Living Proof

There was a howl to the wind yesterday morning, almost like screaming a message while tears of raindrops stream down my windows. I heard sirens going off every ten minutes or so, indicating that perhaps a tree had fallen down or an accident happened somewhere. I thought at some point during the day, the electric will finally let up and I would be left with a candle, a battery powered laptop with no internet connection and the sounds of mother nature giving me her wrath. On top of everything else, while I was working, the rain had somehow managed to make its way in from the skylights, dripping slowly onto the side of the leather sofa. I had to place a huge pot underneath, which gave me a tempo of rhythm that somehow was driving me to the brink of insanity. “Plink, plink, plink, plinkity-plink, plink, plink.” The classical background music didn’t help much at this point. It just made it more “dramatic” if anything. I had planned on doing a promo video for a local gallery nearby, but wi...

The other day, I was talking to my friend Ellen, who happens to own a local Christian store with many trinkets and bits of jewelry with spiritual sayings and symbols. She had mentioned how some customers will walk into her store and will ask her detailed questions about Catholicism or they ask her beliefs upon a Christian-based semi-controversial topic. Some ask out of sincere questioning, while others will ask just for the mere purpose of a good debate. Why “religion” has to be so debated upon is beyond me, but I do understand it since my earlier blogging years were all about debating upon Christianity and different views, beliefs and whatnot. On the wall, there are framed pictures and items that say, “peace and love”, to which I believe is the perfect description of God. For others, “God” is the wrath of the creator - death and destruction for all who go astray and fear for being. ..human. Religion then starts to sound pretty scary, doesn’t it? For these people, it also means cor...

Granted there are many people who don’t think Facebook or Twitter are very useful, while others feel it’s their biggest source of promotion due to whatever business they’re in. My question is: is too much promotion for your business on either social networking sites a good idea? Even though I use it for both: promotional business marketing (for others and for myself) as well as socially interacting with my personal friends and family, there is one rule that people should take into consideration: do not mass email everyone in your Facebook account about an event. Send an invite through Facebook instead. If it’s a small party for just a few people---fine. I’m speaking of people who are promoting their shows, broadcastings and other things through personal emails, but in bulk. If you want to promote, put it on your page and it’ll send right into your feed for people to view at their leisure. Simple. These days, Facebook has become more “looked down upon” if you’re one of those ‘status ...

Lately, I’ve been fascinated with the TV show, “ Hoarders: Buried Alive ”, where they show people who store ‘stuff’ in their houses until it practically hits the ceiling. It’s not just ‘stuff’ either, it’s old food left out and tons of garbage that hadn’t been taken out in like over a year or so. They claim they have some emotional attachment to these ‘things’ or ‘stuff’ or ‘crap’, but I say it’s a load of shit.. .literally. What makes a person want to live in a pile of rubbish? You can’t even walk through the room without climbing and struggling around their “emotional attachments”. I don’t mean to poke fun at their mental illness, which is what psychiatrists are calling it --but for someone like me, who has a huge OCD problem (as far as cleaning goes), I can’t understand it. If I see one tiny little strand of cloth from a blanket or other on my carpet, I freak out. It. must. go. My mom kept a super clean house. She cleaned that monster every single day of her life. She’s still ne...

Sometimes things in life throw me for a loop. I’m learning a lot as I’m now experiencing the world of filmmaking. There is so much involved aside from filming and editing. For my documentary, I’m seeking gays and lesbians of whatever faith, to come and talk about their experiences with adversity and talk about their childhood growing up, which includes stories about ‘coming out’ to the family. In fact, stories about their families are very important in this film. With participants that I am familiar with or who are in my network, I’m not strict with them about signing release forms and contracts. It’s a nonprofit film with contributions from those who want their voices heard, to which I’m grateful for. I never ran into a problem until recently. I totally understand that everyone wants to look their absolute best on film, but sometimes you just have throw your arms up and chuck it up to either bad lighting, bad location or just simply, bad outfit. I don’t know. But to my surprise, ...

Years ago, smoking wasn’t a big deal as it is today. People smoked in their offices, classrooms, malls and dare I say it --restaurant and bars. It’s not like they didn’t know the risks of smoking, it was probably more due to the fact that more reformed smokers were emerging from every corner. I remember walking into a bar with my little pack of Marlboro Lights and smoking at least a half of pack while being there. Anytime I drank I ended up smoking more. I started smoking at the age of twelve. My friend and I had joined a few other people and we walked up into the Appalachian trails, sat on top of a mountain, made a campfire and lit up a few unfiltered Paul Malls. Our friend’s father was with us, and as odd as that sounds, he wasn’t exactly a role model. We were actually grateful for that. My mom came to pick me up at my friend’s house which was probably no more than a mile away and immediately, she smelled the smoke on me. I insisted it was because of the campfire, but she knew......

This morning while Madelene and I were having breakfast, we were watching a small interview with the cast of “ TRANSform Me ”, seen on VH1. Three transgender women travel around the world to give extreme makeovers for other women who are in need of a transformation---on the inside and out. Some of the video clips I have seen were really amazing, but that’s not why I’m writing about it. The three women who host the show are all beautiful women, who were once men. Each of them transitioned beautifully, fortunately.... My question is: what about those people who transform to another gender who don’t exactly ‘fit the bill’, or transform smoothly? I too, agree that it’s all about how a person feels on the inside that reflects how they appear on the outside, but what if the outside isn’t quite meshing up to what’s on the inside? When I was young, before the age of thirteen, I remember people would mistake me for a boy. It first dawned on me when I was visiting my mom in the hospital tha...