Open Mic 40

Date 18 April 2012
Venue: The Hollywood hotel

Momentum.

An object in motion will stay in motion. This is true both in terms of the laws of physics as well as the nature of human psychodynamics. In motion; active, it's easier to keep on going. Even that downward spiral of situations that turn out for the worst produces some definite action. The drive to change course, to try new and daring things. Or the panic that sets in, and the need to do something, anything, just to maintain an even keel.  Those two desires are not so far apart.

At rest, objects will stay at rest. The momentum is gone. And this is what happened to me - or rather, this is what I did to myself.

I will be candid about the last 7 months. I feel the need to be open and honest because this blog is about progress. And it is about regress just as much. And for better or for worse, this is a path that simply can't just... end. I feel this blog can't be complete without culminating in an accomplishment, or resulting in an open letter of resignation. My fate is not tied in with my ability to successfully accomplish one goal of many I have for myself. But those things that make me human, my weaknesses and the situations which are thrust upon me and the situations into which I thrust myself, those are things that do matter.

I didn't do much the last 3 months of 2011.
I quit my job, hoping that I would find work doing something that I actually enjoyed. Something where I would have clear objectives and be earning a liveable wage. Or even just the minimum wage. Or even just the $40 a day I needed to stay afloat, to cover all my expenses and have some money leftover for food.

I didn't find that job.

What I did find was that the unpaid internship existed; that undignifying role where you become a tool to be discarded after 3 to 6 months, surviving on that hope that one day you and the hard work that you do will be good enough to actually merit earning a wage. It's insulting, it's exploitative, and I fully believe it is killing the economy almost as quickly as it was killing my hope of bettering myself.

What I also found was that as a freelance production assistant, I had the potential to earn in a weekend far more than my old 'job' paid me in a week. But working only on the weekends, and not even every weekend at that left me with a lot of free time. Or rather, unoccupied time. Time to wish I could justify doing the things I wanted to do. I couldn't. So I didn't.

I would spend days in bed, watching TV. Sometimes I ate. Usually I didn't. Usually, I would sleep until late afternoon and stay up until the sun was about to rise. Objects at rest stay at rest. And stay and stay and stay.

It wasn't until January that I was able to break out of this funk. I had a temporary job where I was promised the possibility of more work, but more importantly I was promised an occasional $10 or $20 every now and then.

It was just enough to get me moving again. Slowly, I would build up the drive to go out and do more things. Opportunities appeared that promised to get me doing the things I loved doing, or failing that, possibly bring me serious money. I never quite got there, but I could at least go from option to option. Each new possibility on the horizon bringing with it the chance that this would be the one.





Oh yeah, the funny parts. That's why you're here.

As long as I had the feeling that my life in general was going places, I thought that I could at least try and apply that energy towards standup as well. So I made a call to a friend at the Comedy Store.
"Book me on the 30th"

With motion comes energy to try new things. Or in my place "ohgodohgodohgod that's in two weeks, what do I do what should I say on stage am I still funny ohgodohgodohgod" Again, the motivations are not too dissimilar. And I started again, with the open mic.

It went alright. Compared with the absolute shock I felt at open mic #1 in this series, this was more like a reminder what the baseline actually is in Los Angeles. The audience was tired, and I was still feeling things out. Old material got the best reaction I could hope for, new material shows some promise. I can always fall back on what I was doing seven months ago, which is probably what I should be doing anyways.

I don't know where I'm going. I don't know whether this will lead me towards success or towards deciding to go try other endeavors.
But I'm in motion.