Stepping Stones

  This week should see my first calls from the agency for acting auditions.

   It seems like I've been waiting on this forever, ever since Labour Day when I happened to chance upon the two recruiters in Burlington.  Sometimes I get a small worry that I've oversold this to people.  I mean, I had one person in the last week ask me "besides acting, what do you do?" and yet I haven't even been to an audition yet!  Still, if ever there was an application of the "act as if" principle, it's this.  I'm going to take this one heads on and see where it leads.   I'm excited!

   Creative people are difficult to place in a capitalist economy.  It's probably why so many artists grativate towards socialism or communism: if the basic necessities of life were taken care of by the community, then it would free up artists to explore their craft without fear of homelessness or starvation, whatever it might be.  I can definitely see that appeal.  Sadly, while that could be the way things go in the future, at the present, creative men and women are still having to wait tables, serve coffee, lug boxes, or push paper in offices to support the basics of life to follow their dreams. 

   When they do succeed, though, they succeed big.  It's the difference between Harrison Ford the Carpenter - the job he held to pay the bills; he'd met George Lucas when the director hired him to fix his cabinets - and Harrison Ford the A-List Film Star.  If you look at the percentages of artists living almost obscene affluence thanks to their craft and those struggling for rent and food....well, I'd rather not.  As one of Ford's more famous characters, Han Solo, once remarked:

"Never tell me the odds."

    Off the top of my head, I've held something like nine jobs in my fourteen year work history.  Two were logistics clerk positions; one was a warehouse co-ordinator for a marketing company; one was as an office customer service rep; two were pure administrative clerical gigs; two were as a warehouse material handler; one was as a virtual concierge (in an office, but not doing administration); and one was in sales. 

   Out of the nine, I was happiest in the concierge and the sales gigs.  I only left the concierge for the better shift and pay of government work, and - I'll admit - the presence of a union to keep the man at bay (my new thoughts on unions are a whole other entry altogether).  I only stopped working the sales job because the company itself was shady and disintegrated, resulting in a layoff (I enjoyed the work, though).

   I liked them because they appealed to my creativity, because they challenged me to think outside the box, to use my unique talents.  It's a satisfaction I can't get in government.  Here, there is nothing outside the box.  The box is everything.

    There's a lingering convention in the way Western culture - and the American workforce paradigm in particular - views careers, and that's the idea that you're supposed to find one career for life.  It's that 1950s ideal of the man who works for a loyal company, for fair compensation, who gets rewarded for his efforts if he shows effort.  He sticks with the company for 40 years, then retires with a good pension. 

   Flashforward to the Great Recession...hell, even before.  The 1950s vision is only a memory, and a laughable one at that.  Not only has the economy grown more unstable, but several new work paradigms have emerged.  One of them suits the artist very well: the job as a growth experience, as a stepping stone. 

   You start a job with a great level of excitement, stay as long as the gumption stays with you.  Enjoy your time.  When the gumption runs out, and the job feels like an existential drag, or when you no longer see any chances to move up, start finding something else.  Send out the resumes, do the interviews, and when you get an offer for a new place, tender your resignation at the old, and start again.

   In a way, it's more natural than sticking with the same job for decades.  In nature, there are many species of fauna that will habitate one place for a while, and then migrate to greener pastures when the habitat no longer supports them.  Western culture, for all its greatness which I do admire and defend, seems wont to impose artificial expectations on work, as it does other aspects of life.  Why should anyone stick with something long after it's outlived its usefulness?  When it not only stops providing satisfaction and a feeling of purpose and belonging, but actually starts working against your happiness? 

  The reflex of the traditionalists, of course, is to slap back with the other extreme: you don't want a string of fifteen jobs on a resume.  You don't want to show you're non-committal.  To them, I say this: employers are non-committal.  Way more than their workers.  They won't hesitate to let you go if it serves their interests.  You shouldn't hesitate to drop them in favour of something new if they no longer serve your interests, as long as you do so in a professional manner that prevents too much damage on either side of the arrangement.

   When we say we're in a new economic reality, we need to appreciate that this reality now changes on a daily basis, not a generational one.  Most of the gray hairs for whom I work and who still cling to the old 1950s vision of career will never accept that, nor will their younger disciples for whom life has indeed been a straight and narrow path of relative ease.  Adaptability and knowing when to leap are two qualities I'd advise any young person entering the workforce to develop, no matter what they studied in school, at no matter what level. 

   Above all, I say to these kids: don't look for your career to define you as it has previous generations.  Instead, try to resist the tendency to label yourself and others you'll meet by what they do, and focus instead on the experience of life as a whole, in which "career" is only one thread in the tapestry.

   Your career, like your relationships, like your health, like other parts of your life, should all have one thing in common: they should be accurate reflections of the strongest version of Who You Are. Present tense. That is, they put you in the zone and give you a zest for life, make you excited to wake up in the morning to face the new day.   Doesn't matter what the job is, whether it's in your trained field or not, as long as it contributes to your overall joy.  When it stops doing so, look for something else that's more in line with Who You Are, however you define it, wherever you find it.

