A Few Good Men

Recently, a friend of mine bemoaned the fact she was having difficulty finding men to date. She lives in New York City. She's attractive, intelligent and a lot of fun. We were talking about men in general and I mentioned that in addition to my being attracted to men and enjoying romance with same, I relished the friendships I have with men - gay and straight.

The male personality.

My friend's big problem is that literally all of her male friends are gay. I'm not suggesting she dump her gay friends but finding straight men to be friends with, if not date, would lead her in the direction she wants to go. But my friend seems to believe that you can't be friends with a straight male in the same way you can with a gay man.

I disagree. I have several male friends who are gay; I have as many male friends who are straight. Many of my straight male friends have long time girlfriends (and I usually become friends with them as well when they realize I'm not after their guy)so our friendship is based on emotional intimacy only. There have been one or two occasions when the emotional intimacy, at times, bordered on the relationship turning into a romance but both of us had the sense to know the friendship was what was probably going to last and worth keeping unblemished. A physical encounter can change everything and few want to risk ruining a good friendship.

Not every guy I meet and like is someone I'm attracted to or interested in romantically. I believe having male friends is a great joy; they are great to ask "guy" questions of without any strings attached. I've had male friends - straight and gay - 20 years younger than myself, my age and as much as 30 years older. I'm not pretending that strong friendships between a straight woman and man don't sometimes lead to either or both privately wondering what sex would be like with the other.

Yes, I have wondered at times. I'm a healthy, straight woman who enjoys emotional and physical intimacy and the "Let's pretend for a minute" in my personality leads me to speculate. But it usually ends there.

On the practical side, having straight male friends can lead you to being introduced to their friends, the friends of those friends and the possibilities open up where you can meet a guy looking for a girl. You can't lose. You are able to get out there and meet men and, even if a romance does not develop with one, a friendship might. Is that so bad?

A great friendship is another form of love between two people. I am sad that my friend has limited herself so much to what she can and cannot accept in terms of friendships with straight men. That does not always present a problem. It can be quite fulfilling (and helpful) in your romantic liasions; having a guy to act as a sound board is not to be underappreciated!

Open thy mind! Appreciate friendships for the joy they can bring - members of the opposite sex, no matter what their orientation, is definitely worth exploration. I've been very lucky with my friendships. I wish others had the same luck.

It's All About Me, of course

The AP wire ran a story (see below) about a man IBM fired for spending time in an adult chat room on the internet. He is claiming to be a sex addict. And he very well may be. He suffers from emotional illness brought on by memories of his involvement in the Vietman war. Again, I don't doubt that is true.

What people who go online via their company's server do not seem to understand that no matter what innocent intentions they may have, no matter what devastating emotional illness that needs to be addressed, the company is liable for what they do online. If an employee goes on an adult chat room and forgets where s/he is and gets lewd and crude to the point where another chatter complains to the IP, the company can be held liable for that behavior.

If you log onto a chat room and walk away from your desk (as this man did) and another employee, a pedophile, sits down and takes advantage of your screen name to chase little boys or girls online, the company can be held liable.

It's not any different than if you allowed a stranger you sort of knew (which is what most employees are to companies) log onto your computer and it turns out s/he is a pedophile or has a history of cyberstalking. Whatever that person does on the computer is traced back to you. If it turns out the kind stranger is a whack job and racks up a host of violations that can not only shut down your IP but get you arrested, you can then understand what it is companies fear about employees accessing the internet and wanting to control what they do there.

Filters don't always work. Threats of being fired for accessing places you should not go do not stop some employees from venturing where they should not go. It comes down to being vigilant in protecting yourself.

This employee who filed this suit against IBM knew he had a problem but evidently did not choose to seek treatment himself. It's only after being caught all this talk about needing treatment and sympathy comes into play.

He had the cognition to know he was at risk for behavior that could get the company, and himself, into trouble and he continued to engage in the behavior without getting the help needed.

Do I feel sorry for him? No. Should IBM be sued? No.


WHITE PLAINS, New York (AP) -- A man who was fired by IBM for visiting an adult chat room at work is suing the company for $5 million, claiming he is an Internet addict who deserves treatment and sympathy rather than dismissal.

James Pacenza, 58, of Montgomery, says he visits chat rooms to treat traumatic stress incurred in 1969 when he saw his best friend killed during an Army patrol in Vietnam.

In papers filed in federal court in White Plains, Pacenza said the stress caused him to become "a sex addict, and with the development of the Internet, an Internet addict." He claimed protection under the American with Disabilities Act.

His lawyer, Michael Diederich, says Pacenza never visited pornographic sites at work, violated no written IBM rule and did not surf the Internet any more or any differently than other employees. He also says age discrimination contributed to IBM's actions. Pacenza, 55 at the time, had been with the company for 19 years and says he could have retired in a year.

