Generally Speaking, Unspoken

I played a gig at Tastebudds yesterday with my friend Adam who is an amazing pianist, guitarist and singer. Our music seems to work beautifully together so I think we'll be doing more together in the future. All our friends came along with some people we didn't know very well, which was cool. We got free food (a welcome change from the cafeteria!) and even made fifteen dollars for playing! It was great fun. I played violin on some of Adam's songs and he sang on some of mine. Tomorrow we have studio time so I can start working on my projects for my production class.

This is from a series of shorts I'm writing tentatively called
"Generally Speaking, Unspoken" It's still in the working stages (when is any writing NOT?) but anyway, here it is.

"And then he said, 'I love you.'" Rachel sips her iced tea and stares at me, her eyebrows raised over her hazel eyes, waiting for a reaction.

"Like, LOVE love?"

"I suppose so…" She sets her glass on the table with a sharp clink and pulls her purse from the ground. Rifling through the oversized white, leather tote, she pulled out her compact and eyes herself.

"I mean," she said tucking a stray length of mahogany hair behind her ear, "we've only dated for two months!"

"Well, what did you say?" She shifted in her seat, uncrossed then crossed her legs again. The purse still in her lap, the compact open and forgotten in her right hand.

"I didn't say anything. I didn't know what to say. It's like, we were standing on my front porch and all the mosquitoes were buzzing around, and he said it, and my brain froze. I couldn't…" she trailed off shaking her head.

"Do you think you love him back, then?" I ask, pulling my sunglasses down to reflect the sun's hot glare.

"I don't…" her head rolls back staring at the sky "who knows, right? Maybe I do, maybe I don't. I don't think anyone ever really knows, right? Like how can I really, truly KNOW I have a sustainable feeling for someone and I haven't just caught a fleeting emotion that will vanish just as quickly as it came?" her shoulders rise with her uncertainty. I sip my water, she her tea. The sun makes Rachel squint, she pulls her dark shades over her eyes.

"Whenever I went shoe shopping with my mother she always said, 'if it's not an absolute yes, it's a no," I offer.

"That's a tad extreme."

"Yeah, but it's better than limbo." The waiter comes, setting our salads on the table. He is cute, I see Rachel check him out as he walks away.

"Rachel," I say reaching for the balsamic vinaigrette, "trust me, it's a no."

"You know," she says, cutting her cucumbers into quarters, "men aren't shoes."

"Yeah, but they're just as hard to shop for."

How did everyone do with last weeks three hug a day challenge? I'm not sure I even met my quota... The past week I've found myself thinking a lot about how I act differently around different people. With certain people who I feel safe around I can act goofy and playful, but when I've just met people, or am in a public situation, I have a harder time letting loose. It seems like all the "good" actors I know act differently with everyone constantly, if that makes sense. They're continuously playing with their identity and personality. They don't get stuck in one character the way I tend to. This week I'm going to try being looser with my identity, which for me probably means being sillier and doing things that I would normally not do because, "it's weird."I challenge everyone to do one thing a day that is out of your normal character. I want to hear what happens!

I wish you much silliness and laughter.

Love,

Marina