Soul Mates

As a child, my mother used to tell me to pray for my future spouse. Even though I didn't know who my future spouse would be, the Lord knew and He would make sure my prayers went to the right person. So, ever since I was about 10 I had prayed often for my future spouse.

I went through my teen years and college dating various girls, falling in love, but not finding that soul mate. A few years after college my best friend was supposed to volunteer to help out on a church retreat weekend, but he hadn't been able to go to any of the previous meetings and felt awkward showing up late in the process all alone. So, he asked me to go with him. Having nothing better to do, I went along.

During one point of the meeting, this woman entered the room and my soul jumped... that's the best way I can explain it. My soul jumped. As if my soul had recognized her soul as "the one" I had been praying for all of these years. It was the oddest feeling I have ever felt. It was so internal and explosive. It was amazing.

During the meeting the leaders of the weekend somehow thought I had volunteered as well, so I ended up working the church weekend too. Over the course of the weekend I found out this woman who had made my soul leap was named Dea. And that she had a boyfriend.

So, I held my emotions in check and went on with my life. I saw her again months later at a play and found out she was single again. I asked for her number and her friends were stunned that she actually gave me her real phone number. That started the courting process. Over the next three years we dated off an on, liking each other, hating each other, putting up with each other... you know, a lot like marriage.

We finally did end up getting married and it was the best decision I have ever made. I remember people asking me if I was nervous about getting married and I remember telling them "That's just it... I've never been more at peace about anything. That's why I know its right."

Here we are 13 years later, my wife Dea and I are still in love, still falling in love, with two beautiful children and, hopefully, years and years of getting to know each other better. She is my best friend. She fills all of my weaknesses and makes me a better person. Like the meaning of her name, she is truly a "gift from God."

And I have to believe that those prayers from a young child to his future wife paved the way for the happiness we feel now. I am so blessed and still at peace, living daily, with my soul mate.

The List

When I was in college I graduated with a Fine Arts degree, focusing on theater. Getting cast in plays, which is, after all, the entire point one becomes an actor, is commonly handled very publicly. Throughout campus there were a few locations where theater department notices would be placed. A few days after auditions, the director would post the list of the actors that were cast in the play at these various, pre-defined locations.

In a very Pavlovian way, we became trained to respond to the postings placed there. Only really important things were posted at these locations and we salivated whenever our names were on the list.

My senior year in college, I worked off campus with a fellow actor named Jay. As our senior year neared its end we decide to list those people with which we wanted to keep in touch after graduation. The list was varied and to the untrained eye, nonsensical. It consisted of fellow seniors, teachers, both past and present, current graduate students and others from years gone by, a few freshman, a sprinkling of sophomores, some non-theater students and everyone else in between. When we completed this list we had about 100 names and titled it, appropriately, Jay and Pete's Top 100.

On a lark, we thought, "wouldn't it be funny if we posted these names with the other theater department notices?" We digested that thought for a moment and decided, "You know what would be even better? Let's even make it more vague. Let's remove 'Jay and Pete's Top 100' and just list the names with no other explanation."

A moment of pure, evil genious.

That night, around 3 a.m., Jay and I scampered to the various theater locations and posted our list of names. The next morning we just sat back and watched. By midday a subtle rumbling had begun in the theater department. Something about "a list." After lunch, Jay's girlfriend (and now wife) noticed the font type used on the list and almost spilled the beans in front of everyone. We quickly pulled her outside and let her in on the joke.

By that night, The List was THE topic of conversation. At a local dive called the Winnjammer, where the theater geeks partook of libations, the mystery of The List had completely taken hold of the department. Jay and I sat by, quietly, offering no information about The List, only our quiet dismay at its existence.

By the next morning, Ron, our theater shop Forman had apparently been inundated with questions about The List because he had, in very angry handwriting, written "I don't know anything about the damn list!!!! Ron"

Slowly, the psychology started to take effect. By lunch on the second day, everyone had gathered around The List. Those on The List stood in one corner, happy that they were on it, even though they had no idea what that meant. Those not on The List stood in another corner, angrily trying to convince themselves that it wasn't important that their names weren't on it.

In our weaker moments, when the scuttlebutt about The List started to calm, Jay and I would begin feeding the fires by jokingly giving validity to It. Someone would come up and say "Pete, you want to go to lunch?" I'd smile and say "I don't know, are you on The List?" And that was all it took. They'd quickly respond "Yeah, what about that list! I wonder who put it there! Have you heard anything?" Ahhh, the rumor fire had been effectively stoked and was again fully ablaze.

Soon, others followed suit. If you were on The List, you could do stuff, if you weren't... well... By the end of day three, the Dean of the College had heard ALL ABOUT this list and had them taken down. And therein ended our experiment.

Or did it?

Jay and I mulled our options. "How about making The List suddenly a BAD thing. We'll give it an ominous title and watch the happy turn sad and the sad turn happy?" That would be too complex.

"How about randomly taking some people off The List and then repost it around campus again... we can then watch those removed from The List move from the In Crowd to the Losers, scratching their head at what had caused their erasure from this coveted prize?" That would be too cruel.

In the end, we let the experiment die. We never told a soul.

About ten years later I'm in California visiting Jennifer, one of my old theater buds. As we reminisced about our glory days in college it only took her about ten minutes to ask "And remember that list? Did you ever find out what that was about?" I smiled knowingly and told her Jay and I did it, the back story, everything. "THAT WAS YOU????" and she hit me in the arm, really hard, making me pay for whatever pain I may have caused her.

I don't know what her problem was. After all, she was on The List.

The Flu

Inspite of all of my whining about having too many things to do in my previous blog Controlled Chaos, I've started scripting yet another short film called The Flu. The comedy is about a young man who finds himself suddenly allergic to sin.

