help, I'm at jury duty thinking about AI again

Greetings, readers, on this bright and beautiful Monday. Or I assume it’s bright and beautiful, for I am writing to you from the 9th floor of the Stanley Mosk Superior Court of Los Angeles. Yes, the gods of civic duty have lovingly blessed me with jury duty this week. I somehow skirted the responsibility for the last 16 years of living in LA, but, to quote the timeless words of Ginger Minj, they got me gal.

And, as you may have expected, it’s been adrenaline-pinching stuff. So far today the main thing that’s happened is being moved continuously from a room to another room, sometimes a hallway. We started in the juror room, then got sent up to the hallway outside the courtroom, then we went in the courtroom, then we got dismissed to lunch, then back to the hallway, now back in the juror room– and literally nothing has happened in that time. All in all, being on jury duty seems to be an exercise in abiding by the tacit laws of society– which is to say I’m asked to sit quietly and not make a fuss and just Be Normal, a thing I get overly preoccupied with when I realize I’m in one of these situations. As soon as I realize I’m expected to exist regularly– like just sit in a chair until instructed to do otherwise– a sense of panic washes over me and I begin to worry that I’m going to lose control of my body. Since it wouldn’t be acceptable to, say, start shrieking and doing the cha cha slide in the middle of the courtroom, the fear that for some reason I’m going to suddenly start doing that becomes overwhelming. It’s very strange. The last time I had this type of anxiety was a couple months ago at a table read for a movie produced by some friends of mine. I was asked to attend and give notes on the script, which meant quietly sitting and listening to the actors read the screenplay and generally abiding by the implicit rules of normalcy by not, I guess, getting up and walking out, or loudly booing the lackadaisical performance of A-list actress’ sat mere feet from me, or losing control of my limbs and suckerpunching the nice man sat next to me. I understand I cannot do these things, but why not? I have free will, don’t I? Why do I only become concerned with exercising it when I’m in a room where I just need to be fucking chill for a few hours?

I once had a therapist who put me onto a book called Living In The Light by Shakti Gawain, both the title and author of which are exactly how they sound. The book is woo-woo adjacent; all about learning to hear and then trust your inner intuition, this boundless source of knowledge that can guide us through life if we can succeed in tuning out all the noise and tap into it. There’s a lot I didn’t love in that book, but one thing that’s stuck with me for however many years since I read it is this concept of The Rebel and the Tyrant. Gawain proposes that each of us has a rebel and a tyrant living inside of us that are constantly at war. This struck a note with me, particularly about my eating habits. When I’m “being good,” eating healthy, not overindulging, and exercising regularly, the Tyrant is in charge. The Tyrant wants what’s best for you and knows the answers– it is rigid and demands conformity to the rules above all. Tyrant’s a fuckin asshole basically. The Rebel is the other voice in you that defies the rules of the Tyrant, sometimes in chaotic and destructive ways. Life can feel like a constant push-pull between your Tyrant running the show and your Rebel breaking through. In regards to dieting, which– knock on wood– I feel like I may finally be out from under the culture of, so much of my precious brain capacity has been consumed by my Tyrant telling me what I had to do– 1600 calories a day, 10,000 steps– and then the Rebel chiming in with “who the fuck said I have to do that? I’ll show her” and then going to McDonald’s for dinner because technically I am allowed and no one, not even me, can tell me what to do.

goated cover design though

I feel the rebel and tyrant dynamic resurfacing here today as I’m starting to realize I haven’t been in many situations lately that force me to be any one way. In my cushy and unemployed writer life, I walk to get coffee in the morning, then I come home and write or do whatever, then I go on a walk later to buy a soda or maybe it’s just a walk to walk. Sometimes I go to pilates. Sometimes I meet up with friends in the evening. Sometimes I don’t. But I live most of my life within a tight 3-mile or so radius and I see the same people. One act of civic duty is enough to send me into an all-out panic attack, just because I theoretically am in less control here than in my normal life. Even that’s not really true, like I could stand up now and walk out and go to my car and drive home, and probably the worst thing that would happen is maybe a couple people would be like “hello?” as I exited and, maybe in a week or two, I’d be summoned to show up for jury duty again. But I am not going to, because I am a normal woman and a citizen of America.

