In the wake of the debt crisis debacle earlier this summer I have started paying closer attention to economists and political thinkers/pundits on both sides. So far from what I understand is that politicians on both sides made decisions in order to jostle for position in the upcoming election season rather than tackle the hard problems of the deficit and lack of jobs. Now I never majored in political science or anything but it seems to me that one of the great strengths of the United States Constitution is its ability to change with society.
Now this may be reactionary but it just started me thinking one way to tackle this problem is to limit the time a politician (ie: The President, Senators, and Representatives) can serve in office to one term.

In this political climate when the President, Democrats, Republicans and Tea Partiers are more focused on running for office rather than coming up with long term solutions to the serious problems facing our country. If that is the case than the People should simply take getting re elected out of the equation. And if that sounds too Tea Party-ish than listen to this:

1) It makes politicians stop campaigning through the policies that they are making.

2) It makes it more difficult for corporations to keep politicians in their pocket.

3) It broadens the demographic of people who serve as elected officials.

Is that idea so crazy?

Listening To:

A Movie Script Ending

Death Cab for Cutie

This past week marked the first year anniversary of living in New York City and, as I have a penchant for lists, I thought it would be appropriate to mark the occasion with a top 5 list. So the following, in no particular order, is a list of the Top 5 Things I have Learned From my First Year in New York City.

1) Subways: Never regret missing the R train.  Don’t rush for it or worry about not catching it. It always ends up adding at least 5 more minutes to where ever I am going anyway.  Also, and this may seem obvious but, when rushing for trains don’t assume that the train stopped on the platform is the train I want. Many times running late have I rushed onto a train running the wrong direction and going express. Sometimes commuting takes poise!

2) Bars: Nothing good happens after 3am. One thing about New York City is that the bars in this town don’t shut down to 4 am and coming from a place where the night ends at 2 am, this originally seemed like a Wonderland. However, just because the bar is open until 4 doesn’t mean I should stay until 4. It’s not necessarily that I frequent dives or dangerous parts of town all that often but it’s still New York City and better safe than sorry. If my night ends at 3 am it’s still can be a good night, this is my idea of responsibility.

3) The city: Be mindful of the city. It’s the biggest and best city in the world. Take time to appreciate it and be grateful but also be aware that it is antagonistic. I don’t just mean the people either, I mean everything from the traffic to the weather to the buildings: everything. Keep track of when you are up on New York and when New York is up on you. Just like everything else I have come to realize that this city too has good days and bad days. At least for me in my first year things got easier for me when I realized that the city was actually a living breathing entity that really was inherently antagonistic-I think I realized it early this year in the blizzard, or maybe it was on the R train?

4) The clock: Time matters here. People always say life is faster here and “the New York minute…” phrase, it’s the equivalent of the “coldest winter I ever spent…” San Francisco phrase. I don’t know if time is necessarily faster here than other places but I have learned that time means more here than it does other places. I guess it might go back to the city being antagonistic, but it didn’t take me very long to learn there is nothing in between being late and being early in this town. If I think I have time usually I don’t, the city can always find ways to put you behind schedule.  Be early.

5) Growing: Trust you instincts. After living here for a couple of months I started to recognize the lessons I was learning by living here. New York City is a place impacted with opinions. You should do this, do that, live like this, live like that, eat this, eat that and all the rest. I’m not trying to put down advice here or other people’s opinions but the best way I have found to learn is following my instincts, and I have at times been guilty this year of not doing that all the time, when you are starting out instincts are a tough thing to trust. Still the times when I have not followed them this year have led to some worthwhile but tough lessons.

So that’s my Top 5 New York lessons this year. I don’t mean this as much as advice so much as being grateful to friends, family and this city for teaching me these things this year. Thanks New York and I’m sure there’s more in store.

 

Listening To:

Brothers On a Hotel Bed

Death Cab for Cutie

I’ve always been a shoe made for the city. I wouldn’t necessarily say I thrive in city life, but I have always felt more comfortable surrounded by tall buildings, city streets and bustling people because it has always held more meaning for me than trees-indeed this is one of the reasons I have moved to the biggest of all cities-New York (which in a couple of months I will have lived in for 1 year).

