Warning: this is L-O-N-G. I haven't written an epic since I used to be out on the dating scene, but after this 3.5-day trip, I have plenty of crazy fodder again.
Actually, now that I've mentioned the length, maybe there should be some further ado. I've spent the last week thinking about my experience in L.A. and this person in particular, having told the story to a couple of people already and knowing full-well that there really isn't a way that I can tell it without it being a bunch of fucked up anecdotes that make this chick look "Single White Female" psycho. However, I would like to say up front, before I start this entry, that I truly think she's mentally ill. Sure, we're all crazy in some way or another. I prefer my friends that way, because "normal" people scare me. But sometimes, I discover that a person may be far more towards the dangerous brand of crazy... the kind in total denial of their issues... the kind who think that they're the ones who are sane and the rest of the world is nuts. It's these people that I worry about, and sometimes even pity them (while I back away slowly). I'm not perfect, I'm definitely not "normal," but I also don't think my neuroses are the kind that hurt people.
Well, not stable people, at least.
P, as I'll refer to her from here on out, is now officially one of these people. I've met a few others like this one in my life... had a roommate once like this, and had my Senior year of high school plagued by 2 in particular who ganged up on me. But those are in the past and I'd thought that I'd learned how to spot the type. I guess that doesn't work so well when you don't actually know a person. Hopefully you'll understand when I'm through with the tale.
Here's the back-story:
Before my trip to L.A., I'd never spent any time with P or known her in a face-to-face capacity. In the summer of 2004, she'd contacted me on Myspace thinking that perhaps we already knew each other, because she saw me on a local record store's Myspace page of friends. She then informed me that she'd lived in Atlanta until 1993, had been a dj at my favorite college radio station and had gone to school there too, until she left for NYC, where she lived for about 10 years before moving to L.A. She seemed fascinating, though fairly closed about her real identity real photos of her hardly ever showed up in her profile, and when they did, they were always altered by blurring them or Photoshop effects and she only hinted at her job (a "somebody" at a big name record label).
Other than her obscured identity, which I just assumed was part of her trying to avoid unsolicited bands or whatnot, I thought she seemed like a cool person. She subscribed to my blog and occasionally put in her 2 cents, and I subscribed to her blog, which was usually only about articles or videos of interest to her, and rarely anything about her personal life. Again, I never thought twice about any of that.
In October of last year, as many of you know, I learned that my film FOUND had been accepted into a film festival in Hollywood. She immediately and graciously offered her loft as a place for me to stay, should I come to town. A month later, Steve offered me his free Skymiles and before I accepted, I shot her a quick email to see if she still would like to have me as a guest. I stated up front that I would get a shuttle to and from the airport or even get a car, but she wrote back that not only was I welcome at her place, but she also intended on picking me up and driving me back to the airport AND taking me anywhere else I needed to go. I figured that she was not only extremely generous, but she must sympathize with those visitors trying to navigate in L.A.'s tricky roadways in a rental. I accepted and everything seemed cool. Way cool.
Some friends asked a lot of questions about her like how much I knew about this person and I thought she was awesome, regardless of how little I knew. I can be a bit nave sometimes, I know. But my experience with making friends on Myspace has been nothing short of blessed, if I can use such an abused word. N and I met through Myspace, and she too invited me into her home when I visited Chicago and she was an amazing and gracious host and just a swell person in general. C and I met through Myspace and I just felt she was perfect to score my film, sight unseen or sound unheard, as it were. And my hunch was absolutely correct. Her intelligence and creativity that I saw in her written self-expression were all there in the studio. So when it came to P, I assumed that my hunch would be correct again not considering how little I knew of her.
I did Google her, by the way, but that was the extent of my knowledge. I wanted to make sure she was indeed who she claimed to be. I didn't even know her real last name until she made a $50 donation to my film's travel fund after reading about others doing so in my Thanksgiving tribute last year again, an act that I found extremely generous and told her so, actually saying she didn't need to do such a thing, when she was already opening her home to me. She pooh-poohed it all away and said that she felt that I was the kind of person who needed the kind of break she could offer. So once I learned her real last name, I looked her up and discovered that she was indeed the national sales director for a major record label a Disney record label, but still, she was who she claimed to be. As a matter of fact, I had no idea that she was that far up the food chain until that moment in time.
Okay, that's enough with the back-story. Let's skip ahead...
I had spoken to her on the phone only once a couple days before my flight, when I was fretting about what I could possibly wear at the executive meetings in L.A. I mean, I'm the least fashion conscious person I know, but that fact really hadn't hit me until I tried to figure out what I'd be wearing at this power meeting, of sorts. P told me that if I couldn't find anything, I could wear her clothes again, very generous of her and I told her so but I was a little wary of that, since neither of us knew if we were the same size. I warned her that my bustline prevents me from wearing most things with buttons and she said she'd figure something out plus she wanted me to get a haircut from her friend, whom she said used to get paid $100 a cut in a chi-chi salon and now does it on the cheap out of his house for neighbors while he goes to film school.
In this same call, she asked me if I liked sushi. I told her that I loved sushi and usually ate it any chance I got. She said she knew of the best sushi restaurant ever and would make reservations even breaking her 8-month long strict vegetarian diet to join in the feast, because she'd been craving it. Keep this in mind, as it will be important later.
When I touched down in L.A., I called her and she was still on the freeway and sounded angry about traffic. I told her not to rush, as I hadn't deplaned yet and it should take sometime. She called again when she got to the curb and all I could hear was static and every other angry-sounding word: "Come... curb... right... walk... me." I tried to ask if I would have a big walk to get out of the airport, having never been there, but she shouted something I couldn't comprehend and hung up. So luckily, LAX isn't like Atlanta or O'Hare (no shuttles or long walks) and I got to the curb within minutes, went right, and was within maybe 100 feet of her car when I saw a police officer shoeing her away. She drove off, I called her and said, "Wait! I'm right here! Wait, and I'll catch up! Damn cop!" and she responded angrily again with, "No, I have to go around again now" and hung up on me. Again.
