Remember the simplicity of going on a road trip. You sat in the back seat and looked out the window. You had the copy of Flowers in the Attic, that you "borrowed" from your cousin, the last time you were over there, for when your dad took over the radio and made you listen to the Willie Nelson Red Headed Stranger cassette the whole way. You rolled down the window because it was Texas in the spring time and the air was already warm. Your mom packed ranch Doritos and Dr. Pepper, and your dad said "Don't drink it too fast" , I'm not stopping every five minutes. Sometimes you played slug bug, or I spy. Eventually you got where you were going in one piece and the pretend misery was over, because deep down it brought a special thrill to be going on an adventure, even if it was just to your grandmother's house.
What is your deeply buried gift? Don’t think it’s not down there. It is. Something is going to help it rise to the surface. When I was a child, I dreamt of going to Hollywood and making movies. I remember specifically knowing what it must feel like to do that very thing, although I was in the middle of a rural ranchette in Texas. I carried around a video recorder the size of carry on luggage, which attached to a giant news station style camera, and I made movies. I can think of three or four different films that were lost forever in the 80’s. I remember shooting portraits of my cats sitting alongside cowboy hats, with a little 110 camera, and writing story after story and reading book after book. Talking into an old recorder with an English accent, singing at the top of my lungs as I played the piano. These are the snapshots of my childhood forty years ago. When I graduated from the theatre department at Baylor University, I was not ready emotionally and did
thanks robin! good content
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