shopping can make you feel human

The only things I wanted to accomplish today were goi to the bank, maybe get a passport photo, maybe clean the floor and maybe do my workout.
The first thing that got crossed off was the passport photo when I realized that I couldn't get a passport in time to be able to go to this American film festival that invited me down. The truth is I procrastinated like crazy because I wasn't all that enthusiastic about attending this festival. I have no idea why. Once upon a time when my friends were getting invited to film festivals, I was crazy jealous. Now I guess I'm a bit jaded. Or maybe it was just the fact that this festival was only two days long and they were only inviting me for a day. So it would be a big bother.
Still that doesn't explain it. I think I'm just lazy. And maybe I need a little rest from this film, after the relative whirlwind of the Hot Docs and the TVO premieres, so close on top of each other.
Anyway I still haven't done the floor or the workout but I think I'm going to get around to both. I hate working out but when I did it a couple of days ago, I did feel good afterwards.
Yesterday someone implied that, even if I worked out and did everything I want to do, I still would never have the body I dream of. What they were saying was that I should do it for its own sake. The fact is I don't think I dream about having a great body or anything near. I just dream of losing two to four inches from my waist so I can more easily find clothes that firt me. If I could be stocky instead of fat, I think I'd be satisfied.
When I'm finished the workout, I know I don't look any better but I feel like I must look better, so that's reason enough to do it. Tomorrow someone's coming over to do some work, who also works as a personal trainer. Maybe he'll give me the skinny, so to speak, on my challenges.
(That's why I'm cleaning the floor, by the way... because someone's coming over and I need an excuse.)

Anyway I mostly frittered the day away, just too comfortable sitting on the porch or working on my iTunes cleanup project, to move. It was such a nice day. I wish I had more to do but days like this, it's hard to do anything.
Finally though, I got off my ass. It was bike weather but my bike was outside all winter and it needs a new chain. So that was another reason to move, so I could take my bike to the shop around the corner. It'll be ready Saturday. Maybe I'll ride it to High Park that day and then climb the steps there for exercise. I've lived here in the shadow of the Park for almost a year but haven't been there yet.

Somebody told me my posts are too long. So I'll try to wrap this up.

I went to the bank, deposited a cheque and paid a bunch of overdue bills. I sort of can't wait till I rent my upstairs apartment. I say "sort of" because I also dread it. Having someone living above me. Having to worry about noise, mine and theirs. I really wish I didn't have to rent it but the way I set up my house, it's just wasted space and it should get some use. Mostly of course, I need the money.
After the bank, I thought about going down to the more southerly Polish deli, which has way nicer breaded chicken cutlets than my local place, though my local place has way nicer smoked sausage. And they're really pushy at the southerly place, trying to get you to buy more things and also making it clear that they'd be a lot nicer to you if you were Polish, which I've never felt at my local place.
I wish I could avoid them completely but I wanted the chicken and I thought I could use the walk. After I bought the cutlets, which I'm almost sure they overcharged me for, I went to the health food store. I don't like that store either. They're all sourpusses there. But they have these Indian spicy veggie things, which you just drop in boiling water and they're really really good and really cheap. So I ignored their unfriendliness and gave them my (insignificant) business.
(They're so unfriendly at this store that it almost makes you yearn for the normal holier-than-thou bullshit you have to put up with at other health food stores.)

By this point, I was getting a little tired. It might have had something to do with my jean jacket which was probably unnecessary given the warm weather. It's like this every summer; it takes me a while to shed my protective layers, I feel too exposed at first.
A few blocks from my house, I saw these blueberries on sale. Someone in Vancouver who I interviewed for Lovable. told me she freezes blueberries as a kind of healthy frozen snack so I've been doing the same and it works for me. But blueberry prices seem to fluctuate wildly from two dollars to four dollars a tiny container, so I couldn't resist them.
Then I saw raspberries. They're always expensive and these seemed a tad cheaper so I grabbed them.
It was when I was in this vegetable store that I suddenly felt this strange sense of being connected to all human activities.

I mean right now, I'm back home and I'm listening to my Matt Pond PA records (they're a band, in case you never heard of them) and I'm trying to decide which ones to keep on my hard drive and which ones to take off. The iTunes cleanup project is all about the fact that, for instance, somehow I've acquired SIX Matt Pond PA records and that's just too much so I have to make a snap judgement about which ones to keep and which ones to remove, even though they more or less all sound the same.
When I'm home doing this kind of stuff, I don't really feel connected to the community of man.
But when I was in the store buying blueberries alongside all these pretty mothers and fathers buying vegetables, I did feel like I was part of the world. It was a nice feeling.

