the tale of the darko continues…

well, i’m not picking up exactly where i left off. there is much more to talk about in regards to the work and counter work that Gurumayi and Clive Barker did inside of me. but for right now i have an important new discovery to share with you.

the name “darko” actually comes from a character in a movie named “Donnie Darko”. i felt a strong sense of identity with this character a few years ago when i was in a particularly “dark” stage of my emotional progress through the turmoils thrust upon me during my bipolar/depressive breakdown years. Donnie was this young man that was suffering from schizophrenia and was wrestling to come to terms with matters of sanity and life/death/love in his life. it was easy for me to latch onto this character as a moniker for my own spiritual turmoil. plus, it was a really hip movie with a really hip cast.

the cast, oh yeah… a couple of kids by the surname of Gyllenhaal starred in it. Maggie and Jake Gyllenhaal, to be exact. Jake was Donnie and Maggie was his sister. Just like in real life. Well what happens but a few days ago I was logged into geni.com, the website where I do all of my genealogical research and I see that they have Jake Gyllenhaal featured as a key member, and with a click of a button, people could see if they were related to him or not. This is what is so fantastic about geni.com, the computing power it has to go through the social network style connections you have with all the other people that have entered their family tree information in the site.

so low and behold, what happens? a few minutes later the results screen appears (which sometimes says, “sorry, you are not related to …”) and it tells me that Jake Gyllenhaal is my 20th cousin, once removed on my father’s side of the family. yeah. i just kind of sat there, real quiet, till the waves of wonder settled down over me. it’s a freaking small world and we are all connected to each other in so many more ways than we can possibly ever realize.

so now i have to really get on the ball about finishing this story about my path of darkness and also get a letter off to Mr. Gyllenhaal to tell him about my association with his character.

other news; my L.A. trip later this month is building momentum. i woman that i went to high school with, Dori Zuckerman is a casting director in Hollywood. found her through Facebook and got chatting recently. i asked her if she could help me get in contact with a couple of actresses that i am interested in photographing for my Cemetery Girls project. turns out that the two actresses i’m interested in, she actually knows and told me to do two things.

one is Juliet Landau, the actress that portrayed the character Drusilla in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. i’ve made my own contact with Juliet through my model booking site, but she’s been lackluster in responses about working with me. Dori told me to write to her through Facebook and tell her that I went to high school with her and that she vouches for me! did that yesterday. waiting for a reply.

and the other actress is Amber Benson, who played the role of Tara in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Dori said that Amber used to live up the street from her and that she was going to see her agent this morning. that i needed to write a letter for
Amber and that she’d give it to her this morning! so i did that last night before bed and am waiting to hear the results of that.

i won’t be able to shoot these girls on this trip in June because this trip is already fully booked. in fact, i’m trying to squeeze one more thing into this trip. i found out where Frank Zappa’s widow, Gail lives. She lives in Frank’s old house in the Hollywood Hills where he recorded all of his music from 1980 on. I’m going to write her a letter asking if I could come by the house and take some documentary style photographs. Thinking that since I’m not a professional/magazine photographer, maybe I’ll stand a chance.

healthwise, i’m feeling pretty good these days. have lost about 10 pounds in the last fortnight, have started doing yoga again and am also meditating. om yeah!