Life in the Hollywood Lane

Love in a Jar

Was I staring at the almost-empty jar of peanut butter, or was it staring back at me? Organic, the label announced. What words could be made from the word organic? Nag. Rag. Rig. Okay, those were too easy; I switched to four letters. Gain. Rain. Narc. Rang.

Carrie Fisher wrote about eating peanut butter in bed in Postcards from the Edge….which was about a famous actor who made it really big on one movie. (One recommended rule of writing is to write about what you know.) I love how she turned her autobiography into a comedy. In the book, she’d sit in bed eating peanut butter. There’s a good reason for that—it’s the ultimate comfort food.

The yapper dogs next door started their daily yapping. Ugh! We had neighbors with a screaming toddler, plus the dad played the tuba. Frequently. Cyn and I would long for them to leave. We were so happy when we saw a moving truck pull up in front of their house one day. That one darling, adorable, fabulous, screaming toddler and that dear, old, tuba-aficionado dad was replaced with four screaming kids, three yapper dogs, two smokers… and perhaps a partridge in a pear tree. Who the hell smokes anymore, anyway? I’ll take that tuba back!

On my moving-in day, the tuba blared.

"I’ve been meaning to tell you about the whale that lives next door,” Cyn chuckled.

Cyn. Oh, Cyn. You were so funny, so silly, so much fun, so outrageous, so out there. Now you’re really out there. You were so…strong, so…amazing, so…alive. So… much for that.

I couldn’t even cry, I was so numb. I couldn’t move, couldn’t eat, couldn’t get out of bed, could barely muster the strength to go to the bathroom, which didn’t happen all that much because I wasn’t drinking or eating anything at all, other than the odd spoonful of peanut butter. My body started aching from the lack of movement, but I ignored it.

Cyndi. Why? Whywhywhywhywhywhywhywhywhy?

Sweetie, I said inside my head to her when the numbness stopped for a minute, if I knew that in your heart of hearts you really wanted to do this, I would’ve held your hand as you went out. Okay, maybe not. I would’ve held your hand and called 911. You probably knew that.

You were more than my best friend. You were my sister by another mister. You were the love of my life, even though it was never a romantic or sexual thing. I didn’t know this until you left me.

~

Mom flew out to tend to me. Normally having her around wouldn’t be viewed as a favor, but this time it was. She stayed on her “best behavior,” fortunately….I’ll explain more about that later. She dealt with Cyndi’s parents because I couldn’t—I couldn’t answer their questions or deal with the utter heartbreak in their eyes that I knew would be there, and I would be grilled:  Why didn’t you tell us? Why didn’t you know? We trusted you! How could you let us down like this? Why didn’t you save her?

I didn’t know she was so close to the edge. And if I had known, I still wouldn’t have known....that there was nothing I could do and nothing I could say, that it wasn’t even my responsibility. But right then, I wasn’t thinking any of that. I was thinking that I should have known, that I should have said something, that it was completely my responsibility. And if I hadn’t failed so miserably at said responsibility, Cyndi would still be here, dramatically brooding over her morning coffee, laughing at my jokes, making me laugh at her jokes, teasing the houseplants with her ooziness, coming up with some crazy shenanigan or another.

It’s completely my fault.

Somewhere in the far recesses of my mind, I knew that was a crock, but right then that thought reigned front and center.

It was this town, wasn’t it, Cyn? This fucking town—it can chew you up and spit you out like no other. It was acting, too, wasn’t it? This fucking career—it, too, can chew you up and spit you out like no other.

She’d met someone just a few weeks beforehand. Oh, Cyn. How many times did I suggest that you just tell potential beaus everything (well, perhaps not everything) up front so they’re not surprised. He was from Europe and was so taken by her beauty, her carriage, her demeanor. He thought she was a real movie star. But by their third or fourth date, she let him know that she was a star of a number of commercials, but not much more than that. He left—the cad.