Okay my hardwood floor awaits. I have to figure out how to do it and then avoid walking on it for a couple of hours. I guess I'll hide down in the basement, where I definitely won't feel connected to the community of man, even if, God forbid, I give in and watch the American Idol finale.

puppy love

I had two first "coffee" dates this past weekend, one at 4:30 on Friday, one at 4:30 on Saturday, both on patios, one lasting two hours, one lasting an hour and a half, both with women I'd met online, both with women close to my age. And both of them had seen my film. I guess I can't call them blind dates because I'd seen their pictures and we'd chatted a bit but they were blind enough as far as I was concerned.
They were both lovely women. The conversation was fairly easy, we got along, we laughed etc etc. There were moments in the Friday date where I felt a bit like I was interviewing her for some "Lovable" followup and I felt like I talked a bit too much on both of the dates but I think for a first meeting, they both went fine.
Each of them resembled the kind of women I'd been friends with in my life, with a slight edge to Friday's woman. Neither of them particularly resembled "my type" but even as I write that, I'm thinking that doesn't really mean anything anymore, if it ever did. Friday's date was in the West end of the city, close to where I live; Saturday's date I travelled to the East end. That may partly explain why Friday's gal has a slight edge in this non-race.
There was no overt flirting on either date and I'm not sure there was even any covert either. They were friendly meetings. On second thought maybe the one on Friday had some flirting but way in the background. Or at least it seemed slighly clearer with Friday's woman that sex played a part in her online search.
Friday's woman emailed yesterday and said she'd like to proceed. I have a feeling Saturday's woman won't do the same which might mean I'll have to email her and I'm not sure what I'll say. I'm not sure what to do with either of them actually but with Saturday's gal, presumably doing nothing would work.

It's not that I don't want anything to happen with either of these women. I don't know what my proof is but I guess I think, on principle anyway, that if two reasonably sympatico people spend time together and continue to enjoy the conversation, eventually some kind of intimacy would be created, especially if both parties are interested in taking things in that direction. I know that sounds cold and theoretical but it is kind of theoretical for me.

I've had the thought in the last few years that I should be trying to pursue relationships in a more mature way, rather than falling back on old patterns. That means deemphasizing chemistry and sexual attraction which more or less ruled my choices my entire adult life.
I don't think I ever articulated this but I think I must have believed, once upon a time anyway, that sexual chemistry was sort of "God's way" of telling you "this person has been chosen for you". In other words, sexual chemistry may be the first thing you notice but that's just the tip of the iceberg in your potential compatibility and if you spend time with that person, little by little that compatibility will be uncovered.
I guess that almost sounds ignorant now.
There was only one woman in my life with whom I had a strong sexual connection AND a real friendship. But she was so profoundly unavailable that I hesitate to include her. She lived out of town. She wasn't prepared to move and I always had the feeling that if I had suggested moving myself, she would have panicked. I think she liked it the way it was, particularly how the separation made our time together that much more intense. So we talked on the phone a lot, had intense phone sex, and saw each other once a month for a few years before she broke up with me, supposedly to allow me to find a woman with whom I could have a child.... which she was not interested in.
She was pretty well the only woman I've ever been involved with for any length of time where I didn't feel that we were essentially compromising our needs for friendship and companionship in order to play out our sexual connection. So when I fantasize about the possibility of a relationship with friendship, intimacy, sharing, support AND passionate sex, I only have one example from the past and that example is so compromised, I can barely allow myself to count it.
And that makes me think that I should try and de-emphasize the necessity of sexual chemistry. But I'm not sure that's possible.

In the last year, I have found myself experiencing tender feelings for two new female friends. I'm saying "tender" because that's the only word I think I can get away with. In other words, in each case there were moments where I felt like I was falling in love but I can't use those phrases with confidence, because those feelings were never returned.
With the first of these women, I decided to tell her how I felt. But before I could, she sensed that something was coming and headed me off by informing me that she didn't feel the same way about me. With the second woman, I've decided not to even think about saying something, not just to save myself the embarrassment but also for strategic reasons. If I ever did say something to her - and I'm not sure I ever will - I wanted to make sure I didn't say it too soon. I think I have a tendency to get ahead of things when I start feeling something for a woman and if there is any potential there, I don't want to blow it. .
I know she likes me. I know that she knows we have a connection. I know that she's noticed how quickly that connection developed and how quickly our conversations reached a level of intimacy. More than a few times she's told me things and then said either "I don't know why I'm telling you this" or "I haven't told this to anybody else".
Like I say, I know I have a tendency to get ahead of myself but once upon a time, when I met a woman and we found ourselves drifting towards each other, spending more time together, opening up to each other, telling each other things we hadn't told anyone else, there was a reasonable possibility we were moving towards more than friendship. These days, that just doesn't seem true.
I can't figure it out.
But maybe the answer is simple. It's all in my head.
I'm lonely and I want a girlfriend.
Or to put it the way one woman in my film puts it, I'm needy and desperate.

