Kit Lyman's Blog

Pictures have always fascinated me. They can hold so much—memories, stories, feelings, a lifetime—and each of us look to find our own meaning in it all. 

You're probably wondering what this picture means to me. It may seem like a simple answer. Three little girls. They sit outside their country home, decorated like innocent play dolls just as Mother wanted. The oldest looks over her sisters, sure the usual mischief will start. The middle child, conveniently placed in the center, innocently looks for approval. And the youngest, ever-independent, laughs knowingly as the shoes once again come off. 

Somehow, a single moment in time, was able to capture an entire childhood. Beneath this momentary glimpse lies the story of their lives and the paths that guided them. 
This is me. My life is impacted by them. Life is all about the relationships we have and our interconnectedness. Laura, the oldest, taught me how to tie my shoes, write to Santa Claus, kick a soccer ball, and never settle for anything. Liz, the middle one, was my compliant playmate and sidekick, always agreeing to do whatever weird thing I had planned for us. Being the youngest, I wasn't always the easiest, as shown by this picture. 

You see, I came into this world dead set on hating dresses, and it was my mother's only request that day. "Kit, it won't be for very long. It would mean so much to your grandparents if they had a picture of you in your dress." I remember her pawning the desire off on others, but I knew my mother. She was the one who wanted the picture of us in our dresses. I knew because she said I could have two extra Flintstones vitamins that morning. That was the sign of a special day. 

As always, the bribery worked. I would put on her dress and sit on that blanket as she told me to, but I was going to have her know that she couldn't fully break me. If she was going to get her "three-angel-girls picture," I was going to ruin it by taking off my shoes. It was my "quiet" stand. 

This story extends beyond that simple autumn day. My story is about learning from others, leaning on them when I need to, but always pushing the limit. I'll always look at this picture and be reminded of three things:

Even if it is done quietly, I should never shy away from my individuality, especially if Flintstones vitamins are on the line.I am a person created by many. The impact of others have sculpted me, and I wouldn't trade their sets of hands for anything.My sisters may have taught me how to tie my shoes, but I showed them how to take them off.

Note: if you have not seen the miraculous finished products, you can check out Dani and Keely's book trailers here.

Note: If you haven't checked out the videos yet, you can watch Dani and Keely's Book Trailers here.      
    "I don't know how to tell you this, but we're going to have to buy wood and build a tree house."
    "Kit, you're being ridiculous."
    "I know it's going to be terrible and a lot of work, but it's the only way. Dani and Keely had a tree house, and if we want to make this realistic, it's just what we have to do."
    "You and I both know that we aren't building anything."
    "Maybe we could build a little model tree house and zoom in on it then. You have a hot glue gun around here, don't you?"
    "I'm going to shoot everything right here," she said, ignoring my question. My sister and I stood in her backyard, a fenced-in plot of land filled with scattered bushes and an old, dilapidated playset. 
    "But how? Are we going to hold the stuffed animals up against the fence?"
    "Nope."
    "We're going to shoot them sitting on the patio?"
    "No, I'm putting them right up there," she said, pointing to the rickety playset. 
    "Laura, people are going to see right through the posts and know that we're in a backyard."
    "No they aren't. They're going to see exactly what I want them to see. You just watch."

And that I did. She made me realize that Dani and Keely's story was all around me. It lived in a red leaf and a half-eaten pomegranate. Their heartache could exist inside a single drop of concocted blood. I learned that we didn't need to recreate an entire scene to make it complete. My dramatic imagination may have taken some time to accept this, but my sister showed me the beauty of simplicity.  Even though I was adamant that we had to film someone lying in a cramped dog cage in the trunk of my CR-V to get the right shot, I was proven wrong by a small slab of the crisscrossed metal. 
Luckily, Laura didn't allow me to go to the lengths I would have gone to create the bloody effect. Who would have thought that barbecue sauce was the secret weapon of fake blood?  We may have been a little excessive with our blood supply, so it was for the best that I didn't end up being the source. Let's just say that things started to look like we were filming a cross between The Blair Witch Project and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre by the time we were done. As for Dani's trailer, we knew that our backyard wasn't going to cut it. We scouted out the local parks and found our gold mine right up the road. McAllister Park may not have resembled the forests of northern Massachusetts, but we eventually found a spot somewhat off the beaten path that would work.  So, we suited up our man in black, packed our smallest production assistant into his stroller, and made our way through the woods one gloomy day in February. I was the unfortunate Dani dressed in green, and I soon learned that being carried like a potato sack on someone's shoulder is a small form of torture. 
For both trailers, all the videos were shot with a Canon 7D, along with the support of a GorillaPod. Once all of the footage was taken, my audio engineer, Tony Sidari, went to work on the soundtracks. Both songs were created and mixed in Logic Pro X, with the help of some bootleg tactics for the sound effects and voice recording.  With it being my initiation into voice-over work, I sure had a humble beginning. After being locked in a 5x3 closet with a depleting oxygen supply, I can now consider myself an accomplished voice actor. 