But this past week I took a trip out West and well… I have seen all sides of nature. I have flown 3,000 miles friends, I’ve touched down in Jackson Hole Wyoming all the way to the Golden Gate Bridge and Big Sur in between and here’s what I’ve seen: Collisions.

Lots of them.

Big powerful ones. Some between rock slamming against itself and some between the crashing waves of the great Pacific Ocean and the chiseled Earth of the California Coast. And what it all means to me is this: collisions are natural.

I don’t know why but the thought of this brings me peace. I’ve seldom been credited with achieving perfection but I do try to do better in my life. Improve, grow, and strive for a higher expression of myself-ideally I try to be better than I was the day before. For myself I try to keep things running smoothly. I have a routine to my day, relationships in my life and an ambition for my career that generally speaking holds everything in order. I wouldn’t necessarily say I strive for perfection but as a Libra I try to keep a certain balance. When plans change, relationships fall apart, and  money runs out things suddenly feel like life is descending into failure so I panic. When these things don’t run smoothly it can cause anxiety,worry and stress in all of us.

Seeing these crashing waves and violent rock pushing against itself and suddenly soaring over 10,000 feet helps me to realize that in this life collisions happen. Indeed nature is not smooth so why should life be any different? Violent collisions are a large part of nature, they form mountain ranges and coastlines that dwarf all human beings and when standing in front of them, they can offer perspective. It’s true that I have a lot that keeps my life in balance and I have dreams and goals I wish to accomplish. But coming away from these geological wonders brings me a certain sense of calm.

Back home in San Francisco  I was sitting alone in an Italian restaurant in mid afternoon when I began to realize all this. That life is not smooth, that life is not supposed to be smooth, that violent collisions are all around me and are indeed natural and that all this forms natures beauty. That my life is connected to all this and that these are lessons I should take with me back to my days in New York City. Suddenly I saw it and I felt at one with nature, in harmony. Then I collided with this….

 

 

 

 

Not that I am rooting for this but if you asked me today my prediction for the 2011 NBA Finals would be: Heat in 5.

Been a long time, shouldn’t have left you

Without a dope beat to step to!

INVITES YOU TO ATTEND

SINGLE’S NIGHT

Monday May 23rd

@ UNDER ST MARK’S

94 ST. MARKS PLACE

BETWEEN 1ST AVENUE & AVENUE A

That remind us that there is no I in team, but there is a ME

A night of eclectic plays that remind us that there is no I in team, but there is a ME.

Featuring plays by: Erin Austin, Brad Bauner, Ross Evans, Lindsey Gentile, Kimberly Lew, Brett Sanders, and Rebekah Voss

Featuring: Jenny Dunne, Lindsey Gentile, Nick Hardin, Alex Kaplan, Joseph Rende, Brett Sanders, and Pearl Taylor

Directed by Diane Zelenka and Darren Mallet

Doors open at 6:30. Bar opens at 6:30. Show at 7.

$5 at the door

Seating is limited.

TO SECURE A SEAT EMAIL US AT

PLASTICFLAMINGOTHEATRE@GMAIL.COM

www.plasticflamingo.org

Listening To:

Never Gonna Give You Up

The Black Keys

On March 20th I celebrated the 10 year anniversary of getting my tattoo. When I think back to that 19 year old kid walking into that shop in Cotati California that day its stunning. I thought I was doing something very brave, experimental, wild and I was shaking more than the ink in the needle. I remember feeling a hole in my thigh for a few days, it stung through the bandages. I remember looking down at my leg and seeing the outline of my tattoo in blood on the patch. I remember being a college freshmen and having friends and roommates coming in to check it out. I remember hitting it against a chair in the cafeteria and falling down as if I bullet had just entered my leg.

A tattoo is, of course, a personal choice because it stays with you for the rest of your days- barring a desire to cosmetically remove it. Yet to me it was more than simply a cosmetic choice. To me a tattoo is nothing if not a statement all the time for the rest of your days. Of course it always says the same thing but it says it even when you are sleeping. When you are lying, loving, eating, drinking, whatever your mood-always. Looking back on all this 10 years later I still don’t know why I wanted one. I know my senior English teacher  had two and I thought that was cool, though I guess I wanted one before I really knew him.  He did give me the idea of the location of where I would get it though.

