops," my Aunt Fanny).

But part of getting where you want to be is accepting where you are right now, and I accept that I am so happy with warm toes in my little apartment in Los Angeles that I could weep for joy. Except that...it's just that...

Sigh.

I miss Chicago already.

xxx c

Closer to Python: My Mike Nichols Day, Part II

As I'm currently in the process of converting a play with music into a musical play, I'm newly fascinated by musical theater, especially the newer forms cropping up today: Avenue Q, Caroline or Change, all of Ken Roht's work, the Ramayana 2K4, which I guess better start calling itself R2K5 so it doesn't sign its checks wrong next year. Normally I have to wait for these things to come to the hinterlands (a.k.a., Los Angeles) or haul my carcass to New York, not an altogether unpleasant proposition, but generally a pricey one. So imagine my delight in learning that Spamalot!, the new Eric Idle musical based on material from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, was having its pre-Broadway run here in Chicago during my stay! For which I had already paid!

It's selling well, which is a good first sign. The Chicago run opened on Tuesday; I bought my ticket on Wednesday for Thursday, which was mostly sold out. Fortunately, the one good single ticket they had was really good: I was third row center at the Shubert, so I pretty much had Tim Curry, David Hyde Pierce and Hank Azaria singing in my lap for 2 1/2 hours (including intermission, so you know, not really).

They were all wonderful, as was much of the show. The supporting cast is staggeringly good; I particularly enjoyed the drag stylings of the very Python-esque Steve Rosen (who has some sort of Crohn's connection I'm anxious to bond over) and all I can say about Sara Ramirez is "you heard it here first, folks", that combination of good, gorgeous and funny comes along slightly less often than Halley's comet.

It's not an unqualified hit...yet. I'm hoping my issues with the show can be fixed in the Chicago run so it plays a good, long time in New York (and the hinterlands). Right now, it's a little draggy in parts, (especially Act One), it feels a bit repetitive and, for as clever as it often is, it's not clever enough. Maybe I've been spoiled by local (i.e., hinterland) geniuses like Ken Roht and Robert Prior, but I'm used to an extraordinarily high level of inventiveness; compared to Peace Squad Goes 99 or R2K4, Spamalot! does a lot of coasting on old material and not enough in the way of chewy surprises inside.

It's not devoid of them; I won't spoil anyone's possible future enjoyment by giving away all the treats, but there are some hilarious little fillips in many of the show's numbers, the kind of unexpected stuff that has you poking the person next to you and saying "look there!" and them poking you back to "no, look there!", which is pretty damned great. And the show as a whole does a great job of sending up musical theater.

But so did Peace Squad, and on a much tighter budget with far less lead time. Hell, I think we did send-ups on musical genres that hadn't been invented yet.

I wanted to give Spamalot! my unqualified love and affection, but at the end of the day (or the show), I just didn't feel like leaping to my feet like everyone else.

Nor did I feel like stopping by to congratulate Mike Nichols, the director of the hullaballoo, who was sitting there unrecognized for most of intermission (god, I love Chicago) along with his gorgeous wife. And I'm a big Mike Nichols fan, overall; I just wasn't feeling the love enough to blow his cover. (After all, what was I gonna say: congratulations...I didn't love your movie, either?)

In no way is this a pan of the show; I have no problem telling people to get their butts in the seats for this one. I only hope that by the time it gets to Broadway, it's as good as it can be...as it should be.

That is, as good as those shows in the hinterlands already are.

xxx c

100 Things I Learned in 2004, Part 2

I'm sipping a delicious Earl Grey Creme at Argo Tea, which in addition to having tasteful décor and such fine teas that I almost forget my abiding love of the Americano, has FREE FREE FREE WiFi. Fuck you, Starbucks.

And now, without further ado, communicatrix presents...

