to whom it may concern

How long are you allowed to keep on loving someone, years after you last really spoke? It is a tough way that I feel. I don't care anything about rumors (and oh I hear them. I hear them all the time) because nothing is true or everything is true. Someone told someone told someone who told me. I hate it. Or, try grieving by yourself, not really having anyone to talk about it all with, for two years. I can't believe it's been two years. Having this weird feeling you sort of had to add some validation to your grief. I could always tell him that I loved him, and he always answered when I called. I know that if he was still here... Anyway. It's not that I miss people in my life, I have no lack of people who I love more and who love me more, it's just the people who you love when you're 16,17,18... before all of that crap happens that jades and hardens you, that teenage love for your friends is intense and consuming and the memory of it hangs on for years.

Anyway, there are people who I pray for all of the time and I know that it wouldn't mean anything to them... but I do anyway. "God please don't let this person die today. Please protect him today." I hate drugs. And I hate that sense of the poor troubled depressed misunderstood artist. Every 20-something living in Kitsap feels troubled and depressed and misunderstood and it is not special or unique and it doesn't give you an excuse to turn to drugs. I would never tell someone how to live their life as it pertained to music or clothes or career or sexuality but chemical drugs are a vile, vile thing, which is a point I could never concede on. And maybe there is a consensus that because I've grown up in a stable household with good men and women all around me I don't know what it's like to be in the depths... I know what it is like to not understand how you are going to live through the next day. I've fallen asleep and not wanted to wake up. I’ve felt like my heart hurt so much and everything was so blurry there was no possible way I would ever be okay. My deficit is on the inside, but it is there none the less. I don't even know why I'm writing this here. I feel like I am not allowed to call someone and say that I love them and I hate to contribute to the sensationalism... I just want to leave some fingerprints somewhere that I love and respect certain people and I don't know how to act in this situation, but my heart feels very involved. Once I start loving people it is very hard for me to stop just because we all have new friends.

Like I said, I care nothing for rumors and I don't want to add to the sensationalism that these things turn into, I don't even know details, nor do I care to know them, I just want to put it out there that I care and that I've been caring for some time now, that I've been praying for you these past few years every time I talk to God. You and you and you. And every time I hear something it hurts my heart a little bit.

I meant for this blogspot to be light hearted, but chemical drugs are an evil and prevailing presence in my life right now and I felt this was a place I could address it.

Love,
K

Who says we don't have any friends?

We got the message that no-one else was dressing up in time to stop another Romy&Michelle type of situation (story of our lives!), drove around Tacoma for an hour trying to find the place, found it, took pictures with Marilyn and Elvis, got completely bummed out on the lame party, went dancing & hung out at Rob's house. In a few hours we're going to another party. I love my best friend for so many reasons; her sense of humor, her unyielding loyalty, her huge heart and her love of MTV reality shows. All so important. Melis and I can have a conversation and go from completely shallow to intensely deep and back again. And we laugh all the time.

Watch This: http://youtube.com/watch?v=P7BvLVLVY8g

I have a small part in his next video and I trust it is going to be hysterical.

Amor amor amor

K

On Costume, Christmas and Ex-Boyfriends.

There are so many reasons why I love this time of year, and one of the more superfluous is all of the great parties. Last weekend Melis, Anthony & I went to the first of the season, Friday I'm going to Melisa's company Christmas party with her. The theme is "Era's"- you can choose any era and theme it up. Melisa is going 80's:

I can't decide between British Mod 60's:

and American "Summer of Love" 60's hippie:Char thought I should go 1500's...

Hahaha! I know no one funnier than my sister.

Saturday we might go to Bri's Christmas Sweater party. I don't really have any Christmas sweaters, but I was thinking a big bow taped to one of my normal sweaters would suffice. Next weekend at my home my family is having a "Good Old Fashioned Piano Christmas Carolling" party. Then, THEN, is New Years. I'm not sure what we're doing except I know that whatever it is will involve a dress with sequins on it and a lot of dancing and toasting to the New Year.

