My first screenplay ever. Not my last.

Ok, I’ve decided I want to be a film maker. A movie producer.  A storyteller.  But I don’t have the dough to go to film school right now.  Actually I’m pretty broke.  So I’m reading a book called The Portable Film School: Everything You’d Learn in Film School (Without Ever Going to Class) by D.B. Gilles.  And the very first writing exercise is to:

• Write an Eight-Page Screenplay Where Place Is a Central Character.

He provided the place and situation. I wrote the script.

Place: A Funeral Home

Situation: What if there are two bodies laid out in different viewing rooms at a funeral home? A hot twenty-year old girl’s uncle has died, and so did the aunt of a twenty-year-old guy.  Let’s say that neither kid was especially fond of his or her deceased aunt or uncle.  But their parents make them go to the funeral home to pay their respects.

Not withstanding the success of HBO’s Six Feet Under, If there’s one place in the world that isn’t conducive to romance, it’s a funeral home.  Nobody in his right mind would expect to meet someone under these circumstances.

In this short writing exercise, you’re going to chronicle how these two meet.  Take advantage of the place in every scene.

I’ll post the document file here (since it’s 8 pages.)

Ex1_Cindy&Josh

I’d love to hear your comments.

New Pics Posted On Flickr

Check links on right to find St. Anthony’s Triathlon 2009 Team In Training Pics!

RACE REPORT

I could barely lift my legs to keep going. Soggy shoes and socks were making my feet blister and rub. On that last third of the run, there was a man who was probably in his mid to late 60′s who was cheering from the side of the road in a black wheelchair. He looked frail. He kept rooting and shouting out to us “GO TEAM IN TRAINING!! TWO TIME LEUKEMIA SURVIVOR HERE! I APPRECIATE ALL THE HARD WORK YOU GUYS DO!!” You better believe that I turned up a notch when I witnessed his outburst. That was who we did the fundraising for. That was why I chose to do Team In Training.

And I’m not the only one. Thanks to you and your support and contributions, the Northern Capital Area(NCA) Team In Training(TNT) raise over $242,864.68 just for the St. A’s Triathlon. The whole NCA region has raised over $$817,841.75! In addition to that, just at the St. A’s Triathlon, Team In Training as a whole(U.S. wide) raised over $1.7 million towards the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society!

OK- I’m sorry it’s been more than three weeks from the triathlon and no report. It’s amazing how life fills in the gaps where you previously had things going. Work a big one, but also sleep and other things. So, I told you I was going to participate in the St. Anthony’s Triathlon. Well, it ended up being more of a duathlon -just biking and running. The swim was cancelled due to the fact that the tide was making the water was so wavy that the kayaks and buoys couldn’t stay in place(kayaks to watch out for troubled swimmers, buoys to outline the swim course). I wish it hadn’t so that I could say that I did all three legs, but I was happy because I didn’t want to swim in that salty, wavy water and drink(more like gulp) the sea water.

I’ve made you wait long enough, so here are the results:

Notice that several of the top 25 are from the Washington DC area- we kicked butt!!

Yes, that’s right- 19th out of all(73) male Team In Training participants, 1979 out of over 6200 total racers! The bike was great- steady pace, didn’t overdo it too much. Almost wiped out on a turn that was pretty sharp! I amazed myself on the run- I had no idea was running a sub-9 min. pace. I figured after all the biking it would be at least a 10 min. pace. I was definitely in pain half way through the run portion though, and by mile 4(2/3 mark) my legs were ready to give. Some of the local residents sprayed us with their hoses while we ran through, which was great, but I ended up getting some nasty blisters after running in soggy socks and shoes that didn’t heal for a week! I thought I’d work on my tan while I was on the run, so I took off my tri-top and hung it in the back of my water belt. I lost it on the sprint to the finish line though, but I gave it a real ‘all-out’ effort, and I wasn’t going to stop to go back and pick it up when the finish line was so close(~500 yds).

Here’s a link to some pics that the official race photographer took, I don’t think you can just download the pics off the ‘net without buying them.

