the dream that wasn't

When I first started pointing towards moving to LA I thought I was going to go to the Peter Stark Producer's Program at USC. Which would have worked out okay - $180k in debt notwithstanding - because my buddy had an apartment at 29th and Western, deep in the 'hood (a shallower 'hood than my current 'hood but there are still boards up from the LA Riots of '91), part of a weird, sprawling complex owned by one of his buddies who sometimes showed up on Lost.

The unit I was going to occupy had no windows, but it was huge. Probably 30 feet by 100 feet. One giant open hole, brick walls, total darkness.

That was gonna be my movie club.

I had the projector. I had the speakers. I had the processor. It was going to be a big, righteous hang-out place for all my new student buddies, something with a big screen and a popcorn machine and a soda machine full of beer sold at cost. And I was going to screen a movie or two a week and invite anyone and everyone and that would be my new social group, all the young movers and shakers of hollywood, all our bright futures combined together, and it was going to be awesome.

And then I didn't get into the Stark, and then the apartment went to a friend of the actor, and then I ended up hanging out with the people who would have hired those fresh'n'shiny new Stark graduates and I saved $180k. I lived in a shithole in North Hollywood but drive-bys and gang wars notwithstanding it was an objectively better neighborhood.

But I still want that room. And I still want to do movies. All I need is an excuse.

The birth center has a 55" screen and a 5.1 system. It'll only seat a dozen or so but I have every intention of organizing "new parents" evenings of sports or movies or whatever with little young'uns crashed out in the offices.

Of course, that'll be for them, not for me.