Saturday, September 1, 2012

Paying Attention

Long Story Short: I'm in NYC, Brooklyn to be exact, and my film is on it's way to the duplicator. 
Long Story:  I did something really stupid; it just goes to show how important "paying attention" aka “mindfulness” is.  Not paying attention costs a lot. 
I thought the film was finished at 1:30 am on the morning of my flight to NYC.  I gave the DVD master to Nik so he could overnight the film to El-Man Productions (who has replicated my films and CDs since 2004.)  I took one copy with me on the plane. 
So, I arrived in NYC (after one substantially delayed flight - about 16 hours of travel and airport time) and discovered the next day that there were major problems with the sound.   It was partly the rush and partly the encode process exaggerating my mistakes in sound levels and balance.  "I hate it! It can't go out like this!" I shrieked.   I sent an urgent message to Elman to stop the presses.
I had to do a complete sound remix of the entire film, and re-encode, and re-author, which meant another night without sleep   
So the really stupid part is that at the end of that long day, I went to the corner shop to get a gallon of water.  As I left the shop, I was looking at the water bottle, not the sidewalk, trying to figure out how to hold it, at which point the little 2” ledge was not observed.  I heard bones crack, and suddenly. ... Big ouch,  hobbling around, hopping ouch!  And when I got upstairs, crawling seemed to work much better than trying to walk.   I couldn’t put any weight on the foot without pain. 
Two days later, I am looking back at my moments of non-attention, and lessons to be learned.  Even though it hurt to distraction, and I could not walk on my foot, now it seems mostly healed.  This was after using ice packs, an oil called Balsam Fir, and me telling the foot “Heal NOW!” over and over, while breathing and tapping.    I’ve broken my foot twice -  “ballerina” hairline fractures --  in approximately the same place, and it felt a lot like that.  Nik sez the twist & fall probably just snapped a bunch of cartilage temporarily out of place. It was definitely seriously traumatized.    I’m just feeling relieved and thinking this was a miracle because right now, I’m not crawling to the fridge for ice, and I can walk -- not skipping just yet.  
So here’s to mindfulness, paying attention in advance or it will cost you in arrears.   
The cost:  $45.00 to send the corrected version via UPS (they deliver on Saturday), loss of sleep, and a few stressful moments.  I think I’m lucky!
Me, bleary eyed and weary, having just completed the rework of the film “9/11 Dust:  A Healing Journey”   Such lovely red indoor light, late in the night. This shows about the way I really felt.  So done
.