The Coldwater Diaries

Do us both a favor and take a good look at yourself in the mirror when you’re doing another line off it, and maybe, just maybe, you’ll see what I see…

This is the kind of shit Lauren says to me now. What the fuck, right? The last couple of weeks since she grew the moxie to actually walk out the fucking apartment, she’s been bringing in the holier-than-thou-shit non-stop. We haven’t slept together in weeks – maybe a month – and when I say slept together I mean it both ways. And on the only blue-moon that comes to mind we actually shared the bed, we might as well have been toe-to-face.

Not that I mind any of this shit that’s gone on lately – God knows I don’t miss the fights and up-until-morning tear-fests – but I don’t know. It just rubs me the wrong way, this new Lauren. Not so much because she’s been getting mouthy, more so on account it seems like she’s given up on me altogether.

Annoying as it was going through all her rants and raves and tear-filled laments – like some 1960 co-dependent housewife on valium – at least I knew her world revolved around me.

Now I don’t know what to say or think. She does her thing – whatever the fuck that is – and I do mine.

Whatever… she’s been holding me back anyway. Sure I may have loved her in the past; keeping with the same logic on the other end, once upon a time ago I used to shit in diapers. People grow up. People change. People grow.

And in our case, we’re growing apart.

Fuck it. She’s no more than a bank account with estrogen to me now.

Meantime while Lauren’s been out doing her thing, I’ve been out doing mine. Totally over extra-work. Applying myself other ways. Networking. Learning the ropes. Cutting a few corners. Above all things, I’m getting with the fucking times. The program. My head is out my ass and I’ve finally met the reality of the real world, and although both share a similar scent, at least I’m off the scent of my own shit, and facing facts.

It’s a rough world. I was a dipshit to think anything else. That image I had of the actor as an artist doesn’t exist anymore. In fact it never really did in this town. The paths so many of the great actors walked from Dean to Pacino died with the seventies. Studying a craft for a decade before breaking. Doing stage work. Acting for the sake of acting. Meisner or Stanislavsky or Strasburg… those days are finished. Long gone. And I’ve gotta deal with what’s real now. Actors are employees. We do a job. We get asses into seats and sell popcorn. Today they don’t care if you can cry on cue, they just want a sound investment. PR and rehab and bad childhoods and Oprah – America wants someone they can relate to. Not an artist. They want a product.

And although the last place I would expect to spend my nights is a fag-pad in the hills while Tad works his queer-o hustle, I go back night after night because now I know. I’ve been spared wasted time. Moved out of LA-LA land and into the city of Los Angeles in a few weeks time.

In a world dominated by reality-TV it’s hard to be an old soul devoted to acting as an art. I’ve seen the types around town – you know – the hipsters and self-proclaimed anti-conformists. These people go nowhere. They spend their lives bitter, keeping their failures at bay by way of self-inflation… you know the tune – I’m a serious artist. I don’t sell out.

Fuck that I say. Die hungry. Keep it up, please. Less competition for me. You wanna make art douche-bag? So do I. You got a better chance making that art once your foot’s in the door. You gotta sell out first to cash out later. And that’s the plan.

You wanna talk selling out – look at Tad! As I speak he’s in the other room letting some queen suck him off for three-hundred. He’s done this every night and has been at it for years. I’m not the type to judge, what one does one does, but fuck, I can see what he’s doing. He’s sacrificing today to survive to tomorrow. Would I let a queen suck me off to pay the rent? Fuck no! But Tad’s cool with it. Whatever. He’s selling out… literally… meantime he meets people. He’s connected. And sooner or later the right studio-head will give Tad head and have to give him a role…

That’s how Tad sees it anyway.

Bottom-line, vocation aside, Tad’s free to do with his nights what he wants. He networks. A twenty minute knob-job opens the doors to countless nights of potential hobnobbing with the big break. And I’m there with him.

We’ve actually got a little con working – been steady at it couple weeks. The script reads like this – Tad brings me along to his jobs, I’m his straight friend new in town – he puts it out there strong I’m straight. Anyway Tad sits beside queen of the hour while I’m sitting opposite end, coffee table between us. Queen gets off knowing he’ll get busy with Tad soon, and same time enjoys flirting with younger straight guy. Meantime we cop free drugs and booze. After a few ticks Tad takes guy away and gets to business. Leaving me alone to jack computers, rings, pills… anything of value. Queen finishes Tad off, puts money in his pocket, and we leave. A scam yes, but what the fuck, an hour’s work affords a night of networking.

I’m not proud of this shit – but it’s only temporary. Just a little hustle to keep my schedule open and allow all my time to go toward my acting. Same time, temporary for me yes, but for Tad this shit has been pretty steady. I don’t know how he does it. But same time I understand. He loves his acting to the point he’s willing to make sacrafices.

That’s an actor for these times. Sell out, get in, and go from there. Easy to cringe at what Tad does – or even myself for why with the theft and all – but at the end of the day we’re just acting. And ten years from now when Tad’s on the A-List, this shit will be a distant memory.

We do what we have to do. We change. And we move on.

Lauren doesn’t understand it.

Rachael on the other hand does.

She’s another story. We’ve been seeing one another here and there past few weeks. A lunch here. Dinner there. Like me, she’s over extra work. Has a Tad of her own. I’m sure, like me, finding parts of herself she never knew existed. But they do. And like me, Rachael I’m sure is making sacrifices with a bigger picture in mind.

With every dinner or lunch or occasional here or there I take her shopping on Lauren’s dime, I see more and more changes in Rachael compared to the day I met her. Unlike Lauren with me however, I see the change in Rachael as a good thing. We’re progressing.

And although I don’t think we’ve passed the friend threshold quite yet, I’m certain we’re close to it. Soon Rachael and I will be together. She sees it I know, we’re one in the same.

Rachael just needs a little more time to see in me what I so easily saw in her moment one.

We belong together.

It’s only a matter of time.

And although I’m sitting in yet another living room while Tad takes yet another head-job I know for certain this is all only temporary. In one month I went from dork to in the know – Rachael too – who knows where I’ll be a month from now.

I’m sure given the way things are going now Rachael and I will be together by then. Or at least on the cusp. If anything I’m certain Lauren will catch on to my thievery (if she hasn’t already) and eventually leave me… back home to the sticks.

And who knows, maybe worst case a month from now I’m still sitting in a homo’s living room with Tad behind a closed door down the hall. And maybe Lauren finds out everything and reaches boil and leaves me. It’s not like I’ll have nowhere to go.

Worst case I get by finally rid of Lauren – who if wasn’t around, I’d probably be way better off – and can live my life.

Best case – and probably most likely – say a month from now Lauren splits, by then I’d have gotten close enough to Rachael that I’ll just move in with her.

The way it should be.

And the Tad tricks will end, Rachael and I will be a power couple and charm the pants off everyone we see, a break will hit, and it’s happily ever after for all…

… With my head out the ass and living in the real world now, I see no reason it won’t play out that way.

Everything fits into place. We’re all one in the same. Everyone makes out at the end.

It’s like that saying everything happens for a reason or don’t confuse coincidence with fate or in one word – destiny.

Hip to the square root of life and my place in it, I’m done fucking around. This certainly won’t be the last living room I squat. Lauren’s more than likely going to leave me, no matter how down and out I get, I’ll never do what Tad does, and best of all – above landing my first role – Rachael and I will be together…

Just how it should be.

It’s all only a matter of time.