That may all be true. It may in fact be inarguable.
But I can't completely discount another possibility. Once upon a time I had something going for me that allowed me to "close the deal", so to speak. Whatever it was, I don't have it anymore.
Which is kind of strange because, on some level, I think I'm "better" than I ever was. I'm happier, I'm way less negative (note how hard it is for me to say "more positive"). I have more to offer, more to share with someone. But there is one thing I clearly have less of. Youth. Time etc.

Trying to figure this out is silly. "They're just not into you, dude". That's fine but it still makes me wonder how, once again, I've fallen for women who can't return the feelings.
But maybe that's all it is.
I'm looking at these women and thinking "This is the kind of relationship I should be looking for. This is the kind of woman I could have a real connection with. This is what my new attitude and wisdom have brought me".
I look at them and think "we'd be good for each other".
But maybe these women are just my new fantasies. Different than the old fantasies but as unattainable as ever. And maybe, ultimately, that's the main reason I fall in love with them. Their unattainability.
And if that's true, then I haven't changed at all.
Which would be disappointing but not surprising.

I suspect I'm not going to pursue anything with either of my weekend blind dates. I hope that's not a mistake.

the sun is finally out

The sun is out after the rain of the past two days. The rain was welcome because I've spent the last week, with my neighbor Julie, planting a garden. A little one in front of my house and a slightly bigger one in the backyard. So the rain was welcome then and the sun is welcome now.
I don't know what's going to happen in my garden. In fact, I don't think that quite says it. I don't have a fucking clue what's going to happen in my garden. I tried to pay attention to the sun requirements of each plant I chose but other than that, it was all a complete frigging whim.
On one side in the back, there are herbs. A few of the usual suspects like mint, chosen partly because I remember that I once had mint in a garden and it seemed to spread easily. And a few herbs I've never heard of, chosen partly because there was a chance they'd flower.
I'm more worried about the plants in the front of the house and that's mostly because they're so near to my neighbor Elizabeth's huge tree. So they don't get much sun and they're dangerously close to a heavy duty root system.
Actually the weeds in the backyard were pretty wild too. We were pulling ten foot roots out of the ground, which would have been longer if they hadn't broken off. I know I'm not saying much but it's always interesting to me all the stuff that's happening under the ground even when you just have a bit of lawn and some weeds like I had up until a week or so ago.
I really hope most of the things I planted survive and flourish though I doubt all of them will and I'm also aware that if they all flourish, I might not like what everything that comes up.
But the truth is, the garden is already a success, even though nothing much has happened yet.
It's about the delineation of space as much as anything else. If I could draw you a picture here, it might be easier to explain. But for instance, in the front, on the strip where I planted the garden, there used to be grass. And as soon as I took out the grass, it already looked better. The dirt alone looked better than the grass had looked.
In the back, there was one strip of garden but it was overgrown with weeds. It was lined with two rows of sunken bricks but you couldn't really see them for all the weeds and lawn.
We dug up the bricks, got rid of the weeds and dug another garden row on the opposite side of the yard, then lined each side with one row of bricks above ground.
That alone made the whole yard look way better. If stuff grows and flowers, all the better... especially if I keep an eye on the weeds.
There's a lot more to do with the yard. It could be a real oasis back there. I could really use a new deck, possibly on two levels. And at the back, I have lots of plans including vines, a trellis, a bit more shade and maybe, if Julie has her way, a hammock someday. Certainly some good chairs are in order. And it still needs to be cleaned up a bit more. Maybe a better fence someday. I suspect one day I'll cut down one of the small trees and perhaps even add another small tree in another location.
I like being out there now, particularly when I have company. But more than that, I just like looking out there when I pass one of the two windows.
It has shape.
I can't believe how satisfying it is. Already.
I didn't think I was going to get it together this summer. I owe it all to my new friend and neighbor. Left to my own devices, I would have put it off.