“Crazy fucking town. Crazy fucking people. Crazy fucking everything about this place.” Even the successful ones, as I mentioned earlier, say they never feel like they’ve arrived. “Perhaps if we would’ve arrived without it,” I said to the air.

Hah! That’s the whole secret of life, isn’t it? Be happy with what is. We all know that, somewhere deep inside in there. But there can be a long journey between knowing the secret and truly being happy.

~

We talked about the elusiveness of high-level success all the time.

“It’s right near me,” Cyn said once, “but it’s just out of reach. It’s floating in my periphery.” 

Most of our myriad esoteric conversations took place in our two persimmon-colored overstuffed, scrumfy (scrumptiously comfy, my invention) chairs, with morning coffee or evening wine sitting nearby on the huge slab of oak that served as our coffee table. An equally overstuffed, comfy sofa sat on the other side of the table, beckoning everyone who saw it to stretch out and forget the problems of the world. A petite person could nearly disappear in our furniture. Our beds were super scrumfy, too.

Oh, I haven’t told you about our darling, little hobbit house yet! It was absolutely adorable. Tucked away in a grove of trees in the hills of Glendale, you could easily see Frodo walking in to this part cottage, part living fairy tale. It was painted the cheeriest yellow you could stand without being nauseated, and it had rounded recesses over the rounded, latticed windows. Even the top of the door was rounded.

And……it came with fairly low rent! Cyndi’s mom was in real estate and owned a ton of rental properties. She let her daughter live in this one for a song, and Cyn had a ragtag bunch of odd roommates until I moved in. (Maybe I could be counted as ragtag and odd, too, though?)

Colorful artwork from our multitude of colorful artist friends lined the butter-yellow walls. Little palm trees were tucked into every nook and cranny, and this little hobbit house had plenty of those.

There was no carport, but that’s okay. In the whole time I’ve been in LA, I’ve had to scrape ice off my windshield twice.

We even had a bit of a view from the deck, since we were up a hill a bit. We couldn’t see the ocean, but on a clear day we could see that far out, so I’d imagine I was looking at it. At night we saw lights; it wasn’t anything like the Hollywood lights, but I liked to pretend it was a snippet of them, instead of just downtown Glendale.

Anyway….(Don’t you hate it when people say that? I do, so I take it back!) Here’s one version of our many conversations regarding success (or lack thereof) where one of us would play devil’s advocate to exorcise our holding-back demons.

“Why don’t you want to be an actor?”

“I do!”

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I do. There’s nothing I want more than to be an actor. Acting and movies help people open their hearts and give them something to think about that they wouldn’t have thought about otherwise. It’s my calling. It’s what I want to do. It’s in my soul.”

“You’d be there if you really wanted to be.”

“I want to be!”

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I do.”

“No, you don’t. Otherwise you’d be there.”

That conversation happened on many occasions, with each of us taking a turn on each side. Sometimes it helped. Here’s another one, which had taken place just a few weeks before she died:

“What’d make it come in for a landing?” I asked her referring to the ever-elusive, circling success, while asking myself at the same time.

“Dunno. Right timing? A better me?”

“Nah. There couldn’t be a better you.” I was in one of those moods—beneficent, which might’ve annoyed the bejesus out of her if she hadn’t been slightly tipsy already. “You’re the best you you are. Besides, it’s not about deserving. Nasty, abusive drunks make it big all the time.” 

She took another sip of wine. And two. And three. Wait a minute—why didn’t I see this at the time?

“Invite it in,” I continued. “Make it welcome. Serve it tea and crumpets.”

She nearly spit out her wine. “Tea and crumpets?”

“Well, if not that, what does it want? Beer and brats? Champagne and caviar?”

The wine was starting to make itself known in her system and speech. “Maybe it’s an agreement I made before I came in to this lifetime—that success will weasel away from me this time around. This one isn’t my lifetime to be successful because I’m here to experience what trying and trying and trying feels like.”