And after all, writers write, or so I’ve heard. Lately I’ve been hyper aware of the fact that I’ve had very few new experiences to write about. I have to jostle myself out of my cocoon and shove myself into the world. In this way, jury duty could be the biggest blessing I’ve ever had the fortune of receiving! Inspiration cascades over me here in this air conditioned room that everyone’s pissed off they have to be in. Yes? Yes???

I’ve been working on a list of all the things that have helped me become a better writer that aren’t AI, and I am starting to think I should add Being at Jury Duty to it. In fact, being anywhere you normally aren’t is huge. Because I could ask Claude or whoever to “give me a list of funny things that could happen in a courtroom during cross examination about tenants rights,” or, I could sit my unlitigious ass down and listen for once. Let my little brain run away with possibilities. Being staunchly anti-AI has indeed become my leading Cause, the thing I’ll go on a heated diatribe about as I watch my friends’ eyes slowly glaze over… but to be fair to ME and how annoying I am, it’s only getting worse. AI joins the conversation more and more every day. A major novel release has been canceled due to accusations the author used AI for the first time– I was absolutely transfixed by a nearly 3 hour youtube video detailing the AI suspicions a couple months ago and completely agree with that assessment. I can’t make a doctor’s appointment with a real person anymore. The fucking Pentagon is using it to kill children, for god’s sake. It’s on billboards, it’s in commercials. My gmail is using AI to summarize an email that says “let’s have lunch soon!” and inform me that, yes, in fact, my friend would like to have lunch soon. AI is everywhere and it fucking sucks and my corner of the world, TV and movie writing, is naturally wrapped up in it. I’ve heard from peers that ChatGPT is now frequently used in writers rooms. Lines are being drawn between the writers who openly embrace it and those who refuse. Some of your favorite showrunners? Whose work you love and respect? Unabashedly using ChatGPT regularly to write dialogue or ideate or do the “grunt work” involved in TV writing like outlining and making pitch documents. I read a post on this very website about a fellow tv writer proudly announcing her use of AI LLMs. She was aware of all the reasons we say it’s bad, like the environmental implications and the plagiarism and the positive feedback loop and she said: don’t care! Using it anyway! It seems because she is a mom and has been writing for a long time, she’s allowed to cut corners and allow AI to do the extra work, so she can get out all her many dozens of pitches per year and reinforce her place in this industry and say yes I’m a writer but I also do business– I’m adapting. Eat or be eaten, she says. Hmm. Ok.

So, fuck that, right? But of course I’m no stranger to writing being extremely hard and annoying and wanting to do anything besides that. People on my side of the battlefield tend to think this vilification of our occupation isn’t something to overcome, but something to accept and work with. Yes, writing sucks. Most jobs suck. Most things that are worth it suck. We’re all just out here choosing which type of suck we’re willing to endure. Life is suck. I understand the temptation to alleviate some of that pain and suffering to a machine is tempting… but don’t do it. If you’re an artist of any kind, you know that the work is the reward. The slogging and suffering is what makes the breakthroughs beautiful and shiny and transcendent. Anais Nin said, “we write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect.” She didn’t say “I asked ChatGPT what life tastes like and it said ‘lightly sweet, crunchy, and slightly nutty or oaty flavor, with a subtle cinnamon hint’ because it thought I was talking about the cereal.”

Without further ado, here’s some of my list of things that have helped me become a better writer that I’d recommend trying instead of the environment-destroying, world-war-enabling, job-taking, water-guzzling and completely stupefying tech that yes– is going to start charging you soon.

Tape your conversations

I’m starting with one of the stranger ones, but it’s awesome I swear. Tape a conversation with your friends using the audio record function on your phone. With consent of course, if that’s your thing, which it should be. Press record and set your phone down and continue the hang as normal. Later, play the audio back and write it all down in script format. This helps tremendously for learning to write dialogue that flows. I find people speak in half sentences way more than I assumed, and our brains kind of fill in the blanks when we’re in regular conversation with people. If writing naturalistic dialogue is your thing, try this. There’s so many nuances to uncover!

