I’ve always had a bit of a fear of heights. It’s nothing unreasonable. I can get a little dizzy on ladders or scaffolding and shudder when I see people falling in movies. This fear became a full-blown phobia after the terrorist attacks on September 11. I was in New York when that happened and saw the buildings fall right in front of me from my roof in Brooklyn. It took me a while to get to the point where I am now: comfortably working- despite the constant threat of earthquakes- on the 18th floor of a high-rise.

Over the years, people have tried to get me over this fear (though I personally think you SHOULD be a little nervous about being high off the ground- it is a natural self-preservation  mechanism, after all). Soaring through the air on a flying trapeze, safely in a harness and with a net beneath me, seemed like an exciting way to confront my nervousness.

Here is the video proof of my willingness to overcome! I had a BLAST doing this and hope to do it again soon. I got a little distracted by the aerial silks (which I have been doing almost every week since this video was made), but I hope to return to the sky soon.

Many thanks to Brad Bishop and Hermione Leach for filming and SUPER thanks to Morningstar Bloom for NOT LISTENING TO ME AT ALL when I told her I couldn’t do it!

We often start the New Year by making our steadfast resolutions: I’m going to lose weight. I’m going to write that screenplay. I’m going to learn French… In short, we seek out to “fix” our lives in some way.  It’s equally important to take a moment to look back on the year and reflect on everything that you have done. With 2011 in full swing, I take a moment to recall few of last year’s highlights:

1. I got to hang out on some awesome television sets as an extra. The Office? Mad Men? Castle? That’s pretty bad ass. I’m VERY lucky.
2. I got a job as a web developer at Fox. I’ve gotten to create/work on sites for my favorite shows and some of the best shows on television. Fringe? Family Guy? The Simpsons? Glee?
3. I’m working on my 3rd level of improv comedy classes at The Upright Citizens Brigade theater.
4. I’ve gotten to see DOZENS of movies/performances with their creators! “Up” with Pete Docter and Bob Peterson? “The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnasus” with Terry Gilliam? “Avatar” with James Cameron? “Scott Pilgrim” with Edgar Wright? “ASSSCAT” with Amy Poehler, Jon Hamm, Jack McBrayer, Matt Walsh, Tim Meadows, Heather Graham, Matt Besser, and Ian Roberts?! I can’t even list everything!
5. I aced particle dynamics at the Gnomon School and made a music video out of what I learned.
6. I’ve gotten to explore Southern California in all of its glory.
7. I’ve mingled with awesome people. John Noble? Hugh Laurie? Seth MacFarlane? Hells to the yes!
8. And not least of all, I met a wonderful and talented guy who makes me smile, think, and melt, and with whom I get to share much of the above. Our adventures are just beginning.

The point here is not to brag. In this year, I’ve also lost a grandmother, heard news that my grandfather fell down a flight of stairs and is in bad shape, watched my dad get a triple bypass surgery, heard the horrible news of my high school BFF’s struggle with breast cancer, done great battle with unemployment, helped my brother pick himself up off the ground, worked 100+ hours a week to get the new Fox.com off the ground (almost losing my sanity in the process), failed a relationship, lost friends, and collected a hefty amount of debt in the process. But the positives FAR outweigh the negatives. I’ve done all of this DESPITE all of that. My point is to prove that if I get out there and try to make it happen, you can. Granted, I tend to live my life at about 100 miles per hour. Sometimes, the passage of time doesn’t even register with me. Since moving out to Los Angeles back in August/September of ’09, I have pushed myself to do all that I can in my entertainment career.

Wait, wait. What was that? “Entertainment?” That’s right. I have accepted it. I work in entertainment. Yes, I consider myself above all to be a “filmmaker” and primarily a “director,” but I’ve really opened my mind to television and the Internet. Also,  take a look around my site! I clearly have about a dozen other interests and entertaining talents. Realizing this about myself and accepting that having such a broad range of interests is an asset rather than a liability has been a major step for me this year. I enjoy acting. I enjoy writing. I enjoy drawing. I enjoy animating. I enjoy photography. I enjoy scientific discussion. I enjoy music. Hell, I even enjoy web development, my so-called “day job” now that I work for Fox. And to boot, I’m not too bad at those things. Why should I stop doing any one of them?

We have a tendency to want to slip others and ourselves into tidy little well-defined slots. Time and time again, I have had “wiser” people tell me I need to focus on one thing (and I’ve heard this said of some of my other friends with “multifaceted” interests and talents). The problem with that is that it doesn’t work for everyone. The more I limit my music playing, the less inspired I feel to write. The fewer photo-hiking trips I take, the less I feel the urge to sit down and code. When I feel like my interests are too scattered, I remind myself that my idols like James Cameron and J.J. Abrams write, direct, draw, compose, geek out about science, etc. And thanks to twitter, I’m learning that other people I admire have just as varied interests and talents (and learning to appreciate others that I may not have ever heard about).

Enough. Do what you love. All of it. As much as you can squeeze into your life. Soak up every day. Love someone. Shout it out. And as the song in my video cries out: Go Do! The secret to life is not that complicated. Live it. My resolution is to make 2011 just as awesome as 2010, accepting that there will be bad with the good. Take a moment and reflect on just how much you did in 2010 and reward yourself for that. Make 2011 about building from that, not scolding yourself and giving yourself rules. And above ALL, let a little love into your life. There’s a lot about the world to love.