“I can’t imagine making that kind of agreement.”

“Maybe I’m just supposed to light things up no matter what I do.”

“Maybe.”

“What about people who never, ever find the ‘one’—or the two or three if they’re into that kind of thing. Some people are lonely their whole, entire lives.” 

“And some people are lonelier inside a sad marriage than some people are on their own. But wouldn’t folks be married if they really, really wanted to be?”

“Wouldn’t I be a star if I really wanted to be?”

“Maybe you don’t have to be a star—be a starburst! Light up the world everywhere you go.”

She downed the rest of her wine.

 ~

Maybe if I hadn’t used the tea-and-crumpets metaphor, she’d still be alive.

~ 

Yes, of course I’m being facetious, but not about this….If only she hadn’t taken me so literally about being a starburst.

Starve the Fever; Feed the Soul—and Stay Forever Young While We’re at It

I stared at the ceiling while Mom cleaned the house. There was no point telling her we (uh, now I) had a housekeeper; she needed something to do. What about my….oh, which job did I have those days, anyway?

Jobs, jobs, jobs. I’ve had a few: Waitperson. Ice cream scooper. Retail. Hotel front desk. Then I realized I could take care of two things at once by being something physical. So I—oh, you name it, I did it—was a yoga teacher, Pilates teacher, Zumba teacher, CrossFit trainer, even a personal trainer. 

But being self-employed didn’t really work either. I would fret so much about making a living that it was like I was stepping on my own garden hose of creativity. When I worked at a regular job, the hose would flow; because money was taken care of, I freed up the ability to express. My soul yearned to create—doing one-woman shows, taking acting classes, coming up with collaborations, writing songs and screenplays.

One thing I love about writing is that everything can be a part of writing. It’s not just the times sitting in front of the computer. Doing the dishes, driving, taking a shower—those are the times the ideas really come.

I’d be expressing so much that I’d yearn for more time. So I’d think about what could give me more time? Working for myself, of course. But as soon as I’d go back in that direction, I’d be so worried about money that I’d drop all my acting classes and the cursor in the middle of that empty page on the computer screen would mock me.

Luckily, over time, the zombie money and a trickle of other royalties took the pressure of self-employment off, and I’d still pick up odd jobs and personal training here and there. So, what was it I was doing those days? I literally couldn’t remember. Wasn’t there somewhere I had to be? I didn’t care.

Ohhh, it was helping an older hippie writer chick, who smelled of patchouli oil, with her life—personal training, organizing her house and her affairs, and then launching her social media and blog. The personal training had come first, and then as we grew closer and closer, she asked for more and more help. It’s not that I was an organizing or social-media superstar, but compared to her I certainly was.

Skye was so cool. Age is an actor’s worst fear, but she made seventy-five look hip and fun. She eschewed makeup, but that didn’t matter—her eyes shined like beacons, and those were what people noticed. They were perhaps made even more special because they were framed by beautiful skin and thick, long, flowing, white hair. I didn’t know what her secret was…I hoped that whatever it was, it’d rub off on me in the time we spent together. (I’m talking about her secret for happiness and glowing eyes, of course. Actually, she did tell me what her secret for amazing skin and thick hair was: Vitamin E, Black Currant-seed Oil, and Collagen. As soon as I left her house that day, I immediately stopped at a health-food store and bought all three.)

~ 

The week before Cyn was supposed to turn forty, I tried telling her about all the women I know who loved their forties, fifties, sixties, and especially Skye loving her seventies.

“Freedom comes with age.”

“Not in this industry,” she said.

“Look at Meryl, look at Jane and Lily.”

“I don’t want to look at them. They made it in their twenties. They can do whatever they want now.”

 ~

Organ. Cargo. Grain. Still in bed with my peanut butter, at least I was up to five-letter words from organic. Okay, yes, organ was totally cheating.