So what did I learn through all of this? Doing a triathlon is much like a marathon in the sense that you train for endurance. You don’t go all out the whole time-you go at the pace you can maintain, and then there are times when you sprint, or go all-out. I think it’s a very similar parallel to life, even more so with the fact that you have to juggle three sports, not just one. It is a turtle vs. hare thing. Eventually you get there, but don’t just blindly speed through because you just won’t be able to finish otherwise. Enjoy the scenery. I caught up to a fellow teammate on the run and offered her some water from my fuel belt so she could cool off. I had more than enough to stay hydrated and cool(also what added to the blisters!)

Why did I do it all? Why struggle to have breakthroughs in carrying out my schedule? Why struggle with the fear of the unknown, to battle and develop commitment and determination? Why put enormous strain on my body? I did Team In Training for a few reasons:

1. To get in shape (I lost 20lbs).
2. To push myself beyond what I knew (I had no clue how I was going to raise over $4,200- I’m now at $3870).
3. To meet new people (I met some amazing, wonderful, and not to mention beautiful people – many were beautiful women ).
4. To be part of a greater cause, something bigger than myself (I met teammates who survived non-hodgkins lymphoma. A couple people donated in honor of their family members who had leukemia. The son of my mom’s friend was just diagnosed with leukemia.)

The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and the cause to cure Leukemia, Lymphoma, & Myeloma (although to me I just want to cure all cancers) seemed like a good choice partnered up with all those objectives. Do I have a six pack now, no. But I’m already signed up for my next triathlon here in Washington, DC- the Nation’s Triathlon on Sept. 13, 2009. I’ll be training for another 4 months, with possibly some sprint tris in between. I still am saving for my own bike though, so we’ll see what I can manage to scrounge up. Triathlons are expensive!I’ve already paid the registration, and don’t have to fundraise for it(so you can let your breath out- you know who you are).

I also had a huge shift in my health. Some of you may already know, but my father was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes a couple weeks after I started training in December. Not only has he had amazing breakhroughs in his blood sugar and cholesterol by changing his diet, but I did too and now incorporate much more vegetables, fruits, and plant-based foods in my diet. I considered going vegetarian, even vegan, but I love seafood too much! So it’s more of a pescatarian (fish and plant-based foods) thing. We’ll see how it goes. Right now I’m enjoying it.

Am I a better person? A little bit. Is the world a better place? A little bit. Am I going to keep fighting for both? You bet. I’ll go back to the quote from Lance Armstrong- so overused but so applicable, “Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever.”

Thank you for your contributions, your support, your following. Every dollar counts, especially in this economy. Make it go even further by helping me raise $5,000 and clicking on the button below  to helping save the live(s) of some boy or girl, woman or man who is stricken with blood cancer through no fault of their own.  I thank you. Team In Training & the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society thanks you. My Honored Teammates, Kait and Cris, who both survived different forms of non-hodgkins lymphoma because of LLS, and trained alongside me, thank you.

My Fundraising Webpage

One Week to Liftoff!

A Belated Happy Easter to all, and Happy Belated Passover as well! The past week and a half have been so inspiring! Thank you to everyone who has contributed and supported me and the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society! So a little recap-
This past Monday, I hosted a wine tasting fundraiser at Best Cellars in Clarendon(Arlington, VA). We tasted 5 different wines and had a great time- the winery donated both their time and wine to the cause, and we raised over $200 in the name of fighting cancer!

Also, thanks to your help, I jumped up from $896 two Fridays ago to $2,459! A $1563 jump! And I know there’s more on the way… Thank you. But our job’s not done yet. We’re only half way to $5000, and I need your help! Talk to your friends, invite them to check out this blog, and send them to my fundraising page: http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/anttry09/shoar.

I invite you to take a look at your life. Think about the all the times you took on something so large you didn’t know if you could make it to the finish line. Think of the times where you didn’t. Think of the times you did. Right now, there’s a little boy or girl, or even a full grown man or woman, who has a blood cancer and doesn’t know if they’ll be able to make it. Even when they’ve decided to go through with chemotherapy and/or radiation, to fight the cancer and the spread of it. Fortunately, with the research and progress that the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society has made with these cancers, there is, for the most part, still very positive survival rates(from 60-80% depending on the cancer). However, it’s not 100%. There are still people who will lose the battle, no matter how hard they fight, no matter how hard they try. It’s for them that we fight, we train, we fundraise for.
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This week at our swim practice, we did a full mile swim without stopping(1600 yds). I however arrived a few minutes late, so I’m not sure if I swam the whole 70 laps non-stop without stopping to catch my breath. Today however, I did it! I swam a full 70 laps, 1600 yds, 1 mile, without stopping! I wanted to quit around laps 33-36. I started panicing- not knowing if I was going to make it, but I kept on. And I did it. Now I won’t have the walls to push off of every 25yds, or even at all, the day of the triathlon. But, just knowing that I was able to complete it means that I will have a good shot the day of. Plus, I’ll also be wearing a wetsuit which will keep me more buoyant, and in salt water which also will make me more buoyant. Of course the 1000 other people I’ll be swimming with, on, over, under, and into, will certainly create some resistance, so it’s definitely not pie in the sky.

