2024-05-21 Observing those who aren't real

The speaker reflects on their experience with two famous actors, describing them as strange creatures living in a different world. He discusses their own struggles with love and relationships, and how it has affected their sense of self. They also explore the nature of fame and the desire for validation, and their own interest in performance and humour. Ultimately, they express a need to remain anonymous and small. I got to spend time with and observe, for a while, two very famous actors, one male, one female. The male was the brother of the woman I lived with, who was the mother of my child. The woman was his wife. I'd met him several times. I only met her once. I spent several hours in her company. We never had a conversation. I got the feeling she didn't like me very much, probably based on what he'd told her about me. He didn't really like me very much either, for reasons that are too complicated to go into here. But the point of this was that having an opportunity to be in the company of famous actors, very good at what they do, talented, revealed to me that they are strange creatures. They're not like us. They're not normal. They may have been normal once, but they hadn't been normal for a long time. They live in a very strange world, a world where, for the most part, anything they do, they earn a fortune for. Everything they need is taken care of for them. Their every idea, their whim, sorted. They often don't have They often don't have to buy things. Much is given to them. They are always taking phone calls. They're always negotiating what's coming next. They're always having meetings. I wasn't starstruck like many people are when they meet their acting heroes, A-listers. I even got to walk up the red carpet once at the world premiere of one of their films, being invited along with his sister and his niece. And the experience was fascinating fascinating in many ways, but it was like being transported to an alien world where things occur that seem similar to the things that occur in my own world, but completely different. Not something I could ever really understand. Not something I would ever really want to experience, actually. And yet the experience of being in it while not being of it was interesting. I never really got on with either of them. I certainly didn't get on with him. I may have met him half a dozen times when he lived in London before he became really famous, and when he came to visit us in Cornwall when he was already becoming famous. He lives in America. He has a massive place in Vermont, a lake, classic cars, snowmobiles, quad bikes, speedboat, whatever, whatever toys he happens to want. He has a music studio, instruments, recording. Like I said, talented. Writer, director, actor, musician, married to an Oscar winner, who's currently in a series I'm watching and is really good in it. And it's hard, actually, because I don't really like her, but I like her as an actress. She's very good at what she does. She's been doing it a long time. I just wanted to dwell on it for a moment, because it's unusual in many ways to have access to people like that. People like that. You might be related to them, brother, sister, son or daughter, but it was, for me, I wasn't really fitting into the world I was living in anyway, so to have them appear as well was just bizarre and made me feel even more alienated than I already was. I was struggling to cope with who I found myself becoming as a result of having chosen a world that I couldn't really function in. I got to experience that again when I was in America, several times, actually, as an attempt to find a life, but in fact discovering that all I was doing was losing my own, giving up myself to live in their world, doing my best to understand what that meant and yet not functioning properly and slowly but surely losing myself more and more and more so that what I thought and what I did and what I said and how I felt just became somebody else. I couldn't identify with myself. I understand that now. It's one of the reasons I think I am alone, by choice, or at least I don't do anything, I don't make it clear that I'm interested in, so that I can't fall again like that. This concept of falling, being in love, it is perfectly possible to love more than one person at a time. Many people do, but I don't believe it's possible to be in love with more than one person at a time, and this in-love idea I've experienced several times in my life. The loss of self, which starts out altruistically, it's a kind of surrender, a giving. I'll do anything for her. I care about her more than anything. I'm ready to listen at any moment. I'm ready to step up, take action, be there for her. Nothing is too much. I think about her all the time. I want to communicate. I want to spend every waking moment. I don't have to do everything with her, but I could do anything with her. Anything that I could imagine we would both enjoy together, we would do it. It becomes all-consuming and eventually feels obsessive. It becomes smothering. It becomes too close. There's no space. By that point, I can't really function properly. I'm lost, and I don't know how to extricate, and I suppose I really ought to have done so, and yet I don't because I still want it to work. I can't let go of how it felt at the beginning. I'm not even sure I'm still in love. I'm not even sure I love at all. Eventually, one way or another, it ends. Usually, it is her. The one time that I did something to finally close the door, I felt terrible. I wasn't sure. Did I make the right decision? I still don't know. All these years later, I think I did. But