We ended up doing a retake and invaded little Leon's room, which upgraded me to a 5x4 space. That time, I was equipped with an actual microphone stand and an extra foot to move. I felt like a true celebrity by that point.
Putting it all together in Final Cut Pro X was the easy part because I had so much to work with. The entire experience was rather fortuitous, from the fact that Texas still had leaves left on its trees in February down to how my grandfather's boxes embodied the ones Keely had in the story. I'm incredibly fortunate to have Laura and Tony as my sister and brother-in-law, two people who will always be such a huge part of my own story. They have given me so much in the last year, and I wouldn't trade our small, bootleg but crafty family production company for anything. I'll never forget our late treks through the woods, our sarcophagus-esque recording booths, the forever red-stained mixing bowls, our nights of "inspiration," and the endless support I receive from the two of you. 

As a writer, I've learned a whole new creative perspective. Story is all around us. It can exist in the simplest of things. It's just up to us to see it. 

My first month as a self-published author has officially passed. It's been wild. It's been daunting. And it's been worth it—all of these feelings are worth all the work I put in to get here. However, there is one major part that has been missing. Many of you may have known my grandpa, his kooky smile and captivating personality. I find it hard not to miss him. He was my greatest inspiration. He gave every story a heartbeat, and I would give anything for him to see me try to do the same. 

Even after his passing, he still was a part of Satan's Garden. For those that have watched Keely's Trailer, you may have noticed the knick-knack boxes in the background of some of the shots. In the book, they were filled with Keely's private collections—her movie tickets, special pennies, and Pog collections. These were parts of me, things that I would put inside the boxes my grandpa made for me and my sisters. Every Christmas, he would build us a special puzzle box. All were different and wacky, but they still had that signature "Grandpa Boehm touch." Each one represents a year I got to spend with him, and that time is the most precious thing he could have given me.  I'm glad that a part of him will live on in some way through Keely and Dani's story, but I cannot help but want more. He deserves that. I want people to know him the way I did and to understand the parts of me that were gifts from him. The only way I can think to do that is to tell his story. He was a great man and an even better grandfather. My eulogy can't really do him justice, but it can at least leave you with a piece of what he gave to me. 


I didn’t think I could do it. Every time I felt my foot lift off the ground, it was back on that pebbled pavement a moment later. My hands were clammy, so I couldn’t get a good grip on the handlebars, and my helmet kept falling to the side because it was a good two sizes too big for my head. I felt his strong hand on my back, firm, but warm at the same time. “If you think you’re going too fast, just head straight at that sandbox,” he said. I looked out at the mound of dirt at the far end of my backyard—a country girl’s version of a sandbox—and then I looked back at him. He gazed at me with those familiar hazel eyes, a spark of challenge lingering there. It was all it took for my foot to mount that purple stallion, sure enough ending up face-first in the "sandbox" a quick moment later. 

You see, I may not have known it at the time, but he knew I was strong enough to fall. Even though that first time riding my bike wasn’t a success in the typical fashion, he showed me how it felt to pick myself back up. That is how I will forever remember my grandpa. He was the person who believed in you before you had the courage to believe in yourself. He was the man that made you think you were 5’10’’ even when you stood a measly 5’5’’. He was the guy who helped you find your best parts and told you in his very intense but impassioned way, “You, my dear, have all the good things inside of you to be the very best you can be.” He made you want to bet on yourself. 

Robert Boehm was the type of man that was an active participant in life. He never sat on the sidelines or subbed himself out. He was a son that strived to be better, to do better. He was a father that pushed his kids to never settle and to always pursue even an inkling of a dream. He was a grandfather that taught his grandkids to never accept defeat, to conquer the world one sandbox at a time. And he was a husband that dedicated his life to letting his wife know she was loved. He would often say that his greatest accomplishment was somehow finding Lucy and managing to make her love him. My grandma would always be listening nearby, smiling at him in that soft, adoring way. If there was one thing I have learned from watching them together, it was that they both were willing victims in their own love story.  

