Thursday, December 30, 2010

I hate microsoft and other things

why is it I feel that when I am using microsoft, they are in fact using me! Why do I feel that my laptop belongs to them and they certainly didn't give it to me for free.
Why do they change my English English to American English, when I am writing English English because that's what I want to do!
I have just spent about 20 minutes trying to respond to my lovely friend Franca's recent blog on eye contact, only to have it deleted 6 times before I gave up and just wrote a plain old "great blog" message.
Franca writes about eye contact and I can't remember the Italian phrase, however, I agree with her. You can understand another person much better eye to eye, whether they are bullshitting you (lot of that in the music biz), just plain lying, or trying to get something from you, or they are just (preferable) a lovely person.
On the other hand, you could also, as I did, find yourself turning around and coming face to face with Paul Newman standing in line to get his car back and go completely ga ga at those oh so very beautiful eyes
She also wrote about Il Postino and Massimo Troisi. The film, along with Mediterraneo are among my most favourite films ever. I did not know that Massimo was also a comedian, and have to wonder whether Eddie Izzard is too. Franca wrote about Massimo talking with God and reminded me of Eddie doing the same - doling out methods of procreation for animals, the giraffe is really funny, calling his son jeezey creezy and annoying him, all in a James Mason voice.
Wonderful blog Franca, even if I couldn't write a lot of the above and get the comment successfully posted. After 20 minutes of trying, even my tenacity failed me! Love you

Monday, December 27, 2010

How does one let go of the past

when it won't let you go?
Post traumatic stress disorder is a pretty tough condition to deal with, and I cannot imagine how much more difficult it must be for soldiers, who have experienced the horror of war.
I find that I have no clue what will trigger mine. I know that smoking pot helps stop the fragmentation of my mind, which I can only describe as viewing a kaleidescope of broken chards of glass.
2011 was (with the exception of the years my Dad died, my lovely Aunt Tricia died and my beautiful cousin, Stewart died) the worst year. Even worse than working for Jack Craigo and being cheated by Chrysalis, a company I gave my loyalty to and turned down many job offers to stay with them. This included an invitation by Joe Smith to start the publishing companies for Electra/Ayslum/Nonesuch and I still feel a complete idiot for not taking that job. So much pain would have been avoided. My trust in people I looked up to, broken
In spite of all that one of my brothers has done to me; because again I was an idiot and came back to Los Angeles to help him keep his two daughters (lost all of my money and 90% of my furniture); I sent him an email asking for peace between us, but no response.
How does one let go of that hurt, when that brother has been with me all of my life and we used to have so much fun together as children, just discards me?
Franca Cavaricci (someone I met through managing the most difficult artist I encountered in over 30 years in the music business!) has helped me tremendously and made me laugh as we share our problems. She is an inspiration.
Cindy is another such woman friend. Anyone listening to us share our various illnesses and trials and tribulations, laughing hard all the way through, would probably think us fit for a sanitorium.
So many what ifs in my life. I hope that there is a parrallel world (love Stephen King and his Towers series), in which I am once again the smiling child who ran through the green fields of my mother's birth place, Liscarroll in County Cork.
May we all have a happy New Year and a much better 2011, especially for those people, who have lost their homes, their jobs, families living in a motel rooms, and the estimated 54% who survive on food stamps. May we not lose anymore people whose lives were in such despair, they could not go on living.
As we go forward into 2011:
may President Obama succeed (and be allowed to) in changing the corruption perpetrated by the previous government and that has penetrated throughout the country. May he change America back to the country I first moved to, where although I was a bit confused that an actor could become President, we had some equality.
May the 10% of the people who own 90% of the wealth in the world become more charitible and think of others. May Warren Buffet and Bill Gates with their inspiring desire to share their wealth and help the needy, turn towards this country as well as America (although I do not know whether this is true as I have only heard this). May others join them.
May people like Angelina Jolie and Bradd Pitt continue their efforts to make a difference not only in foreign countries, however, as they did in New Orleans.
May we never ever again see people crowded into a stadium in awful conditions, because an ineffective government could not do their appointed jobs and allowed such awful suffering.
May women at last have more meaningful roles in government, may there be more of the and may we leave behind the absolutely ridiculous notion that women are not equal to men. May we have women leaders like Golda Meir, and not like Maggies Thatcher. May women learn that they do not have to do things the way men have, however, use their difference to make a difference.

Friday, December 17, 2010

Remembering friends with thanks

The music business is not a business I should like to be a part of anymore, however, so many great memories. And some dark moments too.
However, FB has me back in touch with people I really enjoyed and respected, Nigel Grainge and Chris Hill are just two. When they had their company together and I would occasionally have lunch with them, they added more to my grin lines in an hour - almost as good as Eddie Izzard.
Franca Cavarricci has kept me going through a tough year and it's so great to have her friendship. She'll phone me in the morning and I shall be laughing within seconds.
I've been able to let one friend have a copy of his vinyl album, as he never kept one.
Billy Bass, an inspiring co worker and the first friend to buy one of my giclees of Tea with Klee, really encouraging me, as he is the master of taste.
Susan Whittred, who I am so proud of for changing her career completely, getting into Cornell Uni and becoming a veteranarian (think that's correct!) and enjoying her life.
The beautiful Lydia Sarno, irrepressible Vicki Giordano, Linda Carhart, who did such an amazing job organizing two Chrysalis reunions East Coast and West Coast.
Eve Lenton of Belle Epoque, Black is Black and her gorgeous brother, Albert.
Tiffany Lowe who I first met as a 3 year old and who has two of the most gorgeous children, Luna and Lux.
Life is a little more than tough for me at the moment for too many reasons to share, however, I know I have friends who have known me for so long, and their continued friendship and respect for me, outweighs the darker side of family relationships, which have just hurt me deeply.

Sunday, December 12, 2010

What do you do when your heart is breaking

and you can see no end in sight to the sadness that has haunted you throughout your life?
Suicide causes so much pain, yet I do not blame my mother. I know how close I have come myself to just give up and not try to get through another day, because I cannot see a future that makes any sense to me.
What do you do when you are just surrounded by the debris of bits of your life that did exist, reminding you of feats that you achieved, people you somehow managed to help, just because you could. Clothes you could wear before you just gave up caring how you looked. Because what is the point.
You plough through bits of paper that you kept for a reason and you look at them and even though it's been a while since you have, you still see that there's valuable information you could use sometime in the future. So yet again you don't throw that bit away.
But then you can't see a future, you can't even imagine a future and sadly you no longer know how to imagine a future anymore