Category: how I keep from writing

Remember that time I was on deadline and decided to customize a bunch of animated talking avatars on Sitepal™ for no reason? And also name them and give them identities?

Of course you don’t. You didn’t know me back then. This was 2006, before I started writing for TV. Back then, my “deadlines” were mostly things theatres pretended to care about, like the environment and other people’s kids.

Just kidding. Theatres totally care about that stuff. My point is, my deadlines at the time were mostly self-imposed and driven by a desire to keep the initial writing impulse fresh.

TV deadlines are different. When you miss a deadline on a TV show it’s bad. You could potentially run up production costs, slow down the writer’s room, piss off the script coordinators who have to stay up all night waiting for your dumb draft to come in, etc. It’s poor form and ugly.

I don’t miss my deadlines. I do get very very very very close sometimes. Procrastination can be a small factor, but honestly a good chunk of my writing time is spent doing character research.

For example:

Myrna. Has degree in textiles and talks like a gansta when she’s drunk. She’s drunk right now. She wants to pop a cap in you.

Abigail. Has a third nipple and dreams sometimes about riding huge animatronic pickles. Not often. But enough.

Aubrey. Her girlfriend is a pastry chef and she’s allergic to nuts, a sad fact for them both. Because they both love nuts. Which is also how they insult each other when they fight in public.

Lourdes. The only one in her family who can’t sing. It’s a blessing. She’s gotta be bad at something. Right?

Sissy. Been married twice, no kids, has a hard time watching violent movies since the accident. Which we won’t talk about. (So many scars.)

Freakball. A man of few words, is tired of people telling him he smiles to hide the pain. Gets irritated when folks mistake “shininess” for “radiance.” There’s a fucking difference.

Freakball 2. Wonders if she can be programmed to feel heartbreak, wishes she had more hair. Spends a good deal of her day trying to look approachable.

Growing up, we had three dogs. One was a cocker spaniel, the other two were lhasa apso mixes:

They were fun and friendly and we loved them a lot. But we didn’t walk them enough. Probably because my family’s default setting was “sedentary.” Instead, we’d open the back door for them twice a day so they could do their business in the yard.

But sometimes, business was slow.

Consequently, there were many indoor accidents. If we were home we could identify the culprit by the deep shame in her eyes. But when we were away, our house turned into a giant carpeted animal toilet. We’d arrive home and bee-line to the paper towels for the inevitable shit-piles and piss-puddles waiting for us.

Every. Flipping. Day.

I know my house reeked because my best friend’s mom stopped letting her come over. I had become inured to it; or rather, the smell from my parents’ ever-lit cigarettes was more egregious to me. Possibly because dog excrement doesn’t threaten human lives the way smoking does.

Still, we treated them as though they were tiny humans. They slept in our beds, ate off our plates, swam in our pool, slobbered on our guests. We coped with their bathroom quirks even if it meant never taking off our shoes inside our own home. Because they were family.

So…

Um.

I don’t quite know how to make sense of what my mother did to our dogs when my father died, so I will just report it.

His death was sudden, a heart attack, and came on the heels of a pretty horrendous financial disclosure. We had to move very quickly to a place my mother could afford; a two bedroom apartment that didn’t allow pets.

I found out she euthanized our dogs after it happened. She brought them to the pound and had them put to sleep. She said she had no choice, she couldn’t find homes for them. But I know in part she couldn’t bear the thought of them living with another family. Eating off their plates. Pissing on their carpets.

And as shameful as it is to admit, I never got over it. I never even talked about it until now. I cry every time I think about it. I’m sure some of the pain is related to my father (we were unable to mourn him properly for reasons I may hopefully be able to talk about someday)… but also, for years I had to downplay their loss so I’d be capable of grieving with my mother instead of vilifying her.

Anyhoo.

I told myself I’d never own animals again. My adulthood would be filled with sweet-smelling rooms, spotless carpets, bare feet indoors, and zero pet heartache.

It was. For a bit. And then we had a baby. Who became a toddler. Who became a nine-year-old. Who wanted a cat.

Like many kids with two artist parents, he’s smart and sensitive. We often indulge his (and our own) desires to discuss topics that are slightly bigger than him. As a result, his conversational drive often has a kind of phrenic patina to it. Adults love talking to him.

Kids, however…

One time when he was seven he shouted this to an entire table of boys at lunch: “If any of you guys are feminists, raise your hands.” None did.

He sat alone at recess and read Garfield books. He rarely had playdates. I knew his desire for a cat came from his longing for soul who was as helpless as he felt. But I couldn’t do it. “No pets,” I said.

And while the citizen part of me was proud of him for his professed political leanings, the mother part felt like a failure. I was raising my child to be a responsible adult ten years too early.

We decided to send him to sleep-away camp, hoping the day-to-night kid rhythms would replace his premature adult ones. It would be his first time ever without a parent or grandparent.

He was going to be surrounded by kids he didn’t know how to talk to.

For an entire week.

While I was on deadline.

(Sigh.)

He came home from camp a week later to find two bewildered kittens and this contraption in the living room:

YOU WANNA MAKE THAT, DON'T YOU...

Three years ago I was on deadline when October 31st rolled around. My son was seven at the time. He wanted to be a pumpkin pie for Halloween.

The year before he was Emmett from The Lego Movie. Year before that he was Jack Skellington from Nightmare Before Christmas. He’s been Doc Brown from Back to the Future, Neo from The Matrix, and of course, Harry Potter. Like most kids, he is attracted to the cultural figures he relates to.  Inevitably he chooses male heroes because they are abundant. Not that I haven’t tried to counter that…

…but as soon as he was old enough to understand that attire can be used to project identity, he made different choices. And aside from continually pointing out the gender disparity to him, I feel a bit helpless.  So when he wanted to be pie for Halloween, I was psyched. How wholesome and uncomplicated. No unconscious bias in pie. And the aspirational qualities! Sweetness, freshness, simplicity…

But unlike a costume based on a movie character, it’s difficult to render for a human body. Luckily I was on deadline and had no free time, so I spent hours researching how to make a delightful pie costume. Conceptually we shifted from pumpkin to cherry because of the color palate. The pie itself was simple enough to make (I used this as a model). The whipped cream hat proved challenging, but we got there.

And although it was difficult for him to sit normally…

… it was impossible not to pick him out amid the throngs of Harry Potters and Luke Skywalkers and Emmets mobbing the streets during trick-or-treating. His weird-ass costume was a hit with both candy-takers and candy-givers alike.  I was proud of myself for buying a glue gun to make it. I stayed proud until one rowdy parent spotted him a block away and bellowed this adorable tune at full volume (do yourself a favor and never google those lyrics).

So much for uncomplicated.