Not so superfluously, Christmas is the most wonderful day of the year.

And in despair I bowed my head
“There is no peace on earth,” I said,
“For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.”
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men.”

I think about that all the time lately. While I enjoy so much the parties and the shopping for people you love and all of that, I have never had trouble remembering the whole point of all of it. The love and the beauty and the tenderness of Jesus that, without any doubt, sustains and saves me daily. Christmas Cards came out beautifully! I did 5 original watercolor and inks that will go to very special people and the rest will get limited copies, I'm only making 3 of each. Hopefully I'll get some scans up soon.

There is this interesting phenomenon that happens across the board with all girls I know: Ex-Boyfriend Week! Like, one contacts you and then you hear something about another one and then you run into yet another and it all happens in the space of a week. I hate it. You finally start feeling like your heart is your own again and then you realize that maybe someone still has a little piece of it (at least with one, the others are just kind of awkward and annoying). I don't understand how all of that time of making yourself okay and "getting over" disappear so quickly. Anyway, this has all gone on too long. I only meant to talk about costumes. I think I'm leaning towards the Mod look, I'd get to wear my favorite boots!

amor,

All you need is

Breathing. The past month has been good for my soul. I have a job that I love and comes quite naturally to me. I've been on stage a lot. I've spent time with my family and best friends. I've danced a lot. As a result I've been incredibly inspired and creativity has been pouring out of me. I wrote a poem for my Mom that I'm going to incorporate into her Christmas present in some artistic way. Today I'm baking biscotti and painting some Christmas cards and I need to come up with some kind of era comstume for a Christmas party on Saturday. Since the past week has been rehearsals and performances I haven't had that time that has become so important to me to read a little Sherlock and cook up something nice for my family and then b r e a t h e.

Pictures now, because I am not feeling particuarly smart or funny today. I have never been good with endings, and Sunday was the last performance. So we'll start with some photos from the play this weekend:

Jonathan & I, we took these for his Mom.

Backstage Artistry.

Baby

I love this, my two favorite people in the Universe.

Jack & I a few months ago.

My absolute favorite picture of 2007, me and my two best friends.

At the Ocean.

Love, love, love.

K

I have a new love of my life: Pomegranate Martinis, sometimes called "The Oprah" (she steals my books for her reader's club, it only makes sense that she steals my drink). Now, usually I'm a beer girl on account of being able to drink pretty much all you want and never end up puking outside the bar, but beer really packs in the calories so all of that dancing in 3 inch healings gets canceled out. Anyway, a few months ago Melisa and I went to the One10 Lounge downtown and I ordered the Pom for the first time. So good! Seriously, the best thing I've ever put between my lips.

Recipe:
2 oz Pomegranate Vodka (I like 3 Olives)
2 oz Pomegranate Juice- make sure you use 100% pure pom juice
1 oz Lime Juice
splash of Grenadine

Shake with ice and pour it in a chilled martini glass, your life will change.

Rehearsals are going well, only 9 days until opening night. Last night we had a hair and makeup meeting and technical rehearsal. I had a very expensive face full of makeup and had to sit and listen to a Mary Kay makeup artist "teach me" about makeup. Since my return to the suburbs I've had to endure many conversations like this. I've heard all about Mary Kay, Olive Garden, Ross and even WalMart. Such is the life outside of the city.

K

On the WGA strike

Who was it who said that the artist's eyes are like a camera? Mine are. Ever since I was little I've seen everything as a movie. I would use looking my vision and imagine other people were seeing what I was, and I would control what they saw- making movies with my eyes. Around 4th grade I wrote my first story, it was about a horse that had a baby and died while giving birth, then that horse grew up and had a baby but died while in birth, and then that horse grew up only to suffer the fate of her mother and grandmother. It went on for a few generations, but they all had wonderful names (I've always been funny about names. It takes me months to name my characters). So throughout high school I wrote a lot (mostly angsty free verse and Salinger style short stories- but I was always writing) and took photo and painted pictures then all of a sudden the year I was 18 I had an epiphany about putting those things together. I could write movies! I could tell stories and show them!