100 Things the Communicatrix Learned in 2004, Part 2:

1. There is no good time to fly out of LAX during the holidays.
2. If you have kids and you want to make sure they get what you want them to get, put it in writing.
3. The mixta salad at Patagonia trumps the mixed baby greens.
4. It is possible to have a crush on a couple.
5. Sometimes, you have to sell off your old love to facilitate a new one.
6. I cannot say "no" to the right font, even if it may only ever be used for the pro bono gig it's perfect for.
7. HBO is worth the extra 10 bucks a month.
8. Showtime is not.
9. STARZ really, really is not.
10. Ricky Gervais is a comedy god.
11. Sacha Baron Cohen is another one.
12. Sweetbreads aren't my thing.
13. After a certain age, it is better to travel less and stay in a hotel room than it is to travel frequently and couch-surf.
14. The Jewelry Exchange in Tustin is not only in Tustin.
15. That the Jewelry Exchange is also in Villa Park confirms that I never need visit the Jewelry Exchange in Tustin.
16. Ani Afshar, on the other hand, I could drop some serious coin at.
17. How to make a dot leader in Word.
18. How to make the numbers line up, too.
19. You can get yourself a really smokin' black-tie outfit for under $50.
20. Shoes included.
21. There is not a spam filter on earth that is any match for the volume of crap you will receive upon inquiring about stealth shopper services.
22. If you get a plantar's wart on your foot and ignore it for two years, eventually it will demand your attention by burrowing its way down to your heel bone and hurting like a mother.
23. You can go as long as a week between shampoos, provided you cool it with the product and don't let anyone get too close.
24. You cannot go longer than eight weeks between coloring appointments if you want to continue to pass for under-40.
25. Red lentil dal is a passable substitute for polenta.
26. They both taste better cold.
27. Life is exponentially more fun at 7'2", even if you have to duck a lot.
28. No matter how great a deal it seems at the time, don't get the free phone.
29. Especially if it's this one.
30. The Earl Grey Creme at Argo is freakily addictive and worth every penny.
31. Do not depend on your doctor to realize that the medication he is prescribing has as its main side effect something that could trigger a relapse of your preexisting condition, even if he refuses to prescribe a different medication because it would have a deleterious effect on the same preexisting condition.
32. If you are passing a resale store and the perfect game-show-host jacket for your upcoming production appears in your peripheral vision, do not, under any circumstances, turn your head to look at it.
33. If you decide to look anyway, you will get the most value for your automobile dollar by going through a broker.
34. There will come a time when you would rather drink antifreeze than another glass of Two-Buck Chuck.
35. If you were wondering whether it was the mercaptopurine, the mesolamine or the prednisone that was making your hair fall out, the answer is "yes."
36. Given enough cashews and cheese, even a chronically skinny person will pork out around the middle.
37. It's worth having a camera stuck up your ass for the fourth time in two years when the photo looks like this.
38. For a variety of reasons, Chicago is not my kind of town anymore.
39. For the time being, L.A. is.
40. If you slather chicken breasts with thyme and olive oil and bake them under a bed of thinly sliced onions for 350º for an hour, the result is chicken that tastes ridiculously good and not nearly enough onions.
41. When it comes to half-and-half yogurt, Medjool dates and Manchego cheese, there is such a thing as too much of a good thing.
42. Once one's basic needs have been met, additional money has almost no bearing on personal happiness.
43. Magical things happen when you add the word “no” to your vocabulary.
44. Despite his legendary bad press and a lot of yelling, Joe Pytka is not only a good man but a kind and gracious one.
45. Selling your unwatched DVDs back to Blockbuster is amazingly freeing.
46. Purging clutter is oddly addictive.
47. Just keeping your sink clean really does make you feel a lot better.
48. Fear changes everything for the worse.
49. Love changes everything for the better.
50. Blogging rocks.

Read Part 1.

Tale of two cities

It is freezing in Chicago.

No, literally: the temperature is freezing here in Chicago and should drop down to about 7, that's s-e-v-e-n, degrees Fahrenheit by Christmas. Without the wind chill.