I don’t know if I realized this at the time or not at the time but the tattoo was more about the beginning of my twenties than it was about my past as a teenager. I understood I was entering a new time and I was right about that. My tattoo has been on my body for 10 years and it has been all over the world and back again. I could never had predicted how many miles this tattoo would have travelled. It’s a strange and powerful thought to wonder about all the things we take with us in this life as we go. But enough of this philosophy!

In a way it has never been anything but a tattoo. It has never been so big or so small as what it is, it has never been so simple or intricate as it appeared that day. It has never changed and at this 10 year mark I feel a type of gratitude to that 19 year old kid, who made a statement-and I guess at this 10 year mark that’s why I got it in the first place.

 

 

Listening To:

When I Drink

Avett Brothers

Essentially I live in two very different worlds, as most actors tend to do; the Retail world and the Acting world. The Retail world has a lot to say about the acting world because every time I report to them that I actually do exist in the Acting world they always respond with some kind of comment like, “Wow, that’s a hard business.” The Acting world never has anything to say about the Retail world.

I was knee deep in the Acting world the other day when I showed up at a midtown theatre space at 8:45 in the morning for an audition I did not have an appointment for ( I assume this is one of the reasons the Retail world sites in their case for why this is a “hard business.”) After briefly bleary eyed checking in with the ever charming man who was the monitor I was led to a room upstairs with about 50 other bleary eyed coffee drinking appointmentless actors. We waited for hours while one by one appointed actors walked in and walked out on their way to their auditions. As the hours wore on, and the coffee ran out, the charming monitor man notified all of us that basically we would not be seen today. “You can try to get in after lunch if you want, but honestly folks it doesn’t look good.”

Now if this was the Retail world people most certainly would have been up in arms at this news. Someone would most assuredly have stood up and complained to the monitor man about how they were mistreated, how they have been waiting, how they demand to see the artistic director and casting director of the company. However, this was not the Retail world, this was the Acting world where instead of whining and complaining until you get your way, the rules here stipulate that you merely respond with a “thank you” and then leave the room. See this is a truth in the Acting world, and I am not certain when it began exactly, but the fact that it is a truth throughout every theatre from high school to Broadway is undeniable.

Before the lights darken and the curtain lifts as the audience waits, the actors are in the dressing room getting ready for the show. Periodically the Stage manager will enter the room and let the actors know how much time they have before that curtain goes up and every time that call is given, no matter what the time is, the Actor responds with a “thank you”, this is the protocol of the Theatre. This is the way to be a professional because, among other reasons, there is usually very little time to complain or voice any feelings at all about how rushed or not rushed you may feel in that moment-in a word it is inefficient.

Which brings me back to this room of appointmentless actors who in that moment of that day, were helplessly turned away from an audition. An actor’s life is about efficiency, make the audition on time. learn the lines on time, know where to go on stage in time; the clock is always ticking so to complain or through a “temper tantrum”, as is common in the Retail world, would be a waste of time and valuable energy. So next time you get pissed off in the Retail world and want to scream at the poor schlep behind the counter because you feel him or her or the business is being dishonest and unfair it would do you well to think of the Actor in the room waiting for an audition and getting turned down who just responds with thank you. Because that is an Actor who has no time for complaints or arguments because to do so would at the very least be a waste of time and energy; and no matter how hard people’s lives really get, who has time for that?

 

Listening To: Sportscenter

The  late great Tim Russert,  long time host of Meet the Press, used to ask just about every politician who ever came on his program when they were running for President. He asked everyone from Hillary Clinton to high party officials in Congress to lowly Governors of tiny states. Almost always the politicians would deny the desire by shrugging it off, evading the question or simply making a joke about it. However, his assumption was that every politician deep down really longed to be President. In wake of this I was thinking about the Academy Award Nominations, which were released yesterday.

Around this time of year leading up to the Oscars there are always a million and one opinions on it all and also inevitably there is a wealth of cynicism and negativity on who got snubbed. As a struggling actor in New York City its kind of tough for me to have feelings about any of it.  It’s easier to be cynical about it and say who ever was nominated didn’t deserve it, who ever should have been nominated did deserve it, and  what do awards have to do with Art anyways? It’s not that these feelings and opinions aren’t valid really, it’s just that’s not the point.

