Work has been ramping up again lately, necessitating focused bursts of escapism while I struggle to stay on top of an untenable and ever-expanding mountain of needs-doings and needs-thinking-abouts. I’m aware on some level that the stress is all in my head, that a different person in the same situation would be much less stressed simply because they would see it differently. Maybe that person has a mythology that copes better with too much to do and too little time to do it, whereas the one I escape to isn't really related to my daily activities at all. So then, do I have the power to change that? Could I turn my curse of mythologizing into a self-affirming career-management strategy by crafting a more work-oriented mythology? Could I turn Helmut Kravitz into a work horse, and skyrocket through the ranks of Capitalism?
Probably not. Unfortunately, the emotional pressure of the moment tends to define the situation on its own terms, and I don’t get much say in it either way. I’m either stressed or I’m not. So I’m left with a mythology only good for escaping to. But as far as that goes, I’ve been indulging a lot lately. If this were a real twelve-step group, I’d have to turn in my 24-hour chip and regretfully admit to zero days of sobriety.
I’m still thinking episodic-office-endtimes scenario, but I’ve lapsed back into thinking about whether I should actually *make something* beyond just thinking about it, completely destroying the hard-earned progress I’ve made so far with my therapy blog. I’ve been envisioning a series of short filmed episodes, five to ten minutes long, that could be aired on the intertubes and adored by the faithful audience of this blog. Each story would take place inside a small office, where I would use the lack of any budget or actors or set pieces to my advantage, letting the few actors I could pull together tell the story of their fantastic world-gone-mad from the contrastingly uninspired setting of the Spigot Corporation. It may sound boring, but that’s because I haven’t yet told you about the Pods - oh, the Pods, and the wondrous plot-twisting things they would do. I can't even bring myself to tell you about them or their awesome pocket-sized potential.
I’ve been fantasizing about the sinfully alluring motion graphics that would consist the title sequence, animated silhouettes telling the story of the mythology against a clean backdrop of color. The end of the sequence resolves to the Spigot corporate logo (which also happens to be the name of the show), and then, ingeniously, we zoom out to see this final image emblazoned on some device, a Pod, a TV, a computer screen, which would be different every episode. And in some way, either prominently or just as a subtle cue, that device would be the key to the episode. The clue to the puzzle.
I could, right now, hammer out full scripts and storyboards for at least five of these episodes, and cobble together the mental inventory of resources needed to see them to fruition. I’m really good at that part of the process - the immediate hypothetical assessment. What I’m not so good at is the enduring follow-through required of self-indulgent and hopelessly overwrought personal projects like this. I refer you to the now still carcasses of The Bishkek Daily Steingard, the Penguin Republic video game, etc. etc. I would like to think that I will return to these projects, and perhaps I will, but honestly, completely realistically, I would only be doing so out of a sense of obsessive task-completion. My mythological passions are largely escapist and rarely productive - to take on more would be choosing to further embroil myself in things that have no practical end or culpable artistic benefit.
Now, if I could make money doing them, that would be something.
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"I threw a pebble in a brook and watched the ripples run away and they never made a sound and the leaves that are green turned to brown. They whither in the wind and crumble in your hand. Hello hello goodbye goodbye." (Simon and Garfunkel).
Undoubtedly your outcomes and recurrent themes speak volumes about your emotional innards.
Perhaps you need to develop some Utopian mythologies. See if you can get some positive stories going...how should they be told? Do they need to come to extremities? Could your characters just live, grow, marry and die - happily, without a tortured search for allegorical importance?
The reason I first started thinking about Utopias was because mine usually involve farming. I just can't think of anything more wholesome then scenes of hardworking, salt of the earth types sustaining our existence.
The reason I started thinking about farming was Simon and Garfunkel's talk of green leaves turning to brown. Nature has a way of growing and dying. Waiting and growing again. If 10 of your ideas die in childbirth to produce one beginning and 10 beginnings die to produce one maturation and 10 maturations die to produce one story that makes it to a ripe old age - then you're doing much better than most plant species. Let things die. Death is the only thing that allows birth.
That's true as an ideal, and I wish the mythologies lingered more in the mundanity of pleasant existence. But I don't think they would obsess me if they did - they would simply be comfortable mythological wallpaper.
But there is solace in the world of the mythology, which I haven't talked about yet. And it's actually just as potent as the darker stuff. I should talk about it soon.
I volunteer to act in your show. Of course, I'm not very good at acting, but if you have someone like me, I could play her.
Sitting by the pool in the Arizona desert,my mind so empty it is appreciative of another that is so full. Articulating the obstacles and having obstacles to articulate,not nearly so arduous as it may appear. Full speed ahead until all the myths merge into one. One that elevates you beyond the relentless gears of the engine of the mind and lands you by the pool in the desert. The goal in life remains the realization that you've always been where you were supposed to be. Your words continue to inspire.
Ah, follow-through. My constant nemesis.
I have many such unfinished projects. I'd like to say something inspiring about how if you take a simple slice of story with a beginning and an end and if you really care about it and commit to finishing it, it will happen. But although I'm optimistic about my current project, I haven't written anything in two weeks now. So at the moment it would seem just a teeny bit hollow.
I continue to hope, however, since I love my elves and I really want to finish this project. I almost said "I want to have finished this project." Oh, dear. It's hardly begun.
Sigh.
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