Transcribe your favorite TV shows and movies

A stepping stone to this if you feel too weird to ask your friends if you can record a particularly juicy and/or life-ruining-if-it-got-out conversation is to throw on one of your favorite movies or tv shows and transcribe it back into script form. Have fun with action lines, deciding when or when not to include parentheticals like “(annoyed)” or “(sarcastic).” Decide if you want to spell things phonetically. How to add in interjections or stuttering during dialogue. All of this helps. You’re doing the action– let the inspiration follow!

Read. Just read

Obviously. But what should you read? You can start by googling for PDFs of your favorite movies. This is my go-to when I feel a little uninspired and like I want to throw my laptop into a pond. Even the best movie you’ve ever seen– the ones you can’t believe somehow made it to your screen– started with a bunch of words on paper. Yes, I sound like that guy in that opening sequence at AMC theaters right now (“it all starts with a script”) but, yeah, it all starts with a script. I can’t tell you how it felt the first time I wrote a bunch of dumbass sentences in a document then watched actors saying those lines like they were real… on a set… with a bunch of other people there in agreement that those were the words to be said and filmed and edited and released. When you haven’t had that experience for a while or maybe even ever, it can feel extremely futile to keep tippy typing away. It can feel like delusion. Read other scripts. Those writers probably felt a lot like you do. Seeing it in front of you on the page helps, I think.

You can read pilots– ones that have been made and ones that haven’t. I used to fear this. I worried that looking directly at the sheer number of work out there, thousands and thousands of made and unmade pilots, would overwhelm me and make me feel like “who do I think I am, trying to say I’m unique and deserve a spot in this landscape?” Surely any idea I’ve had has been had before and will be had again. Eventually I had to flip this narrative for myself because it is, of course, damaging. Super unhelpful. I learned to accept that there are maximum maybe… 6? Ideas? Unique ideas? Total. There are 6 of them and every single piece of art you’ve ever seen is a person’s take on that idea. Everything’s been done, everything will be redone. Join the soup, the broth is fine.

Help your friends

Dammit, it’s all about helping your friends. I used to fear this even more than I feared reading strangers’ pilots. I worried too much that reading the work of my peers would send me into a spiral of worthlessness. That my veins would course with jealousy upon reading a funny line my friend wrote because I didn’t write it. That they took all the great ideas and left none for me. I spent years here, and sometimes still it rears its ugly head, as I’m only human. But, annoyingly, the way out is always through. Consider yourself lucky that you’ve been asked for your unique insight on something that came from your friend’s soul. I sat at a diner with my friend for 3 hours last week to talk about her movie script and we could have sat and talked for 3 more. I left feeling inspired and rejuvenated. There is talent surrounding me and there’s just no way some of it doesn’t rub off on me. Community! Community. Why the fuck would you ask AI what it thinks instead of your HUMAN FRIEND over a grilled cheese and milkshake. When you read your friends’ work, you’re a part of it. They can read your work later, provided you ever sit the hell down and do it. You’re part of it! Stop trying not to be!

Morning pages

Hate to say it, dawg, that lady Julia Cameron was right! We must be kind to her because she grew up being James Cameron’s sister and I just know that was utter hell. Imagine trying to play outside with James Cameron and he’s like obsessively world building when you’re more into the vibe of swirling a stick around in some mud. But I digress. Julia Cameron wrote The Artist’s Way, the cornerstone of which is the practice of Morning Pages. Just freewriting first thing every morning. I’ve been doing it consistently for 5 years now and it really does help. It demystifies the act of writing. You aren’t beholden to any rules, it’s more just to clear out the cobwebs. To keep you in practice. Try it! You might like it.

Go to jury duty

Oh, you don’t have it?? Well aren’t you so lucky. Shut the hell up. Call them and tell them you’re coming in. Don’t take no for an answer.

Xo

Caitie