Training for this triathlon has been life transforming. Just a year ago, back in March, I weighed 210 lbs. I had gone to my doctor for a checkup, and she diagnosed me ‘obese’. I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t think I was Obese. I didn’t feel Obese. I didn’t feel fit either. Throughout the summer and fall I managed to lose about 14-15 lbs. When I began training for the triathlon, I was back up to 196. Last week when I weighed myself, I was down to 176. I feel great. I feel healthy. I had to alter my diet. I had to workout twice a day for weeks on end. and now, in a little more than a week, I will be completing my first triathlon. Yeah. Pretty cool huh?

If you were inspired, moved, or touched at all by anything you saw, read, or felt here, I request that you make a donation to my fundraising page to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. You can help save lives too!

Where I’m At

Hello everyone-

I just want to thank those of you who have been following my progress, updates, and those of you who have actively supported me through donations to my website, and through words of encouragement.

As many of you may have noticed on my fundraising page, I haven’t been making a whole lot of progress towards my $5000 goal until recently. I’m not going to give you any excuses, but I do want to just say what’s been so.

Help me reach my goal of raising $5000 to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society by making a donation to http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/anttry09/shoar .

See, I also have been fighting my own cancer. Cancer of the mind and psyche. At the beginning of this journey, I was inspired but scared. Scared of not meeting my goal. Keeping up with the physical training, although daunting at times, has not been the hard part. No, what has been the hard part is getting past my fear.

It strikes me, however, that cancer victims may face something of the same sort. I have been hiding, denying the fact that I was running out of time to actually do something, anything, about fundraising. I’ve been resisting what there is to do. And in that resisting I’ve been suffering. That suffering lead to denial, which led to being irresponsible. Yes, I have been irresponsible about the task that I set out on.

I set out to be a contribution for the Leukemia & Lymphoma community, to further the chances of finding a cure, to saving lives.

I’m finding it difficult to keep going. And that is because I’ve been harboring this all on my own shoulders. What I haven’t been doing is sharing, or giving the opportunity to contribute to you. My friends, colleagues, family members… my support.

Well I’m asking now, that you take a look for a moment at your own life. Take a look and see if there were ever times when you needed support from your friends or family because you were afraid of what was to come ahead- because you didn’t know what it was.

Right now, there are thousands of people who have been diagnosed with leukemia, myeloma, non-myeloma, lymphoma, or other blood cancers. Some of them are in the same shoes. Where do they go from here?

I don’t want life to be like that. Life should be about spending the time you have on this planet with the ones that you most treasure, or about living your life to the fullest, giving it your best shot. Climbing your own Mt. Everest. I think cancer gets in the way of that.

That’s why I chose this mission. To fight for those who couldn’t see the goal line. To give them the chance to have a life that was worth living. But I can’t do it all on my own. I need your help, your support. They need your support.

Thank you. I will continue my training and my fundraising efforts. For myself, but also for you and for blood cancer.

An Email from a Friend, Fellow Triathlete, and Lymphoma Survivor

I didn’t go into this knowing anyone who was affected with Luekemia or Lymphoma. Since I started, I’ve been hearing their stories and seeing what their battles have been like. Take for instance my Friend Kaitlin Sighinolfi…

As many of you know, this has been a hard week, a week full of tears, reflection and reevaluation. A friend, an inspiration, and a fabulous man lost his battle with cancer on Monday, at the ripe ole age of 26. I met Dan while doing some work with the National Coaliiton for Cancer Survivorship and Team Fight and the Ulman Fund. It is incredibly difficult to hear a friend suffer through their last days while still sprouting words of inspiration, hope and happiness. We will miss Dan but his message and his mission will live on forever in me. Please check out his blog to understand what I mean: http://waegerwillwin.blogspot.com/

Cancer affects too many young people in this world, in our nation. In fact, each year, 70,000 people between the ages of 18-40 are diagnosed with cancer. Currently, more than one in every 900 persons in the United States between the ages of 20 and 45 years of age are survivors of childhood cancer. Cancer is the leading disease killer among 20-39 year-olds.

