the point is: clean up your side of the street

I love RyRy so much–as a friend and as a communicator — thank you Ryan for letting me appear on your show.  I am better for knowing you and so glad you are my friend.  If you are interested in seeing the video that spurred this conversation, click here.

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What do you think?  Did this conversation stir up anything for you? Leave your comments below.

learning curve

Hi.  I did this video blog a couple weeks ago and it has taken me a bit to post it.  It’s such a topic close to my heart that I wanted to make sure it was just right before I shared it with you.  If I am anything, I must be honest, both with my successes and my failures, my strengths and my growth edges.  I am human.  This is just the first reflection of several.

Yes, I did Katy Perry’s Birthday Party as “dwarf entertainment”–with Taylor Swift, Perez Hilton and Julianne Hough.  I have to be honest.  Please leave me a comment–I would love to know what you think, if you have an idea for something else you want me to talk about, etc.

Eager to journey with you…

~Jen

you have my heart

i hostessed at katy perry’s 25th birthday tonight.  it was a pretty crazy, kaleidoscopic, fun, brightly colored bash.  a regular hollywood soiree.  taylor swift, julianne hough, perez hilton, jonny makeup – lots of famous faces were there.  grateful for a new opportunity to learn and grow – and be reminded of what really matters. the people in my life are what matters, they are my heart and without them i would be lost.  a few names especially come to mind–stacey, arthur, sara m., bonnie, jack, claire, renessa, debbie u., mama dana, johanna, shari, just a few of the people who have known me and know my heart and what i am made of.  a couple of them are new friends, yes, but friends who hold and carry pieces of my core.  hollywood may allure and twinkle, but my own reflection is what i have to live with.  i am reminded of the message i want my life to reflect.  a life loving people–i hope those in my life know how much i love them.  i hope my disposition reflects joy and love to strangers. i am reminded of my family and those who hold powerful stories.  of the children i nannied and mentor and love.  and i am reminded of greater issues.  of greater battles that are being fought.  of kate.

out on a limb here

i have been waiting and waiting for this clip to make it to youtube.  thank you to new friend paolo presta for sending it to me. as weird as it sounds, i get a lot of truth from grey’s anatomy.  god nudgings if you will.  this one hit me like a ton of bricks. without further adieu, let’s just get to the point.  first the clip, then my video response…

love and peace TO ALL!

hello from la la land & emmy wrap up…

…and here’s my fashion wrap-up…

BEST DRESSED kara dioguardi

gosh this was a moment!! k-cheno!

cutest couple…

ooh fierce ginnifer goodwin…

love elisabeth perkins on weeds

actually like this jamie-lynn…

do i like this leighton? not sure?

beautiful from the stomach up…

ugh, olivia wilde…bad…and you were my fav. 2 years in a row!

i like your watch

i think today the reality of moving here set in.  don’t get me wrong, i love l.a. and know for fact, i am supposed to be living here right now.  it’s just if this blog is one thing, it has to be honest, and today i felt really alone.  (i know things will improve and moving across the country is a big deal so no need to say “chin up charlie”…i’m okay :0D)  nothing in particular made me feel this way, except in seattle i can’t run an errand without running into somebody i know.  here, i force myself to make conversation with random passer-by’s at in-n-out.  i started conversation with dorky statements like:

i like your watch…

wait, there’s no red robin’s in the heart of l.a.?

cheesy stuff like that.  but i did meet 2 different pairs of people who both are from seattle–so hey, that’s a start.  my soul is fed by meaningful conversation.  so today, i felt a little alone.

someone special but nameless right now texted me this morning telling me i should do something special for myself.  good idea i thought.  special but CHEAP, because money is pinching me like old ladies.  so i bought a iPhone clear shield for what i thought was a deal–$5–only to find that it has script that you have to look through!  like huge words printed across the screen of the phone.  oh well, i guess it will suffice until i find something else or get annoyed and rip it off.  i’ve seen 2 shattered iPhone’s this week so i thought i should shell out $5 in preventative care rather than $400 in rehabilitative care.  kind of like what our flawed healthcare system should do, right?!

in between waiting for my agent to call me back, i’ve been searching for part-time nanny or preschool gigs…a realistic day job that i love!  i also have been really interested in signing up for giuliana rancic’s hosting class.  but for $500, that will surely have to wait.  but hey, the video looks really cool and i think i’d learn a lot from her.

so don’t get me wrong, i’m not a debby downer (WAH WAHHHH) i’m just being realistic as to the feelings that i’m wading through during this major life change.  i know without a doubt this is where i’m supposed to be.  everyday i wake up thinking about the dreams i dream for myself in this city and hoping i’ll get closer to realizing them.  i’m so grateful to be here and i hope for little people everywhere i can truly make some progress in mainstream media.

