From Boy Bands to Love Dogs

From Boy Bands to Love Dogs

Hello, everyone!

So, the last few days I was a little MIA. I still cannot reveal complete details, but, basically, I was hired as an actress on a music video for a very famous boy band… perhaps the most famous boy band of the moment, and maybe ever.

This is not really a fair thing to say or assess, because more people have more ways to access technology than back in the Beatles’ day, and, there are more people running around this little blue planet in general! Still, they are MIGHTY popular and really cute.

Those of you among my friends know I’m way more into dark and crafty songwriters in general, but I like a good top 40 venture now and again!

I was hired without being told who the band was. I wasn’t given the location or any details until the night before, and although I actually did have a hunch, I wasn’t sure until I got there and saw the handsome lads in the flesh… Then I knew I was, in fact, working on a video being shot out in the middle of nowhere in Agua Dulce for THE boy band of the moment.

When I arrived, the production crew had me sign a Non Disclosure Agreement and even taped my phone with a special seal as I promised not to take any pictures, nor disclose the name of the band, nor tweet nor instagram… nor… NADA! NOTHING! ZIP! ZILCH! ZERO!

Until… Um, well I don’t have a copy of the NDA so I don’t really know when! But I assume once the video comes out I can tell you who it is. Aw, who’m I kidding! I’m giving plenty of innuendo as it is!

Still... No pictures with me and the darling Harry Styles, I’m sad to say!

Why the secrecy? I really didn’t understand at first except that I know so many television shows, films and videos really need to bank on the SURPRISE of the audience.  Not only that, but they want to TEASE the audience. Hello, burlesque! It’s all about the TEASE far more than the strip! I mean, I know a lot of current pop stars are living in a time and place where the value has been placed on the strip way more than the tease, but really? We gotta tease and entice somehow!

There was another reason, I realized, as the shoot went from day one to day two.

On set there were not only LA Country Sheriffs but also a whole security team monitoring the premises. I talked a lot with everyone on set, and a lot of the security people had special training with the FBI for all kinds of things! (One fellow was telling me all about his “hostage negotiations” training.)

I thought to myself, Geez… are these guys really under that much threat from anti-boy band types? Then I realized… Oh! Actually they are really just making sure the shoot can actually happen!

See, on day two, despite this incredible ban on social media and swearing an oath of secrecy, SOMEHOW, some information was leaked and a bevy of teen and preteen girls showed up at the entrance to the desert park where we were shooting. They waited ALL DAY for a chance to meet these boys!

If the production staff hadn’t taken those precautions, the shoot may not have happened at all! The set would have been swarming with fans.

I have never been the kind of fan that gets so rabid I would wait around all day for the chance to see a glimpse of a band I liked. I don’t even like waiting in line at the grocery store! But I do understand that to those girls, and they were all girls in this instance, these boys represent something about love, and something about glamour, and something about…

Well, I think, something about what Rumi wrote when he wrote in LOVE DOGS that the LONGING IN YOUR HEART (I’m paraphrasing here) is the ANSWER ITSELF…

Say what? Little girls AREN’T wasting their time tearing up at the thought of meeting a beloved boy band member?

No. This is a sacred and divine act, in my book!

Rumi wrote:

"This longing


you express is the return message."



The grief you cry out from


draws you toward union.



Your pure sadness


that wants help


is the secret cup.



Listen to the moan of a dog for its master.


That whining is the connection.



There are love dogs


no one knows the names of.



Give your life


to be one of them.”

…

In the context of modern society, we have to be so careful not to use this unrequited love against ourselves. Many of you know that I spent YEARS in love with love- really- in love with UNREQUITED love. Did it lead to healthy relationships? Oh, hell no! But what DID it lead to, when opened up in the right context of surrender to a higher power? It led to that higher power. And that led me to my heart.

I am therefore grateful to all those relationships that journeyed so foul, for they broke my heart OPEN, until I really did hand everything over to the divine and found my source of health in that surrender.

I got to practice my own longing on the video shoot as well!

See, I was originally hired to play a VERY FEATURED PART in the video, but when I arrived on set, I learned that in fact they wanted me to play a different part that was going to be hardly featured at all. I was so disappointed! I wanted my face being seen in that video with 500 bazillion hits on youtube, damnit!

I really thought long and hard about what to do. If I had known, when being offered the LESSER part that I was actually granted once I arrived on set, that I would be “less featured,” I probably would have said no to the video. But I had said YES, and I keep my commitments. Actors and entertainers are workhorses, really, at the end of the day. Move us here, put us there, we do this, we do that, and then we go rest and eat some hay. Or something.

I don’t like to complain.

And yet, I also want to have boundaries and advance my career.

I was wondering what to do when the main figurehead of the band walked up and introduced himself to me. He shook my hand and said, “thanks so much for helping out! It’s so nice to meet you. Are you okay? Do you need anything?” I smiled and chatted with him for a moment and watched as he continued to shake absolutely every single person’s hand. He hung out with the cast and crew, he brought everyone waters, he was incredibly kind and incredibly generous and all the lads in the band were so thoughtful and grateful to have us there. I thought to myself, this guy, he has incredible humility, and I am blown away. He didn’t have to go out of his way to be so gracious, and it wasn’t an act. He was just… cool. So then I thought to myself, come on, girl. Get over your bad self. Just have fun.

And guess what? I had a blast. I met such wonderful people. I talked with everyone and stopped thinking about myself and my little temper stewing in the land of ego. I danced atop desert rocks, I sang along with the chorus, I smiled at everyone I encountered. And it was fun!

So, the next time you watch a famous boy band’s video on youtube, look for the nutty blonde in the Zebra patterned outfit… if she has a big grin on her face, that’s me, finding God, dancing into the surrender.