I am grateful everyday that I had YOU as a support system. That I was able to battle through and beat this HORRIFIC disease. Although I received results that my latest CT scan was CLEAN, I live in constant fear that the disease will return and I will have to find the strength again to fight. One of the reasons I continue to do triathlons with Team in Training (www.teamintraining.org) is not only to prove to friends and family that I am STILL healthy, but because its hard to be fearful of a disease when there are so many people who have joined me in an attempt to find a cure.

If I have learned one thing this week, its that life is far too short to be fearful of what the future might have in store for me. I am determined to live my life one day at a time, and continue to give back to all the cancer advocacy groups who provided me support, knowledge and scarfs during my treatment. As Dan used to say, “life is 10% what happens to you, and 90% how you react to it.”

LOTS OF HUGS, LOVE and GRATITUDE!
Kait

Maybe not a WHOLE practice TRI…

But it was still a challenge! We started out today in our wetsuits at Riley’s Lock in Poolesville MD. Although I was one of the only people who actually thought it would be a cool challenge to swim, the cold water, wind and temperature was something that would not have made it fun. (We’re talking in the 40s at 7:30am). What we did instead was practice our transitions. We started out in our wetsuits, then had to jump out of them and run our bikes to the starting line, and bike 10 miles. From the dismount of the bike, we ran two loops from the transition area to the end of Riley’s Lock Rd, where it intersects with River Rd. It is supposed that distance is close to or around 3 miles. I will check on that and update after the post.

So that’s what was supposed to happen. What actually happened was that I was the last one to start the bike ride. I was quick out of the wetsuit, but as it was cold and windy, I made sure I had enough clothes to keep me warm- running shirt(sleeveless), long-sleeve workout shirt, windbreaker, reflective jersey, tri-shorts, biking pants, socks, road shoes, biking gloves, helmet, and sunglasses. No wonder I was the last one off the line. But health and safety is paramount! Fortunately, down in St. Petersburg it should be quite warmer, so I’ll be able to do without all the long sleeves and layers.

We started on a big hill. It wasn’t fun, but I’m glad that I went to those two spinning classes. Regardless of the back injury which had me laying on the couch for a week instead of working out, I was better accustomed to the quad-killing strengths it took to keep going.

The wind was strong today too. It blew me off the road once and almost a few other times as well. I was glad I had the windbreaker though.

I regained some ranking on the ride due to those hills, and the fact that going down the hills on the other side proved very easy and would accelerate me to speeds up to 32mph! The downside to that speed was that I almost collided into a big van on the sharp turn back onto Riley’s Lock Rd. I was pulling both break pedals and was skidding all over the place! About 5 feet from the van, I was able to gain control again and make the turn. Whew!!! I’m pretty sure I had the team captains at the corner wide-eyed in horror, but all’s well that ends well, as they say.

The run wasn’t so bad- I did pretty well I’d say. It was a slow go nonetheless, as starting into running after biking my feet were numb, and I felt like I was a a struggling pace the entire time. Nothing quite as fast as I can normally run on the treadmill. But hey, I was going and I wasn’t stopping. That’s what counts.

Overall, the whole thing took me about two hours or so. Pretty surprising as we didn’t swim and definitely didn’t do the whole 25 miles or 10K(6.5 miles) of the run. Nonetheless, still a good workout. And after packing up and socializing a little we were out by 11:30am. Not bad.

Well, the deadline for the fundraising is coming up on April 8th. I had thought it was originally April 20th, but apparently they moved it up because of Easter or something. Regardless, if you’ve checked my page lately, you’ll notice that I’m still a long way off. I need your help! If I haven’t met the minimum of $4200, they will charge my credit card the balance. The good news is if I can meet that balance within a month after the triathlon, they will credit me back the money from my credit card.

You can donate online at my page up in the right hand corner, or just click this link. Thanks for your support. Your money is going to a good cause- saving the lives of cancer patients.