Requiem for Monday
Nothing to celebrate at the moment. But the title sounded good in my head.
The toughest part about any creative endeavor - writing, painting, music - is to not get stuck in your head. It’s so damn easy to over-analyze the shit out of what you’re trying to create that you lose sight of what you’re trying to express.
To create something is to express something that lies deep inside, something beyond words (intellect) and into the world of symbols and action (emotions).
Case in point: I hate writing loglines for scripts. Some people are frickin’ genius wordsmiths when it comes to writing loglines. I’m a damn clunker. I’ve tried tons of templates. I’ve reviewed hundreds of professional loglines. And yet every time I work on my own logline it turns to shit.
I know why, too.
I over-analyze the shit out of every word I write. I worry too much about if what I’m writing in this 25 to 35 word compound sentence is cool enough for someone to want to read my script. I put to much pressure on myself making sure this damn sentence is perfect.
Ah, that’s it. Perfectionism.
The sneaky little devil likes to lurk in the shadows while I write. It haunts my psyche like a little leprechaun waiting to steal my creative gold (these days it feels like creative bronze…or lead).
I worked diligently for an anguishing hour on my logline, and I think (dear lord I hope) that I got something that looks like a legit logline and sounds pretty cool.
Does it sell my story? That remains to be seen.
For now, I’m rolling with what I got and just gonna keep chugging along. The leprechaun can steal today’s gold, but he’s a fool if he thinks he’s coming back for more tomorrow.
Today’s Accomplishments
Revised the season one logline in my show bible. I suck at loglines so hard. I’ve used seemingly every template that ever existed and it just never feels right. Lesson to learn: it’s about vibe, tone, character, conflict, interest. Gotta feel my way through this.
Signed up for my first screenwriting retreat for late September in Lake Geneva, WI. Really looking forward to some dedicated time to write, meet people, and get feedback on my writing.
Wrote short introductions for each section in the Frank’s Workshop part of my website.
Tomorrow’s Goals/Tasks
Wrap up the pseudo first draft of my show bible and email it to my accountability group for feedback.
Would like to finish up the short introductions for the Frank’s Workshop page tomorrow.
Story Worthy Moment
Met with a parent today to discuss her son’s performance in my class. Nice kid. Very, very shy. He does’t interact much and doesn’t complete his work. And he’s failing - no bueno.
So we (assistant principal, other teachers, myself) begin the meeting and the first issue that comes up isn’t the woman’s son, it’s the lack of communication between her son’s teachers and her. She expects us to call her and let her know that her son isn’t doing any work. And, she explained how upset she was that after receiving her son’s grades (not passing any courses), no one from the school called her.
Okay. Fair enough.
During this part of the meeting my assistant principal was translating everything the teachers were saying for the parent, assuming she only understood Spanish.
Now, most schools have a text/voice messaging system that allows teachers to send batches of emails/voice messages to parents without having to email or potentially calling 100 or more families.
The way the system is set up is that parents select which language they prefer to receive the message - English, Spanish, etc. This parent apparently didn’t complete her profile and the system defaulted to Spanish. Kind of makes sense because an overwhelming number of our parents only speak Spanish.
Now, teachers claimed to have sent home a bunch of emails/messages via our system, but the mother was claiming she didn’t receive them.
As teachers were explaining why they didn’t call home - because the system shows the parent prefers to receive messages in Spanish, and since the teachers don’t speak Spanish then it makes sense why the parent never received a personal phone call home. Right?
While my assistant principal was translating our reasons for why we didn’t call home, the parent interrupts and tells us - in perfect English - that it’s wrong for us to assume that she only speaks Spanish.
What?
Literally for 20 minutes my assistant principal was speaking Spanish specifically to help the parent. The parent even responded in Spanish!
But at this particular moment the parent breaks “character” and totally shocks us by her perfect English.
Now, this reflection was a criticism of why everyone should/shouldn’t speak English. But it does serve as an interest moment of how assumptions about people often are wrong.
It was a great moment that was super intense as it happened, but upon reflection I think it was a really good story moment.
