Memory Vision! Stories in 4D!

Driving to work tonight, with the Ipod plugged into the car. I decided that I would just put it on shuffle and see what happens. The odds of something interesting is very good, mind you, because I have 64 gigs on the old Touch, and a sizable collection of eclecticism.

So, right about the time I got to the overpass on I94, on comes the smile inducing melody I first heard in Harrodsburg KY, during a sound check at the late, lamented LEGEND OF DANIEL BOONE outdoor drammer...

Well, the mystery masked man was smart,
He got himself a Tonto;
'Cuz Tonto did the dirty work for free...
Well Tonto, he was smarter,
And one day said, "Keemosabee.."
"Kiss my ass, I bought a boat, I'm goin' off to sea..."

I love that song.

My knee is recovering from the rehearsal nightmare yesterday, but as I think about things past, I wonder what I was like; I mean, REALLY like. Back then. When I was a young actorlet.

Was I egocentric, wanting the spotlight for myself alone, or was I interested in the concept of ensemble? Did I long for my moment to "star", or did I want to work with people who gave and took with equal abandon?

When did I really develop this appreciation of creativity and cleverness in others? When did I begin to starve for it?

As I was rehearsing last night, and came across a moment I hadn't seen before, but should have because there it was, buried within the given circumstances. And I can remember this time when I was in college: and it was the first time I can actually remember letting go and allowing the creativity to come.

A lovely lady named Barb Legler directed this little fluffball piece about a dancing worm named Curly, and how a down-on-his-luck agent began to represent him, making him an international superstar.....and in the early part of that little piece, two kids (myself and my dear Maureen played multiple roles in that one) are showing off the worm, who dances on a leaf inside a cigar box. I became, in this one moment, the mercenary kid, closing the lid and asking holding out my hand for money each time the agent asks to see it again.

I just did it on the spur of the moment; it was there, I just didn't see it until that very moment...but in that moment of flipping the cigar box closed and holding my hand out to the actor playing the agent (who, to my infinite joy, didn't miss a beat and played off of it, creating a series of moments based upon that one) I discovered that the secret to this whole thing was the secret to success in any endeavor, any relationship, any....single...experience...on the face of this rock:

Be Open To Every Thing.

It's not something I can say that I've lived by all of these years; in fact, I can only say that within my career as an actor was the only real time I ever fully lived by that motto....but my life isn't over yet, and it's never too late to have a happy childhood.

We've all been in moments that coalesce into that idea, that one thing can lead to another, and what started as a living room full of people watching Law And Order turns into a room full of semi comatose people who have begun an improvisation that can STILL bring tears to my eyes as I recall it in vivid Memory-Vision (patent pending).

And how is it that you don't realize that you've been starving for years until you again taste the cake?




Okay, quick quiz...how many of you SAW the cake reference coming?



My love to those that did....and to those that didn't. I feeling very love-like this morning.