International Business Machines Corp. has asked Judge Stephen Robinson for a summary judgment, saying its policy against surfing sexual Web sites is clear. It also claims Pacenza was told he could lose his job after an incident four months earlier, which Pacenza denies.

"Plaintiff was discharged by IBM because he visited an Internet chat room for a sexual experience during work after he had been previously warned," the company said.

IBM also said sexual behavior disorders are specifically excluded from the ADA and denied any age discrimination.
Study: Some choose Internet over food, sleep

If it goes to trial, the case could affect how employers regulate Internet use that is not work-related, or how Internet overuse is categorized medically. Stanford University issued a nationwide study last year that found that up to 14 percent of computer users reported neglecting work, school, families, food and sleep to use the Internet.

The study's director, Dr. Elias Aboujaoude, said then that he was most concerned about the numbers of people who hid their nonessential Internet use or used the Internet to escape a negative mood, the same way that alcoholics might.

Until he was fired, Pacenza was making $65,000 a year operating a machine at a plant in East Fishkill that makes computer chips.

Several times during the day, machine operators are idle for five to 10 minutes as the tool measures the thickness of silicon wafers.

It was during such down time on May 28, 2003, that Pacenza logged onto a chat room from a computer at his work station.

Diederich says Pacenza had returned that day from visiting the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington and logged onto a site called ChatAvenue and then to an adult chat room.
Looking for 'titillating conversation'

Pacenza, who has a wife and two children, said using the Internet at work was encouraged by IBM and served as "a form of self-medication" for post-traumatic stress disorder. He said he tried to stay away from chat rooms at work, but that day, "I felt I needed the interactive engagement of chat talk to divert my attention from my thoughts of Vietnam and death."

"I was tempting myself to perhaps become involved in some titillating conversation," he said in court papers.

Pacenza said he was called away before he got involved in any online conversation. But he apparently did not log off, and when another worker went to Pacenza's station, he saw some chat entries, including a vulgar reference to a sexual act.

He reported his discovery to his boss, who fired Pacenza the next day.

Pacenza says he would have understood if IBM had disciplined him for taking an unauthorized break, but firing him was too extreme.
Pacenza: Couple who had sex on desk merely transferred

He argues that other workers with worse offenses were disciplined less severely -- including a couple who had sex on a desk and were transferred.

Fred McNeese, a spokesman for Armonk-based IBM, would not comment.

Pacenza claims the company decided on dismissal only after improperly viewing his medical records, including psychiatric treatment, following the incident.

"In IBM management's eyes, plaintiff has an undesirable and self-professed record of psychological disability related to his Vietnam War combat experience," his papers claim.

Diederich says IBM workers who have drug or alcohol problems are placed in programs to help them, and Pacenza should have been offered the same. Instead, he says, Pacenza was told there were no programs for sex addiction or other psychological illnesses. He said Pacenza was also denied an appeal.

Diederich, who said he spent a year in Iraq as an Army lawyer, also argued that "A military combat veteran, if anyone, should be afforded a second chance, the benefit of doubt and afforded reasonable accommodation for combat-related disability."

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Curt Dempster

I can think of little else except Curt since I learned of his passing. It doesn't seem real and I'm sure that's how it is for those who work at EST each day right now.

His influence on my life and work is incalculable. The three years I was around him were great learning experiences. I liked and respected him even in the times I wanted to whop him upside the head about something.

I really want to know what killed him.

The Theater Loses A Champion - Curt Dempster

When I was hired to be Curt Dempster's assistant in 1987, I was warned by several people that he was difficult, exasperating but a genuis when it came to analyzing plays. In the nearly two years I worked as Curt's assistant, he was indeed all those things and more. He was alternately nuturing, annoying, supportive, a stick-in-the-mud, incredibly funny, generous, but always a champion of new work enshewing the New York commercial theater which made hearing new voices almost impossible.

Curt died at home on January 19th. He hanged himself. The news is almost as devastating as trying to imagine what compelled him to make the choice to end his life. As he got older he developed, as everyone does, some health issues. His beloved theater was once again facing some hard times financially. But in knowing Curt and his resolve to have things his way or the highway, he decided he was done. No more.

Three men I met in New York influenced forever the way I thought about the theater, writing, and how to live. One was an actor named Jonathan Frid, another a teacher/actor/playwright Chris Ceraso and then Curt Dempster who looms quite large in my memory and pysche.

Curt Dempster was and will always be one of the most important influences on my life and work. Curt gave aspiring artists a chance to be seen and heard. He was incredibly generous that way. He could be hard if you were not giving it your all but if you were trying to make something work and having trouble, he was nuturing and patient.