the local gelato store

I moved into a new neighborhood about nine months ago. I didn't choose the neighborhood, it came with the house I bought. But it's a good neighborhood. A lot of people choose it. My only complaint would be that it's a bit far from the part of the city I used to call home.
It could be worse though. A lot worse. I've lived in worse neighborhoods.
About ten years ago, I was exiled from my home. I'd lived in a particular neighborhood for almost ten years, felt at home there and then I got evicted. I couldn't find an apartment anywhere close to where I wanted to live. Actually that wasn't quite true. When I did finally find an apartment, it was close to where I wanted to live. Close. But no cigar.
It was about a ten or fifteen minute walk from a part of the city I felt at home in. It was about a half hour walk from the part of the city I'd left. The problem was, if I left my house and walked those fifteen minutes to the part of the city I felt at home in, it would be what you might call a "dead walk". I could walk down one of the residential streets and see a lot of nice homes, kids playing, and maybe wave to a distant acquaintance. Or I could walk down the main drag, past a whole bunch of stores that I had no interest in, alongside a lot of car traffic and very little foot traffic.
In other words, where I lived was nowhere. It was only close to somewhere.
Now don't get me wrong, this particular neighborhood was very desirable. A number of my friends live there now and are very happy to be there. But they're happy for the kids. They're happy because they can walk to work. They have different priorities than me.
I don't need to live in the heart of it. I don't need to live in what I recently heard someone call a "destination neighborhood". But I prefer to live in or close to one of those neighborhoods where people sit in cafes and on patios, buy groceries, go for a stroll. Somewhere you might run into someone you know.
That sort of describes where I live now. I don't love it here like I loved that place I was exiled from ten years ago but I'm more than satisfied. My house is on a kind of a sketchy street, not one of the really beautiful leafy streets in this neighborhood. But on the other hand, it's about as close to the main street as you can get without being right on the street. And I like that. I'm lazy. If I just want to go for a walk, I like to walk where other people are walking. And I don't like to walk for ten minutes to get there.
Anyway back when I lived in exile, there were a few occasions when a nearby business folded. The best example was probably the variety store a couple of door from me, we used to call The Elvis Head Store. It was one of those fell-off-the-back-of-a-truck stores that sold different brands of cigarettes on different days, filled with knicknacks from eras gone by. And as the name suggests, it was filled with Elvis heads, which no one I knew ever saw anyone buy. But it usually had milk and pop and smokes and interesting old birthday cards and the owner was a character and he actually had a revolving gang of sidekicks who would hang out with him all day. It was a hangout as much as a store. And it definitely made a contribution to my daily life.
It disappeared one night. A truck must have pulled up while I was sleeping. Later I heard that they were running some kind of bookie joint in the basement and the cops came by and made them an offer they couldn't refuse.
So began the wait for what would replace the Elvis Head Store.
I was hoping for a coffee shop. A Second Cup or even a Starbucks. It stayed empty for a long time and then it became a dentist's office. On the rare occasion I go to the dentist, I'm willing to drive.
And so it went. Everytime a business would leave, it would be replaced by something equally or more useless to me. A local bar went out of business and was replaced by a lawyer's office. A framing store was replaced by a winemaking store.
I hated this area so much I actually made a film about how much I hated it. It wasn't a very good film; it was kind of a challenging subject for a film. But I hated it enough to try.
Anyway a couple of months after I moved to my new neighborhood, a store that, as far as I could tell, sold slightly groovy upscale furniture, went out of business. I didn't pay much attention. I certainly didn't begin the "what's this going to become" countdown I used to engage in back in my exile days.
That's partly because I'm more or less satisfied with the neighborhood. But it's also because of the particular mix of stores in this neighborhood. For every restaurant, bar, store and cafe I might occasionally patronize, there are four more I'll probably never set foot in. This includes a number of fancyish restaurants as well as sports bars, a framing store, a bead store and a place that apparently teaches children how to cook.
But a few weeks ago when the newspaper finally went up on the empty store windows and the abandoned spot was finally about to become something, I felt a little flutter of anticipation. I couldn't think what I wanted to see there but I was hoping for the best.
They put up a little sign a few days ago. It's going to be a gelato store.
The kids will like it. And there are a lot of kids around here.
Myself, I guess I'll try it out. Maybe they'll have a good lemon gelato. I like tart things. But I try not to buy too much ice cream or sugary things so I won't be there too often.
It could be worse.

