Hi,
I paid for my "donation" copy of the other side of the glass add on to the trailer. When will I receive my copy? Please contact me promptly! Paypal completed on 2/10/09 and I haven't heard a word. Wonder if I can reverse it?
I am glad I got that this week and not last week.
I am in the midst of a last minute scramble to finish up what I can here in Phoenix as I am leaving Friday for a grueling 3 day trip (1200 miles and 3-4 interviews) to finish up filming. I will arrive in northern CA to work with my editing teacher on Monday after a long trip and interviews.
This note was a good reason to stop and take time to update visitors and followers of the film about my progress. It's been on my "to-do" list.
I am experiencing a computer challenge as I prepare to meet with my editing teacher in what was to be "polishing" of Part One. It will not be as ready as I planned. However, as is the nature of this amazing film that has a life of it's own, amazing things have emerged, much like it did in September in my trip to the east coast.
But the good news is plentiful: Part one finally has a name, His Moment ... of Awe. I recently completed the DVD label and cover design knowing it will be adjusted as the film itself completes. I also connected with the person who is, as we speak, doing original music for this part. A major birth photographer is lending her photos. Everything takes a lot of time. Someone in Italy emailed me about translating the trailer. I spent three days on transcribing it in detail -- finally, crossing that off the list. I have someone to do Portuguese and Spanish and looking for French. All of these people are donating their piece to this part one. It is such a blessing. I intend for sales of Part One to fund paying them to finish their part in the completion of the film (two other parts).
For those of you who are waiting so patiently, some of you since you donated in September and October, I wish to thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for your patience and support. I have tried to keep you updated via email but have not done such a good job here.
Last week I sort of hit a wall ... I was (and am) so tired as I continue to do this as a one-woman team. Actually, as I learned to do in Trance Dance (check it out!) I danced along the proverbial "brick wall" examining and experiencing it. I have been aware since September's visit in SC with unassisted couples, that I am doing this film as if I were birthing my "baby" unassisted. It is also, above all else, a film to honor my grandson, Andrew; my daughter, Erin; my son-in-law, Osama, and my older grandson, Adam. They are the hospital birth family. I am the Grandma. My younger daughter, with me on this production, was the videographer.
I have much support -- emotional, spiritual, and physical -- from around the world, but only these donations are the financial support. I had an internal tantrum, threatening to just quit, knowing that I can't, knowing I was just being like my three-year old grandson, Andrew, where I am living in Phoenix. I am just showing my frustration, independence, exhaustion, and determination. I am blessed and grateful for the opportunity to do this film as I am in awe of the message that has emerged and how important it is.
But seriously, honestly, I have been frustrated with the lack of financial resources and the obstacles. And, while 99% of the time I am in awe of my accomplishment and the spiritual journey in this process, I am always in need of financial assistance. Aren't we all? The trailer was to be fundraiser trailer; to procure big funding, to hire experts and professionals, but I found that I was to do the work. Like an UC birther. So, since it's my baby, I am not sure how to ask for support for this film, except through offering a copy of the completed Part one when it is done. Like a homebirth/UC mother I know it is my baby and I need support, education, resources, and those who are more qualified than me to help. Me, personally, I don't want to borrow and owe people, and I want the energy of the film and funding to be reciprocal. Hence, the donation now, in exchange for the "First Edition, Fundraiser Edition" that I fantasize becomes a "collector item."
I have big expenses coming up -- paying my editing colleague for assistance with the editing ($500), travel to DC in March ($500) and professional burning of the final product in late March or early April ($500). This is what sent me into a "little tizzy tantrum" with God, the universe, Whoever. I don't know where the money will come from and this is nothing new, but I am at the end of the birth, in transition, where the great amount of energy is needed to birth this amazing baby. I am tired. And, the journey makes me so grateful. I bought myself a new $6 bra and a pair of $20 pants last week -- my first in two years. Everything goes to my daughter and to the film.
I have been blessed with "in-kind" donations to make this film happen. One year, rent-free, in a wonderful duplex in MO, "home" while I zig zagged across the country for six months, and while I spent six months working 50 hours a week, learning the editing software and editing programs for community access television station. My ten-year old grandson sat with me last night watching me transcribe video (I let him listen to Sarah Buckley in reverse and had him convinced that I was translating from a foreign language!) and he asked, "Granny, who pays you your pay check?" I answered, "I don't get a pay check.... but people are donating money so they can get a copy of the film, and later, a lot of people will be buying the film."