   I'm mindful that I'm now as excited about acting as I was about starting my current job, as I had been about the virtual concierge, about many of the jobs that ended up burning me out over the years. I haven't left my day job, and don't plan on it, for all of the shortcomings it has of low creative satisfaction and the social isolation. But I'm no lifer: my boss knows that, and if this new adventure turns out to be lucrative and personally fulfilling enough, I'd be silly to stick with a sure thing that fails to satisfy on both counts.

   How this turns out remains to be seen. That's why it's called "risk". Stay tuned.

***UPDATE: For those of you who have expressed concern, even criticism, that I shouldn't write this for fear that current and future employers may Google me, read this.  Frankly, any employer who would seek that much control over my thoughts and feelings does not deserve my services.

Confidence without Douchebaggery

  The following is a recounting of something Jody witnessed, and may not have happened exactly as depicted, though that's totally okay, because this version's been sexified by Jody's awesome imagination.

 The Phidelts had Wing Night this past Sunday in Westdale.

 After gorging on the delightful parts of some hapless, mass-produced chickens, me and the younger guys chill for about ten minutes before they head off to another pub. 

   During that time, two lovely young ladies emerge from the restaurant, walk past the bunch of us, and get into a car to light a cigarette.  Long story short, one of our entourage - driven by courage, apathy, and a deeper fortitude located somewhere in his pants - walks over to the driver's side.  I have no idea what he says - I'd later find out he opened with "I'd like to see some ID" - but the girls seem to enjoy it and the rest of us are quite entertained.

  "I love the way he sauntered over there," I say aloud.  "It's such a balls-out approach."

  At that point, a brother - who I shall deem "The Moustache" until he gives me formal permission to reprint his name publicly - responds with a cool point. 

"The trick is not giving a shit if people think you're a douchebag". 

  Think about it.  How many "nice guys" worry about looking like anything but "nice guys" when it comes to impressing the ladies?  That's why nice guys fail so frequently and so hard when they try to be less "nice" at bars and at parties: they're aware that they're putting on an act.  They're too afraid of saying something wrong that will make them look like complete assholes to the women.  Their fears become their focus, and thus become their experience.  There's nothing as confidence sapping, as emasculating, as the feeling that you have to choose between being a dick and being the Pillsbury doughboy to succeed at dating, and life.

  The trick is to lose yourself in the part.  And also to eliminate the word "douchebag" from your self description.  All you're doing is just walking your confidence. 

  Much like Jack the Clawless Tabby did in 2006.

  Call it a biological Napoleon complex all you want, this cat is one mean pussy.  Never once did it occur to him that the bear cub could easily take him out with the slightest of swipes, or that he was about five times smaller. The cat had his turf to protect. 

   Jack the Clawless Tabby never dwelled on his shortcomings: instead, he pushed his natural strengths to the max and harnessed them behind a single goal: telling a wandering bear to get the fuck off his property.

 Issues of confidence are rampant in my daily existence, mostly in the assertion department. Assertiveness remains a challenge for me, especially in the presence of stronger, go-getter personalities who are way more cock and balls than I'll ever be.  They give me little room to maneuver: if you push, I'll either dig in my heels or I'll just walk away, start some lone wolf time. 

  Or, if you're really being direct, I'll push back a little more out of proportion to what's called for, but that's a last resort.  I don't much care for pissing matches with people, but if you're on my territory - my home, my office, my arena - I will do what's necessary to protect my sovereignty.

 And yet, in situations where I'm not forced to beat my chest, I'm damned good at the confidence game.  I've landed a couple of jobs where I only barely met the requirements, based mostly on the interview.  Aaron pointed this out a couple of times when I've had moments of doubt: he's one person who sees that strength, and he's one of the most confident guys I've ever met. 

  We have an archetype in Western culture of the disgruntled office clerk.  That person who occupies a lower station in a greater organization who is so much more capable than what he's getting, if only he had the guts to just speak up for himself.  Frequently, the place where he paralyzes himself is one concept, this all-too-familiar fear:

"I don't want to be an asshole."

  Nor is it just guys.  Alice remarked to me today, in a somewhat related discussion, her own qualms with self-assertion.  After showing her the story on Jack the Orange Tabby, she said this:

   I'm always afraid that I'll look like a bitch if I assert myself like that.

    Back to the Moustache for a moment.

    "You know," I say to him, back at the parking lot of the restaurant after Wing Night, "I've always struggled with issues of authenticity, especially when it comes to meeting girls, but you know..."

     I steal another look over at Mr. Ballsy, chatting up the two girls.

    "It's nothing new.  I've summoned that kind of confidence at job interviews, why not here?"

    The Moustache agrees.  "Real douchebags don't care what people think.  That confidence is attractive and they know it.  You can be a good confident person without being a dick."

    Plus, as much as pretty girls can't initially tell the difference between an asshole and a confident good guy at a bar, I'm willing to bet they enjoy the process of sorting them out.

    Simple concept, right?  And yet, so many people fret over it.

   Losing yourself in the role doesn't mean putting on a show.  It's the acquisition and continued accumulation of a genuine feeling, and then just running with it.  It's like summoning a comic book superpower and then swaggering around. 