This is a beautiful city, and never more so than around the holidays. The air is clear (a good wind will do that) and the fairy-lit branches of the trees flanking Michigan Avenue look magically delicious in a way Beverly Hills palms only dream of. There's the same old nonsense there is everywhere this time of year, with people overextending themselves both financially and time-wise, but the hustle and bustle is more picturesque when everyone is rushing around all bundled up against the elements.

It is one of the major reasons I think I am done with Chicago as a place to live (the Universe has kicked my ass enough times that I know never to say "never", even though I just did).

Yes, L.A. has earthquakes and mudslides and unavoidable traffic that grows more heinous with each passing year. But L.A. is warm, and as I'm staring down middle age, that is not to be discounted.

What's more interesting to me is the other reason I doubt I'll move back here: Chicago just doesn't feel like home, and hasn't for a long time. Whereas the first time I set foot in L.A. as an adult, I immediately felt at ease. Correction: I got a taste of what it would feel like to be at ease. Just getting over my homesickness took two years (yes, you can long for a place you don't really love and that is no good for you, and if you don't believe me, you clearly don't have enough girlfriends who get involved with lousy men). Really digging on L.A. took at least another five, plus a divorce; it's hard to be "out" about loving your city when your spouse openly despises everything about it.

But 12 years (and many litmus-test trips back "home") later, I realize that I love Chicago the way most people love L.A., for short stretches of time. I like to walk and I like to get my Kalamata chicken fix at Athenian Room and I really, really like that I can take public transportation from where I am to somewhere I actually want to go. And then I like to get on a plane and go home: the place where I feel most like myself, the place where most of my friends live, the place where I am free to release my inner wacko without fear.

And, oh, yeah, the place that's 65º and sunny right this very second.

xxx
c

How to Make a Happy Accident

I remember how I learned of the word "serendipity", a very sexy upperclassman who introduced me to many carnal pleasures, including the famed NYC shop's frozen hot chocolate, but when called upon to provide a definition, I've always drawn a blank. So imagine my surprise when, as I'm looking it up for the, 20th, 30th, 100th?, time,  a mnemonic catchphrase (serendipitously) pops into my head: the happy accident.

Though I've used the phrase for years, I'm pretty sure the connection was the result of a literal (happy) accident I had last week that netted me $200. I say "netted" because the dings on my fender were so minor in comparison to the ones the bumper already sported (what can I say? people like my rear end), there's no way I'd ever pay to have them buffed out. Which I told Ari, the kindly and honest Escalade driver who hit me; he insisted I take the $200 anyway.

Now, $200 is no small potatoes for me. I could probably think of ten or fifteen ways that money could be put to excellent use off the top of my head. In fact, I did: bills; groceries; 1/4 of rent; long-overdue cut and color (my sole New Year's resolution is to find a reasonably priced, kick-ass salon on the EAST side).

The funny thing was, nothing I came up with felt right. I enjoy serendipity but I actually place a lot of stock in vibes: when I've listened to them, I've generally done right by myself; when I hear the voice and do it anyway, I generally find myself up the creek without a paddle. As chance (or serendipity) would have it, I'm reading Trust Your Vibes: Secret Tools for Six-Sensory Living, a great book by Chicago-based intuitive Sonia Choquette right now, so I not only got a little reinforcement for going with the inner flow, I actually had concrete instructions:

I believe that the more you practice getting quiet, the quicker you'll sense your vibes. It doesn't matter what approach you use as long as you get quiet. Choose what suits your temperament: My mind becomes quiet when I fold laundry, organize my office, or go to the gym; Patrick paints and gardens; my mom sews; my dad putters on gadgets; my brother Stefan washes his car; one of my neighbors loves to work in the yard, while another walks his dog. All are valid ways to connect with your spirit.

I know she's right, right? I also know that patience and trust are huge parts of the equation, and neither is my strong suit. However, 43 years of living and ten years of copywriting have taught me that the answer rarely comes when you're yelling at it to hurry the hell up, so I let it go and went about my business.

Sure enough, in pretty much the first moment I'd really forgotten about the money, the perfect solution popped into my head: give it to Jen.