Beyond the financial situation and the yearning to get back to working with babies and families, is the passion to just get this information out to the public -- the wonder at how amazing the information is, how it can contribute to transforming birth in our society and to transforming humanity. Being in my grandson's presence (and his brother's, Andrew, in the film) I am blessed.
Baby Andrew is an amazing soul who came to give us this information. Sometimes he and I just gaze into each other's eyes and I melt into the universe in a moment of bliss. I had one of the moments in the car taking him to his other grandma's house. We were making eye contact in the rear view mirror. The music on the radio, which ironically, I can't even recall, heightened "the moment of awe" (hint, hint) with him and I was transported in a moment of bliss. I cried. The film is for Andrew ... and all of our babies.
Sooooo, a musical fundraiser planned in MO isn't happening this month. Rather than be in a tizzy, last week I started to develop a format to do a "Fundraising Party" based on my producer-friend's "how to" book, but I just don't have time to add that job to my current work load -- of finishing (birthing) Part One. I am still working totally alone. If someone would like to take on that role, to set up a format, contact people, network on Facebook, I could help and hand it over. I wanted to ask people to have a little party in their community and show the trailer and take donations for a first edition, fundraiser edition of Part One.
Part One is really designed for doulas, childbirth educators, midwives, and women to give to their men, and other than child support and "in-kind donations, is my only resource for funding my living expenses while I complete the rest of the film. This fundraiser edition will include the Intro (expanded trailer) and Part One: His Moment ... of Awe. Part Two is not yet named but looks at men's experience of transformation when they have experienced a powerful woman who trusts and knows her body works ... and births powerfully. Part Three will get into the world of pre and perinatal psychology, the wounding of men since their own birth, the healing of birth experiences, and impact of empowered birth on humanity.
So, taking this time and opportunity to update folks, I want to ask for your financial support by donating at least $15 in exchange for a first edition fundraiser edition copy of Part One, and to consider showing the trailer at a house party and collecting other donations. If someone one wants to create and manage fundraising, please let me know.
Also on my wish list is an RV as I plan to travel to do extensive interviews of the OB's in Part One, amazing people doing science-based, mother-baby focused obstetrics for the next project.
So, here's my response to the note:
Dear ______,The film is in production, as is indicated in the blog.
I am doing this film as a one-woman team. I am still filming .. completing filming for Part One this weekend as I travel from Phoenix to San Diego to Los Angeles, and then to Nevada City, CA with the plans to finish Part one, then travel to Washington DC in a car with 200,800 miles on it to screen it to a group, to film a birth for part one, and to then wrap it up and get it professionally burned. I travel in prayer, I tell you. I am doing every single bit of it -- including thank you's for donations, which I had not yet gotten done for you. THANK YOU.
People who donated in October and beyond are also still waiting, and I am so appreciative of their interest, support, and patience. I don't think people realize how precious and important that $15 is and how far it goes and what it means to me and the film. I am often waiting, as I was this week, for child support to come in to do this next leg of the trip. I do not have credit cards and this film, unlike many, will be done without "debt". This months allocation (child support) will not get me to DC, and I have no idea at this moment how I will pay for the trip to DC. I am leaving Phoenix where I have been living with my daughter and family (grandson!) having given up my home a year ago -- to do this film. It is a place where I can work on very tedious aspects of the film. I have been traveling off and on for over a year now .... with a 15 year old, a dog and a cat ..
This film is an act and labor of love -- baby Andrew is my grandson and Erin is my daughter. The donations are the only funding I have other than child support and acts of kindness -- lodging, meals, etc. I feel I am in late stage and transitional labor. I hope you can appreciate the process and bear with me ... I am laboring heavily now and birthing this baby very soon. Like every birth, this film has it's own timing and process. Like a woman in labor, all I can do it go with the present contraction.
I appreciate your support more than words can say.
L. Janel Martin Miranda, M.A.BabyKeeper Baby Doula/CranioSacral based Birth Trauma and Attachment Therapist/Birth Videographer
573-424-0997
www.theothersideoftheglassthefilm.blogspot.com
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