  Easiest way to summon this power?  Do what Ben Affleck's character talks about in Boiler Room - which Michael is watching over at his place as I type this:

"Act as if". 

   Assume you're a superstar, then lose yourself in the part.  I do this a lot lately as part of my visualization for acting.  Since I started, not gonna lie, my swagger's gotten more attention from all the right places (and a few of the wrong ones).

   As that superstar, walk up to someone today and strike up a conversation like it was nothing.  Unless the other person has some malfunction in that moment, I promise it'll go smoothly.

  If anything, that other person should feel anxious talking to you.  Be polite, kind, say whatever comes to mind, thank them, shake their hands if the chat was meaningful, then make your way out. 

   As you leave, notice that feeling - high, energized, certain - and carry it with you as long as it lasts. 

  And remember it the next time you see that cute girl you've been dying to talk to.

  To the naturally confident, extroverted A-types, this seems so basic, but to guys like me, it's always a new revelation, like a monolith from 2001.  Some people need to have this literally beaten into our skulls with a proto-human femur bone to make sure we never forget.

  And yes, lately I've been following my own advice and doing this with women.  More on that in a later entry.  Back to the novel, in the meantime.

Dare the Universe

Blog Evolution

To make any blog more searchable, it helps to include a few words about what it's about.  It's also preferable not to have those keywords all appearing at once in the title banner.  Hence, why I've resorted to the tag cloud, visible in the module on the upper right corner of the homepage to Dispatches.  I did a quick skim of all the entries to date and tagged according to what I saw. By the numbers, this isn't as much of a divorce blog as I thought it was.  We'll see how it evolves from here.

The Secret, on Amphetamines

Thursday, I returned home from work.  Another busy week, yet more mediocrity. 

The reason I'm perpetually unsatisfied in most jobs I've held is that most of them have been office work without much room for creativity, and I'm a creative person.  The most creative office based job I ever had was at the virtual concierge where I worked before lucking out on the government position.  Even that gig was heavily regulated due to the nature of the service we were providing.  I stick with administration for the same reason that food servers with other passions stick to waiting tables: it's the only means of making money to support their basic needs they've ever done while bigger dreams are still pending.

I'll also flat out state that the Public Service, from a creative standpoint, is a zombie apocalypse.  It does many things well, but encouraging innovation, imagination, and outside-the-box thinking is not part of the deal.  Nor should it be: you need to conform to existing processes and suppress all independent thought or desires to change the system, because there's only so much you can change.  Again, nothing inherently wrong with that.  But  I can decide is where I want to stand in relation to it all.  I'll do my job, but I need to get out before I, too, get zombified.

So, I returned home from work and decide to pop in The Secret. 

Now, most of my science-y friends and more rationalistic buddies don't necessarily buy into the Law of Attraction, or the way it's presented in The Secret. Fair enough. What you have to realize is that this DVD was my introduction to the concept.  I have it practically memorized. So even though I have my own doubts from time to time,  The Secret is part of my own belief system. Thus, telling me not to watch it, or to discount it on empirical grounds, is like telling a Catholic not to attend mass, or a Muslim not to bow to the east. Many scientists are devoutly religious, keep that in mind.  And I have had some rather anomalous experiences the methodology that prove, in my subjective experience, that the Law of Attraction exists, and works as advertised.

And one such experience occurred that night. 

I decided to do some visualizing of my own.  Scheduled to pay a visit to my talent agency on Saturday to activate my profile and start getting auditions for film and TV work, I started to fantasize about such a gig. 

Since this opportunity landed in my lap, I've had various fantasies and daydreams of success in commercials, film and TV which I won't share here, frankly because I don't trust that some well-meaning but skeptical readers won't shoot them down on practical grounds.  Watching The Secret, I decided to indulge in these daydreams. 

Two minutes - two minutes! - after I began my reverie, the phone rang.  It was the agency.  On a hunch, they wanted to see if I could audition for a major restaurant chain the very next day!  Normally, they'd wait until I was completely set up, but they were in a bind and were willing to chance a long shot.

I was stunned.  Chalk it up to coincidence all you want, it was a wake-up call of the biggest sorts. 

And I ended up turning them down.  A manager at my office was retiring the next day, so my absence from the office would have been conspicuous.  Or so I told myself.  They said "no worries", and I hung up the phone.

Next day, I went back to work.  Long story short, I wasn't nearly as needed as I thought I was. 

Today, I went in, and finalized my setup.  And I found out I had a great chance to have landed that part had I gone to that audition.  Major.  More where that came from, sure, but I've learned a few lessons from this.

First, office work assimilates people: people become bureaucratized quite easily. This happens in the private sector, sure, but government's particularly nasty at that because everything's hyper regulated and monitored.  Just visit any family court.  Remember the episode of The Simpsons where Homer actually files for divorce from Marge?  Who could forget the immortal words of comfort of the court clerk (who looked suspiciously like Lunch Lady Doris)?  "These things happen. Eight dollars".  This lady actually exists, I'll tell you.

As physically safe and mentally simple as government work can be, it steals the spirit of the artist, one bit of ectoplasm at a time, until you're nothing but an overweight, cardigan-wearing zombie, more concerned with potluck parties and the weekly lottery pool than trying to do anything more creative and passionate.  Don't rock the boat. Don't ask too many questions. Don't take risks.  That becomes your life, if you can call it living.