So I was hoping she was just having a bad day and was tired and stressed from traffic little did I know. She made it around again and when I saw her, I was beaming and happy to finally meet. I dragged my bags over to her trunk as she came around the vehicle and I noticed that she still looked pissed off. Not even the hint of a smile. So I decided to greet her warmly and give her a big hug. She actually BLOCKED the hug and put her hands up to push me away, but I hugged her anyway, as she was trying to wriggle away and she finally said, "I'm trying to get your bags into my backseat, okay?" Um, okay.
I demurred, as I usually do, and we were off into traffic. She remained pissy the rest of the ride, only now turning her attention from the traffic, which was fairly light, to her ringing cell phone. Apparently, she believed that one of her friends sent her a text message that was actually some sort of virus that had changed her ring. She even called him to tell him she'd delete him from her cell if he didn't change it back, but he seemed thoroughly confused. Anyway, being that she had lived for 10 years in NYC, I just figured that she was abrupt and gruff, like many New Yorkers can be. Perhaps she'd soften up with less distraction?
Oh, that reminds me. I should back up a second.
When you first meet someone, you always have to shift your expectations to the reality of who they are, but sometimes the shift is slight and other times it's pretty drastic. This was the latter. I was expecting record exec hipster chic, in retro 70s attire as she'd described. Instead, she appeared 10 years older than her actual age (which I really still don't even know for sure!), harsh features and a blunt bob that accentuated them, no laugh lines, just frowning angry eyes, and wearing a heavy winter parka-type coat from the 70s with fake fur lining the cuffs and hood. I came to find out that she wore this coat in all weather... low 60s evening to mid 80s daytime while drinking hot coffee, summer, winter, and everywhere in between. That part was the hardest to adjust to, I think. Well, that and her driving. She drove like a freaking maniac... total aggressive driver, cutting and weaving and slamming on the breaks at the last second. She reminded me of the stories I'd heard of NYC taxi drivers... oddly, she told me some stories about their horrible driving as well, which made me wince as I wished I could say, "Sounds like someone I know," but I kept my mouth shut.
We'd stopped off at a deli on the way back to her place and got some soup that later we discovered to both of our dismays was pretty bad and it became the butt of some jokes between us. I even left some in the fridge hoping to forget about it, but at least it seemed for the moment that she might have a sense of humor in there, so there was a bright side to the weird soup.
We talked for a couple of hours, trying to get to know one another before heading to bed. We didn't seem to be hitting any kind of rhythm to our conversations, where one person's story triggers another person's story and back and forth like that. It seemed more like she was talking at me most of the time, which got a little draining, to be honest.
For instance, she started talking about some new over the counter pill she was taking HC5-something or other. It sounded like a Star Wars droid to me, but what do I know. Anyway, she said she'd been miserable before the pills, depressed, horrible to be around, headachy, until she found this miracle cure... for a week she'd been a little too speedy and high in the beginning, but then settled into the "calm" person I saw before me. Silently, I wondered how unbearable she might have been before this magic pill, because she was quite high-strung and draining still... though I second-guessed that thought with, "Perhaps she's just tired, or PMSing, or both." Privately, I was feeling like "You've known me for just 2 or 3 hours and you're insisting that I need this pill? Are you some sort of doctor? No? Then shut up already!" I don't say these things though... it's just what goes on in my head as I smile and nod and say, "I see."
Intermittently during the hours before sleep, she'd been obsessing about a new tracking device she'd installed on her Myspace page. It not only discretely showed you the name and profile picture of the person who'd visited your page, but also showed you how long they were on any of your pages and how they'd gotten there and where they went when they left. Her biggest obsession was over a girl she'd had lunch with a few days earlier and how this girl had visited her page 6 separate times in that one day. She kept asking me to explain why anyone would do this. I offered many thoughts... perhaps she was obsessed with a guy who was in P's friends list... perhaps she was coming back for running dialogue on a blog.... perhaps she was just plain bored and did this with everyone's pages. None of these were good enough to P, and she argued all of those away as not being possible while stating repeatedly this behavior was just "so agro" (a P catch phrase). It wasn't until I said, "Well, do you think she has a crush on you?" That's when P excitedly said, "Mai oui!" (another one of her catch phrases, but I'm probably misspelling that. I don't speak French).
Finally, when she'd finished obsessing for a bit, I asked if I could check mail and she said, "Of course!" and I checked quickly, as she kept hovering nervously over my shoulder and I didn't want her to think that I'd be looking into her files.
After all that, she insisted that I take her bed and she take the couch. I said I'd be fine on the couch, but she claimed to enjoy sleeping on her couch and talked all about how comfy it was. I don't like to overrule people, so I let her choice stand and I got in her bed. Truth be told, the bed was big enough for 2 people, but I just figured maybe she was weird about not wanting to be too close to someone or maybe a germophobe or something all perfectly understandable, as far as I'm concerned. I was a guest, so I just did as my host suggested without arguing.
The first full day in L.A. came and P had the whole day planned. Since she'd decided to take off work, I decided to blow off my obligations at the film festival, other than showing up to register and get my badges, etc. I did need to stop in at Staples to make posters and postcards to advertise my film at the festival, however... this'll come back into play later.
Before we left, she mentioned that it was weird for her to be at home when her maid came to clean, because she'd never been there when she'd arrived before. The maid was a sweet Mexican woman who did everything for just $65. If I were in her shoes as a single person with no dependents or pets even to mess up the place, I'm not sure I'd feel comfortable having a maid; but it just clarified to me that P was in a whole different ballpark than me.