He was a genuis at constructing and de-constructing plays. No one else came close. He also told me once how important it was to have a life outside of the theater, to have other interests. Curt had a painful childhood and his sharing memories of that with me allowed me to understand him. Rather than feel sorry for himself and seek out the limelight to prove how worthy he was, he used the limelight to discover great talent. I won't go into the personal things he shared with me about his early life other than to say elements of those negative experiences haunted him and he channeled those feelings into his own plays and work. He made a great effort to be healthy physically and emotionally but he succeeded more in the former than the latter. There was always a sense of deep unhappiness about Curt.

However, Curt could be quite funny - that dry, deadpan delivery was frequently missed by others completely. I loved it. He was not above being self-depreciating.

Ensemble Studio Theater (EST) had some difficult times financially and while I was working there putting on new full stage productions had stopped for a period of time. Nonetheless, we got on staged readings, Octoberfest, and more informal productions to keep the artistic blood flowing. There were humorous moments: some new theater patrons came while a pipe near the lobby had sprung a leak and Curt, complete with that dead serious face, talked to them while stopping the leak with two fingers. Another theater employee and myself were laughing so hard that we had to hide in the bathroom until the hysterics passed.

Curt and I had our moments - both strong-willed people - and we'd go at it when clashing. He fired me three times. I quit about the same number of times as well. When I wasn't fired he would mock-shout at me: "Let's try to remember who supervises who here!" He made fun of himself many times with that dry wit of his. Some articles written about EST included the opinion that Curt looked very "Lincoln-esque." This would inspire staff to post a photo of Lincoln on his office door. He took it in stride. It was a big day for me when Curt told him he respected me very much and that I had an "inherent sense of play structure." I'm still living off that compliment.

He loved rock climbing. One time while chatting with fellow climbers during a climb, he discovered there was an aspiring playwright among them. This playwright handed Curt a script just as they reached the top of their climb. It was one of his favorite stories.

One of my favorite Curt stories involves the parting of one of the theater's producers. Curt and this producer worked well together but their butting of heads was well known. As a parting gift, Curt had a photo of himself put on a T-shirt and gave it to the departing producer. It was so funny.

Curt loved children. The 6,000 some odd plays that have been developed and presented at EST were in their own way his progeny. It is impossible to accurately capture the influence this man has had on the New York theater. Many playwrights and actors owe a large debt of gratitude to him.

Even though I had not seen Curt in a decade, it's hard to believe he is gone. It hurts. It's unbelievable. I loved him. Many people will miss him.

I encourage everyone who reads this blog and believes in support new plays and playwrights to nmake a contribution to the Ensemble Studio Theater in Curt's name. You can read more about the theater and how to make this important donation at Ensemble Studio Theater.

Thank you. I appreciate it very much and I know Curt would.

The Monster in Me

Ever since I can remember, I have loved monster movies. The supernatural elements of Dracula and The Wolfman to the biological miracles of giant spiders, lizards and other assorted bugs and animals. Many kids watched these movies because they enjoyed being creeped out and seeing the special effects. Me too. But I take this one step farther.

I identify with the monsters.

No, I don't stomp over cities or fly off into the night with a dangling human in my jaws. These monsters, for the most part, didn't want to become what they were. What happened to them was beyond their control. If they could have chosen something else, they might have. I believe Dracula is the only supernatural character, as written by Bram Stoker, who gloried in his evil. He didn't wish for anything else. The biological phenomena that became super monsters didn't ask to be into such creatures. They only act on their needs. The Frankenstein monster was brought to life and immediately reviled because he was ugly, part of dead flesh sewn together to make whole an artificial being. But he had feelings. He didn't like being reviled. He wanted to be accepted and loved as all of us do. That didn't happen. He didn't ask to be different.

As a child, I was different from the get-go. I had more energy than most kids (and that's saying something), I had bright red hair and a rather spastic, undisciplined personality. I also had some undiagnosed learning problems as a result of my undiagnosed and unknown at the time ADHD. I did not ask for that. I did not ask for not getting concepts everyone else did in the class. I did not ask for having so much energy and curiosity that I could not contain myself to the point where my calling out in class, impatient at not having my raised hand recognized, being so spastic and energetic it was hard for other kids to like me as being with me for any length of time was exhausting. And to top it off, I had interests most kids my age did not: politics, religion, old movies, and theater.

I never belonged and was never a part of anything growing up: just an appendage to various groups who could participate but never really belong.

I came to believe very early on that I would never have a normal life. Other girls would grow up, having important jobs, get married to nice guys and have kids. Nothing even remotely like that would ever happen to me. I felt that I was so much to handle in terms of energy and curiosity for any guy to want to devote his life to me - it would be too emotionally and physically exhausting. I also had developed a bit of a hard ass cover to mask my very vunerable self.