I didn't want to add anything else to my plate, but I was inspired, so I had to start writing. I don't anticipate the first draft to encompass all that is possible with the storyline. However, I hope that it defines the outline.

I need to make writing a priority again. I have to find time to do something everyday toward the end goal. I have too many subjects running through my head. I feel like I'll creatively explode if I don't start jotting down this stuff.

I seem to be on a "the" roll lately... The Box, The Business Trip and now The Flu. Pretty soon I'll have to start referring to myself in third person as The Pete Bauer.

Why Kids Rock

Kids rock, plain and simple. They are the only reason worth living... everything else is a bonus.

It's through their eyes that we revisit the world, glimpsing at the innocence that once made our world so special, where, if you could simply imagine it, it was possible.

It's through raising children that we get insight into God. We have a greater understanding of His love, of His mercy, of His discipline, of His consistency, of His success.

They say "youth is wasted on the young." Having children and, eventually, grandchildren allows us to relive our youth yet one more time, no matter how far away from "young" we currently reside.

Intolerant Tolerance

Political Correctness is a growing rash on the buttocks of this country.

For all of its good intentions, with which many o' roads to heated landscapes have been paved, Political Correctness has turned into Intolerant Tolerance... you must be tolerant of my ideas, no matter how extreme, and if you disagree I am completely intolerant to your opposition.

How this ludicrous idea seeped into the mainstream mentality is beyond me. Its another reason why this country has turned into pansies. Doesn't anyone in this country have the backbone to be offended anymore? What happened to free speech? Or just plain common sense? We used to be able to agree to disagree. Now we demand universal agreement.

The outcome is that no one can do anything anywhere that may offend anyone at anytime, even if those offended are so outside of the borders of decency that they would have been arrested 20 years ago.

In the end, this effort is hurting this country. When police are not able to "profile" terror suspects due to Political Correctness, then sanity has officially left the building. Under that expectation, the next time a rape suspect is on the loose, lets make sure we round up the grandmothers and infirmed as suspects as well, as not to offend the rapist.

It's stupidity run amuck.

And if any of this offends you, well, then tolerate it.

Conflicting Self Infliction

I love to make films. But I don't make a living at it... yet. So, I do the day job thing until my passions overtake me and then I must find a creative outlet... and quick... like an addict suddenly needing a fix. And in my constant internal battle between what I want to do and what I have to do, I end up putting myself into a no win situation.

People's Exhibit A: The Business Trip. It had been over a year since the final edit of our first DV feature The Box had been complete. I was getting ansy and was looking for something, ANYthing that I could throw together to fill this creative void while being able to fit in it my limited available time.

So, I scour my old short scripts and find a copy for The Business Trip. It's now seven years old, but has a nice little story, taking place in a single location. I update the script, scrounge together some friends, storyboard the mother out it and schedule a three day shoot. As it turns out, due to last minute scheduling conflicts, three shoot days turns to one, 14-hour shoot day.

At the end of the exhaustive day, I am immediately conflicted. Part of me is satisified that we shot something, anything at all. The other part of me doesn't want to settle for making crap because that's all I have time to make. If I'm going to spend 14 hours of my life shooting something, it should be good, shouldn't it?

I edit the piece. The acting is strong, the lighting average to marginal and the directing okay... kinda. Again, I'm conflicted. It's nice to have accomplished something... but, in my exhaustive state during the shoot day I made some fundamental directing errors. It has to do with a 180 degree line of sight and crossing that line and confusing the audience and annoying the hell out of me and stuff like that. But, in the end, at least I was able to express myself creatively. But, in the other end, its with a product that should have been better.

Ugh. Impatience is the root of all sloppiness. I must find a way to fill my creative void and retain a higher level of quality... somehow. Or else I'll be frustrating myself for the rest of my natural life.

The Separation of Church and State Myth

In the news I frequently hear the phrase "separation of church and state" when discussing the US Constitution. So, I did a little research. And you know what? The phrase "separation of church and state" is nowhere to be found in the US Constitution. It is, instead, a sound-bite version of the first Amendment:

Amendment 1: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

There is a big difference between a "separation of church and state" and the government establishing a law about religion. How is bible class or a prayer meeting of any religion held in a public school after hours equate to the passage of a law? How is allowing discussion of creationism (a.k.a. intelligent design) along with Darwinism equate to the passage of a law? How is the visible display of the 10 Commandments on public property equate to the passage of a law?

In my opinion, these "separation" stances are in direct violation of the second part of the first amendment "prohibiting the free exercise there of." I am prohibited from exercising my faith on property owned by the government? That's what the founding fathers intended? I don't think so. What they didn't want was another Church of England. And they certainly didn't want to establish a government based on atheistic secularism... if they did, they would have stated as much.

However, I did find the clear separation of church and state in a constitution... The 1936 Constitution of the USSR.

Article 124 of this document states: "In order to ensure to citizens freedom of conscience, the church in the U.S.S.R. is separated from the state, and the school from the church. Freedom of religious worship and freedom of antireligious propaganda is recognized for all citizens."

Our country is dangerously close with flirting with communism/socialism. National healthcare, "separation of church and state", the "redistribution of income" from those who've earned it to those who haven't. Granted, each of these issues are often founded by concerned citizens, but we must be aware of the path in which we are heading and those leading the charge. I've read that it only took 7% of the Russian leadership to turn Russia from a monarchy to a communist country. Who is the "7%" pushing this socialistic agenda in this country?

Every time you hear the phrase "separation of church and state" remember that it does not reflect our constitution, but the constitution of a country that evaporated under the weight of a moral-less existence.