Cat in the Hat

Working title for my next screen play: The Day of Many Hats. 

While it would be a cake-walk to use a Mother of three as the central character, the issues I’d explore are more male-centric, hence, my alter ego will star. Again. 

The heroic nature of the protagonist is demonstrably evident in his backstory. To say that he is damaged is a slap in the face to the truly bent. He has lost at love (several times), suffered the ignominy of employment termination, and always seems to buy high and sell low. He is the polar extreme of King Midas. But, and I know you saw this coming, he has a twenty-four carat heart of gold and tries, often to the point of embarrassment, to forget the past, ignore the future and live fully in the present moment. That patch on his ragged left sleeve is indeed his bleeding heart, joined on the right by the portrait proxy of his soul. His fortune lost, his ambition gone, he steadies himself to each individual task as if the fate of the world depends upon it. This microscopic view of life’s meaning provides both a heavenly opportunity for growth as well as a hellacious load of challenge. 

From sunrise to sunset he nerves himself to ceaseless activity. He is truly the superior, however flawed, renaissance man. While the odds (Vegas has it at 2-1) are against him, he keeps the big three of humor, paradox and change at the forefront of his vision, moving forward, sometimes comically naive, sometimes blatantly heroic, towards the light of his truth. Along this noble path he meets a bevy of disbelievers, doubters, devils and dumbshits. 

That is my guy, and this is his story. 

Here are the monkey wrenches, the tools of conflict, he must deftly wield today:

A) He must be a prolific writer, creating magnificent and meaningful prose to inspire millions with a one hour deadline. 

B) He must be a personal trainer, teaching and sharing with others the manufacturing of physical strength and mental toughness.

C) He will be a mentor to adolescents, allowing the action of ‘caught, not taught’ to manifest.

D) He will create new media, combining music, visual arts, spoken word and positive spins on difficult circumstances. 

E) He will act as an unbiased witness to mediate disputes, some major and some minor. 

F) He will act as volunteer custodian, cleaning up after messes made by mindless minions. 

G) He will become a journeyman electrician, finding the damn electrical short in the RV that three others, professionals, could not.

H) He will refuse to allow the gross, evil, disheartening, slimy shit-show political circus ruin his day.

I) He vows to take immediate action in this regard, doing what he can where he is and with what he has.

J) He will ride his bike tonight in the world Famous PowerBarn. 

K) And drink three or four beers afterwords, watching Rachael Maddow, a quarter of UW Husky football, and one episode of Season Three of 24.

He is a man of many hats, some fit better than others.