Make it Happen
Jones
7205 Santa Monica Blvd (Cross Street: Formosa Avenue)
West Hollywood, CA 90046-6718
Price: Pretty Average / No Cover
The Room SM
1325 Santa Monica Blvd
Santa Monica, CA 90404
Price: $5 dollar cover
For me 30dayla is about trying to transform into the person that I want to be. A person who lives his life passionately but still holds true to the values that make him who he is. At the beginning of day 5 I decided my first goal would be to turn LA into a living reminder of what I was trying to do by spraypainting my 30dayla symbol the "!" across town (click here to learn what the "!" means).
At 1 in the morning me an my friend ArtSchool decided to get things moving early by heading over to Jones in West Hollywood. On the way there we took some time to discuss a bigger street art project and a message that I was planning to deliver closer to the end of 30dayla. When we go to the bar itself I was impressed by the setup. I really liked the layout of this bar and the music that was playing (at one point I heard Fugazi on the speakers) but in all honesty I was not completely in the mood to chill at a bar. Although I planned on socializing with the locals I wasn't up to it all. I was more interested in what we had planned next.
Once 2AM came around ArtSchool and I were ready to move out. He had created stencils of the message that he wanted to write across LA and I had my "!". With those in hand we decided to spraypaint the town leaving the images across West Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and Melrose. I have to admit that stuff like getting caught by the cops was not a real worry for me. I was too interested in leaving my mark on LA and creating a reminder for myself of what I need to keep doing for the next 30days and beyond. The mission of the night was to bring the excitement and passion back into the way I lived my life. Hopefully it will stay.
I went to be feeling accomplished and ready for the big street art project that I was planning to take on later this month.
[PICTURES TO COME: BE PATIENT]
The Day Mission
When I originally made my plans for 30dayla day 5 was planned to be an extension of day 4 in which I took a walking tour of what I like to call white LA. Walking the 6 or 7 miles from Palms through Beverlywood, Fairfax, and the otherside of Beverly Hills taking pictures of the things I saw and exploring all the stores and things that interested me along the way. I was starting to feel that the best way to explore LA would be by foot and to let my impulses guide how and where I spent my day. However the day came around and I got off from work late. By the time I got home I had to get ready for a friends Birthday dinner. I was a bit dissapointed that the day did not work exactly how I planned but it wasn't too late to make something out of the night.
That night I made my way with a group of friends to The Room in Santa Monica (I'm sure most of the readers have been there so I'm not going to describe it). It was pretty dead to begin with. As time went on more people began to show up. Things didn't change much for me since I'm pretty lame at bars and clubs, I don’t dance and don't socialize with new people.
While we were at The Room I started having a conversation with a friend of mine there about how we have all these good ideas about how to approach people but rarely put them into action. For me that pretty much describes my life. All these ideas for how I want to change the world around me that never get acted upon. I may as well have never had these ideas to begin with.
In my life I’ve faced little rejection, since I hardly ever act (definately not because Im amazing at everything I do). This is especially true with women, I never take initiative and I never act, I just complain about how things don’t turn out the way I wanted them to. For me what 30dayla is about is moving from ideas to actions in my life as a whole, not just with women. So as we sat there we identified people who appeared to be alone. I found a girl who was sitting alone (I found out later she wasn't actually alone) and decided to move go with my impulses (albeit very slowly) and take a seat next to her and try to engage her in some way. I failed miserably; she seemed to be way more interested in her phone than me. I cant really say I was rejected because I’m not even sure if she even knew why I decided to sit there, more than anything else I was awkward and confusing. To use a basketball analogy, rather than having my shot blocked it was like I took a shoot and realized half way through that I wasn’t holding a ball to begin with. At the end of the day though I didn't really care. It was relieving to know that I could take action fail and it at the end of the day nothing really changes.
It really isn’t about women, for me it’s really time to start putting some bigger ideas into action. I need to make things happen since my life isn’t going to wait.