A Fat Day, Selfies & Why All The Love

This is not my real hair.

I just celebrated my first Mardi Gras last week. First thing to know. It was cold by New Orleans (NOLA) standards. Thank the Universe, Buddha, the Goddess whoever you will for encouraging mi amiga, Watson, for making sure I owned a jacket. 

So I scored a lot of beads without lifting my shirt once and skipped the alcohol consumption because it’s not really my jam. And I had an amazing time because I snapped a series of selfies with random people and asked them what they loved most about the Mardi Gras experience. 

"Everybody gettin' down on the streets 
and havin' a good time together."

"This! This is it. This is that moment."

"Costumes, creativity. Everything."

"Look around you, man. This ..."

Bonus Pic 'cause dude's costumes is beast.

Grand Budapest Hotel

Radio station bumper stickers.

I only have an eye for you, baby.

"Community."

"Used car lots!"

"OMG! All these crazy fucking people letting loose 

for a day. I love how everybody is celebrating life. 

You can feel it in the energy."

Unicorns or bust! 

Cards Against Humanity timeout.

Sunset Jacket.

"The glitter. These people all around me.
I love that I'm spending it in this community."

"It's really inspiring. How everyone is
doing their thing and not afraid of
doing it."

Speaker system for street dancing.

Random Cool Bike + Woman

Bloody Mary topped with bacon, jalapeños
& cheese on a bun.

"The craziness. You can do anything.
And Beads!!!"

"The community & the costumes and the glitter." 

"Coming out and seeing all the costumes."

Street Art

Puddle reflection.

Sticker Art

"Having ____ in the _______ of a dark ______." 

"The soul. The jazz. The freeness. It's just a good vibe."

"Wait? What's the question?"

And that's a few moments from the streets of New Orleans on Fat Tuesday 2015. Thanks for the memories.

Sometimes You Miss It

Steve Perry sang it best, "The road ain't no place to start a family," and so goes the life of the accidental gypsy.

Corpus Christi, Texas. 

Pop. 300,000 +

What to know about the big CC? One of the windiest cities in America, home to a gigantic warship, death place of Selena and a number two party spot for Spring Breakers. 

And for me right now the place where I slept through the 5:15 A.M. alarm and have missed my flight back to New Orleans where I currently have a front room futon with my name on it. 

I never miss a flight. 

I never botch travel. 

It's kinda become my #2 best thing. 

Universal intervention? Difficult to say, but it sure makes for a strange in what was to be an otherwise ordinary day. I'm still drop dead fool tired and not sure what method of transport will get me back to NOLA. 

One thing is for sure. I'm not thumbing it. 

The view from the 7th floor Shoreline Drive hotel is snazzy. It overlooks the luscious possibilities of the Gulf of Mexico. Joggers on the jog. Birds on the perch. Empty white legless benches just waiting. And the water ... there it is just moving. 

Breakfast taquitos are in my immediate future, and I've got a rental car until 4pm I think. That's long enough to consider the possibilities of the universe deep fried on a stick and crack out a few pages on a novel. It's long enough to maybe see my childhood friend Jody over a Texas Sized cup of Sweet Tea and reminance of when I useta steal his toys for two days, play with them and bring them back for another set. Sort of a community share program implemented by me, myself and the I. 

What a weird kid I was ... what a weird adult I still am. 

So maybe Steve Perry was right. About the road. But it is definitely a place to hear someone else's story and continue to write your own. 

Peace, kindness and rock the word!

How We Win

Author Barry Lyga gave a keynote at YAK Fest 2015 about how life is about failing. How we learn and grow from the very act of not succeeding. And for all Barry's success, the man has failed a lot.

So often we are told to be the best. Number one at all costs. Perfection without rejection. Zero failure. But that is soooooo loaded. By whose standards are these? More often than not, they aren't our own and so plays that Song of the Year

"You + Failure = Bad"

And maybe it's some version of Iggy Azalea and/or Drake singin' in your head:

Let me hear you
Hate on me
'Cause I suck at everything
Never get it right
Let me hear you hate on me

'Cause I fail shit all the time ...
Everything I do ain't right
Why even try?
I hate on me

And we learn this degrading tune, making it out mantra. 

#thatissonobueno

Now, I'm not suggesting failing out of school, failing to pay your phone bill or even failing to take personal responsibility for your actions is on the up and cool so you can "learn." That would be a negatory. 

What I believe is that we get knocked down. Sometimes a little harder than expected or needed, but it is how we rise back up. How we stand in our self when back on our two badass feet that determines the "what's next."

Yeah, I know. This is all a little woo-heavy. Humor me. It's a day in the week ending in "Y," and I am thinking on this because it has circled in conversation all around me lately. 

Fear. 

Failure. 

How the Double F has so much power in grid locking us from taking reasonable risks. Like risks when writing, drawing, painting, slamming -- speaking our truth or passion through image. How this Double F keeps us from being heard. 

What if I fail?

I say fail. Word!

I dare you to fail. Fail with abandon and absolute unbridled you-missed-the-mark. 

You will grow.

Multiple award-winning author Pat Zietlow Miller received 126 rejection letters before publishing her first book. 126! That's a whole lotta fail, but ask her if she didn't grow. 

I tell my friends when they are afraid to ask someone for what they need, "What's the worst thing that can happen? They can say no, right? Well, if you don't ask, it's already a no."

We are so terrified to be made vulnerable and real and possibly be rejected. It keeps us from reaching our potential. Then we get all manifesty and scream the profane at some dude or dudette that cut us off on I-99. Or we self-deprecate when we feel vulnerable. Fear and the possibility of failure keeps us trapped. 

#asupernobueno

I'm an author, a filmmaker and artivist. I dream big and hard and live with a lot of passion, hope and creativity. It's not a perfect life, but as lives go I'm lucky. See, I get to excite and empower young people ... I have this precious opportunity to mirror back their best selves. And working with them mirrors to me things I never imagined I could do. But I have failed A LOT to get to this place. 

Repeat the lyric: But I have failed A LOT to get to this place. 

And I will fail again. 

Because in this epic result of human imperfection, I, like you, can't always get it right. But what I can do and what you can do is make that failure your teacher. Learn from it. Don't hit Repeat bad mantra song. 

Write a new ending. One where you don't stop living your hope, truth and voice because you are afraid ...

To fail.

Let's Be Honest ..

February 14, 2014Love Day 

I am terrible at the art of blogging. At this hour, 1:47 in the a.m. I am wiped out. Sleeping in an airport in baggy shorts and chill worthy temps teeters on the suckage. My meal consisted of a $1.50 bag of peanuts with the blare of CNN as white noise.

Haven't done this airport smash-crash since January 2014. That was Philly. Epic snow. On the lamb from the Polar Vortex, a soon to be failed relationship and the heartbreak of not having somewhere I could call home. Destination then: California.

It's been over a year. So much has gone down. No doubt. Feature documentary completed. Sold fourth novel. Six weeks in Belgium. Played said documentary across America including the State Capitol of Texas via the Texas Book Festival. 

I've seen young people moved by the movie and I've seen adults moved. I've watched what is the beginning of the creative revolution. Including the nonprofit Never Counted Out. A foundation to bridge the gap between artist and youth on the fringe. A foundation functioning from the goal of access. 

So yeah, I'm terrible at the art of said blogging and my goal in 2015 is that I will do better. But for all those of you wondering, I am out here -- doing for as many people as I can. 

Because I believe the life you change may be the life that changes another to achieve even a heighter sense of greatness. 

So, yes. Welcome to the creative revolution!