The Martini Shot
I can’t complain. If in 2017 I was a sad bitch , in 2018 I was a bad bitch. I started out the year a bit wobbly..getting in a spat with my sister and realizing I had the next five months ahead of me in the mother country, still fraught with uncertainty of where my next foot should fall. “Surprises are good for you”, said my heroine Nora Ephron once. And they sure are. Those five months were exactly what I needed. While most think all I did was lounge around country club pools in tiny bathing suits the better part of my shift happened then, it was just not something you could see on Instagram.
What you did not see on IG:
- The terror of facing who we are. The relief in finding that we actually like what we see. Winter in El Salvador was a time for Finn to learn where he comes from ,at least by half. He learned a new language, but also some of the particularities and wonder that surrounded my childhood in that big old house camino a Los Planes. Before 2018 he was my kid and we were close- physically close (as in I was always there and he was always near.) But in 2018 I chose to lead the life of a single mother - the responsibility and the joy of parenting both resting upon me. We weren’t just close in proximity anymore, my child and I developed a bond that had never been there before and that we will hopefully never lose. We laughed, we cried, he got sick. We got lice. Twice. I know that rhymes, but it’s true. We went to a fantastic island with Daddio.
- I gave my mother the gift of lost time back, handing her the opportunity to have a child live with her again, this time being a softer version of the woman who raised me. I gave myself the gift of forgiveness. I reopened old wounds and this time I opted to seal them instead of salting them, putting decades long childhood resentment to its final bed. On the day I was about to fly back she told me she just wanted me to be happy. I said I was sorry I have always judged her so harshly. We both wept.
-I strove for things worth having: peace, satisfaction, being of service. I tried to make decisions that wouldn't give me tummy aches after, or leave me vulnerable for mistreatment again. I’m not done, Probably nowhere near done, but I’m on it. And I’m learning and growing as I go. I learned the value of time affluence and chose to be a person who expands constantly through learning and experimenting rather than one that seeks being established through career or money.
- I worked hard. I worked in a jail, I worked as a florist, I worked with refugees seeking asylum my first two cases a woman and a child from El Salvador. I worked as an actress. I learned more in one year from all these interactions than I have in a decade put together. I finally understood the true meaning of gratefulness and a new, fuller appreciation for the small every day blessings bestowed upon me,- ranging from a keen ability to spot beauty and feel it blowing my mind to the renewed breath of every morning when I open my eyes. I learned to just what an incredible extent the people in our lives shape it and enrich it. Every day I am grateful I get one more day on planet Earth with all you other animals. Fill in the blank with your name here _______.
-I learned to lean towards acceptance and rethink the pride in anger because I just want to live in peace. I learned that the more I love the better I feel, and the better I live, the better I’m doing in fulfilling my life’s mission which is the same one we all as spiritual beings on a human adventure have: To learn to live and love better. To be proud of every aspect of who we are , our bodies and our souls and how its great to be proud of the former but more satisfying to be at peace with the latter. I learned to appreciate the amazing things a body enables us to experience. Sensations ranging from wind in our hair, seeing the golden hour a the end of a day, hot showers when you are wicked tired, passion, a complicit squeeze of a hand, the understanding of friendship in a tight hug. The tenderness in kissing the top of a child’s head. I realized I perhaps need to take better care of my body, but most importantly that no one and nothing is worth endangering my soul.
Wrapping it Up.
In this recent venture in the acting world I pull twelve to fourteen hour days shooting scenes you will see on your screen for not even a minute. By the time it’s time to go home the day’s work has been put in,a fraction of something has been produced and it will come together with its whole eventually. It’s true of scenes in a film , and it’s true of life. I like thinking of this year as a constant shooting of scenes that we have finally come to the last of. This is what is referred to in Hollywood slang, as “The Martini Shot” . It is the last shot of the day and after that the next one, well, it comes out of a glass. In my mind I hear the AC yelling “Check the gate” and the AD saying “Moving On”, meaning we are close to wrapping and indicating a milestone, a maker on the road to a finished film.