You see, about a month ago, I fell in love. In my obsessive quest to find out more about my new love, I stumbled upon an intriguing tidbit that bore remarking upon, so I did. The writer was apparently intrigued enough in turn to check out my site, where she found an entry discussing a particular piece of graphic design she had also admired, along with my 757th apology for the hideous graphic state of the Evidence Room website.

And so she emailed me, offering her services. To code the whole damned thing. For free.

Understand, please, that I started the redesign on that site over two years ago. I knew how butt-ugly it was; so did the rest of the company, who were politely but insistently pushing me to fix the problem NOW, or they'd fix it for me. We'd been burned so many times on the coding end that I was hours away from giving in and letting another designer do his own redesign of the site just to get the damned thing fixed.

But then came the magical, mystical email from Jen, someone I'd never met, someone I didn't know from a hole in the ground, and I paused. "Let it go," I told myself; "Let it go for the night," and I went off to see a play. And when I came home, there was an email in my inbox with a link: Jen had built an entire test site from the Photoshop sketches I'd sent her earlier that day. I didn't just find a web person; I found the web person, someone whose generosity and work ethic were so firmly entwined with her taste and abilities that she was going to do this amazing job for free.

Only she wasn't, of course: she was now going to do it for $200.

It's funny how an amount that seemed so great all of a sudden seemed so small. It's all about a shift in focus: when I relax and let go, a half-empty glass becomes half-full; a so-called tragedy becomes a gift of epic proportions.

You can't chase the happy accident. But if you give yourself time and room and lots of love, you might just find yourself having them a lot more often.

It is my Christmas wish for everyone I meet.

After all, I already got my Christmas present.

xxx c

ADDENDUM: My new buddy and coding goddess, Jen, blogged about the incident from her perspective. Made me all hot in the face and tight in the chest, so it must be good. Thanks, Jen.

Proving doctors wrong, one patient at a time

Since writing this post, I've aggregated a number of helpful Specific Carbohydrate Diet-related links, both internal and on other sites, on this dedicated SCD page. I'll say this upfront: I have never been the dieting type. I'm pretty tiny, it's pretty much genetic, and I pretty much top out at about 5 lbs. over my fightin' weight of 104 lbs. B.G. (Before Gold's); I guess if I worked reeeeally hard at it now that I have some muscle on me, I might be able to make it to blood donor weight.

But I'd have to work really, reeeeeeeally hard at it, now that I'm on the first restricted food plan of my life: the Specific Carbohydrate Diet, or SCD. I've been following it with "fanatical adherence" for over two years now, ever since I was released from my 11-day incarceration in the IBD ward of Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles.

That's one of the crazy things about the SCD, as its major proponent, Elaine Gottschall, B.A., MSc., has emphasized repeatedly on the many Listservs and bulletin boards she still frequents for sufferers of Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis (UC) and autism, in order to work, the diet must (at least, initially) be followed with fanatical adherence. As in, no "just this one cupcake" or "just this one beer" or even "just this one sip of Coca-Cola", you either follow the SCD 100% or she very kindly but firmly insists that you are not actually following the SCD.

Elaine Gottschall stumbled upon the precursor to the SCD when her young daughter was diagnosed with UC. After dragging her from specialist to specialist, she finally met Dr. Valentine Haas, who put Elaine's little girl on a diet he'd found successful in alleviating a number of gastrointestinal disorders. Her progress was slow but steady; to this day, some 40 years later, she remains in remission (and on a modified version of the SCD). Elaine was so impressed by this remarkable recovery that she went back to school to further research the diet. She subsequently wrote a book about the SCD, outlining the science behind it and including an extensive list of allowed and disallowed foods, as well as a batch of recipes that she had come up with over the years.

Very simply, the premise behind the SCD is this (from Seth Barrows's site):

The premise of the diet is that damaged intestinal walls and bacterial overgrowth are a part of a vicious cycle that wreaks havoc with the body's health and immunity. The diet restricts the types of carbohydrates that feed these pathogens, thereby restoring the body's inner ecology. The SCD diet is very similar to a Paleolithic diet, except it allows the consumption of certain legumes, fermented dairy products, and dry alcohol.