Second, bureaucratization causes you to lose sight of your own big picture.  No adventure would be considered risky if you weren't willing to lose everything, but it takes balls of pure adamantium to actually do it. 

Had I gone for that audition and booked it, it would have been worth the one day off and the potential wrath of my boss to get the start of a new career and several thousand dollars which would help me pay debt and travel.  But on the phone, having to make a split second decision, the reflex to play it safe that I've developed over a year of government work was all too automatic. 

In order to be an actual risk taker and not some guy who blogs about it from his all-too-comfortable swivel chair on his lunch break, you've got to actually take risks.

Finally, there's always more where that came from.  I'm not only talking TV auditions, here.  I'm talking full-time jobs.   In retrospect, I got everything backwards ass.  I took the risk of leaving full-time work to pursue my passion when I was supporting my ex, and now play it safe as a single guy with no one depending on me. 

Switching that around means daring the Universe.  It means being willing to sacrifice a sure bet for the slippery chance at your own fairy tale.  It means knowing that just as you step over the chasm, a step will rise up just as you're about to fall and catch your foot.  And another, and another, until you reach the other side.

The last time I decided to really take a risk was in 2007. That was when, supported by my ex, I quit my job at the distribution centre where I had worked since high school with nothing else lined up to replace it.  And all along that chain of events leading me to this writing, never once did I end up starving, or on the street, or having to tuck tail and move back in with Mom and Dad.  On the contrary: money and work always showed up somehow, in various forms, just in time to keep me going.

That's not to say it didn't have a price in debt or stress, but overall, Serendipity has looked after me.  I just forget about her in weaker moments, as do we all.  Fortunately, Serendipity is a forgiving lady. And hot to boot.

I'm not quitting my office job, to be clear, nor am I going to slack off.  But I am extending the same rule I had when I started: never let it interfere with my greater ambitions.  There are always other jobs, but precious few big dreams, the latter of which have only the narrowest of opportunities to become reality.

I have no illusions that I will become a major Hollywood star or anything, nor am I giving up writing to do this, but I am definitely open to the possibility, and am willing to be passionnate about any work I get and see where the passion leads me.

And next time they call, I am saying "yes" to whatever gorram audition they have for me.

Eames the Forger says it best in Inception: "You musn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling". 

Surely,  I can dream bigger than my desk.

Randoms - November 17 2010

  It's been a while since I've done one of these.  Here goes:

Migration

  This is a shout out to all my mainstream, naturally-born, predominantly Anglo-Canadian homies, as well as my multicultural, foreign-born, predominantly non-white new Canadian and landed immigrant peeps. 

  Fellow citizens and residents, please be advised: some of us are far from being fresh off the airplane.

  Since Lester Pearson's time, Canada has enjoyed moderate to large scale immigration from many countries. For those who are historically challenged, that's the 1960s, people.  That's when PM Pearson removed the last racial prohibitions on immigration, essentially making Canada the world's first nation not to give a crap what colour your skin was if you wanted to find a better life here. 

  A half century has passed, so you'd think you'd be running into more visible minorities like....well, me.  No accent, no "multicultural" clothing - I don't even know what constitutes "Trinidadian" wear for dudes, anyway.  Maybe a pair of swim trunks, thong sandals, and a big red shirt with a picture of a Coke bottle?  I know if I were living there, I'd be dressed like that 24/7 - and no discernable body odor (this is a biggie: I myself do not partake of the "curry BO" that seems so popular with many of my complexion.)

   Trinidadians in particular have a rather unique place in Canada's migration story, given that they themselves come from a former colony that's barely 50 years old.  Indo-Trinidadian Canadians - and that's as far as the string of hyphens will extend - are often indistinguishable from Indo and Pakistani-Canadians at a glance, and in places like Brampton where the latter two populations are large, are frequently taken to be part of them.   Of course, Trinidadians are themselves quite visible when they're flying the colours - the flag, the roti shops, the calypso, Caribana, etc. - but even those displays are positively dwarfed by the sheer number of émigrés from the ancestral lands. 

   These are some of the reasons why the public perception of people with my pallour as being "fresh off the plane" or "boat" never quite goes away.  Caucasian strangers will still sometimes speak slowly to me as though I'm ESL, and other Trinidadian and South Asian arrivals will assume I'm one of them still getting to know this "cold" place.  All based on what I look like.  Then I open my mouth and remove all doubt.

   So my question: after half a century of immigration - from the Caribbean, from South Asia, and other "visible minority" nations - where are all the so-called "whitewashes"? 

   Where are the kids - now approaching their 30s - who grew up with Hull and Gretzky and Gilmour on the CBC during winter nights? Who listened to rock and techno and grunge as teenagers? Who prefer mates outside their own race? Who show up to Remembrance Day ceremonies with absolutely no sense of historical irony?  The ones who were Arts and Social Science majors at university? 

   Where are the others like me?  There are so few of them that after 50 years of migration, it seems quite the anomaly.