My family was never a huge movie watching family. I discovered Casablanca on my own. And of course I'd seen Moulin Rouge, but then I learned about Baz Luhrmann and Strictly Ballroom and how to appreciate his version of Romeo & Juliet. Then I met Darrin and he taught me about Wes Anderson and Pedro Almodovar and Ang Lee and more and then, in my obsessiveness (and IMDB.com and NetFlix as my enablers) I started finding one actor or director or writer and watching everything they've done. I did the whole Anderson &CO, meaning Jason Schwartzman, Luke & Owen Wilson, Bill Murray, Sofia Coppola etc etc, then Kate Winslet, then Gael Garcia Bernal, M. Night Shyamalan, Joaquin Phoenix, Joe Wright (I loved P&P and am greatly anticipating Atonement) the list goes on and on. I learned about Zach Helm and how inspiring he is. I'm still learning all of the little connections and there are so many classics I've never seen, but learning to appreciate the rare movie that is beautifully written, acted, produced and a million other things changed my heart. So I started to write.

I have all of these stories I want to write and show people. I have a script almost done right now about a group of friends dealing their friend's suicide, how they all uniquely handle their grief and how it changes them. I have an idea about a girl who with a huge imagination and a huge heart who goes through a dark time. Last Sunday I wrote out a couple ideas about a man who learns he only has three months to live. I started writing comedy sketches as well, little parodies or situations. Things that captured my heart. I want to finish and polish a few of these and then I fully intend on trying to "break into the business". I know how hard it is, I know what my chances are but I just can't see doing anything else with my life. That is what passion is, you don't pursue such an unstable profession for the money or fame, you do it because nothing makes you feel so good, nothing else would work.

Now the Writer's Guild of America is on Strike. I am so in awe of these people who quit their jobs and fight for their rights, for my future rights. It is the most patriotic I've felt in years to see people who are risking their careers stand up to major corporations and protect their art. Writing is so emotionally draining and intimate and these people who are, quite literally, putting themselves on the line... it inspires me as an American and as a writer. Quite obviously, I am pro-strike and pro-union and all of the reasons that I am can be found much more intelligently and eloquently explained elsewhere (try UnitedHollywood.blogspot.com). Mostly I am uplifted and inspired by and hurting for all of the writers on strike. I'll miss House and the Office and all of the nightlies and I hope that strike is resolved soon in a very pro-WGA way, but for the moment, for the week, I am so proud and enamored with the Industry that all I've been doing is writing, writing, writing.

K

I love Jimi Hendrix

Since moving from the city to the suburbs I've held tightly to my aversion to wearing any kind of sweat style clothing in public. I do not wear tennis shoes! I do not wear sweat shirts! I do not own any type of cargo pant! I can hardly wear jeans and a t-shirt. I just can not be comfortable in comfortable clothes in public. And then yesterday happened. I spent the entire day writing in my favorite black sweats. I'm not talking bunched at the ankle (think more Paris Hilton style), but sweats none the less, complete with paint stains. Soon 5:00 rolls around and, you know, I'm feeling pretty comfortable, I decided to "not care what people think of my appearance" and I go to play rehearsal in these pants and a hoodie with my hair up and no makeup. I'm feeling very "okay, I can do this. I can live in this town and go to rehearsal au natural". Of course, this was all shattered when I arrived and found out the photographer for the Port Orchard Independent was there for an image to accompany our press release. Being that I have an ironic and very Larry David like life, it of course makes complete sense and luckily only 7 people read the Port Orchard Independent, but call it a lesson learned. I will never again try to fit in with suburbanites and lazy people everywhere by wearing home clothes outside of the home.

Speaking of calling it a lesson learned, the John Mayer/Alicia Keys collaboration is phenomenal. Her whole album is heaven, listen to it. And as always John is brilliant.

I have some really great thoughts on the WGA strike boiling, they're coming soon I swear.

K