For those that knew him, they were quickly able to see his tenacity towards life. I once asked him, “Grandpa, what was the best time of your life?” And he said, “My best time is still ahead of me. If it already happened, then what the hell else do I have to look forward to?” And that was how he lived his life. He never looked back or dwelled on what used to be. He celebrated each day, a new chance to learn another guitar chord, to become a better photographer, to build a trickier treasure box, to plant a bigger garden for his precious Lucy, and to tell a brand new story. Stories were his favorite. He had a way of captivating an entire room. Every conversation was an animated saga of thoughtful observation, sharing his experiences and allowing you to feel a part of them, too. He loved talking about his times as a teacher and how his students used to say, “Mr. B, Mr. B! You aren’t like those other teachers. You don’t tell us what to do—you let us do what we want!” He would always smile fondly because he knew he had them right where he wanted them. His students may have thought they were doing what they wished, but it was all in the effort to impress the enigmatic tech teacher, Mr. B.  

One of my Grandpa’s favorite things to do was to leave you with a piece of advice that you could take away and hopefully keep with you. As my mother can attest, his favorite bit of wisdom was, “How can the old lady know what she thinks, until she hears what she says?” He would always have a different meaning behind it each time, and it reminded me to look at the world from all different sides. As a celebration of his life, I want to continue his legacy and share with you what meaning he has left with me. The goal of living is to never fear the possibility of failure because in life there are always going to be sandboxes to shelter the fall. The sandboxes are the people you have at your side, the grandparents, parents, siblings, friends, and lovers. They are the warm hand at your back, keeping you steady but at the same time pushing you forward. As I stand here today, I still feel his hand behind me, reminding me that I am never without him. I know that whenever I need him at my side, readying myself for another purple stallion to tame, I can just close my eyes, listen closely, and hear him whisper into my ear, “You, my dear, have all the good things inside of you to be the very best you can be.” 
The greatest love story is right in front of you.

In response to my previous post, I want to share with you a piece of my screenwriting background. Since I was pursuing a career as a TV staff writer, I needed to prepare samples of my writing. Spec scripts are original episodes written for currently airing shows, and they showcase a writer's ability to capture the characters and overall tone. 

I have an affinity for the mockumentary style, so it only made sense that I wrote a spec for Modern Family and The Office. The two specs were written back in 2011, so both of the scripts reflect the storyline of that season. For all of you Office fans out there, Michael is still well and alive in, "Worms & Dirt." You can find both downloads below. Enjoy!

Terminology for Scripts

For those of you who have never read a script before, here is a list of basic terms found in screenplays:
INT/EXT — Interior/exterior, stating whether a scene is happening inside or outside. V.O. — Voice-over, when dialogue overlays the action lines and the speaker is not physically in the scene. O.S. — Off-screen, when a character is heard in the specific scene but cannot be seen on camera. ( ) — Whenever there is a parenthetical used with dialogue, it is telling you what the character is doing while speaking or how the words are being said. Tag — This is the last segment of an episode. It is usually when the credits roll. Cold Open — This is a teaser at the beginning of an episode. The Office was known for their cold opens. D# — Represents the day number in the storyline. If an episode is dependent on a timeline, this detail is important. Continuous — If this is present in a scene heading, it is telling you it's a continuation of a previous scene. Beat — Signifies a brief pause.  [image error] worms_+_dirt_-_the_office_spec_script.pdfFile Size: 135 kbFile Type: pdfDownload File [image error] x-rated_-_modern_family_spec_script.pdfFile Size: 127 kbFile Type: pdfDownload File

Self-publishing has a certain stigma. It is often looked at as a "last resort" or an "only option" for authors. "It's a quality issue," they say. "Bad content is clogging the system."  While I think there is some truth to that, my overall belief is that the lasting stories will find their way to the top of the pile one way or another. It isn't so much about how much bad content is out there, but rather, it has more to do with the growing number of good content that is working its way into the system. Competition is becoming thicker as more people are vying for those top spots, but I believe there has never been a better time to be a writer. 