The SCD also resembles the Atkins diet in certain respects (although as SCDers are always quick to point out, unlike Atkins, you can be on the SCD and eat a lot of carbs. You just can't eat any of the good ones). The diet basically excludes all disaccharides and polysaccharides, which pretty much in turn excludes all processed foods, since they rely heavily on sugars and starches.

So for 2+ years, I've had no ice cream, sherbet, sorbet, cake, cookies, cupcakes, candy, pasta, pizza, rice, tofu, potatoes, pancakes, waffles, syrup, bread, bagels, crackers, chips, gum, soft drinks, Russian/French/Thousand/Ranch dressing, ketchup, coffee, beer or chocolate. And that's a partial list.

But for most of the past 2+ years, I've been healthy. I've put back the weight I lost in my initial Crohn's onset and actually gained enough energy to start a weight-training program. I've been tapering off my meds successfully and plan to be off them completely by early 2005.

My doctors still think diet has had nothing to do with my recovery. This is a fairly standard reaction, I'm told, which is sad. Out of all the doctors I've met since I was diagnosed, only one was even aware of the diet, and as he said, "It's really hard to follow and we can't explain the science so we don't really recommend it to most of our patients."

So if you know of someone with Crohn's, UC, IBS, candiasis, celiac disease, cystic fibrosis, or even a parent of an autistic child (there's an incredibly brave and intrepid parents' SCD group which Elaine has lent a great deal of support to), please send them here. Or here. Or here.

The SCD can't cure everyone, but it can't cure anyone who doesn't know about it.

xxx c

UPDATE 3/4/11: I fell off the SCD wagon roughly two months after writing this post, and did not get back on (with fanatical adherence) until September of 2010, which I did through the aid of hypnotherapy. (The hypnotherapist, James Borrelli, cured my wandering eye for carbs in one session. WELL worth it.) While I can't blame falling off the diet for the flares I suffered afterwards, there are many, many things that can trigger a Crohn's flare, I know that I feel better, look better, maintain a healthier weight and have way less G.I. distress (not to mention much less stinky gas) when I follow SCD 100%.

Does luck come in flavors?

It's official, I'm sick. I hung in there for awhile, but I've been exposed to too many germs from too many people in too small a space, and I've succumbed. (Theaters, nursery schools and hospitals are notoriously difficult places to stay healthy. They're dropping like flies at the show these days.)

My dumb luck, right? Getting sick in the middle of the holidays?

Well, maybe. And maybe not.

You see, two years ago, I had what some people would characterize as a really nasty streak of luck. In February of 2002, my father found out he had to go on full-time dialysis. In May, my live-in boyfriend of 3 years and I broke up. And finally, in September, I was diagnosed with Crohn's disease.

For those of you who haven't had the pleasure, Crohn's is a super-chic disease whose symptoms include fever, weight loss and diarrhea. And we're talking high fevers (104ºF +...several!), severe weight loss (I was 90 lbs. when they released me from the hospital), and, well, I won't even detail the horrors of my bowel movements except to say that at my nadir, they were happening 32x/day and necessitated the replacement of 2 pints of blood.

The thing is, when I'm done cataloguing the many delights of my illness, I always follow up by assuring my now-horrified listener that it was the best thing that ever happened to me. Because it was. Not only did I have a bona fide epiphany in the hospital (worth the price of admission, alone, believe me), the sucker actually took. My outlook shifted. I relaxed, for one. I began greeting each day with genuine delight, instead of worry or aggravation. I began to rely less on "The Colleen Show" and got more in touch with my authentic self.

If I hadn't gotten sick, I wouldn't have found the amazing diet that not only sent my Crohn's into remission and improved my overall health, but taught me that I was the best authority on my health, not some doctor. I might have met my new best friend, Jan Pessin, in fact, we already had met prior to my illness. But if I hadn't been sick, she wouldn't have been my advocate in the hospital. We might never have bonded over our illnesses and become good friends. And we certainly wouldn't have written our show.