It was her idea that we go to the Museum of Jurassic Technology, though she thought it was a museum of strange old patents and gadgetry, and she wanted to go badly, being that she was obsessed with the idea of selling her couch and starting a welding shop in her loft space to build crazy things. It turned out to be nothing like that, as the photos in the previous "Comedy" blog show, but it was equally, or perhaps, more amazing. And, it was her idea for us to stop at this amazing fish taco stand, which was another good idea... she kept asking repeatedly while we ate how amazing they were, and I had to keep responding with "unbelievable" or more adjectives to appease the questions. They were good though, but asking once will suffice. We had a hair appointment for me at 5:00, so we decided to drop back by Staples to see if the prints were done.
P was stressed from driving, so she said she'd stay in the car and call a friend. I was in there for probably 15 minutes, as there was a crazy crowd and the printers weren't even done with my posters yet after being there all day. P finally came rushing into the store and shouted, "Let's GO!" which got everyone's attention, so I told them I'd just have to be back in the morning. I tried to apologize and explain the lines, but she interrupted with the crazy incident that had just happened in front of her.
According to P, apparently a woman had hit another car pulling into a space, backed out, parked somewhere else, and went into the store. P got the license plate and was reporting it to Staples employees, when the woman exited the store. There was some sort of argument that ensued, but the gist was that P was the hero of the day.
As she's telling me the story, she starts up the car and pulls around the parking spaces to the other side to roll down her window and yell, "You've got my number, in case you need a witness in court. I saw her. Yeah, you know I saw you lady. You should just do the right thing." The woman, a gray-haired lady in her late 60s, shouted back, "YOU ARE A SONOFABITCH!!! I ALWAYS DO THE RIGHT THING AND I AM DOING THE RIGHT THING!!!" To which P starts rolling up her window yelling, "WHAT-EV-ERRR. I CAUGHT YOU," and drives away, muttering to me, "Can you believe that? Granted, I probably shouldn't have taunted her just now. But can you believe her?"
I was speechless. I thought either that lady really was insane and evil, though I honestly didn't see any scrape on the other car as we drove by, or else there really had been some huge drama that I was only getting the tail end of at that point. I agreed with P though and said, "Yeah, that's just insane," because I tend to err on my friends' sides as we all do.
We went off to her friend's place for the haircut, but once there, I realized that he really wasn't a friend that she knew well, but rather just a guy who cuts her hair and she calls her friend. They seemed to not know much about each other's private lives the way friends would, but rather made idle chit-chat the way you do with your hairdresser who is just that your hairdresser. Nice guy, though, and as I thought he was a friend of hers, I tipped him huge almost 50 percent. She bummed a smoke off of his roommate, which then sent her on a 3-pack smoking bender for the rest of the weekend. Apparently, when she gave up fish and chicken 8 months earlier, she'd also given up smoking. After we left the haircut, she immediately bought a pack for us, though I never said I wanted one. I had maybe 2 or 3 from that pack later, just to be social.
We decided that we were both tired after all that driving around, so went to Chinatown for takeout to eat at her place. She recommended I get something called "Slippery Shrimp" which was some sort of sweet and sour. I don't usually order that because of it being too much sugar and too much breading. She swore it wasn't like any I'd had and used to be her favorite before she gave up meat, so I went with the "Slippery Chicken" because we'd already had seafood earlier that day and we were going to have sushi soon. P tried to insist on the shrimp, but I stuck to my choice for once and took it back to her place. It was good though; I'll admit that, which I had to do several more times while we ate. But I may have slipped up when I didn't offer any of mine to her. My reason for not offering was that I didn't want to offend her. Many vegetarians get offended when you offer them meat... pescatarian dishes are one thing, but this was chicken and I didn't want to piss off this already grumpy Gus, who'd already mentioned about a dozen times that she was so much healthier as a vegetarian. I couldn't finish the carton myself, however, so I asked if it was okay to put it on the open shelf in her fridge. This too comes up later, trust me.
This night she was obsessing about the fact that Tom (as in "Myspace Tom") had apparently caught onto the whole silent monitoring code that she and others were using and he disabled it, which pissed her off to no end. When she'd finally relinquished the computer for a bit to use the bathroom, I slipped on to check mail again, to see if anyone needed passes to my screening the next day. When she came out, she stopped and said, "Oh, sure, you can use my computer," in a bitchy tone that told me she wasn't happy at all. I apologized and said I'd get off, but she brushed it off with the quip, "It's fine." Sometimes I'm not sure when someone's using sarcasm for humor's sake, so I acted like nothing was wrong, but got off very quickly anyway.
The next morning we had to rise early, so any partying or going out had to be put off. Scott L had suggested we meet that night, but I had the exec meeting at 10am the next day, so we decided to put it off until Santa Monica 2 nights later. P had gotten an offer to go to a new bar, but it didn't start rolling until after 10pm and so we stayed in for the early morning rising.
We ended up staying up pretty late, talking more about our lives. I started, because she seemed to want to give up very little and I find that if I just offer stuff about my life, people will open up about themselves. I tell my tales in anecdotes, as you've seen in my blogs, usually with a bit of a laugh to lighten them up a bit, despite the turbulent times I've experienced. P, however, never laughed once. Instead, she became an armchair therapist, trying to get deeper and deeper down into causes and motivations, and basically always ending up with telling me how I was viewing things all wrong and she was enlightening me. It was exhausting, frankly.
I managed to get the discussion back to her story on occasion, enough to find out all about the love of her life and how she uses him as a yardstick to all men she meets since... that's not me judging, but what she really stated about him. Basically, she had 2 characteristics in mind that he held and that she wanted again... the most important was selflessness. She stressed this over and over and over again. Actually, I'd seen something or other on her profile about selflessness previous to this night, but she really drove it home in person. Again, this bit comes up again later.
I'll not get into the details of her relationship or post-relationship with the man in this public forum, since that is her private story and some of it is kind of incriminating for her. But let's just say she's been very disappointed with everyone else's "lack of selflessness" ever since this legendary guy left her life. Again, this comes up later.
