today i spoke with my aunt's neighbor and friend who is in the television business. she gave me the low down. a brain dump, as she called it. it scared the crap out of me. to be fair, it was a lot of stuff that i should have been able to figure out on my own. throw yourself in full throttle. really, really want stuff. be prepared to be a grunt for a while, potentially a long while. self doubt cropped up pretty quickly after she had finished what she had to say. and the thing is this: all of a sudden i find i have to make a decision about what i want to do for the rest of my life. and that's not even true, but it definitely feels that way.
and the real question is: do i want this enough? her husband, andy, was talking to me as i was walking out the door about some potential hook-up to be gopher for a bunch of jewish gay sitcom writers, and when i expressed only vague interest, he said "this position is for one of a thousand guys frothing at the mouth for it." and that's a problem: i should be frothing at the mouth, and i go to look for it, and it's not there. to be fair, the idea of hanging out with gay jewish sitcom writers all day is a bittersweet one, and i think that's what caught me off guard by andy's offer... but can someone who wants to be what i want to be ever be caught off guard?
mary (that's the wife) made the comment, when i asked if tv was the soul-sucking business everyone makes it out to be, that idealists shouldn't work there. they should go to africa and help cure people if that's what they want to do. but there's nothing wrong with entertaining people. i'm worried i don't believe that. i mean, i do believe that, but what is the use of my life if that's all i'm going to do? tonight i watched a recorded episode of er where one of the chicago docs goes to darfour to help carter run a clinic in a refugee camp. that's the work of an idealist. but i don't think i'm him.
and doing this excites me, which is something, even though i'm scared crapless. one thing i did realize is that even if it's hard or long hours or whatever that nobody seems to achieve anything real without them. doctors, teachers, lawyers. and i do have to remind myself that i love love love to write. anyway. i've got my summer job, and so any jumping in for to get feet wet can stew for a while. and maybe it's all right if i freak out, just a little.
hasta mañana.
and the real question is: do i want this enough? her husband, andy, was talking to me as i was walking out the door about some potential hook-up to be gopher for a bunch of jewish gay sitcom writers, and when i expressed only vague interest, he said "this position is for one of a thousand guys frothing at the mouth for it." and that's a problem: i should be frothing at the mouth, and i go to look for it, and it's not there. to be fair, the idea of hanging out with gay jewish sitcom writers all day is a bittersweet one, and i think that's what caught me off guard by andy's offer... but can someone who wants to be what i want to be ever be caught off guard?
mary (that's the wife) made the comment, when i asked if tv was the soul-sucking business everyone makes it out to be, that idealists shouldn't work there. they should go to africa and help cure people if that's what they want to do. but there's nothing wrong with entertaining people. i'm worried i don't believe that. i mean, i do believe that, but what is the use of my life if that's all i'm going to do? tonight i watched a recorded episode of er where one of the chicago docs goes to darfour to help carter run a clinic in a refugee camp. that's the work of an idealist. but i don't think i'm him.
and doing this excites me, which is something, even though i'm scared crapless. one thing i did realize is that even if it's hard or long hours or whatever that nobody seems to achieve anything real without them. doctors, teachers, lawyers. and i do have to remind myself that i love love love to write. anyway. i've got my summer job, and so any jumping in for to get feet wet can stew for a while. and maybe it's all right if i freak out, just a little.
hasta mañana.
posted by Charlie Beckerman at 21:47
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