I don't mean to discount the tragedies great and small that befall us all; I would never use the word "lucky" to describe someone who has suffered a loss of any kind. But since my own so-called misfortune, I much more leery of automatically classifying something as being bad for me, whether it's an election outcome, a relationship that ends painfully or a much needed job that falls through. I enjoy my good times, but it's my difficult ones that have moved me to look at the world differently, to become more compassionate, to educate myself, to change.

I suppose that sometimes a rotten thing that happens to you ends up just being a rotten thing that happens to you. Lord knows I don't have all the answers (I'm still learning to recognize the damned questions.)

But sometimes, just sometimes, what you think is the worst thing that ever happened to you can turn out to be the best thing that ever happened to you.

If you're lucky, that is.

xxx c

What to get the butt doctor who has everything

As a neophyte blogger, I'm still fascinated by every technical aspect of blogging. But I'm especially curious about where my up-to-200 hits per day are coming from. I mean, I have friends, but not that many. And while my new presence at blogging.la has driven some traffic over here, there are still plenty of people who randomly stumble on my wacko wedge of iSpace and, I guess, poke around a bit while they're here.

Many of them come via Google. Some are doing a search on my name, which freaks my shit out a little, but since I've not done too many noteworthy things I'm ashamed of, doesn't really keep me up at night. (I have lain awake wondering if any of the other Colleen Wainwrights ever Google our name and if so, whether they click on my links like I do theirs.)

But by far my favorite Google search landing people here thus far is this one: colorectal + surgeon +  christmas + gift + ideas.

Oooookay!

Frankly, I'd sooner go back on prednisone than buy a gift for the one colorectal surgeon it's been my misfortune to meet. But if you have a beloved butt doctor on your holiday shopping list, I do have a suggestion.

If you don't have one of your own, I'd be happy to make you a copy of my own recent colonoscopy memento (see  above-left) at cost. It was taken just this fall that sought-after c-scope photog, Dr. Graham Woolf of Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles. Because, after two years of struggling with Crohn's, I'm happy to report that my colon is pretty as a picture.

Not to mention suitable for framing and gifting.

xxx c

Why I Wish I Was Ella Fitzgerald

At some point during the show last night I was perched on the bar, talking to my friend, Nick (he was bartending and the bar is at ass-height when you're on stilts) when the conversation turned to guitar playing. He's just picked it up and I started earlier this year and he's into the same cowboy kind of stuff as I am, only even more so: he's a Hank kind of purist and I'm more of a Lyle/Lucinda/alt-country fan. (In fact, I'm listening to the remastered Waiting for Columbus right this second, which I purchased at extraordinary savings through the super-cool YourMusic.com, every single-disc CD is $5.99; doppios are only $11.98, which, of course, is $5.99...x 2!!) But I digress. As usual.

You see, Nick's enthusiasm for playing got me all fired up again about playing. It also made me realize it wasn't so long ago that I was playing every day, wasting all my time on pop-up-ridden tabs sites, teaching myself new strums and chords and songs; today, when I picked up Lucia (she's from São Paulo, via a theater dumpster and a couple of generous friends) for the first time in god-knows-how long, I realized that, urp!, my hard-won callouses were gone! I was playing with virgin pads! What the hell happened?!?

Well...the show, for one. And my show, #1 & #2, for two. And this blog, of course. Oh, and a bunch of design work I couldn't say "no" to. And, and and and.

I've come to the conclusion that I always digress. Digression, or parenthetical leanings, or split focus, or whatever you want to serve it up as, has always been my bête noire. Or maybe overabundant appetite is really my bête noire and digression is my modus operandi. All I know is, there's something a little bit wrong with a chick who is cheating herself on much-needed sleep and letting the clock tick away on a friend's (Christmas!!!) design project deadline and taking up valuable gee-tar playin' time because she just has to find the key combo for the circumflex-ê glyph (option-i e on a Mac) to write a blog entry about how she no longer has the time for, you guessed it, guitar playing.

I have a sneaking suspicion that a part of my problem is a lingering addiction to perfectionism. I've let some things go (come eat off my baba ghanoush-encrusted, hair-strewn kitchen floor tonight if you don't believe me) but clearly, not enough. I mean, the bed is unmade right now and I've been out of it for a few hours, but its state of dishevelment is bothering me. (I was talking to my Scary-Movie Companion and  fellow-sufferer in Virgo Never-Enoughness, Dorie, about the whole perfectionism issue after the show last night. Two healthy bourbons each and we still didn't make a dent in the problem. So more on that in another post.)

But the other problem is I have been cursed with just enough ability and/or interest in a number of things to make them equally rewarding and cumulatively disastrous. I doubt Ella Fitzgerald had this problem. Not that she wasn't a rip-snortin' chess player or a killer in the kitchen, but come on, those gifts knew their place; they couldn't hold a candle to the pipes. So Ella didn't stay awake nights wondering how she was going to finish the patter song for her one-woman show when she really wanted to blog her feelings about the shift in the way businesses are marketing to their customers, or whether she should market herself as an artist who does PowerPoint or a former copywriter who does graphics for artists, or even how she was going to see four shows in the two free days she had left to see them. Or maybe she did, but somehow I doubt it: I've gotta believe that a super-talent on the scale of Ella Fitzgerald's voice or Vincent VanGogh's painting or Eleanora Duse's acting demands its due, period. Maybe there's room for stamp collecting or swing dancing or some other hobby, but it knows its place.

I'm not saying life as Ella or Vincent or Eleanora was all sunshine and roses; biographies on plenty of great talents show that genius and happiness, while not necessarily mutually exclusive, do not ordinarily go hand in hand.

I'm just saying there are over-booked days when I wish I could (just) act/write/sing/design the hell out of one goddam thing, and leave it at that.

And now, back to Lucia. Or the Christmas project. Or...

xxx c

How? No...YES!!!

Wednesday is List Day here at communicatrix.com. Imagine my consternation, then, when I pulled up this entry from Evelyn Rodriguez's always-stimulating blog this morning in my RSS reader and realized I could not possibly coast on Fave Rave Eric Rohmer Flix or 10 Ways to Ace Yourself Out of a Date with the Communicatrix Through Your Profile Alone, but would have to address the role of risk in effecting change. Unless...

Well, unless I can combine the two. How would it look if I did? What could be gained by compiling a list instead of writing an essay? How might I feel if I were able to do it? What impact might it have on my life as an artist, a blogger, a designer, a friend & companion?

Okay, enough. You get the idea. Or if not, you can go read Evelyn's post about Peter Block's book, The Answer to How is Yes and the leap of faith required in any great venture.

And so, my list. I put these things forth not to toot my own horn, but to tell everyone within shouting distance,"if an a**hole like me can do it, imagine what you smart people can do":

"IMPOSSIBLE" ACCOMPLISHMENTS ACCRUED BY SAYING "YES," NOT "HOW?"

1. Got copywriting job with worst book in ad history.
2. Got into Groundlings Sunday Company with no prior experience being funny.
3. Did not die when world collapsed after being unceremoniously booted from Sunday Company. (NOTE: Seriously, this was worse than any breakup, divorce or death of a loved one I have experienced. Yeah, I'm nuts; I'm an actress, for cryin' out loud.)
4. Wormed my way into best 99-seat theater company in L.A. with worst resume in L.A. theater history.
5. Became working actress at 36 (that's 207 in Hollywood Years).
6. Despite dour prognosis from Son-of-Mengele Colorectal Surgeon, went from Miss Bloody Hamburger Intestines of 2002 to a clean colonoscopy in two years.
7. Co-wrote & produced play about aforementioned bloody colon that people actually came to see.
8. Taught myself enough graphic design to pass.
9. Got invited to blog for honest-to-jesus metblog.
10. Met blogging idol.

What dream can you say "yes" to right now?

xxx c