We had some difficulty figuring out the schedule for the day, mainly because she couldn't understand why I'd want to stay in Hollywood at the festival. I was already feeling bad that I hadn't been socializing with the rest of the filmmakers, a point which one of the festival directors had reinforced to me earlier that day she even mentioned that they'd flown filmmakers in from all around the globe for this, so I should try to attend as much as possible. P later told me that "everyone in this town lies" and that "they probably have one guy coming in from another country and suddenly they've flown everyone in from everywhere." She actually railed on the point of my naiveté a little too much for my taste, but I do take people at their word generally (until it's too late).
She wanted to drop me off in the morning, then come back for my screening at 3pm, then leave right away again and come back for the awards ceremony at 7:30. The trips between her loft and Hollywood Blvd were about 30 minutes in heavy traffic, so all that driving seemed pointless to me. I said something like, "My film's only 10 minutes, as you've seen" and she interrupted with, "I haven't seen it yet. I just don't have time for that." I was a little shocked, since it was online for a month already and she's got DSL at work and home, but okay. I was going to suggest that she didn't need to bother with coming to the screening, but since she hadn't seen it yet, I said, "You know, you're welcome to join me for the other screenings too." Her response was, "Sweetie, I'll sit through your film, but I'll be damned if I'm going to stay for anyone else's."
This made the scheduling a problem, as she decided she had to drive back and forth to that location 3 times in one day. I convinced her to stay for the after-party, at least, but I could tell she was annoyed yet, there didn't seem to be a solution. We looked into the train, but it wasn't safe to ride late at night for me. Anyway, she made all of the trips.
I'd been buying her morning coffees and on Saturday morning I also told her that whenever she would be stopping next for gas, I wanted to pay. She seemed rather miffed about these things and I wondered if perhaps she was feeling like I was insulting her somehow, by basically repaying her the money she'd given me to support my trip? I didn't ask her though, because I wanted to repay her for her trouble as much and as often as I could. All I had was what I came with, but I wanted her to feel that I wasn't trying to be a leach. I'd even paid her entry to various places too, which she didn't seem happy about either. This too comes up later.
Anyway, I called her after the exec meetings to tell her the coolness of it all, but she wasn't interested in chatting and just wanted to know what time she should be back at the theatre to catch my film so she never really heard that story. Even later when I attempted to retell it to her, she cut me off, which was odd. She came to my screening and left right away as she planned. S from SAG Indie and I continued chatting when this sweet couple walked up and joined our discussion. They were animators and I'd briefly met with them earlier in the morning and we'd agreed to catch each other's films. We had a pleasant talk for sometime as a group very easy and fun, which came as a refreshing change from my time spent with P.
Scott needed to leave to rest up for his own show the next night at the Improv Olympics just down Hollywood a ways, and once I learned of that, I thought it would be cool to hang out a little the next day and then go to his show, which would only be an hour, before we went off to the rest of our plans. I felt it was the least I could do when he took time out of his Saturday to come support my film. Besides, I love improv. I told P about this idea later when she returned, but she didn't seem excited... she didn't object either though.
I spent the rest of the time until P came back for the awards ceremony hanging out with the animation couple. They were really great interested in sharing their experiences and opinions of various films and festivals with me. I thought they were just so cute like the ideal creative couple in my head. Hell, even their names were cute together: Amy and Andy.
P returned to the theatre just in time for the ceremony to start. During the screenings, I continued to chat a bit with the animation couple, but I was also trying to include P, who had no interest in talking to them. During the films, she even text messaged with her friends on her cell phone. Now, I don't care if someone does this, as it's not as rude as talking on the cell phone... but the light from her cell phone screen was like a lighthouse beacon blaring in the darkness through throughout the screenings. It was more than a wee bit embarrassing.
She did stop texting when a winning music video came on, however... it was made entirely from a pop-up book that one of the band members made herself and it was really truly cool. P leaned over and asked if that girl was still in attendance, because she wanted to catch her after the show. I said yeah, and pointed her out and let her run off to chat with the girl. I was thinking that she maybe wanted to see if the band was signed, or something. It&..39;s called "Don't Fuck with Love" by the Sad Little Stars you can look that video up on the internet it's really cute.
We moved outside and I was still with the animation couple when P rejoined us. I said something like, "So are you interested in signing them?" And her response was, "Oh no, not at all. I just want to give their video to our Creative department because it would be a really cheap video for them to produce." She said this, mind you, to me (a filmmaker) and to my friends (animators both of them). No matter if that's the truth, it was gauche, to say the least. The animation couple started stepping away from us and said, "Um, we're going to see what's going on over here," but I could tell by their expressions that they just wanted to get far away. And I was mortified.
Right at that moment, my heart problem kicked in. I have paroxysmal superventricular tachycardia... big words for an extra node on my heart that sometimes takes off at times of too much stress, though I haven't had a problem with it in about 2 years, not even during the stress of finishing my film. Suddenly, I felt sick, my right leg went numb, I was feeling dizzy, and my heart went racing erratically. P started moving towards an empty area and griping about the crowded section we were in and it just got worse with each word she spoke. Still, I wasn't making a connection directly to her. Not just then.
I finally decided to tell her about it. I don't usually talk about the heart thing, mainly because it's a non-issue unless I'm going to be under anesthesia... or it acts up. I felt I needed to tell her that this was happening so she'd understand that I needed go sit and calm myself. She instantly went into over-the-top panic mode instead... first she wanted to drive me to an emergency room immediately, and when I said no that's not necessary nor is it financially feasible, she then changed over to admonishing me for not telling her about this condition when I arrived. I tried to tell her that I'd traveled to a lot of places in recent years and this hadn't come up, and that I hadn't even thought about it in 2 years, but she just kept admonishing. The racing was getting worse, so I agreed that she should just take me home, and we slipped out without a word to anyone else.