   I frequently get mistaken for being South Asian, or a new Trinidadian.  I don't mind it anymore, but it really used to bug me.  And now that I've grown up some, now that this aspect of my identity is more concrete, this question of finding others like me is no longer as personal as it would have been even five years ago. Instead, I truly wonder, from a preodminantly intellectual standpoint, why it is that I've "integrated" so much while so many others, even when they're born here, have found it so difficult?

   There's a book in this somewhere, so close I can taste it.  Not gonna lie, it kinda tastes like curry...

 Mind Wanderers Do It Melancholy

  Science finally catches up to what spirituality has known for centuries.

  A Harvard study recently concluded that the majority of people's attention in any given day is elsewhere.  That lack of focus on the present moment creates a sense of unhappiness, generating a feeling in the brain that makes the subject feel as though "they're not where they're supposed to be".

    I won't bother re-quoting much of the article, except that it notes that places where people's mind wander the most - and where they are, thus, most unhappy - tend to be at work, resting, or using a home computer.  Eeeep....

   By contrast, the activities and places where people are most focused on the now are sex, exercising, and conversation.....Meat Loaf summed up my position relative to these activities best: "two out of three ain't bad".

   Speaking of melancholy....


SAD Season is Here

  From now until the first day after the Winter Solstice, the nights are longest.  For this blogger, it means the onset of Seasonal Affective Disorder.  Though I've never been officially diagnosed, winter's been a crap ass season for me pretty much since I was 12 years old. My family, my ex, and some of my friends can attest to its impact on me. 

   For the past two years, it hasn't been as bad, but only because I've had major crises to keep my mind occupied (in 2009, revising my first book and layoffs at work due to the recession kept me on my toes; in 2010, it was my marriage ending, moving apartments, settling into the new job and life). 

 This year, with most things more or less stable, I've noticed the energy drain almost immediately.  Much of this has to be because I'm at the gym three to four times weekly now, so I'm physically tired, but it's definitely there, in the lack of sunlight. 

  I'm not as bad as some sufferers, but the SAD creates a climate where I'm far more susceptible to being bummed out by little things.  Hopefully, an impending pay raise at my current job, the start to my talent work - as early as next week if I'm really lucky - as well as the Christmas season where I can get away from the routine will all help. 

   In addition, I'm pre-empting the Blahs by registering for ballroom dance classes in January that will run for six weeks - i.e., through most of the crappiest months - and introduce me to new friends and the like. 

  Then again, there's a benefit to hitting rock bottom. In Debbie Ford's The Secret of the Shadow, Ford writes of one of her clients who always held onto false hope, burying the reality of her life's negatives in seminar after seminar, self-help slogan after self-help slogan. Years later, she's still just as frenetic as ever, not realizing that all she had to do was let go, wallow in the crapulence that was the reality of her situation, and then rebuild. 

  The advantage to not caring is if it all falls apart, I hit my credit limit, my car stops working, and so on is that I have the chance to start over.  You get another hand after you fold, right?  That's what the "Airplanes" song says, anyhow.

  For now though, I'm just tired and blah and meh, not necessarily in that order, and should be until the days start pushing back the night again, on December 22nd.

 The Plight of the Shy Guy

  I read Owl City singer Adam Young's blog almost religiously.  He's closer to my true personality type than most other entertainers I see, preferring to explore imagination, romance, and love than indulging in the pimpin' and the drinkin' and the "what what" of the more stereotypical male crowd. 

  Young posted an entry a few weeks back that I recently caught that describes exactly the feeling of angst, frustration, and hope that guys like me have when we see a beautiful woman, but can't approach them for our own crippling shyness.  I couldn't have said it any better myself. 

  Why is this notable for me?  Because Young is the only other straight male in the creative industry I've encountered who still believes in soul mates, and won't settle for anything less.  And he's not afraid to tell people about it. That makes Adam Young, in my mind, a way ballsier motherf***er than I could ever be.

  ***

  All things said, it's a crazy transitional time for me at present. I expect the next two weeks to see major changes to my life.  More thoughts on that as they develop.

"The Healing of the Nations"

   As a public servant, this is my second year in which I've had Remembrance Day as a statutory holiday.  Last year, being bedridden due to the flu, I watched the service from Ottawa on TV.  This year, I was able to walk three blocks to Burlington City Hall for our service. Working for the Province makes this no more or less my civic duty, though it does make it easier to serve.

   Near the end of the ceremony, a Fransciscan friar took the podium. By this time, many in the crowd were footsore from standing for an hour or so, and after the laying of the wreaths at the cenotaph, a few were starting to leave.  Carrying my laptop on my shoulder for over an hour, I was tempted as well, but I chose to finish what I began and hear him out.  I'm glad I did.

   The friar told the story of his visit to Assisi, Italy.  A pilgrimage for his Order, the trip to Assisi revealed to him the beauty of the city, and the energy that resides there.  I've spoken with people who have made the trip, both Catholic and non-Catholic, who have reported that feeling of sacredness there, of the sensation of God and spirit that defies the often hate-filled dogmas of the fundamentalists that taint what should be a religion of peace and forgiveness. Spirit and light in Assisi....

   ...and yet, not far from the city, in the surrounding lowlands, the Assisi War Cemetery sits.  945 Allied soldiers from World War II lie buried there.  50 of them are Canadian. 

