I'm In The Spotlight!

Lisa Ciurro has a blog called Tampa Film Fan. She's claims to be neither a scholar nor critic, just a rabid film fan. Her website has grown into the focal point for all things artistic in Tampa Bay. She stumbled across my website a few months ago and asked if she could spotlight my efforts.

Well, that spotlight appeared today at her website. I check her blog daily and was initially freaked to see my name there, but her article is very complimentary.

Thanks Lisa!!!!

Check it out!

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 6, Leftovers

After you’re in a car for more than two hours, everything begins to blur. Time, location, meaning… everything ends up in a big, fat vat of “are we there yet?”

Our drive from Florida to Mississippi was a long and unmemorable trip. Trying to conserve as much money as possible, we planned on utilizing as many relatives between Florida and California that we could muster. Unfortunately, all of my extended family lived in the Northeast. As it turns out, Beth was the only one who actually had relatives located anywhere close to our prepared, mapped-out course. We didn’t want anything special, just a place to rest our heads… for free.

Beth’s Aunt Patsy and Uncle Don answered the call and kindly offered us a place to sleep for the first night of our trek.


In an effort to refrain from being presumptuous, we all decided to stop and eat at a local McDonalds just before arriving at their Mississippi home. After all, it would be too much to expect to be fed for free as well… wouldn’t it?

We should have done our research on Southern hospitality before devouring our McDinner.

Stuffed to the gills with various fried and soy-enhanced edibles, we arrived at the nice and humble home of Aunt Patsy and Uncle Don. Aunt Patsy exited her home and greeted us with hugs and smiles. The four weary travelers were just happy to escape the blue cocoon we had called home for the past ten hours. Our muscles were stiff and our bones crunched as we unpacked and moved our belongings into the house.

Aunt Patsy had prepared one guest room for Beth and Sunday to share and another for Tim and me.

And she also prepared some food.

A lot of food.

A mess hall’s worth of ham and turkey and potatoes, both mashed and sweet, and vegetables and desserts. We all just stared in awe at the feast that laid before us, our stomachs churning as it struggled to digest our fast food appetizer. I leaned over to Tim and said “I’m stuffed! What are we going to do?”

“Eat,” he replied.

And he was right. How could we turn it down? Think of all of the love and care and effort that went into that glorious meal? None of us had the nerve or desire to inform Aunt Patsy that her banquet was unwelcome because we had partook of a large helping of unknown chicken parts mashed together, formed, fried and labeled “nuggets.”

So, we sat… and ate… slowly.

Every bite was a challenge. Aunt Patsy looked on as if her entire value as a human being depended upon our facial expressions and food intake. After some time, the eating had to stop. After all, if we had tried to squeeze one more morsel down our gullets it would have surely forced a reversal of the digestive process, thereby destroying any goodwill we had thus far created.

As we put our forks down we were ashamed at the amount of food still available to us. Had we really eaten so little? Or was there just way too much food? Or some combination of both? With almost pleading eyes she asked “are you sure you don’t want anymore?”

We all politely relayed our immense satisfaction and gratitude, but respectfully declined. Wounded, yet undeterred, Aunt Patsy smiled and started to put all of the food away. We offered to help, but she quickly reminded us that we were guests in her house and Uncle Don guided us into the adjoining living room.

Tim, Beth and I sat down, our stomachs pooched out like just before a post-Thanksgiving Day meal nap. We moaned and groaned to ourselves, hoping we wouldn’t burst open.

Sunday, on the other hand, remained standing, looking none-the-less for wear, transfixed on an intricate tile design on the wall above the fireplace mantel. The tiles formed a circle and displayed a variety of animals... a fish, a scorpion, a man with a bow and arrow... all of the astrological symbols.

Her eyes studied it closely and a small smile brightening her face.

********

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 6, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 5, The Kiss Of Friendship
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 5, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 4, Scholastic Intimacy
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 4, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 3, Space Invaders
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 3, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 2, The Fourth Wheel
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 2, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 1, The Seed Planted
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 1, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 5, The Kiss Of Friendship

The previous semester, I realized that my passions lied more in film than in theater. Unfortunately, the university did not have a film program at the time, so I had to manufacture my own filming opportunities. As a sophomore in college I scraped together a little money and, along with my brother Paul, my friend Mike and my girlfriend at the time, Sue, we shot a half-hour comedy short on Super 8 film called The Term Paper.