On the drive, she spotted a convenience store and pulled in to get something for herself (a second pack of cigarettes, I later discovered, but she wouldn't admit it to me) and she asked, "Do you want anything?" It had occurred to me that I'd been on a long flight and maybe the leg numbness might be deep vein thrombosis or something scary like that, so I asked her to get baby aspirin. She came back out all angry, saying they didn't carry it and now she'd have to go searching all over town for a drug store for me. I tried to calm her down by telling her I didn't need it for my heart condition, but I thought it couldn't hurt in case there were any DVT issues, which were probably unlikely. She snapped at me again, telling me, "OF COURSE I'M GOING TO GET YOU ASPIRIN AND OF COURSE I'LL DRIVE ALL OVER LOOKING FOR IT! AND I CERTAINLY HOPE YOU'D DO THE SAME FOR ME IF THE TABLES WERE TURNED. WOULDN'T YOU?" I told her yes, of course I would, but inside I was thinking, "but I wouldn't make such a drama out of it, jeez!"
I got really quiet at that point, and luckily 2 lights down there was a drug store... no driving all over town after all. She went in and got the hugest bottle of aspirin she could find for me, which I didn't tell her was overkill... instead, I thanked her and immediately took one. The rest of the drive, I tried to change the subject. I brought up the next day's plans again and mentioned the fun Improv Olympics thing again. Big mistake.
She freaked out in a whole new direction and said, "We have reservations for the sushi place at 8pm... that's in Studio City. Do you know how far that is from Hollywood?" As a matter of fact, I didn't... duh. She started listing off how she didn't want to be driving to 3 different places in one night Hollywood, then Studio City, then Santa Monica for my friend's film shoot... she even pointed out that Scott had said earlier we were crazy for driving to all those places. Her rant became fever-pitched until she finally announced, "You know what? You know what? We're just going to have to cancel one of those places."
I was thinking she was about to say the trip to Santa Monica would be off, but instead she snaps at me, "So we won't be going to your sushi place that you had your heart set on!"
Um, what? Did I miss something?
I said, "I thought we were going because you'd been craving it and you wanted me to experience it." And again she snapped at me with a passive-aggressive tone, "Sweetie, I can have sushi anytime I want it. I live here, remember." Again, I said, "But I thought we were going because you wanted to go," to which she barked, "Uh no. That makes no sense at all. You were the one who wanted sushi!" I tried to say that I can have sushi anytime in Atlanta too, but she wasn't listening anyway, so I just dropped it and concentrated on getting my heart rhythm back under control.
I switched the topic again, this time realizing I hadn't eaten anything since the exec lunch, and said, "Oh, I know what's set this off. I bet it's lack of food. When we get back to your place, I'll just eat the remaining chicken I left from last night." Suddenly, there wasn't a word from P. It was a little weird. Just silence.
We got back to her place and when we walked in it smelled like a cigarette convention had been there, so I jokingly teased, "Did you smoke that whole pack while I was gone today?" (I knew she'd bought another at the convenience store, even though she was hiding them from me). She snapped back with, "Yes. Why? Did YOU want them?" in that bitchy tone again. I told her no, and just laughed it off as "shame-shame" in a light-hearted way, but she wasn't amused.
Suddenly, she offered to draw a bath for me to relax. I don't know where this idea came from at all. Although it was a nice suggestion, I didn't think she needed to go to that trouble. She insisted and so I just let her do it, figuring if she feels like she's helping me, maybe it calms her nerves, which will ultimately help me to finally relax.
When I was done with the bath, I remembered the food and went to the fridge to find nothing but a bare spot where the Chinese food container had been.
So I said, "That's odd. Did you move it?"
"Move what?" she replied.
"The Chinese food from last night. I put it right here, remember?"
"Um, are you sure you didn't just leave it out all night?"
"No, I distinctly remember the moment when I asked you if this big empty spot was okay and you said yes."
"Hmm." P nervously pondered. "I don't remember that at all."
As I continued to look around inside the fridge, she stammered on, and finally said, "Oh, I think I might know what could've happened. I reached in earlier today to throw out that icky soup from the previous night I bet I accidentally grabbed the Chinese food instead and tossed it."
"Really? Well, okay," I resigned. I had a feeling the way she was acting weird because she had actually eaten the chicken herself, but I didn't call her on it, because of the way she'd just acted when I mentioned the pack of smokes when we came in. Obviously, she had a huge guilt complex and this was clashing with her self-image of a non-smoking vegetarian. I didn't want to push the matter, so I dropped it and acted like I totally bought her reasoning.
However, at that same moment, I remembered her words from the day before about everyone in that town being a liar. Suddenly, it occurred to me that she was implicating herself. I thought it was funny still, but also just plain odd.
The next day, I woke up and mentioned getting back early to the festival, so to avoid traffic and so I could hang out and watch more films that I'd missed before like that cute animation couple's film, which was playing at 11am. I briefly said something about how they were like my own ideal relationship that I'd never had, because in all my years of dating, I'd never dated another filmmaker... that maybe I needed to do that in order to have something that would work for me at last, except that creatives tend to be very focused, and a woman with 3 kids is a threat to that level of focus, so they tend to run from me. I was just sort of thinking out loud at that point, on something that had just occurred to me and suddenly she piped up with, "You don't know if that guy is cheating on his partner every single day they've been together. You don't know. You don't know."
Next she attacked the notion that creative types are focused. "I've known nothing but creative people my whole life. They're not focused. They're just self-centered." I replied with, "Well, maybe I'm giving them too much credit by calling them 'focused' and they really are self-centered. I don't know." And she insisted she was correct. She picked a whole argument with me on the basis of this "ideal" of mine that I'd passed off in casual conversation and basically took that moment to tell me that it was the reason why I'd never be happy, because I was only settling for some "ideal" that didn't exist. I tried to tell her this ideal wasn't something I'd ever had and that I had been in plenty of relationships that were far from this ideal that this ideal was just a new concept but she basically had made up her mind that I was hopeless. And she told me so, in not so many words. Well, not then. Later.
