Ups and Downs… And a Couple of Middles

First the downs. I will in fact have to file for bankruptcy sometime this year. I need to raise the money to pay for the lawyer first. I’ve been told it costs about $1,700 to file and go through all the stuff to get the kind of protection. As it goes I may not be able to get it. I’m in a gray area— which seems to be a huge factor in my life these days— where I really owe $92,000 in total, but only maybe $15,000 or so could be covered by bankruptcy protection. It might not actually be worth it to file for that amount, but since it will take a while to raise the funds and start the worksheets to get the process going, I’ll have time to see where I’m at.

The big problem will be changing my own spending habits. What’s the point of bankruptcy protection if you’re just going to get into another hole down the road? The biggest problem is that I’m paying out more than I’m taking in. Some of it is necessary (medicine, food, etc), but some of the stuff I is just expenses that is hard to deal with (weekly allowance) and the occasional but expensive surprise costs that can really hurt you (medical costs again, car troubles/car repairs, bills higher than expected). Right now I’m living check to check. I shouldn’t be at this point like this when I make enough money. And I do make enough but only if I never move, never buy anymore clothes and stuff like that. It’s nuts.

Some of the middles. This really should be an up but I’m a little ambivalent about it. My parents are going to lend me some money to pay down the back taxes I owe this year (and sparked the whole bankruptcy process). I asked both my mom and dad for $1,000 each to pay down the money and I would enter a payment schedule to pay down the rest enough to kill it off with next year’s tax refund. Dad agreed to lend it to me, which is great; my mom did something which is why I’m ambivalent about things. She asked me how much I would need to make me feel comfortable about the situation. I’m not comfortable having to borrow money from my parents so that’s kind of a loaded question. She’s going to lend me $2,000 to help pay things down further. It definitely helps and I’ll take it, but I’m just weirded out by it a bit.

Part of me getting back on financial track is having to do whatever OT I can find. It’s not that easy where I’m at, because there’s no set ways to get it. Luckily the last couple of weekends they’ve needed some help a few hours at a time. What’s going to be hard is August. That month has no holidays in it, and it seems people are taking their vacations now or earlier so no guarantee of OT. Very scary and unstable times right now. Sophia’s mom and I have been talking about my needing to work more OT hours. While she’s not happy about it, it means there are some weekends that I can only take Sophia one night. I need to work that much in order to afford my life these days.

The ups. I sent out my full application to the Latino Producer’s Academy yesterday. Actually I sent it out to my producing partner on early Thursday morning, and she hand delivered it on Monday. However there were a few things missing, specifically a clip reel of something I directed. The application was strange about that and a lot of other people were confused, too. I didn’t think I had one (especially one I liked), however I found a short scene I directed for a directing class at BU about 10 years ago. Some of it is cringe-worthy (I realize now I cast it badly), but they needed to see me at work so I sent it in. I made a dub copy and we had until today to get it all in. Turns out they needed two copies of it so I wound up sending the dub and the original just so I can get it there in time. Hopefully this gets me into the Academy in August. I feel I really need to be there to get my career up on the upswing. The only problem would be getting there. The thing with the Academy is they pretty much supply you with the stuff once you get to Tucson, AZ, but you’re responsible to get there yourself. So if I’m successful in getting there, I’m gonna go into a little further debt to fly out there and that’ll be it. I’ve already chopped up two of my cards and will stop paying for ANYTHING by credit card unless an emergency after that.

The Academy is one of several opportunities that I am going for this year. I’ve already submitted an application to the Sundance Writer’s Lab; they’ll let me know if they want me to send them the script by August. The deadline for the ABC/Disney fellowship is coming up—they offer a paid writing gig in LA for one year. I’m applying and hoping for each one to come through so keep the prayers and good thoughts coming. I still have a ton of writing I need to do. Some for the Sundance script, some for other scripts that have a shot at getting sold, some for new ideas I have for web based series. Just have no time to do so.