Hobbies

Apparently, I'm incapable of having hobbies. If I enjoy something, I tend to pursue it, put my protestant work ethic to the test (despite not being protestant), and suddenly it's a wildly consuming semi-profession.

Don't believe me?

In college, I decided to take a class in dance in order to fulfill my fine arts credit requirement because I always did it during my work in theater, but never really trained. When given the chance to pursue it for a single class my freshman year, it should have taken up exactly 3 periods plus lab. Instead, after the first semester, I was dancing 6 hours a day and became part of the company. And no, I wasn't a dance major. I just spent as much time in rehearsals as I did in my Econ classes.

I tried to pick up dancing again when I was working in New York to get back into shape. I changed my hours in the city, so that I could make classes that I had—nearly every night. Before I left, I was dancing through auditions for everything from commercials to Broadway (which didn't go well, but was still awesome!).

I started dancing in LA, again to stay in shape, and started performing here despite having rehearsals that meant me not getting home until after 11pm—not late for normal people, but I'm up at 5am, so it wasn't the brightest move.

A friend asked me to help out on his film project—I became a producer (while still maintaining my normal day job).

You might have noticed that I enjoy a little show known as "The X-Files". For most people when they enjoy a TV show, I think that means kicking back and watching it regularly. For me it meant doing extra work on the show. For me it meant when the new movie was pending release, I went out to interview fans, editing videos and blog posting. It means I won't go to an event without a camera now because I know I'll want to "report" on the event. It means wanting to work with the people involved—and increasingly finding ways to do that.

I'm into charity work. Now what time I have left on weekends and evenings is spent on upcoming events, auctions, fundraisers, etc. Oh, and we're in the midst of incorporating. So, add another company to my list of "hobbies".

I started writing a blog to quickly deal with an emotional experience so I could process and move on. Three years later, I'm still writing with the very real possibility of turning it into a series and a book.

Maybe it's the control freak in me—I can't just enjoy an experience without it becoming another profession.

All I can say is-- it's a good thing I'm not having sex.