I think Tim Russert asks every politician when they are going to run for President not because deep down he is cynical about politicians but because in some way he acknowledges, perhaps idealistically, that everyone aspires to greatness. The office of President of the United States is the highest office that any politician can hold. So too I think is it the same with actors and The Oscars. Now I am not oblivious to the fact that nothing is pure, neither politics and politicians or actors and The Oscars. I am sure there is a fair share of back door dealings, behind the scenes campaigns, and much else. Of course, frankly I wouldn’t pretend to know a thing about what it takes to get nominated in the first place. But, as an actor, I would be a fool not to admit that in what we do the Academy Awards is the highest acclaim (and I understand that me and Tom Hanks do not necessarily do the same thing).

The point is that as these Academy Awards approach and I listen to all these opinions about it, I am going to keep Tim Russert’s question in my mind. For in the face of all the negativity and cynicism that is sure to come, I would do well to remember to not to pay too much attention to it. Greatness like that is scary, and even contemplating things like this are scary, which is why cynicism makes it easier. But in the face of all of this let me just say, My name is Joseph Rende-and I want an Academy Award someday.

Listening To:

Saint Simon

The Shins

So Happy New Year everyone. I know it is 4 days late but I feel like I have been hung over for three of those days already so let’s just say that the New Year starts now. Each year is unclear. That’s why people make resolutions. It’s not just because it is the beginning but because time is so uncertain that people feel better when they can have some focus to their year, some goal, some promise of betterment.

For myself I wish that New Year’s Eve was like the Real World. When I was a kid I was addicted to the MTV show and at the end of the first episode they would always show a little teaser about what the season was going to be. It would start out, “this season on the Real World.” There would be clips of the different castmates fighting, kissing, throwing up, arguing and so forth to get you excited to watch the rest of the season. I, of course, would  always think what led them to do that? Why are these two fighting? Who’s that girl kissing? etc. I guess it was clips of people acting out of control-which is what the Real World is anyways.

The point is, I wish on New Years Day when I was asleep I could have a dream where I could have my own clip of that in my own life. It would say, “This year in 2011″ and really I would be alright with any type of clip. Me getting punched in a bar, falling out of a taxi cab, kissing someone, throwing up, going to a wedding, going to a funeral-whatever. It wouldn’t necessarily even have to be good, just as long as I knew what was coming and I knew it was at least going to be entertaining. I’ve never really considered myself a control freak or anything like that and maybe this is a superficial wish in terms of wishes, I just think it would be a little more reassuring because last year for the most part was great-but also one of the longest.

HOW SOON IS NOW?

Listening To:

Janice Whaley

So I went into work yesterday afternoon and after a few minutes my boss asks me how am I doing today. Now yesterday was Friday and I had just came into work on a Friday afternoon, while mot people were getting off of work and preparing for the night, I was also a bit on edge due to the fact that  I was waiting to hear from a girl I had a date with the earlier in the week. So in light of all this after I accurately surveyed where I thought I was mentally and spiritually in the moment I responded to my boss that I was, ” Hanging in there.”

Apparently this response seem to strike a chord with him because he proceeded to explain to me that was not the right response. He explained that people were currently in hospital beds sick, in-firmed and preparing for death and that it was them who were actually “hanging in there.” I was actually doing quite well. Seeking of course not to anger him more, and continue to hang on toe my job, I smartly capitulated and reformed my response saying that was true and in fact I was doing great. The line of rationale that my boss was using was relativism and I have come to learn that this philosophy is not wholly good.

Relativism is good for what it affirms but bad for what it denies and in that it is only half true and doesn’t in fact really succeed as a philosophy. When applied to this situation it’s true that my day was probably going better than someone who was in a hospital bed facing death, but that does not mean that I was having a particularly great day.  In fact, what it did was actually minimize my feelings, discarding them with some hocus pocus hypothetical so as to silence me. This is what relativism often does and how it is often used-to discard, to quiet, to shrink.

In the end it is of course more valuable to understand, empathize and resolve but relativism can never be a process to this end. In a way it is the enemy of empathy because it is said in the spirit of elitism and condescension. I know more than you so stop complaining, your situation is better than this situation. Bullocks!

I admit that I will not always succeed in this endeavor but I will try to use less of this kind of talk in my life as well as be a little more careful about my words; and I will start this weekend.