  The friar spoke slowly and deliberately of the contrast of the joy in the city atop the hill and the sombre mood below where the graves lie. Googling Assisi in World War II, after the ceremony, I learned that his Order had worked to save over 300 Jews from being sent to the extermination camps by dressing them as priests and nuns, at one point forging Nazi documents so well that they managed to convince the Nazi garrison that Assisi was an open city, thus saving it from destruction.

  Imagine: a single beacon of human spirit shining through a landscape darkened not merely by war, but by the dark shadow of mankind made manifest in the Third Reich.  The Nazis were a particular evil that saw entire peoples decimated in the name of racial and ideological superiority. 

   Growing up in an age of moral relativism, where there is no longer automatic consensus to tar and feather a wartime enemy as absolutely evil simply because the government says we should, there is no way anyone in my generation can not see the scourge of Nazism for what it was.

  Ditto for the Taliban, and al Quaeda, who remain an Islamic version of that kind of oppression, destruction, darkness, and suppression of the human spirit.  The shadow of humanity manifests itself time and again in many places, in many faiths, in many ideologies.  Every nation, every faith, every person, is susceptible to the shadow. 

  And half a century ago, an alliance of free nations - in all of their shortcomings, civic imperfections, and checkered histories - recognized the shadow for what it was and sent their best to liberate and protect places like Assisi from the darkness.

  The friar's admiration of our troops was clear enough, but what caught me was his concluding quote from the Book of Revelation.  I was struck by the following:

  "In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bore twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.”

  The reconciliation of humanity with its own shadow is no mere New Age metaphor, but a real experience, a physical battle that takes place throughout the world.  And sometimes we ourselves play the role of shadow, as all the controversies of the past fifty years of foreign policy bear out. 

  Elements of the darkness that our troops continue to battle also appear within our borders: in the political and fundamentalist demagoguery we see appearing on the news; in new political and religious movements that embody anger and intolerance poorly disguised as meaningful change.  The National Socialist German Worker's Party began as such a movement; the Taliban and al Quaeda emerged in houses of worship.  As both examples demonstrate, under the right conditions, the men who shout at the rain from their soapboxes today become those who manifest genocide in the world tomorrow.  Sometimes all too easily.

  But in those who embrace life, and love, and spirit, and compassion lies all of our hope.  Peace is possible by acknowledging our dark sides as individuals. "A world of individuals at peace with themselves is a world at peace", as Dr. Dyer says, but it all starts with you. What will you do to acknowledge your own darkness, and thus prevent it from taking over?

  Remembrance Day has grown far beyond its original historical purpose - to commemorate the British war dead of World War I - and is not the celebration of war, but the acknowledgement of a fundamental paradox of the human experience: that we must sometimes fight for peace. 

    That we should prevent horror by addressing human grievances before they take root and grow into something far more sinister and deadly.

   And most importantly, to remember and thank those who stood, and stand, between us and the darkness that grows too big and dangerous to mitigate by non-violent means.

   And as the Franciscan stated so eloquently, today does not belong only to us, but to all, that the leaves of the Tree of Life that lives in us all will heal us all, that all nations may live in peace.

  To those who stood and stand for that peace, and to those who fell in its name, with all of the gratitude that one soul can muster....thank you.

Whiting Out The Scarlet "D"

  In the previous incarnation of this blog, I talked a lot about divorce.  As I've said numerous times, this blog wouldn't be around were it not for the end of my marriage.  I've had numerous people approach me to say what an eye-opener it's been for them to read about my divorce experience, and how I've navigated through it.

  And yet, I don't particularly relish leading off with my marital status all the time - who would, really? - which is why for the last while on this blog, I've focused strictly on other aspects of my life experience. 

  I even have one or two readers and Facebook friends who only ever seem to comment whenever I talk about divorce.  I appreciate the words of sympathy and support, I really do, but I'm light years past where I was this past winter.  I know it's not the intention, but the commentary has this almost condescending "That's it, Jody, way to go!" feel, like what you say to a six year old when he finally goes a week without wetting the bed.

  The other part was that up until last month, I was heavily involved in online dating. 

 That's a tricky endeavour when you're divorced because the medium sends the wrong message to would-be companions.  You can meet someone in person, see what they're really like, interact with them, fall in love, and maybe a few weeks into it learn about their previous marriage.  And if there's clear charisma between you, if neither of you have any particular religious or personal issues with it, you'll move past it.  Or, you'll end the relationship, but at least you had those weeks of experience.

  But when all you have to go on is what the person's written on a dating profile, you look for any red flag.  And that's when you walk into the Catch 22 of divorcee online dating disclosure. 

  If you don't disclose your marital status, the person may find out later and determine you're a lying scumbag or "not over your ex".  If you do disclose your martial status, the person may determine that they appreciate your honesty,but that they're looking for someone with a little less baggage and that you're "not over your ex". 

  You can thus understand why I abandoned online dating in favour of the harder, much more satisfying route of meeting actual girls in the real world.

   So....yeah, talking about divorce for me is touchy, but not for the conventional reasons you might think.

