waiting...

That's how I feel today.

Staring off into the distance, waiting for my ship to come in.

I realize the shot's taken on queen street in Toronto and that they're waiting for the streetcar but cut me some slack here people.  I love how the distance is blown out (I pushed the exposure to get the effect I wanted), how they're staring into the light waiting for hope, warmth, transport.

Today we'll either get a 'yes' or a 'no' on a contract we've been working on securing since the spring of 2008.  At this point in the game, my wife and I are back at the edge of a cliff.  Yes, I know, I've been here before.  I'm a little baffled to find myself back here and I will confess to doing some introspection re: how much of this recurring theme is connected to me and my various character or work-ethic flaws and how much of it is, well for lack of a better term...

Kismet.

As I look back on the history of my family, we're prone to this kind of living.  On the edge type stuff.  Money is never plentiful but life is always full type living.  Trust as the bedrock type existence.

I don't feel tired.

Last time I was here (scroll back in the blog to fall leading into Christmas 2007) I most definitely was.  We were well past breaking point then.  Today, as I was buying groceries I caught myself wondering why I didn't feel as badly this time around.

I mean, the particularities of our situation are similar.  Money running out, pressure mounting, no 'actual' prospects in sight.

But here's the key difference.

Last year was year-two of my transition from 'full-time preacher sometime producer' to 'full-time producer sometime preacher'.  Last year was the apex of two years of suffering and working very hard to re-discover and re-define who I was professionally and personally.  Last year, true, we had no 'actual' prospects in sight but we didn't have any real 'potential' prospects brewing either.

This year is totally different.

As I speak (or write)...

-My first feature film is being watched by two major U.S distribution companies who are very close to picking us up.

-A co-development deal is supposedly passing 'legal' at a production company office in NYC before being sent my way so that we (myself, my business partner and said NYC-based prodco who have a major series currently airing on U.S Network television...) can start developing it together for pitching to U.S cable.

-A contract should have been signed last night (that we're awaiting news on today) that will lock 104 new bio-documentary episodes of a very exciting TV series we've developed that should start airing in prime time on Canadian network television this September.

-A spin-off talk-television series based on the above bio-doc series is already in the works.

-A new kids show pitch I wrote last week is in to a major kids broadcaster.

-A 'reality tv' series for 'dudes' will be in to a specialty cable network as soon as march break is over and the VP gets back.  His assistant already has it.

-A major U.S star and his mgmt are reading a script I co-wrote with a writer friend from Austin and the cable network said star has done much of his recent work with is reading it too.

-A re-write on a super-cool sci-fi thriller script I've developed with a writer out of L.A (that he subsequently wrote for us on assignment) should be crossing my desk any day after which it'll go out for graphic novel consideration and to my film reps in L.A to see about setting up.

-And I got an idea this week for a way to (I think) preach on a recurring basis, in my home town (starting out once a month) without planting a Church...

So you see...one year, similar circumstances and pressures, totally different realities.

This is a reminder to me, and to you, that life doesn't ever get easy.  

No matter where you're at or how far you've come or how far you have yet to go, life's never going to take the pressure off. My sense is that, even if the financial stresses weren't quite a bleak as they currently are, I'd feel just as stressed because the stakes were higher, or what I stood to lose that much greater.

I walked out of the grocery store thankful to be alive, thankful to be able to buy today's 'daily bread' and reminded of the fact that...

Without a vision, the people perish.

The difference between last year and this is that this year, I look into the distance and I can see the shape(s) of things to come hiding in the light.

T