’til then i’ll be trying to make new friends at my local in-n-out burger! :)

is this really necessary?

being adopted myself and caring for at least 8 3 year-olds adopted from china, russia and the united states over the past two years, this strikes a serious chord with me. what is the message of this horror movie beyond that adoption is damaging and destructive? one of the tag lines in the film is “it must be hard to love an adopted child as much as your own.” is there any redemption in this film?

face what you fear

They didn’t look away, your friends, they didn’t cringe, not one of them. They didn’t look away, you looked away. You didn’t trust them, you looked away from them.
-Lexie Grey, Grey’s Anatomy 5.18

If this blog isn’t vulnerable, it’s nothing. I’m so rarely vulnerable sometimes I forget what my speaking voice sounds like when I see my emotions seep out. I forget the cracks in my voice. I was going to say, “when I let emotions get the best of me”, but then I realized that is what got me into this problem in the first place. The fact that I so often equate showing emotion in my personal life with weakness. In the audition room, I hear the vulnerability come out that I so often hide from. In the audition room, I can find beauty in the tears.

Most of my life so far was spent trying to prove that being a little person wasn’t a stigma. While I have come to believe that now, the repurcussions of that meant that I tried to convince the world that I was fine, all the time. Every tv interview I gave, it was my sole goal to prove to the audience that I was acceptable and dignified. I have come to realize this flaw in myself and am growing into a person who is much more comfortable letting you see my vulnerability.

Not every day do I love being small. But the days I don’t, I am learning to let people in–to share in it. I looked away from my friends, expecting them to cringe. I blamed them so often–felt they should have seen my struggle–yet I was too closed off to allow them to. I felt that if they saw the days I struggled when boys didn’t see me as more than friend material that they would secretly gloat that they weren’t small. But the fact was, I was connecting all the wrong dots in the wrong order. Half the time, it wasn’t the fact I was small, it was something else. And nobody was gloating. It was my fault, I didn’t let them in. That was the big chip on my shoulder–my inability to be vulnerable. I am slowly chipping away at it and I’m coming to be proud of my imperfections.

just a couple…

…of my personal photographs from the academy awards:

Dress: Custom designed by Emily Tillery at Luly Yang Couture.
Ring: Custom designed by Melanie Lynn at Rings Eclectic.

tears that don’t seem to fade

(Written directly after the Oscars)

I remember when I was a little girl, about 12 years old, I went to the circus in Idaho with my family.  After the circus, somehow I was introduced to a boy, a little person about 19 years old, who was sent away to work in the circus.  How this happened, I really have no idea.  All I know is that he lived and travelled with the show and had no idea that a life outside the circus tents might be possible.  When he found out that my father was a teacher, his eyes lit up and he seemed surprise that such a path might be possible.  What was conveyed to me most specifically was the realization that the world had not changed very significantly from the days little people were side show acts in the “carnivale freakshow”.  While I understand that this was probably a rare encounter, it impressed upon me that my human dignity could only be taken as seriously as I carried myself.  And that certain privileges had been bestowed upon me, an education, that had I remained with my biological parents in Israel, would have never been possible.  A scary encounter but an encounter that planted a mustard seed of hope that sparked a desire to live boldly and fearlessly.

A little over ten years later, I find myself at the Academy Awards.  While not on my own merit, it was certainly a “full circle moment”.  Over the years I’ve heard Oprah talk a lot about dreaming.  Often times, during the course of her specific shows, women will say that their biggest dream was to attend the Oprah Winfrey show.  Oprah will usually smile and say, “you’ve done it honey, now dream a BIGGER dream.”  My experience at the Academy Awards was never exciting to star-gawk or wax poetically about being less than five feet from so-and-so.  While that was random and surreal, that was not the reason I was so weepy at nearly every acceptance speech and moving moment.  (The weepiness has not faded three days later).  My tears come from the fact that the realization of achieving a smaller dream now allows me to have just a little more confidence to dream a bigger dream.  The immense gratitude I feel in even being allowed to experience this makes me abundantly thankful.  I now have just a little more spark inside me to realize my own potential and be able to carry the liferaft and hopefully be able to pull someone else up too.  I have always wanted to be an actress, without it, nothing else in the world makes sense.