  Nevertheless, every now and then, I come across something that lights up my synapses and motivates me to put fingers to keyboard and make divorce the front and centre of my attention.  Here's one such instance.

 Doing Divorce Differently

  The Huffington Post recently created an entire section to Divorce.  In the words of founder Arianna Huffington:

  "I've always thought that, as a country, we do a lousy job of addressing how we can do divorce differently -- and better."

  Only a few days old, the section already features numerous opinion pieces from various commentators and writers that essentially outline the points I've been trying to make in my much more limited writings. 

   Articles I'd like to suggest include the following, which closely parallel what I've written on the subject:

     - Why Divorcees Make The Best Dates and The Case for the Starter Marriage by Sascha Rothchild, author of How To Get Divorced By 30. 
     - The Scarlet "D", by Joel Dovev, Comedian
     - The Stigma of Divorce, by Jennifer Cullen, Blogger

 Friends and neighbours, I strongly suggest you read these articles.  Especially considering how little my own writings on the subject have been able to convince some of you that my approach to this experience has been beneficial.  

  That really bugs me, by the way.  By the reactions and input I've observed from a few particular individuals, I've been made to feel that they think I've somehow been permanently compromised by the experience. That I have no perspective whatsoever on what's happening to me, that everything I say is just part of the transition phase.

  And because I dared to defy some of the established conventions of divorce - forgiving and building a new friendship with my ex, choosing not to become Barney Stinson, pursuing reconstruction instead of self-destruction, deciding to express my feelings rather than addling them in booze and drugs and false machismo - some people have declared - and I ain't namin' names or anything - "See? Jody's not better!  He needs to man up! He's not following the rules!".  (Well, sentiments to that effect, anyway).

   Anyway, venting complete.

Throwing Out the Standard Rulebook 
  
  I didn't follow the rules of divorce because, right from the beginning, I had no rulebook to follow for this experience. My parents are still together: for much of my reality, divorce was something that happened to other people.  Hence, no rulebook.

  When colleagues started citing at me from the Standard Rulebook for Divorce, I looked at the consequences - litigation fees, months of hostility, self righteous chest-beating in and out of court over who was more in the wrong, who's going to hell; substance abuse, porn addiction, stress, general recrimination - and decided, "nope, not for me".  I needed to be able to at least feel neutral waking up each morning in the new alternate reality I was suddenly living in.  I couldn't do that if I was waking up just to fight the same skirmish each and every day, over and over again.  Divorce as a war of attrition didn't appeal to me.

  As it happens, making this up as I go along has been the most optimal approach I could have taken, and while I'm not as bubbly about my divorce as Sascha Rothchild is about hers, I definitely prefer this to the Standard Rulebook for Divorce that has lawyers and counsellors reaping millions from people's suffering.

  The Huffington Post has really done well to open up this topic to enlightened discussion past the expected orthodoxy of divorce as an exclusively negative experience. North American society has had decades to trace and re-trace the "Scarlet 'D'" onto the page, and I don't presume to be able to white it out with a single stroke.

  But I will continue to try.  And now I can provide citations that prove to the hardest skeptics that I'm not alone in that pursuit.

Ordinary Stories

   More entries coming soon, but I've been mulling some things, and that I'd like to mull about out loud to the Internets.

   Inspired by a recent entry on Julius' blog, I've been doing a lot of thinking about this blog's many autobiographical qualities.  As a rather direct chronicle of the past year, Dispatches and its previous incarnation, Jody's Quarter Life Adventure, tells the story of my renaissance, my new start in life after my divorce, and the new experiences I've had since.  Really, though, even the past year, the past decade, is but a part of my life overall. And I've had some interesting episodes to say the least.

   Like Julius, I'm fascinated and baffled by the motivation that inspires ordinary people to want to share their life stories with those who would listen, even those who could care less. Then again, some of the most interesting people I've learned about in the past year include Allie Brosh, who I've only learned about through her blog and who has really made me feel more all right with my own eccentricities (she has them too, and so do most of her 30,000 readers).  Though I only have 13 "official" followers, I know many people read my entries, and take something away from them that helps them.  That's my hope, anyway.

   Every person's story has to have some value outside of that person's own life.  You can't break everything down into objective, quantitative terms: do we all have to be John Nash to deserve to have our stories told? Howard Hughes? Temple Grandin? Out of six billion lives on the planet, does no one else have value? 

   If life has no inherent meaning - which I believe it doesn't - and if it's thus contingent upon us to assign meaning to it, then ultimately there are no ordinary stories. Very few boring stories: just maybe boring storytellers.


  Poignancy exists, and joy, in the words of obscure writers, of which I'm still one, though I hope it changes.  In the meantime, interesting, ordinary stories are everywhere.  And though they're each unique, they are also shared human experiences.

  A 21 year old woman in Britain is diagnosed with terminal cancer, so she moves up her wedding to her fiance in the hope of creating "the best day of her life".  But it's such a common tale - touching, heartbreaking, deeply rich in human experience - that when I google "terminally-ill bride" to get the link for the story, I find numerous other entries for different people touched by this same kind of transformative experience.  I first see the story on Yahoo! News one day, and I remember it.