I remembered hearing once that the brain can’t really feel pain if it’s entirely focused on one task. As soon as the task of word-making stopped, the pain rushed in—at least until it got to be so much that the numbness would set in again. My brain swirled with “If only I’d said…” “Perhaps if I’d….” “Maybe if I’d moved out….”

So much was starting to dawn on me. Perhaps if we hadn’t lived together so long, we each might’ve found a solid partner—a Bogey for her Bacall, a Tracy for my Hepburn—to make a life with. Maybe then we wouldn’t have fed off of each other’s misery so much.

I wasn’t that miserable, was I? Not that much, really. Oh, maybe I was a bit. I was born with a sense of optimism that carried me through my bleakish childhood in Wisconsin and my years in one of the toughest towns in the world. You can’t attempt this business unless you have some steel and grit and tons of patience. It does wear you down, though. Maybe I was more miserable than I knew.

Oh, Cyn—yes, it’s ridiculously hard here. But we deal with life as best we can. Sometimes that means cutting our losses and making do with what we have.

“Fuck it!” That’s what she said back during the conversation about older women. She probably would’ve said it again to what I just thought.

She cut a whole lot more than her losses.

Oh, Cyn. I’m so sorry I didn’t say the right thing to make it all worthwhile to you. What could I have said? What could I have done?

A crystal hanging in the window turned slightly and suddenly sparkled in the sunshine, casting little dancing rainbows around the room. I thought back a few weeks to when I was struck by the sudden sparkle in Cyn’s wineglass as she walked under the track lighting in the living room.

“The story is in the details,” a filmmaking professor once said. I’ve taken classes in every aspect of this industry, and the ones in the actual art of filmmaking were among my favs.

In that particular student film, the shot was an ECU (extreme closeup) of the sun shining through a piece of kiwi in a child’s hand. The close-up of the seeds and rays shooting out from the center of the fruit slice was a metaphor: in this case the little girl was the light in the life of the family.

A big part of Cyn’s story might’ve been in that one detail, that one sparkle. How much did she have to drink? No......it couldn’t have been that whole bottle already. And did she drink that other bottle, too? And perhaps a couple of bottles the day before? How could I not have noticed this before? I might’ve been a big drinker, too, especially given what this town can do to the soul, if I hadn’t been so crazy calorie conscious.

 ~

How did I end up having to make all the arrangements for the place, the food, the everything?

“Her parents can’t do it,” Mom said. “They just can’t.”

“Like I can?”

“I’ll do it. Just help me a little. What were her favorite foods? What were her favorite flowers? And what colors did she love best?”

That was the thing about Cyn—as miserable as she must’ve been, she also loved so many things. I don’t think there was a food on Earth (as long as it wasn’t once a bug or a reptile) she met that she didn’t fall in love with. And flowers and colors? Loving one kind over another would’ve left the others bereft. She didn’t have many favorites—she loved all of them. She loved everything. She loved life. Or so I thought.

Go Mom! She handled everything. Once I recommended some flowers and food items, she went to town—or at least to Costco. She sat at my computer for a day or two writing up the memorial and emailing my friends.

“Make sure you tell everyone to wear bright colors,” I told her. “Cyndi would hate it if everyone was in black or somber stuff.”

Mom went into Cyndi’s closet to see what colors she wore. If there’s a color, it was in Cyndi’s closet. Yes, that’s an exaggeration, but not much. Finally Mom figured that a coral-y/watermelon-y color seemed to show up more than any other.

“She called that color happy,” I said, bursting into tears.

“Honey, I don’t know if I should just leave you alone or make you go out or what.”

“'Or what’ sounds good.”

“And what does 'Or what’ look like?”

Well, my body was growing stiff from lying in bed for days, and Malibu would always be first on any or-what list. After nearly shoving me in the shower, Mom drove my car while I stared at a few wispy clouds. We each grabbed one of those decadent, caramel-y things at the Starbucks in the Trancas shopping center. Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin sat in that parking lot during one episode of Grace and Frankie.