I meant to talk about women in this post. But the gelato store kind of reminds me of my fortunes with women these days. I can't say exactly what I'm looking for but whatever it might be, I think it's too much to ask for.

tomorrow is the first day of the rest of my life

This is the third blog I've started in the past year. I can't even remember how to find those other attempts. I don't know why I didn't keep them up but if I don't keep up this one, I'll stop trying.
My new film "Lovable" premiered at Hot Docs in Toronto two weeks ago tomorrow. Then it showed again a week ago yesterday. Then it had its TV premiere this past Wednesday. It will show one more time on TV tonight (in Ontario only).
Of course that won't be the last time it's ever shown. There will be more TV plays in six months or so. And I suppose there will be some festivals. But effectively the Lovable whirlwind will be over for me and so... tomorrow will be the first day of the rest of my life.
What am I hoping for in the rest of my life?
I hope to make a living and pay the mortgage. I think that's number one.
I bought a house last summer. I still had money left over from my inheritance. Then I spent all my leftover money on the renovation. I should have kept a blog about that but suffice to say that I've always been bad with money and I had no idea how much work was going to be required when we started the renovation.
A year ago I felt rich. Now I have a house but no money.
But if I can make a modest living - and find an upstairs tenant - I should be okay. That's easier said than done though. I haven't always made even a modest living.

What else do I hope will happen in the rest of my life?
I guess I hope I'll make a few more films that I can be proud of, though pride does not come that easily to me. I guess another way to put it is, I hope that, while I'm making a living doing whatever comes along, I'll have a chance to make a couple of my "own" films.
But at this moment anyway, that's not a priority.
For the moment, I feel satisfied creatively. I feel like I've made a few decent films and gotten a lot more attention than I ever believed I would get. So now I don't need to be an "auteur" anymore. Or so I'm telling myself. If I can just be a working filmmaker/writer, I'll be satisfied....assuming of course that a working filmmaker makes more money than an auteur.

In my thirties and early forties, I was filled with inspiration. I would write a screenplay just for the pleasure of working out a story that was banging around in my head. I would work on an idea even if I had no real expectation of ever making the darn thing. I had all this stuff I needed to get out of me. Or so it seems.
It was also a lot of fun, in the larger sense of the word.
Or maybe it was more cathartic?
If you took everything I ever wrote in my life and subdivided it into categories, I'm pretty sure you'd find the highest page count listed under "breakup diaries". Writing down everything that happened was a surprisingly effective way of dealing with the pain of relationships ending.
I never wrote a script that was specifically about my love life or even all that autobiographical. But I think that I wrote screenplays for many of the same reasons I wrote those breakup diaries. It was about getting stuff out of my head. Expressing myself.
It was also about learning to write. And I did make a bit of a living from it.
And even though writing a script isn't the same as making a film, it can satisfy a lot of the same urges.

It's been a long time since I wrote anything or worked on anything just for the sheer need to get it out of my head and on to paper. And probably the biggest reason for that is that I've actually made some films, rather than just writing scripts for films that never get made.
But it's also because, in my best writing period, from about 1990 to 96, I wrote a few pretty good scripts that went nowhere. So why write more?
I had two interesting, nagging script ideas in the last couple of years but I never got past making a few notes.
That could change. I have been writing something for the past few months. But the difference is I've been writing it with a director that has a pretty good chance of getting the film made. And two, there was a promise of some money, a promise which subsequently paid off.
Maybe my days of working out ideas speculatively are gone. Maybe it'll be all about money and deadlines and making a living. That wouldn't be such a bad thing.

This might even explain why I've had so much trouble keeping up a blog. I'm not sure I have it in me anymore. Before there were blogs per se, I had a website and I posted huge long diary pieces. I obviously still have the impulse to unload my thoughts and stories onto an unsuspecting world but maybe the impulse is not strong enough to do more than start a new blog every six months.
Then again, I've had the thought that now that I'm no longer making confessional or autobiographical documentaries, if I'm no longer blabbing into a mirror with my camera, maybe I'll need a place to tell those stories.
It's a reasonable theory.
I'm going through something with a friend right now and I do have the urge to write about it. It's almost like writing about it helps me think about it. Or it helps me stop thinking about it.
Anyway I got carried away there. Let's get back to how I hope to spend the rest of my life.
Number one, become a professional filmmaker (and maybe writer) and make an adequate living from it.

What else?
I'd like to lose weight, eat well, learn to cook more (take advantage of my lovely kitchen), keep up my exercise routine, get into yoga or pilates.
I'd like to make my backyard into the oasis it could be.
I'd like to quit smoking. I'm going to try one more time this year or before my next birthday. I have to. I think it might be too late for me but just in case it isn't...

Then there's women, relationships, sharing my life. That'll be my next post.