Okay, this is getting a tad... freakish. Over the past week, several people have made comments that took something out of my head that I didn't even know was there & put into really effective wording.
Today, it was Gaby Hoffman, who summed up my own upbringing better than I ever could. Am now out to connect more fully with my Inner Gaby.
Unlike Gaby, I wasn't born to an Andy Warhol superstar & an NYC actor, didn't spend my childhood in the (in)famous Chelsea Hotel or start a rockin' film career when I was only slightly more than 7. But what she shared about growing up as she did - yep, I could say the same.
Living in the world in a way that might seem to others outside of the box or nonconformist—I was just raised outside of that box. To me, inside of the box is what is bizarre. I feel very privileged to have grown up that way, because it’s been easy for me to be myself or whatever iteration of myself I’ve been in the world, because there’s no transcript.
"To me, inside of the box is what is bizarre." Yes, yes & yes! And I also feel privileged to have grown up exactly as I did, with all its wild weirdness. It took a long time to realize - precipitated by a comment from Peter - but I also find it easy to be myself "because there's no transcript." THAT's so much of what Mim gave me - living without a transcript. Because I didn't realize that was my experience, it held me back for a fierce number of messed up years, but once I got that what seemed like a bunch of bumps in my life were/are actually a series of springboards - well, things turned around.
Another line from her Salon discussion that I totally embrace - "These last few years, it’s all been very organic. These characters have just come to me... I’m not exactly choosing the parts. They are choosing me, and it’s based on people knowing me. It’s all very much intuitive and organic.
Organic - that's how my life has been going for the past 26+ years. Ever since John first came into it. Phew! Talk about organic - our love is about as splendidly organic as you're going to find. It just happens. Even the wretched stuff ends up adding nutrients to what makes us grow, individually & as a couple. And the organic goodness that's the two of us just climbs like a clematis vine into every other aspect of my life. I didn't choose the work I'm doing, its chosen me. Definitely "all very much intuitive & organic."
Gaby, speaking of a role ~ ~ Life is, of course, both tragic and funny. We are finding her in a rich little pocket where those things are really intersecting. Because the comedy and her missteps and her self-destructive, wild behavior is born out of this desperate place. This place of emptiness and disconnection and uncertainty, the misery of not really knowing who you are in the world. Of course that’s always changing and evolving—and if it’s not, that is miserable also. But when we meet her at the beginning of season one, she is really at the tail end of this period of paralysis. She’s starting to unwind and act out and unfurl. It’s messy and it’s thoughtless at first, but it starts to find shape in her searching. The search itself is becoming more focused and considered towards the end. She’s not just blindly acting out and hitting walls and acting unconsciously. She’s starting to open her eyes to what she’s feeling, and why she is feeling that, and what she needs.
Wow - so much of that speaks to recent inner travels, to where I am at this place in time. Especially wrap myself around that last line - "She's starting to open her eyes to what she's feeling, and why she is feeling that, and what she needs." Yes, yes & yes! My heart's desire is to live life pretty honestly, in all of its messiness.
It all seems so magical and it all seems… kismet.
If you are actually writing life for real and getting into the nitty gritty of stuff, it’s f--king funny. It’s awkward and painful and heartbreaking, but it’s also really f--king funny. People in their real dynamic in life and their habits, and in their space where they behave in their natural habitats, it’s funny.
It was only when I turned towards it and decided to approach it like I do most everything else in my life, which is from the gut, that I started to really enjoy it and also then find these parts for me that are really perfect fits. It’s also a dream to go to work with people that you not only respect and think are talented, but also love and find great friendship in.
Look at Meryl Streep. She’s as good as it gets and she’s incredibly well trained, and I think she has a very different process. She gets to place that is the most free and the most natural. That seems really interesting and fun for me. I just have no f--king clue how to do it other than just blindly diving in and trying to keep my eyes and ears open.
This is honestly just who I am and how I’m comfortable in the world. I don’t inhabit the world as a woman in the way that I think has been prescribed over the last couple of decades. I never have. I didn’t grow up in a way that would have led me towards that.
Women need to feel emboldened and comfortable in the world however makes them feel comfortable. If that’s hairless and dyed and tanned, then great. I don’t feel comfortable with my armpits shaven, but I like to shave my legs. That’s my relationship to body hair, and that’s how I want to be able to in the world. The more freedom that women have to express themselves in all shades and shapes and colors, that is to me—if we are talking about feminism on this sort of superficial level of what we look like—that’s true feminism. There is no one way to be a woman. It’s all valid. It’s all real. It’s all feminine. It’s all womanly.
I certainly think it’s to each their own. That’s the real lesson. To each her own. That’s what is really sexy and really empowering, when every woman is able to be their true selves in what they say, in what they do, in how they look, and the choices they make.
May I always & forever tap into my Inner Gaby, a woman with an intrepid soul & inspiring spirit!
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