Mike and Pete on the
set of The Term Paper

As I worked my way toward a Fine Arts degree, I had been enveloped in theater, in words and in drama. Cinema is told in images, Theater is told in words. This focus on theater was made apparent when I wrote a short film called Homesick. It’s an overly-wordy and unsuccessful drama about an actor who returns home to face the family demons of his past. Upon his arrival home, he is surprised to find his high school buddies happily waiting to greet him. One of those people is an old flame, who ended up being played by Sunday.

Sunday (back to us), Pete, Jay, Leslie
and Mike on the set of Homesick.

In order to shoot this mini-film I asked all of my theater buds to act in the project. Sunday agreed to play the role of the ex-girlfriend, but a few days before the shoot she had to have her wisdom teeth removed. She showed up on set with swollen cheeks and heavily medicated. Forever the trooper, she mustered enough focus to fulfill her commitment to me and the project... part of which included an intense kissing scene. You can trust me when I tell you that kissing a woman with newly extracted teeth, swollen gums and on pain medication is about as unromantic as one can get. Add to that the aspect of having to do it on camera, worrying about lighting and blocking (where you move on a set) and acting... well, the kissing was our last priority. Trying to shoot a talk-heavy half-hour short in 36 straight hours did not lend itself to any sort of sexual enlightenment, just getting the shot and moving on to the next scene was our primary goal.

Sunday, in Homesick, poofy cheeks and all.

So, as Sunday and I discussed our friends and such, we did have a weird sort of intimate history, but a completely false and fabricated one. In the end, we spent most of the time talking about boyfriends/girlfriends, past and present. Sunday had mentioned how happy she was with Dave, how she was determined to be completely loyal to him and that she could see being with him for the rest of their lives. This was reassuring to me. I was happy to know that there wouldn't be any odd sexual tension between Sunday and me. Dave had been one of my best friends and betraying that friendship with him, or Sunday, was not even an option.

Our conversation slowly died off and we ended up taking naps, waiting forever to get out of the state of Florida. That’s one of the problems with Florida… there’s only one way to leave this dang place... go straight up.

In what seemed like an eternity, our first goal was finally achieved... there was a small celebration in the car as we crossed the state line and headed as quickly as we could toward Mississippi…

…and Aunt Patsy.

********

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 5, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 4, Scholastic Intimacy
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 4, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 3, Space Invaders
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 3, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 2, The Fourth Wheel
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 2, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 1, The Seed Planted
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 1, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 4, Scholastic Intimacy

As the car sped out of Sunday's apartment complex parking lot, loaded down with an excessive amount of luggage, we were all one big happy family. Tim and Beth were looking forward to the time together and I was looking forward to getting to know Sunday a little more.

I had known her as a friend in college for a few years now. She was an odd dichotomy of personality traits. As mentioned before, she had a smoldering sexuality to her, yet she had an incredibly innocent approach to life. She had more interpersonal experiences with others than anyone else I knew, yet was incredibly loyal to her boyfriend, Dave. She was very spiritual, yet without being religious. She, like everyone else, was far more complex and layered than she first appeared.

Since I was coming from a relatively sheltered background, her unique and different view on life was intriguing to me. Peeling back those personality layers would end up being an interesting and, at times, very frustrating experience.

Our bodies not yet stiff from the limited body placement options in the small back seat, Sunday and I quickly made ourselves comfortable, resting our heads against our pillows propped up against the back seat windows. Our initial conversation covered a lot of ground. Our families, our college experience, our past relationships, other people in the theater department… stuff like that.

One of the odd things about acting is the uncommon intimacy that is required to do the job. There were many times during my college years where, during a scene, I had to kiss or hold or touch a fellow actress as part of a scene... often times with people I barely knew. It creates a unique dynamic. I had kissed girls that I only knew in passing. I had allowed numerous actresses into the intimate three foot bubble that surrounds us all, our personal space, in order to fulfill the dramatic necessities of a scene. That's the nature of being an actor, but an odd existence for everyone else.