Next thing I realize, it's Noon and I've missed the animation couple's film time. I secretly wondered if this was all a ruse to keep me from meeting up with them again. Finally, she dropped me off at the theatre again for the time until the Improv Olympics but as we drove up, I asked her if she'd ever been to the Ripley's museum. She said, "No, but I want to I just never come to this part of town." I said, "Well, you'll be coming back here later anyhow. Do you want to join me there before the improv thing?" She told me she'd think about it and wished me a great day. Ms. Jekyll was back briefly, I suppose.
I called her later after the second awards ceremony finished and asked if she was interested in the Ripley's thing. First she just tried to get me to jump on the train and travel 20 minutes back to her place, so that I could turn around a half hour later and travel back to Hollywood with her. I told her that I'd rather just stay down there instead. She sighed and asked, "Are you not going to go if I don't join you?" I said, "Oh, no. I'm going no matter what. I just wanted to see if you want to go too." "Oh fine," she tisked back at me, "I'll go with you." And again, she hung up on me without so much as a bye.
I decided to walk around a bit and take some pictures, as you've seen, then I waited for her at the museum. My phone rang again, and it was P... "I've parked behind the Egyptian. Are you still here?" I told her that I was standing in front of the Ripley's museum already, waiting for her, and she made some big sigh sound and hung up on me again.
I thought about walking the block back to meet her, but my luck we'd miss each other somehow in the throngs of people and then she'd get even more pissed at me, so I stayed put. Eventually, she showed up wearing her big sunglasses and winter coat again, looking completely pissed off and walked right past me without so much as an acknowledgment. I paid for the tickets and she just grabbed hers and walked on into the museum. I don't think she said more than 3 words to me through the whole tour, so I just took pictures and contented myself with the cheese-factor, ignoring her mood. Occasionally I tried to make small talk about the exhibits, but she just wasn't having any of it.
When we were done, we still had some time to kill, so I asked, "Wanna go to the Guinness museum now, or have you had enough cheesiness for one day?" She said, "We could just go have coffee at Starbucks" and I said okay to that. We got there and it was packed. She mentioned one of us grabbing a table and asked if I knew what I wanted. I didn't, so I just said that I'd go first. It was a long wait and I had some time to think about things. I figured that I'd pissed her off somehow with wanting to actually do things involving the festival, which she wasn't interested in, plus I was probably bugging her somehow each time I paid her way, as evidenced by how pissy and never saying "thank you" to me she was each time. This time, I just ordered, and came back to the table. She went up and got her own order, and I took that time as my freedom from her attitude problem.
She got back with her coffee and instantly got on her cell phone without a word to me. I soon discovered that she was calling Delta to check my flight for the next day and then she dialed the Super Shuttle so she wouldn't have to drive me to the airport. All of that was fine, but it also was stuff that I could do later at her place. She didn't ask though; she just did it, despite me saying I could do it later. When I asked her how much the shuttle was, she just wrote it on the paper in front of her, rather than talking directly to me. I tried to make small talk about observations and whatever again, but once again she wasn't having any of it.
Finally, she let out a big sigh and asked, "What would you say is the best thing in your life?" I didn't know what she was getting at, so I just said, "My animals."
"That's it?" P asked indignantly.
"Is there something wrong with that?" I asked back.
"No, what else though? What else would you say is the best thing in your life?"
"Depends on the day you ask me," I said, thinking to myself that on this day she definitely wasn't one of them.
"Would you say your kids are the best thing in your life?"
"No. But that's because being a single mom isn't much fun most days."
"See. I would say that my friends are the best thing in my life," P told me, which I thought was odd, as there wasn't a single photo of any of her friends around her whole place, and I'd only met people who served her since I'd been there... her barristas at her favorite coffee house, her maid, her hairdresser... that's it.
That's when the most bizarre part of the P-experience began. She paused briefly, then began the attack...
"I don't know you very well, but I can tell you that from the few days I've been around you, you're one of the most miserable and most self-centered people I've ever met." She continued on and on about how I never talked about my kids (which I had, she ignored it), or editing (which I had, but she ignored that), or my friends (which when I'd made references to N, for one, she flat out walked away from me and went to the bathroom in the middle of what I was saying), but apparently all I talked about was myself (despite the lack of the other subjects), and that I never let her talk about her life, not that she needed to or anything. Not only was she haranguing me about our previous conversations, but she was also laying into me over and over with: "It isn't all about you, you know." And it was all being said at a volume louder than the whole crowd in the Starbucks... people were looking and I was completely flabbergasted.
She kept saying, "Don't you agree? Don't you agree?" over and over. I tried answering with a "no, but..." and she would raise her volume and try driving her point home louder. I tried answering with "yes, I agree..." and she would exclaim, "See, even you agree with me!" But regardless of the answer, nothing seemed to stop her. There wasn't any answer I could say to shut her up. I stared out the window towards the street, trying desperately to think of something that would stop this attack, and feeling like a lover who'd just disappointed her so terribly and hurt her feelings. But I wasn't her lover. I was just a "friend" whom she'd invited for a visit, or so I thought. I even tried momentarily to apologize for hurting her feelings when she mentioned that I hadn't thanked her for making the Super Shuttle booking, but she talked over me and just kept going.
the window I stared out while being attacked
It probably only went on for about 5 minutes or more, but it felt like a lifetime, especially at that volume, and we were supposed to be at the Improv place in like 10 minutes and spend the rest of the evening having fun. Together.
Finally, I couldn't take it anymore and I put up a finger... my index finger, not the bird.... and with the "one second" gesture, she finally stopped, her eyes bulging in that "oh no you didn't" look, and I said to her very calmly, "Do you have to get into all of this now??? I'd be happy to have this conversation any other time, like later tonight, but we're about to be at a comedy show laughing and having FUN in a few minutes, and you're trying to bum me out..."
She was way pissed at this point. She said, "Oh, don't you even try to turn this on me now!" and stood up from her chair, making it squeak across the floor. Then she announced, "Let's just go."
