I’m back in L.A. and faced with some big decisions.   Folks are dangling pretty shiny options in my face and giving me a lot of unasked for advice.  Some have mighty impressive credentials, but it’s hard to know whom to trust.  Luckily, I learned a valuable lesson from Mark the Porno Guy last year…

When I first arrived in L.A. and was actively seeking employment, I did something I’d been warned not to.  I applied for a job as an editor…with a porno company.  Hey, desperate times, as they say.  Besides, I have my own editing system and figured I could work at home from an external hard-drive (I know there’s a dirty joke in there somewhere). So, it seemed harmless enough. In retrospect I realize, however, that I probably oughtn’t have left my website link after my signature.

I got a response back from a man (who would forevermore be known to me as “Mark the porno guy”).  He saw the pictures on my site and decided that perhaps my talents might be put to better use in FRONT of the camera (he clearly hasn’t seen I Spit on Eli Roth).  At any rate, I responded that while I was flattered, I hadn’t any acting aspirations and, instead,  attempted to emphasize my editing history and strong work ethic.

He wrote back with an angry e-mail suggesting I was a “man-hating bitch” and “too jaded for porn.”  Wow.  One month in L.A. and I was already too jaded for porn? That’s gotta be a record.  Or maybe not.

It did, however, prove to be a valuable lesson.  First, I didn’t come to L.A. to work in porn and I’m really glad Mark the porno guy reminded me why.  Second, every choice we make defines us.  I’m a pretty open-minded kind of gal, but this was not something I felt would enrich my resume or my life experience in any valuable way.  I was not likely to learn anything I wanted to learn and it was certainly not how I wanted to spend my time.  Mere survival is not enough in this life.  It’s all gotta count for something.

But after Mark  so righteously halted my illustrious porno career before it even began, I made perhaps an even worse choice.  I took a McJob that barely put a dent in my monthly expenses and I let it suck the soul right out of me.  I used it as an excuse for my creative dry spell, lack of productivity, and my ever-dampening spirits.   If I hadn’t been before, I was certainly “too jaded for porn” after a couple months in McJob purgatory.  They always say, “You are what you eat.”  I’ve learned that, even moreso,  “You are how you live.”

Fortunately, I got fired for the first time in my life (whilst I was sipping a cosmo on the Queen Mary at a horror film fest, no less), which marked the beginning of a new era for me.  I opened my eyes at last and saw what I had become.  Shudder.  It wasn’t a pretty picture.  I determined what it was I wanted in my life and what I absolutely did not.  And I began to make positive changes at once.  Mere days later, London called.  Paige & Hadley’s Prom From Hell (which I co-wrote with partner Circus) had won the Grand Jury award at the London Independent Film Festival, where Death in Charge was also selected to screen. I was to be flown out and put up for the duration of the fest (2 weeks)!  I tacked on an extra week to hang out for the  Sci-Fi London Fest where we would also screen.  I met some people who would become hugely important in my life and my soul began to grow back (thank goodness they do that!)  From that point on it feels like things have just kept improving.  We finished trippin’, Death went wild on the fest circuit and opportunities began presenting themselves right and left.  How far we’ve come in but a mere year.

Now I don’t personally believe that “things happen for a reason,” but I do believe they “happen for a rhythm.”  I find it fascinating how when I’m working my hardest and have the best attitude, suddenly everything else also seems to fall magically into place.  And when I get off track, lower my standards, waste valuable time, it all goes to hell.

So, at a time when I’m meeting with big fancy industry people with sexy track records promising me the world, and also earnest, hardworking indie folks who want to help me  do it my way, I feel grateful for the perspective Mark the Porno guy has offered me.  I am hesitant to believe things simply because they’re what I want to hear, and when in doubt, I find the pro-active choice in which I have the power to get things done myself is usually the better choice.  A lot of folks talk a good game but, in this town in particular, far too many are simply too jaded for porn.

Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart once proclaimed “I can’t define porn, but I know it when I see it.” I myself can’t define somebody who’s “too jaded for porn,” but I think I finally know them when I see them and, the moment I do,  always run the other way.  Thanks, Mark the Porno Guy – you are neither a scholar, nor a gentleman, but you’ve been a valuable mentor.