In our part of Los Angeles it doesn't usually become "awful hot" until August; September brings increasing heat, then arrives October, also known as "fire season." But July of 2003 proved slightly different as temperatures inched into the nineties. William continued to work on his movie at a studio lot in the Valley.
I was muddling, hot and uncomfortable. True, I had found peace in our home, but I still had no leads on a life of purpose and creativity. One down, two to go. With the house renovation completed, my creativity languished in a moody state of uncertainty.
In our first year of living together we hosted thirty-five lunch or dinner parties. I studied cookbooks over breakfast and went to farmers' markets on weekends.
In a particularly desperate bid for creativity, I invited two small neighbor girls over for dinner and a movie one night when William would be working late. I suggested to their parents they could enjoy a night out while I entertained their daughters.
The children arrived on our doorstep and I sat them in front of salads decorated to look like little girl faces, with black olives for eyes, cucumber slices for cheeks, tomatoes for smiles and stripes of ranch dressing for long tresses.
The salad faces stared up at my small guests. The children blinked back at them and started eating. I followed up with gooey mac and cheese, ice cream sundaes and popcorn to go with an animated movie. I guess it felt good to be doing something good but my overeagerness to please depressed me.
The screenplay I had worked on for two years gained some traction when it advanced in the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences screenplay competition, the Nicholl Fellowships. Thrilled, I called William at work and we celebrated over the phone.
And that was that. I didn't go any further in the competition. I didn't win. I didn't get an agent or a producer call or a new career.
Do what you'd like, William said. We'll live on my salary. Do what you want.
Who wouldn’t want this scenario?
Me, that's who. Because I didn't know what. I looked into classes at a local college. Maybe art history or music history. Maybe English lit. Or maybe me crawling around a campus with a bunch of eighteen-year-olds would be an exercise in humiliation.
I did maintain a private coaching schedule and had a few actors arriving at our house to prepare for auditions. But these actors wanted roles more than they wanted to learn the craft of acting. I couldn't help them with career guidance. All I could teach them was how to break a script down into beats, then turn those beats into actions, then turn those actions into interesting performances. Who wants that in Hollywood?
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