At that moment in time, I realized that my heart was acting up again. That's when I realized that she was the source of all my stress that night and the previous night. The rest of the walk to the comedy club was in silence, with her a few paces ahead of me, except when she announced, "We should have taken the car. It'll be dark when this is over and this area could be sketchy." I agreed and said we should go back and get the car. She snapped, "Oh no! We're already walking."
"But I don't want us to be in danger, let's just get the car," I begged, trying to be as agreeable to her ideas as possible.
She refused to turn back and just kept right on walking ahead in silence. It turned out the club was just another block and a half up... a total of about 3.5 blocks from the car.
Once inside, I threw my attention and head into the improv on the stage. It was definitely fun and a much needed diversion. Afterwards I had to do a quick goodbye with S from SAG Indie, however, because I was worried that her pissy mood would rub off on him. I knew he could tell that something was wrong, but I couldn't explain it to him there. I've since straightened that up with him in email... and good thing I did, because he was worried that we thought he sucked!
She was pissy on the drive to Santa Monica as well, but I just concentrated on getting the directions right. We were meeting Scott L at a different sushi place that he said was good with half-off prices. When we got there, we learned that the sushi place was in a giant promenade an outdoor mall. Sarcastically, she snipped, "So is your friend Mr. Suburbia now or what?"
Fortunately, Scott is a total charmer these days. The old punk Scott probably would have totally called P out on her shitty behavior, when she was acting pissy and snobby. But today's Scott just plied the jokes and after a half-beer or so, P warmed up. I remember glancing over at her and thinking, "Who is this person? I haven't seen this warm, friendly face before now!" She was all googly-eyed at Scott and smiling at everything it was weird, but I was thankful that she was behaving well. Finally. When we settle the bill, she was putting it on her card, so Scott and I gave her cash. When Scott pointed it out that he was giving her 30 when we each only needed to give 28, she said, "That's fine. Whatever." I had to stop from laughing when he said, "Of course it's fine. It's more than I owe." I handed her 40, but she didn't say anything to me.
I tried to pay for her gas at the next convenience store stop, but she apparently had used a card while I had walked up to the window to pay the cashier. Once we were at my friend Brendan's shoot, the alcohol must've been wearing off, because she was getting stuck up again. But when Scott wanted me to hang out more and she had to go, she was very pleasant with me about letting me stay out with him and coming in late... insisting that it would be good for me to meet Scott's friend in the biz.
I told her that I wanted to take the couch, so she could get a good night's sleep in her bed for work the next day, but she just refused to listen and talked over me with, "I have to get up to let you in anyway, and I've been on the couch the last several nights anyhow, so what difference does it make?" Scott then walked away for a moment, so I took that time to say, "Look, I don't want to leave things hanging badly between us..." and she interrupted with, "It's fine. I just wanted you to know that I felt you were taking advantage of me." At that moment, Scott was back and the conversation stopped. She left, and I had the best time of my whole trip. Truly.
When I got back, she was on the couch, of course. So I slipped up to her bed and left it at that, not wanting to disturb her sleep further. I only slept for 2 hours when I realized that the clock said 6:30, which was the time she usually had her alarm set. I got up and decided that I should wake her and make sure she made it to work on time... god forbid she has something else to blame on me! Every 10-15 minutes, I sat there saying the time, but she just continued to lie on the couch making these "tisk-sigh" noises, like a broken radiator. Finally, I emphasized that it was 7:30 and she'd been laying there for an hour, so she got up still in her clothes from the night before, ate some cereal, brushed her teeth, did not comb her hair or shower or change clothes, and simply slipped on her big crazy coat and giant plastic sunglasses.
She came over to give me an awkward "butt-out" hug before she left, so I said to her, "I want to thank you for letting me stay with you..." and she interrupted me again to say, "That's fine. But you know how I feel." And with that, she left.
I had a couple hours to kill after she left and I wondered if I should write her a note, but then decided against it. What would be the point? She'd made up her mind about me being a self-centered user, apparently, and that's all I was going to be in her mind. It wasn't up for discussion ever. I was convinced that she left for work looking so haggard, because it would elicit more sympathy from her friends and co-workers as she told them the story of how horrible I had been to her.
Instead of writing a long note, I tidied up the place and made the bed, left a copy of my DVD with 40 bucks sticking out underneath it (for the gas I hadn't had a chance to pay), and went to her Myspace profile to leave her a nice comment that read: "Without you I would never have been able to come to the L.A. and I'll always thank you for that. - P.S. I'm stealing your big wall light." The wall light was something I'd "oohed and aahed" over since I'd gotten there. It was about the side of a Volkswagen's hood, so there was no way I could steal it... but after I submitted the comment, I imagined her panicking all day at work and racing home to see if it was still there.
the wall light off and on
The next day when I was at home again, I got on Myspace and decided that I'd needed to do some re-arranging. Being around P made me appreciate the real friends in my life even more... so I guess I have her to thank for that as well. But I thought she didn't deserve to be so high in the ranks as she'd been. I moved her to the bottom of the Super Friends list, but not off the list though. I just exchanged names with someone else that I'd put down there without really giving it thought before that. I did consider removing her from the list entirely, but I figured she'd freak out about that. Apparently, there's no pleasing her anyhow, because within a few hours, I had a message in my inbox from her. She'd noticed the move... and then some:
From: xxxxx-xxx
Date: Feb 28, 2006 9:54 PM
Subject: No Subject
"so I've been thinking a lot about your visit sherri and I just want to give you my perspective on things, put yourself in my shoes for a moment. lets start with you being a complete stranger, I opened my home to you, donated money for you to come out here, drove you all over gods green earth and truth be told I felt a bit like you really took the situation for granted. I offered you my bed while I took the sofa, it wasnt until the last night that you offered me my bed. Had you said "no no no I will sleep on the sofa" even the first night I wouldnt have done it because that's who I am however it bothered me that you didnt offer until after I called you out on how you were behaving.
