by Alison Martin | Apr 4, 2020 | Scuffed Stuff |
A Lifetime of “Breaking News” I have a heart condition and my husband and I both work freelance as actors… so, just like many people, during these times I feel fear and worry and dread about both health and finances. I was also raised by two parents who...
by Alison Martin | Mar 5, 2020 | Scuffed Stuff |
It’s been a challenging time… or maybe it’s best to say that I am having a challenging time (less victim, more power that way). Lots of change and surprises for myself and my family… so I’m feeling a lot. Last Friday, my husband and I had an incredibly busy, stressful...
by Alison Martin | Feb 4, 2020 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
The best time to talk to someone is in the car. It’s sort of quiet and the passing scenery takes on a meditative quality and, well, basically you’re trapped. No one is going anywhere so you might as well talk. I knew I had to write this article on our theme of love...
by Alison Martin | Jan 5, 2020 | Scuffed Stuff |
I’m an actor. This job of being an actor has paid my bills for quite some time… that’s how I express my creativity. I’ve been on Broadway, I’ve been in movies, I’ve been in TV shows, and I’ve been in commercials – lots...
by Alison Martin | Dec 7, 2019 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
Gifts. That’s the theme for this month. That’s easy. I love gifts. I love the whole idea of gifts – the giving, the receiving, the shopping, the making. I like surprising people and thinking about their expression when they open something. And I like it when I’m...
by Alison Martin | Nov 5, 2019 | Scuffed Stuff |
In our small Studio City living room, we have two Thanksgiving tables set up – sort of side-by-side like a separated “T”. It is crowded. It is fun. It is loud. You have to suck in your stomach to squeeze around a corner to get to the kitchen for more sweet...
by Alison Martin | Oct 7, 2019 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
“Story… was crucial to our evolution – more so than opposable thumbs.” – Lisa Cron from “Wired For Story”. There is so much noise, so much news that it can all feel overwhelming. We hear it all the time – “I can’t watch it anymore” or “I’ve turned...
by Alison Martin | Sep 5, 2019 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
This was on my street. Just like this. Leaning against a tree. I have lived a “Full” life. I laughed that someone joked about the “Full” size of the mattress (I guess “I have lived a ‘Twin’ life”, although interesting, doesn’t quite work as well). It strikes me, so I...
by Alison Martin | Aug 5, 2019 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
My 18 year old son, Brady, had oral surgery and he left the doctor’s office with a big white bandage around his head (to be honest, he looked a little like the ghost of Marley in A Christmas Carol). I had been anticipating this procedure for awhile now. I kept hoping...
by Alison Martin | Jul 5, 2019 | Scuffed Stuff |
It looked like she was walking on water. I actually had to do a double take to make sure I was seeing her. The LA river (as it is called) NEVER has people walk in it… yet there she was… trudging along… alone. It was weird. My husband and I walk over a small bridge...
by Alison Martin | Jun 11, 2019 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
We had an idea… since mid-June has Father’s Day, Jean & Alison wanted to share about the men in their lives. My Dad As a child, we lived on the eleventh floor in an apartment building in the Bronx. Eleven stories is really high… it’s something like 110...
by Alison Martin | May 3, 2019 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
I have a friend… … who gives me gardenias as a surprise … who makes me laugh till I cry … who always reaches for the check first … who calls me because she knows I have a doctor appointment … who I tell everything to because she never judges … who doesn’t gossip … who...
by Alison Martin | Apr 7, 2019 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
You can almost hear the uncoupling. “Your mother has 3 weeks to live.” You can feel the lift off. “You’re pregnant.” You can sense the profundity. “You didn’t get the job.” At that moment, you know that the path, the journey, the track you are on is changing. It’s...
by Alison Martin | Mar 7, 2019 | Scuffed Stuff |
The car bumps through the country road as I sit holding my toe in the Starbucks napkin. My husband drives. My two kids sit in the backseat looking at a meme or a snapchat or a quick-time or… I don’t know… something that makes them laugh on their phones. Little do they...
by Alison Martin | Feb 8, 2019 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
A friend – a very funny, smart comic – whom I met many years ago when I lived in Boston passed away recently from cancer. I would see him at auditions in LA and we would talk and laugh way past the time we went in the “room”. He was a kind, sweet family...
by Alison Martin | Jan 14, 2019 | Scuffed Stuff |
The Soggy Question.Trust is a funny thing. It seems friendly, open, easy… but really I think it’s a tough cookie. It’s all in or nothing, balls to the wall, get in or you’re out… you either leap or you don’t, you either trust or you don’t… it’s hard news, at least for...
by Alison Martin | Dec 10, 2018 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
The other day I was riding my bike and I was hit by a car. Not badly…but enough that it got my attention. I was holiday shopping and had bags in my bike’s basket. I was crossing the street at a crosswalk at Laurel Canyon Blvd., as the orange walk-hand was...
by Alison Martin | Nov 11, 2018 | Featured, Scuffed Stuff |
Oh God, here again. I sit in the ICU next to my mother. I look at her thin skin and her pale lips and I can’t believe we’re here again. The hospital smells stale and dry and hot. Can’t they open a window? The air has a bad, sick taste. I hear strained breathing from...
by Alison Martin | Oct 9, 2018 | Scuffed Stuff |
I’m grateful that the wisdom of the past can resonate and reach us where we stand. It’s June 1965. There is a lot going on in our culture. In New York, at the Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University – a strong-willed 56 year-old woman named Helen...
by Alison Martin | Sep 9, 2018 | Scuffed Stuff |
IT is…… simple… tender… the image of a tree against the sky through my sunroof while stuck on the 405 freeway… the single tear that rolls down my cheek when my meditation goes deep… my dear friend’s kitten’s toes…...