   A few days later, I hear this song on the radio, and the vision of one such dying bride falling into the arms of her new husband and choosing this song for their first dance plays out in a cinematic high definition in my mind's eye.  And it's so poignant it hurts.  Imagine a moment of such...honesty, to be among those teary-eyed guests in the presence of two people, savouring each instant of time with each other before an end that could come anytime. 

   I just made that moment up, true.  But these real-life human experiences happen all the time.  And many of us never hear about it, save for those who are witnesses, and those who choose to share.

  How many of us have failed to be transformed by stories worth hearing because we never heard them?

  My experiences aren't, for the most part, all that dramatic, but they are notable, and over the next few weeks, you'll start seeing more accounts of my 29th year.  This has been so transformative for me, someone has to benefit from my story, even if it's just me telling it, and knowing someone else is reading it.

  That's the hope, anyway

Shadowy Seasonal Spin Cycles

Underlying the commercial side of Halloween is its origin. Samhain is the reason for this particular season, and I won't re-explain the significance of this (neo)pagan observance here. Its origins, however, remind us of the cycle of life and death. The harvest is as much a symbol for death as it is a literal reaping of the crops, where we reflect on what we've done and what's happened. 

Halloween was low key for me this year, with one party and a Sunday spent at home on a ghost walk through the beautiful Church St. Cemetery in Brampton with Mom and Dad.  During that visit, my mother and I watched a DVD from motivational speaker Debbie Ford called The Shadow Effect. Shadow work is a conscious acknowledgement and introspective study of all the qualities of your being that you hide from others. The parts of yourself that you're ashamed of - your fears, your past transgressions against others, your guilt, your regrets, etc..

According to Ford and other experts, whenever you react unusually strongly to a slight provocation; whenever you indulge in something that you rail against publicly (see NY Gov. Spitzer, or Rush Limbaugh, or the Catholic Church), or sabotage yourself, that's your Shadow getting tired of being suppressed and ignored.  Those are dramatic examples.  The rest of the time, the Shadow acts in millions of small ways that compromise you, leading to boredom, routine, the inability to escape from vicious cycles of behaviour, finances, health. 

That which we bury in the earth will grow back. Always. Don't believe me? Watch Dawn of the Dead.

I'm familiar with shadow work. Much of my twenties has been about looking at myself critically and as objectively as possible. This work is never done. It's not intended to "cure" all your ills or eliminate the darkness: those who war against their own darkness really war against themselves, and will never feel whole. Rather, it's to embrace the totality of your being, light and dark. It means understanding that for you to live in a nice house, every now and then you've got to take out the trash and sweep the floor. It's the way of things.

Monday being the start of a new month, I figured that some shadow work on myself was a great way to mark a new beginning. Everyone could use some honest-to-Zeus introspection.

Among the other creatures hiding in the dark, I discovered Stuckness. I was stuck. Existentially bored. And the goal wasn't to slay Stuckness, for he's a part of me, but to cure him.

Arriving at the Goodlife Fitness after work that Monday, I sauntered into the mall, up the stairs past the usual regulars, and into the locker room. I changed in the same spot near the same locker, and headed out to the floor to do the same cardio-resistance routine I've been doing for months.  All I could see was drab routine: my work, my exercise, my weekly calendar.  Blah, blah.....blah.  Was this really life? 

Then I saw that the spin class was starting in ten minutes.

I see it every time that I'm in there - seemingly crazy people, dripping with sweat, killing themselves on the bikes to pretty catchy techno music and rock and roll - and I'd always promised I'd try it once.  Still, the tricky part about a routine is that you're at once sick of the normal, and very comfortable with it.  I'd fought the impulse to go for weeks, despite having reached plateaued in my weight loss around 215 pounds. 

But Monday night, the thought of another boring 45 minute elliptical session kicked me in the ass, and I took the leap.  I walked in, met the instructor, set myself up, and joined in.

As I said on Facebook, Megadeth would be happy to know that I've found a 100th way to die....

And yet, it was worth it, not so much for the exercise - which was amazing, and which wore me out enough that I went to bed at 9:30pm - but for the sake of the New.  Suddenly, even though I'd changed absolutely nothing else in my routine, my life felt more interesting, and that's what ultimately counts: how you feel about your life.

I've talked about the Power of Now, but sometimes the solution to existential angst is simply to try something new, even if it's something small.  Spin classes, of course, are somewhat dramatic if you're not into exercise that much, but I realized that I am thoroughly missing new stimuli.  Time to embrace the Power of New.

A slide from the creepy DHARMA Initiative brainwashing film from LOST quotes the Buddha:

"Plant a good seed and you will joyfully gather fruit". 

As Samhain ends, according to the Pagan calendar, those in the Northern Hemisphere lie directly opposite of Ostara, the spring holiday when we plant next year's harvest, when we sow new seeds, and start the cycle over again.

Naturally, we don't have to wait to re-create ourselves. Everyone has a stuckness monster living in their shadow.

And for people like me who, more than most, have to do regular inner work to prevent the monster from manifesting in yet another life crisis, sometimes all it takes is to do one new thing - plant one good seed no matter how small - to cure the hapless creature, shine a light for him to see, and set him free.