A friend of mine sent me a story this morning with the following headline (image will link to story):

Toy robot detours traffic near Coors Field

Another sent me this one (again, image links to story):

NASA Finds New Life

Wow. Not EXTRATERRESTRIALS, sure, but it opens to doors to what we should be looking for.

8-inch Killer Robots and Arsenic-based life forms.  Finally, the Universe is reading my screenplays.  And producing them!

Thanks to Carl and Pericles for sending me these stories!  You have made my day.

(Picking up on my extras stories…)

The second extras assignment I got was for the show “Cold Case.” Fittingly, the thing I remember most about this experience was that it was freezing. It was also wet and muddy- sometimes dangerously so (lights and their power generators and cables don’t mix well with “wet”). How a Los Angeles set manages to seem freezing and wet to a native Colorado ski bunny is beyond me. I played a 1970′s-ish circus goer who witnesses an “accident” on the aerial silks (the show aired months ago, so if this is a spoiler, I’m sorry, but you need to catch up). I was married with kids. The pressures of the set split our happy family up, though. My husband and I separated. I lost custody halfway through. So did he. Sigh. I miss little… kid.

Not only was it freezing, but the costumes were ridiculously uncomfortable. I still don’t quite understand how women could wear polyester, pantyhose and high heels. Simultaneously.

Part of the props also included balloons. Anyone who has known me long enough or who regularly reads this blog understands that this is a pretty serious problem.

I am globophobic (afraid of balloons and yes, it is a real thing and yes, you can shut up). They make me tense up and act like an imbecile. I will leave a grocery store if I can hear them being blown up. When I see a balloon animal artist (or as I view them: terrorist) on my side of the street, I will make an effort to cross to the other side or feign sudden interest in whatever the storefront closest to me has to offer. The situation to the left, for example, in which my “daughter” is mercilessly beating me with a balloon flower, was torture. It’s a strange phobia and does not solicit the same sympathy as, say, a fear of heights or a fear of spiders. I usually just keep my mouth shut about it and hope I don’t reveal too much to the person walking with me. (note: I recently tried to overcome this fear by participating in/orchestrating a photo shoot. The results of this test are on my facebook page.)

Of course, “my kids” wanted balloons and balloon animals more than they wanted sugar (which on that set, was saying something). They also insisted on attacking both me and my camera with them. I wore a brave face throughout it all. Three balloons were detonated in front of me. People kept thrusting them into my hands. Honestly, I should get a freaking Oscar for the photo at the bottom of this post. Or an Emmy, this being television. Do they give out Emmy’s for stills?

Anyway, it was two days of either standing in the mud or sitting on metallic bleachers and being told to “shush” every three seconds. The popcorn was fake- actually, it was real, but ancient. I am SO glad none of the children eating it plus copious amounts of cotton candy were mine. Seriously. Whose idea was that? “We have a bunch of kids that we need to keep still between shoots on a circus-like set filled with clowns, balloons, and live snakes (I don’t think the snakes made the final cut). How do we keep them manageable? I know! Let’s give them stale salty popcorn and colored clouds of sugar!”

Turned out they had to cut many of my scenes because the guy in front of me was wearing earrings and they didn’t catch it until AFTER the last shot. The result? You can see approximately half of my head for less than a second. I vowed to never again do it, but then, I hit the jackpot of extras gigs…

I’m working on it, but I have a long way to go before I can get anything this raw and honest out of my voice/fingers:

After weeks of dialing and dialing, I got my first gig in November of 2009: Bar Patron on the NBC summer season sitcom “100 Questions” (note: this episode will air on Friday. I will try to update with a screencap if I can get one). Since this was going to be my first time on a big television set, I was really excited for the job. That is… until someone not only took the wind out of my sails, but shot a canon through the side of my enthusiasm ship by informing me that you haven’t really arrived on the extras scene unless you’re in a summer blockbuster and THEY call YOU. Dually noted.

From my new perspective on the bottom of the “T’ain’t-nothin’” Ocean, I prepared myself for my experience. I was told to come “hair-and-makeup-ready” (this industry is filled with terms spawned from bad English, more on that later), which required the purchase of makeup. I ended up spending about $50 to make my $8/hour. I took one stealthy picture of my costume in the bathroom because I was terrified of being sued or killed. I also respect the “No Spoilers” rule and the concept of “sensitive information,” so it’s not just a matter of self preservation. I’ve since learned that a picture of myself in a business suit does not count as “sensitive information.” In fact, how do you know this is not just a picture of me from some office job in 2002?

As a girl who once made television sets in her desk at school, it was surreal to finally be on the set and stare at all of the toys. It was all I imagined it to be and more! Lights, camera, lots of inaction mixed with frenzied moments of action, baseball caps, gaffing tape! There were only three walls and bleachers (complete with “Applause” light). A particularly fun Hollywood moment came when we were told that in the event of an earthquake, we should run to the nearest wall. The nearest REAL wall. The director was loud and had a British accent. Only he and the first AD were either allowed to laugh at the jokes or thought they were funny (I’m leaning toward the latter- note the earlier description of “NBC summer season sitcom”). And I’m pretty sure James Cameron was the second AD. Why not? I don’t think he had anything better to do at the time…

I met people who were happy to be there and revved up about the industry, and jaded, miserable folks who should probably seek out other careers. I found myself somewhere in between. “Content” would be the best way to put it. After all was said and done, though, I’d had enough fun that I decided to try to land another gig.