Leslie and Pete in The Tempest

For a young, virile college male, it was both fun and confusing. For someone who never dated in high school and who was too shy and insecure to ask anyone to his prom, being paired in acting class with a beautiful girl whom, in real life, you would barely have the courage to talk to, and being assigned a scene in which you had to kiss this beautiful girl... well, let's be honest, that was frickin' cool! I mean, you got to kiss girls you didn't think would give you the time of day. And they had to kiss you back! It was in the scene! Their grade depended on it! It was every young man's dream in a lot of ways.

Overall, it was an odd convergence of fantasy and reality and it ended up creating an almost false sense of closeness amongst our class. By the time we were all graduating, it was like a sitcom that lasts too long... eventually, everyone had kissed everyone else. That sort of intimacy is not something to which you can naturally disengage, yet it is a shallow intimacy, so it is not something to which you can wholly grasp onto... it's somewhere in between. It's... weird.

So, as Sunday and I discussed our classmates, the conversation eventually ended up in the "who did you want to kiss but never did" or "who did you kiss and wish you didn't" realm. The strangest part of this conversation was that, as part of a short film I had written and directed, Sunday and I had already made out... on camera.

Sunday and Pete in Homesick...
They're acting... really!

You'll have to trust me, it was unnatural and completely unromantic.

********

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 4, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 3, Space Invaders
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 3, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 2, The Fourth Wheel
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 2, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 1, The Seed Planted
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 1, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 3, Space Invaders

Ignorance is a wonderful thing. It allows you to make stupid decisions that often have wonderfully catastrophic consequences. You also find yourself doing things and attempting challenges you never would have dreamed of tackling had you known enough to make a wiser decision.

Such was the case of putting together four unique personalities on an extensive road trip in a small car... I knew Tim, I didn't really know Beth and I didn't really know Sunday. And I certainly didn't know if our four personalities would react as soothing elements or cause random, cataclysmic explosions. Yet, we were now unified like some wicked Survivor episode, stuck in an Acura Integra for approximately twenty-one days over the Summer of '88. Knowing what I know now, I would have cancelled the trip all together. But, then, I wouldn't have this story to tell. So, in this case, ignorance worked in my favor.

An '87 Acura Integra

Tim picked me up in St. Pete. Packing for a long trip knowing you're going to be in a car without a lot of space was a challenge. Fortunately for me, I overcame the obstacle by simply not owning that many clothes. I took my meager belongings and shoved it into the back of Tim's almost new 1987 blue Acura Integra. It sat four comfortably, had a new fangled CD player and the engine purred as you moved the stick shift from one accelerating gear to another. We took the short hour long trip up to Brooksville and picked up Beth, whom had packed accordingly. There was just enough space for Sunday's luggage in the trunk.

We met Sunday that morning at her apartment complex. We were all happily anxious to get on our way and Tim and I gladly offered to help Sunday with her luggage. That's when physics and geometry got in the way. Damn that college education! Eyeing Sunday's luggage and calculating the available space in the trunk, the weight of said luggage, breathable oxygen and that hard to define space in a car that separates harmony from growing resentment... well, unless my abacas was wrong, things just weren't going to add up.

Never the less, we pulled her luggage down to the car and dropped it at the base of the trunk. With the luggage even closer, the impending package problem seemed more evident. The issue was that Sunday actually packed for a twenty-one day trip. True, the trip was intended to be twenty-one days... but we didn't expect her to pack twenty-one pants, bras, panties, socks, shoes along with the appropriate hair care products, toiletries and, as I lifted her large duffle bag into the back of the car, was certain she had packed lead in there as well, just for giggles.

The trunk wouldn't close and we knew some creative reshuffling was required. Not only because the duffle bag wouldn't fit, but because that was only one-third of her luggage. I remember asking her what she packed or why she packed so much or why she existed in human form, but her reply seemed valid, commenting on female necessities and feeling pretty and her inherent urge to make people want to kill her.

Okay, the human form and killing comments are exaggerations, but I do remember vaguely trying to understand how I could survive on five pairs of underwear, some socks, a couple of shirts and pants and one pair of sneakers and she needed three tons of Madonna closet leftovers, a small salon stock of hair care products and various silky skimpy lingerie items for a trip where most of our time will be spent camping.

Overwhelmed with the urge to get on the road with the assumption that this was our hardest part of the journey, Tim and I moved some of the smaller pieces out of the trunk and into the foot space in the interior of the car. We pulled out our slide rules and atomic clocks and figured out how to redesign space and time to fit all of the remaining luggage into the trunk. At first, the trunk wouldn't close. I jumped and put all of my weight on it and it still wouldn't close. Tim joined me in a unified jump and we celebrated the CLICK of the locked trunk with a high five.

Sunday and I squeezed into the back seat, now without anyplace to put our feet, held our pillows in our arms and tried to get comfortable. Beth simmered slightly as her foot space was also now full of various traveling items. The only completely luggage-free zone was the driver's seat, where Tim happily landed. He started the car and we headed toward our first destination.

In the coming hours, Sunday and I would pass our time with long conversations, ignoring an awkwardly intimate history.

********

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 3, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 2, The Fourth Wheel
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 2, Audio

Goin' Out To Cally - Part 1, The Seed Planted
Goin' Out To Cally - Part 1, Audio

Lord's Lotto

As my daughter and I drove to the supermarket to pick up some groceries, we passed a lottery billboard stating that $64 million was one ticket away from all of us.

My daughter wondered aloud what it would be like to win such a large sum of money. I mentioned that it's up to the Lord if we win the lottery. So, after we finished shopping we went up to purchase a new group of lotto tickets. While waiting for my new tickets to be purchased I placed my old tickets under a scanner that lets you know if you won or not.

One of my tickets said "Winner - See Retailer." The cashier looked a little stunned and told us we had four out of six numbers right on a previous lottery game. We won $85.00. Cool. Our grocery bill was $83.00.

As we walked out of to the car, I looked at my daughter with concern and said "I hope the Lord knew we were talking about winning the $64 million lotto, not 85 bucks from a previous one!"

We both laughed, grateful that we won anything at all. The Lord does have a sense of humor and if you don't ask for specifics, he'll fill in the blanks for you. We tithed 10% into the church collection on Easter and found that no one won the $64 million prize.

I knew I should have been more specific!

The lotto is up to $82 million now. I'll remember to be very detailed in my prayers next time. :)

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter, everyone! This is the day all Christians celebrate our freedom from death through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Spend the day with family and friends and enjoy the love between each other and with your risen Lord.

From the Catholic News Agency, a little more information...

Easter is the principal feast of the ecclesiastical year. Leo I (Sermo xlvii in Exodum) calls it the greatest feast (festum festorum), and says that Christmas is celebrated only in preparation for Easter. It is the centre of the greater part of the ecclesiastical year.

To have a correct idea of the Easter celebration and its Masses, we must remember that it was intimately connected with the solemn rite of baptism. The preparatory liturgical acts commenced on the eve and were continued during the night. When the number of persons to be baptized was great, the sacramental ceremonies and the Easter celebration were united. This connection was severed at a time when, the discipline having changed, even the recollection of the old traditions was lost. The greater part of the ceremonies was transferred to the morning hours of Holy Saturday.

Commemorating the slaying of the true Lamb of God and the Resurrection of Christ, the corner-stone upon which faith is built, it is also the oldest feast of the Christian Church, as old as Christianity, the connecting link between the Old and New Testaments.

The connection between the Jewish Passover and the Christian feast of Easter is real and ideal. Real, since Christ died on the first Jewish Easter Day; ideal, like the relation between type and reality, because Christ's death and Resurrection had its figures and types in the Old Law, particularly in the paschal lamb, which was eaten towards evening of the 14th of Nisan. In fact, the Jewish feast was taken over into the Christian Easter celebration; the liturgy (Exsultet) sings of the passing of Israel through the Red Sea, the paschal lamb, the column of fire, etc.

The connection between the Jewish and the Christian Pasch explains the movable character of this feast. Easter has no fixed date, like Christmas, because the 15th of Nisan of the Semitic calendar was shifting from date to date on the Julian calendar. Since Christ, the true Paschal Lamb, had been slain on the very day when the Jews, in celebration of their Passover, immolated the figurative lamb, the Jewish Christians in the Orient followed the Jewish method, and commemorated the death of Christ on the 15th of Nisan and His Resurrection on the 17th of Nisan, no matter on what day of the week they fell. For this observance they claimed the authority of St. John and St. Philip.