In spite of having some very good relationships with men as friends and lovers, the above thought is burrowed very deep into my psyche. Some things have improved, certainly. I have learned some control and discipline through my life though not as much as I would like. I still experience times of the very demoralizing inability to process certain kinds of information. When it comes to graphs and charts for example, I can look upon them but nothing processes. It's a major disconnect. Part of my medical problem as a person with ADHD there are certain situations and objects in which I simply cannot process - the neurotransmitters do not connect to areas they need to for me to understand what I am looking at. As one doctor explained, the electrical charges in my brain don't connect the way a normal brain does.

Frankenstein's monster anyone?

Though I have done much for which I am proud and my life time experiences have been amazing and varied, the assault on my self-esteem continues in sometimes unexpected ways. I can understand how a supernatural creature feels - they possess certain superhuman abilities that might be envied, but other aspects of their existence is not what any normal being would want.

But the question has always been for me - would I have been able to accomplish what I have and be the kind of artist and teacher I am if I did not have such obstacles and super energy in my personality? I was described by playwright friend as a "force of nature" which alternately pleased and horrorfied me (depended on which day you asked).

It still depends on which day you ask. The past few days, and weeks, I have felt tired of life and things in general. It will undoubtedly pass as it always does. I read blogs of friends and strangers which help me on occasion with perspective. One friend of mine who lives in New York and is ten years younger than myself writes wonderful blog entries almost every day and in spite of our age difference and his being a guy, we share so many perspectives on life it's scary to me especially since I haven't really had much to do with him in a decade. Scary but reassuring. Blogs and conversations with friends hold me together during these tough times.

In absence of that, I pop in a good monster movie and root for him. I know how he feels.

P.S. A friend of mine, Gary Rhodes, has written a book on actor Bela Lugosi. Gary has an impressive resume as a writer and teacher. Check out his book.

Tarry forth!

Or something like that.

Wow, a month since I posted as if there was nothing to blog about. There's been plenty. We've been kicked out of our apartment (renovating the building) and the lease expires March 31st. I've been writing, preparing class lessons and working at a new part-time gig at a big intellectual property firm in Philly. I love this kind of work as much as I do the creative things I spend the other half of my time doing. Even better, I have an office with a real door that I can close and focus if need be. Or meditate during lunch which I have also done along with a few pilate moves.

There have been other developments as well.

My sudden fascination with dwarf hamsters has continued unabated. I acquired a huge (and I do mean huge) white Syrian hamster someone gave up. He's very friendly but his size makes you think of him as a rat. My newest dwarf hamster is called a Robovorsky and is the smallest hamster in existence. Damn cute.
Robo Hamsters

But that wasn't enough. While on a "rescue" the black kitten I brought home wound up staying as in for good. I initially tried to unload the 5 week kitten on my mother but she was too smart and would not take the bait. So, with us she stays. I will post a photo tomorrow. We need some suspense to take us to the next day, don't we?

And then there is the terrible cold. Our winter has been very mild; little really cold temps to talk about. All that has changed and we have not only been in the single digits but dipped below the 0 mark in wind chills. I hate extremes of any kind. Cold weather makes me want to sleep. I must be part-bear.

Teaching college freshman has been an eye-opener. I can't even articulate yet how much so.

In that case, I will tell you that I saw The Devil Wears Prada via On Demand and laughed out loud through many parts of it. It made me miss those days in New York when I walked the corridors in both entertainment and legal power and prestige - men and women to whom the word "no" was not uttered and could make anything happen. Their business associates and acquitances were similarly famous (some world famous) and wealthy. Fortunately, I did not personally experience the nastiness of the Meryl Streep character but I've witnessed that behavior. I saw first hand Naomi Campbell have a hissy fit over something and start throwing anything that was not nailed down. I never saw her hit anyone but she has - several times - those who work for her. I do not understand (or maybe it's never reported) why one of those struck individuals did not haul off and bitch smack her ass across the room. That is a complete mystery me unless, of course, the bitch smacking was kept out of the press for some reason. Some interns or personal assistants will take any abuse if they think it will get them somewhere in the business afterwards. Apparently, they do not put a premium on self-respect and boundaries that no one can cross.

It's just so important to be "it" or "be there" or "in the know." Not.

I much prefer my more contemplative life now which, oddly enough, allows me to focus more on my creative pursuits and dabble in the legal arts as well. I have started to more towards wellness, practicing a blend of pilate and yoga that allieves more stress than I realized it could. I have gradually changed over my diet, removing this and adding that. Good stuff. I have not felt well for sometime and it's because of my eating habits and being more sedentary than I used to be. Fortunatley, these are all things that I can change.

I love being able to take time out from plotting, planning, thinking and doing and enjoy the critters and rodents I call pets. It brings me down to earth and centers me in ways nothing else has.