Self-publishing Was My First Resort

I didn't send out any queries for Satan's Garden. I didn't print out a manuscript and mail it off to dozens of agents and publishers. It wasn't because I don't believe in the traditional process, because I do, very strongly. Writing is and always will be a collaborative process, and traditional publishing provides that constant creative network and support system. Nevertheless, I wanted to use the resources and team I have in my corner and show the world what I am made of, without a big house behind me at the start. 

Today's publishing landscape is in the writer's favor. The platforms available to us puts the cards back in our hands. It allows us to create our own worth, to earn our spot. Self-publishing is my first resort because I believe that in order to prove myself, I have to be my greatest advocate. 

At twenty-four, the road I took to get here may not seem that long to many of you. However, in the last two and a half years, I feel as if I have lived many more than that. I have had setbacks, disappointments, epiphanies, and revelations. I constantly found myself going back to the drawing board. What I realized was that each time I went back, I was closer to figuring it out. All of those revisions and wiped-clean boards, they all mattered. 

Figuring Out What I Didn't Want

I moved to LA the summer of 2011 to pursue a career as a screenwriter. Screenwriting has always been my first love. It was the reason I moved across the country and what I had planned on doing with my life. There wasn't a shadow of a doubt in my mind that it was where I was supposed to go.

That was the hardest part. I was so sure of what I wanted. The thing was, even though I love[d] writing scripts and relished in being surrounded with such creative talent, it wasn't the lifestyle I had imaged for myself. I struggled with that realization. I'm a person who makes decisions confidently, and at first, it was tough admitting I was wrong. 

But my time in LA was far from a failure. I worked at a literary management company, learned the ropes of a boutique talent agency, sat on the set of TV's best primetime show, Parenthood, and day played as a production assistant for CBS's daytime talk show, The Talk. I witnessed passionate artists every day, and it inspired me to lay down the bricks of my own path. It was in the late nights tucked away in my pillbox-sized studio apartment that I found Dani and Keely's story. I'm not exactly sure where they came from; they were two sisters that just kept showing up on my computer screen. All I knew was that it was my job to tell it. 

Success is Never a Guarantee

Being a writer never has a guarantee. There is no promise at the end that it will work out or if it will all be worth it. Over the last twenty years, there has been a transition towards this idea that everyone gets a trophy, everyone gets a reward. It reinforces the idea that people will find success if they follow a certain path. Self-publishing defies this. It has shown that people can create their own way, on their own terms. If this has become the new social stigma, then I'm happy to be a part of it. 

As the start to any conversation, I thought it would only be polite to introduce myself. I'm not really a huge fan of the generic, "Hello! My name is..." template where you list a bunch of facts that anyone can look up on a social media profile. Granted, I'm not going to throw away the entire onion concept either, but I am going to let you in a little past its flaky skin. 

If I could live my life through movie quotes, I would. I'm the type of person who would rather do nothing with someone interesting than do something incredible with someone boring. Life is all about the analogies. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. My party trick is and always will be singing "What Would You Do?" by City High—eight states and over twenty karaoke bars strong. I'm pretty competitive, but I don't accept challenges involving holding my breath under water or jumping over objects. If there are two things I love most in the world it would be moments that allow for speeches and those people who make me want to give them. 

I currently live in San Antonio, Texas, with my sister and brother-in-law, and I can safely say they are the reason my first novel will be released in a little under two months. Not only have they given me the time, but they have also played a huge part in making my story come to life. They are both doing their residency here with the Air Force, leaving them few options when their son, Leon, came into the picture. I help take care of him while they are at work, which has allowed me the lifestyle to give my writing a real chance. It's an incredible feeling to know that I'm laying down the pipeline, and it's all starting to feel very real. 

This isn't going to be a themed blog but rather a writer's rambling space. I don't want to put myself in a box by saying I'm only going to talk about self-publishing or my tips on making Cup Noodles nutritional. I'm going to free myself from the conventional. I know that people have a general need to have a purpose behind an action, but why can't my purpose be to not have one? I am a part of the tangent-talking species, so I want to widen my platform. 

However, I have broken it down into seven main categories:
Childhood StoriesPersonal Anecdotes Thoughts on LifeSelf-publishingPast WorkThe Writing ProcessWords of MotivationI can't promise what order my posts will come in, but you can bet you will get a little bit of each. Keep an eye out in the coming weeks for behind-the-scenes footage of my upcoming book trailers!