not once over the time you were here did you ever talk about anything positive in your life and again I completely understand the situation that you're in but as sympathetic as I am to your situation it does become a bit draining being on the other end of that, again with a stranger. Not to mention I dont think you asked me anything about me, my life etc. we spent a lot of time talking about your problems and most interestingly about you wanting a reciprocal relationship when the reality was you were behaving exactly the opposite way with me. I felt the way you were behaving regarding your heart condition was completely irresponsible, again leaving a complete stranger responsible for you if anything happened. You never actually asked me if I wanted to go to your friends comedy show, nor did you ask if I wanted to go to santa monica - you just assumed I did and assumed I would take you, and I did. even when we went to starbucks I asked you what you wanted and if you'd grab a table - you said you didnt know so I grabbed the table. instead of asking me what I wanted while I held the table you waited on line got yourself a drink then leaving me to wait on line for myself and get my own drink. just the fact when I drove in to the ripleys museum after just driving back from hollywood and then having you tell me you wouldnt walk over a block to meet me in front of the egyptian I found a bit much. and I dont think we need to discuss me again going out of my way to make your travel arrangements to leave, calling the airline, the shuttle, and making your reservation without you even saying thank you.
on top of all of that I just noticed that you changed the pix of me on your friends page to the bulky red headed chick. as being someone with self esteem issues with your own weight I can only imagine how you'd feel if someone had done that to you. the truth is, up until I finally called you on it your whole trip revolved around you, and again even then I didnt get home when I needed to to get a good nights sleep.
that all being said, I can tell you are a cool girl that is having a rough go of things. again, you are the only person that can change that - and that must come from within yourself. I highly recommend you investigating the 5htp and may we meet again when your head is in a much better place..."
So as you can see, her take on things was completely different from mine. Apparently, she can't seem to think about anything but negatives of my visit. Oh, wait... no, it's only me that's supposed to be the one who thinks that way.
I asked her a lot about her life, for the record... I know about the love of her life, that she hasn't spoken to her family in Atlanta in 12 years because her mother is "crazy and abusive," about her friends that are musicians in far off places and another who's an artist over in France right now. She even claimed that she was homeless once back in Atlanta... though, if I apply her own theory of how L.A. people are liars, I can assume that she spent a night in her car once and now calls it being homeless. I did NOT say that to her, of course. Nor will I. And apparently I wasn't in town for a film festival (that I only got to attend for 1.5 days of a 3 day event), but rather just to visit her and make her drive me around to all my friends (which was only 5 hours of my whole 3.5 days there). Okay, sure.
Unfortunately for me, when we were in each other's presence she only wanted to play armchair therapist with me too much and kept refocusing the conversations around how I am running my life all wrong and I just let it happen, thinking that if I showed her that I was open to talking about me, maybe she'd be more open to talking about herself in the process. Instead, she just used that as ammo against me later. I don't care if she actually thought she was going to "help" me somehow, this is a practice that I strictly try not to do for people, and reserve for instances of good friends and who come to me for advice on a continuing issue. And I definitely wasn't trying to solve any issues... I was just telling her about events in my past, some of it good, some of it bad, all of it anecdotal. My belief is to try to talk freely about anything to keep the conversation flowing, and when someone is holding back about themselves, I try to offer my own stories to encourage others to share their own. Perhaps I've gotten so good at it, that some people don't even realize they've talked at about themselves at all?
Nah, I can't be that good.
In keeping with my feelings about reserving my opinions for my closest friends, I chose not to write her back and just let her feel she's right about everything. If that's where she gets her self-esteem, then so be it. My life is too complicated already to be dragged down by someone I hardly know at all. I also felt that she had concocted most of this drama herself, including the stuff like the friend stalking her profile and the other one giving her cell phone a virus. Basically, I think she's an emotional vampire. So I deleted her entirely from my friends list and blocked her from contacting me further. It's just not worth it. I figure that I'll just write it all out here and release it to the ether. I do have some fun anecdotes for the future though.
On the downside, because I learned that she has at least one, if not several, fake identities on Myspace, I had to take some other precautionary measures. I know of one pseudo-profile of hers for sure, that is some guy named "Drake" who's 21 and lives in San Francisco... I think that's what she said about him/her. Anyway, I accidentally discovered that one when I went to sign her out of Myspace so I could briefly check mail and saw the welcome screen saying "Hello, Drake!" So I said out loud, "Huh? Hello, Drake? What the...?" And quickly she piped up with that same nervous tone again with, "Do you like that name? It's a cool name, isn't it?" I was still confused and just said, "Sure, but who's Drake and why is he signed in here?" That's when she admitted that Drake was one of her aliases she uses to get around people's possible spy tracker things. The fact that she said "one of" them was a clue to me that she's got a bunch of alter-egos, none of which are for music or film or any creative endeavors, but rather explicitly for spying on her friends. To me, that's just creepy.
Hmm? Maybe from now on she should be known as: "Cree-P"?
Anyway, because of that, I've decided to block all the people I didn't know who had a subscription to my blog and I'm currently making the entries readable to "friends only" until I feel that the craziness has finally blown over. The people I already told this story to have asked me if I thought she had a "thing" for me, but felt jilted when she realized that I wasn't attracted to her or something along those lines. I honestly hadn't thought of that before... as I said, I do tend to be naive sometimes... but now that they've mentioned it, it does seem to make more sense than any other theory.
I still can't do this tale justice, even after 17 pages of typing. I wish I'd had a video camera. Damn. I don't even have still photos, because I was trying to be nice and respect to her wishes of remaining anonymous. But now I have some insight as to why she has to approve all of her comments before she lets them post... my guess is she's ruffled more than a few feathers along the way.
She does have a nice view though. I'll give her that.
on a "clear" L.A. day (huh?) you can see the Hollywood sign
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