it's not certain, and we're not out of each other's lives every so often. I hear from her, and it's lovely to do so, and the banter resumes just as smoothly as it always did, as if no time has gone by. The only difference? There's no desire. There's no intention. There's no attempt to have things be different, have things return to connecting, sharing more. There's none of that. It's pure in many ways. No attachment. It's so much easier, and after it's finished, whenever it arrives, months can have gone by, even longer. After a day or two, it's over, and it's as if it never was, and within a day or two after that, I've forgotten the interaction ever took place. I don't miss it. I don't need more of it. It's fascinating, and it's easier for me to have those kinds of interactions. It doesn't require physical contact. It is purely textual. It might involve a photo or two. It could involve a recording. It has involved a few minutes on the phone in the past, but all of that is over-complicating it. It's just contact. It just feels like touching base, making contact, just checking in, and then checking out. It's quite often we hear about those in the public eye, the famous, talented actors and musicians. They're getting married, breaking up, getting involved, breaking up. It's complicated for them. They don't exactly know who they are either. They spend their lives playing somebody else, dressing up, playing make-believe, and they often fall for those that they work with. It's quite normal. We do that too in our mundane, typical jobs. We find our girlfriends and our boyfriends, and some of them become our husbands and wives. If you're famous, you can't just go to clubs. You'll be hounded by paparazzi, and people want your autograph and selfies, so it makes more sense that you seek out or are open to those like you, and they are used to that lifestyle, and I observed that with him, with my ex's brother and his wife, and how they live, and what they have to do, how they make life seemingly more complicated than it needs to be. But they are sensitive, and they are creative, and they are romantic, and very thoughtful, and very kind, but kindness seems to be quite typical amongst the creatives. They don't like to hurt. They don't like to do anything that could possibly hurt. They often want to please, especially actors. They're looking for validation, reaction, approval, love. Anyone who gets up on stage is looking for the applause, is looking to feel like they've done something, they've moved someone. If they can make you laugh, or cry, they've achieved exactly what they've set out to do. I think it's amazing, and it's difficult, and it's why there are relatively very few who are considered the top, and who always bring a wonderful performance to anything they choose to do. I've been fascinated with the idea of performance and acting, and while I have had a go, I have taken some classes. I have enjoyed experimenting with improv, and in a sense, these recordings are a kind of improv, just speaking stream of consciousness off the top of my head, without planning, without having any idea what I'm going to say, and hopefully making sense, and saying something that has meaning, that can be related to. I've written, I've spoken, I've wondered if I could stand up, but I don't need to make jokes, even though I like to. I do like making people laugh. I do like being funny, but not like a clown. I realized many years ago that I was also looking for validation, looking for approval, looking for approval, needing acceptance, and I explored those ideas and understood why, and don't really feel like I need that anymore. I still like to make people laugh. I like to be clever in my observation. My kind of humor is dry, and witty, and smart, but only if it's working, only if I feel it. It has to come naturally. I don't like to force it. I don't like how it feels if I do. Then I'm beginning to go down that road again, where I want something in return. I need to feel what I believe the stand-up is looking to feel, what they've talked about, the ones that I have great respect for, the love, the feeling of love that comes when people appreciate and love you for making them laugh, for making them feel good. It's a great thing, and it's not easy to do, yet I still would do something like that. Maybe this is something like that. I don't know, but if I try, as I have, if I move towards making myself appear prominent, visible, I lose it. I have to step back very quickly. I cannot become visible and must remain anonymous. I have to be small. I get to say things like this in these situations. I get to share it, and maybe somebody listens. In the past, I have attempted to get people to listen, and the same issues quickly appear. I can only speak if I actually don't have to share this with anybody. Then I can speak the truth. Then I am authentic. Anything else, I'm under pressure. I feel I have to perform. I've got to provide content. You could do a podcast, someone says. No, I don't think I can. All it would take is people to start to like what I say, and I'm now obligated or I feel under pressure to continue to speak. I don't think that would work. If one doesn't produce content, there's a million other things that will attract your attention that will. This way, I get to speak whenever I feel inspired to do so, and while I do put it up on a podcast site, it is really more a place to store things. You can't subscribe to someone. You can't be notified when something new is posted. You can like it. You can even comment. Some people listen. Very few do, and that's fine. I don't need anything else. At least, not at this time.