“Hey, that’s my parking lot!” I shouted.

“A little possessive, are we?” Cyn chuckled.

Cyn. For a few seconds here and there, I’d forget about her dying, but then waves of utter sadness would wash over me.

Mom and I sipped our drinks at my favorite beach spot. After that we wandered through a few shops down the highway. I was numb; two minutes later I’d want to scream at the top of my lungs.

I’d heard that grief gets worse after the balm of the initial shock wears off. Grrrreeeaaaaat.

The Performance of a Lifetime

Cyndi greeted us at her memorial, from those big, blue eyes smiling out from my favorite picture of her, blown up to poster size. It was a perfect day—springtime really is the best time of year in LA.

There were probably a thousand people there—one of the benefits of being such a phenomenal person and then dying in your hometown. Many people stood up to lavish beautiful words on her.

“She was the brightest light I ever met, and she helped everyone around her to shine brightly, too.”

“She’d walk into a room, and it was like the sun just came out.”

“She’ll never know this now, but she taught me to be fearless.”

“…kind…”

“….forthright….”

“…..amazing…..”

“……incomparable…..”

“…….special…….”

“……..SO funny……..”

“………beautiful inside and out………”

“……….a kick in the pants when I needed it……….”

“………..the life of the party as well as the party of the life………..”

“…………one of my best friends…………”

Who were all these people? And why don’t we say these things before someone dies? Actually, a buddy of mine knew he was dying and had a party—a living memorial—so he could hear all the wonderful things his friends wanted to say about him. But he knew he was dying. I doubt Cyndi knew, really knew, until the very last few seconds.

Her mom stood up and asked, “How many of you thought you were one of Cyndi’s best friends?” About half the people in the room raised a hand. We all laughed. That was so Cyn.

After the last speaker shared, I stood up and started applauding. The entire assembly stood up and started applauding, as well—giving Cyndi a standing ovation for her life. Her beautiful life. Her beautiful, too-short life. As we clapped and clapped and clapped and clapped, some started hooting, shouting, stamping, and whistling, like people do after a stunning performance.

“Cyn, can you hear all this now?” I asked her, wherever she was. “I tried to tell you.” But sometimes we fade out the voice of the one who loves us the most and listen only to the voice that we’ve trained to pull us down.

 ~

Afterward, I wanted to call my best friend and tell her about the truly amazing memorial service I’d just witnessed. “Oh, yeah. I forgot. It was for you.”

I went back to bed. The palm tree outside my window didn’t even gift the little lift to my heart the way it always did, no matter what, not even for a split second. Wow, that’s bad.

I’ve got to get out of this place, I thought. Maybe I’ll import sweaters from New Zealand and sell them at a little kiosk in the Mall of America. Maybe I’ll grow pot in Humboldt county. Maybe I’ll go can salmon in Alaska. Maybe I’ll go back to Wisconsin and work in the Harley Davidson factory. (My dad took me on the tour there once when I was a kid; those guys were some kind of happy. Really. They left a lasting impression on me.) Maybe I’ll go knit baby things in a cabin near Mendocino. I guess I’d have to learn to knit first. Minor detail. Maybe I’ll….

 ~

Mom and I turned Cyn’s Facebook page into a memorial page. She’d asked me a few months earlier if I’d be her Legacy Contact for Facebook if anything should happen to her. Duh! Good gravy, Trish—talk about hints. But I was rushed in that moment and even if I hadn’t been, I might’ve thought she was just being her melodramatic yet practical self. People wrote and wrote and wrote the most beautiful things about her—like what they said at the memorial but even more moving, which I wouldn’t have thought possible.

“If something only gets fifteen likes on Facebook,” Cyndi once jokingly grumbled about a post that wasn’t receiving the attention she thought it deserved, “did it happen? I mean, it needs at least two hundred likes to have happened, right?”

“You certainly happened, Cyn,” I said out loud as the tributes grew from the hundreds into the thousands.