Family.  This is mine.  We can get caught up in the future and planning ahead.   And there’s nothing wrong with that, but it shouldn’t be at the cost of recognizing the present because really, in the end, that’s all we have.  Our family shared this moment at Christmas.  It’s not easy to get this group together and we don’t normally have traditional gatherings.  This gathering was kind of a spur of the moment.

Family (with all its joys and pains) is a constant theme in my scripts.  One person missing from the photo above is my dad.  He passed away July 3, 2010.    He suffered with Alzheimer’s in the final years of his life.  One moment I remember vividly with this man is the last time I saw him the week before he passed when my sister and I visited him at the nursing home.  I share it with you as an example of why many of us don’t want to live in the “now” because of how painful it can be.  But pain is a reality.  It means you’re alive…and it can mean hope for better days.  I look at pain as an opportunity…a challenge to look at things differently.  Beautiful things can come from pain …things we miss out on if we don’t live in the now.

My dad stop talking at the end of his life and though he recognized us, it was difficult for him to articulate words.   Some who get this awful disease turn angry, resentful and it’s hard to manage them.   My dad was pleasant, kind.  The face you see in this photo is what you saw when he greeted you.  And on this visit, my sister and I took him out of his chair and walked down another hallway where we sat with him and “talked”.   I asked my dad who I was and he leaned into my ear and whispered in the most clear way….”Romeo”.  And then I asked him about my sister and who she was and again he struggled, but whispered….”Lisa”.

I share another moment of my mother who after the passing of my dad, had a breakdown and was in the psych ward for 5 months.  Her mind was gone and considering she had suffered with mental illness for many years, we thought we lost her for good.   I visited her in the psych ward one day and I found her sitting on a chair in another room all by herself.  She was facing out, the sun hitting her body.  I quietly called out to her and she turned to me and said:  “I just wanted to feel the sun”.   In that moment, I knew my mom was recovering.

Two moments, painful on the surface (dad living his final days in a nursing home and mom locked away in a psych ward), and yet they are memories that I will never forget…and who knows, they may end up in a script.

Speaking of writing,  I am in the midst of re-writing two scripts – both essentially page one re-writes which means starting over.  I’ve struggled with my writing lately and it has nothing to do with writer’s block, but more to do with a lack of focus.  My screenplay Let It Shine is currently stuck in the outline stage.   2018 was the year of ANIMAL.  I had a public reading of the play in March and in November had a full production at the Alumnae Theatre.  I have since met with my dramaturge Jane Miller and the Alumnae Theatre to discuss the play.   No matter how I slice it and dice it, I am very aware that ANIMAL needs a significant re-write.   If  I want the play to reach a broader audience, it’s missing  what that photo of my fmaily above shows:  a little it bit more joy, some tender/calm moments and yes, even laughter.

So the plan is, focus in on the now because that’s what I have.  Cut out the distraction/ procrastination/excuses and start rebuilding these script, one brick at a time.  I take some comfort in what Academy Award winning screenwriter William Goldman said about writing: