Cubed vs perfect; 27 vs 28

Posted 10/12/11

Tonight is the Martha Marcy May Marlene premiere as part of the New York Film Festival. Beginning its journey in Livingston Manor and Roscoe, it’s since been to Sundance, Cannes and Toronto. I …

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Cubed vs perfect; 27 vs 28

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Tonight is the Martha Marcy May Marlene premiere as part of the New York Film Festival. Beginning its journey in Livingston Manor and Roscoe, it’s since been to Sundance, Cannes and Toronto. I haven’t seen it since Sundance and never projected on film so I’m excited.

Right now I’m in my editing room on 64th and Madison and I’m wearing a tie, which always makes me feel a little taller and sit up a little straighter. Two good things.

Fall is my favorite season. The weather is getting colder and summer is a distant memory. Though last weekend’s warm spell was a not-so-subtle reminder, for the most part I’ve gone from iced coffee back to hot.

A month ago, I turned 28. At the time I was debating a column about how Osama Bin Laden ruined my 18th birthday 10 years ago. But I’m not quite ready to write it. (Look for it at some point in the next five to 10 years.) Will it be more or less appropriate at that point?

I liked being 27, but it flew by.

I like the number itself. Twenty-seven is three to the third power. It’s a cube. In my mind, there is a math-nerd coolness about that. It won’t happen again until I’m 64. But at that point, I’ll also have the Beatles song.

Twenty-seven is also divisible by nine and numbers that are divisible by nine also add up to nine when you add the digits together. From time to time, I would think about that. I’ll only have to wait until I’m 36 before that happens again.

Last year, director Sean and I were hunkered down in the editing room at Supermarcé below Canal on Broadway putting “Martha” together. Lunch eats-wise, I never knew I had it so good.

We finished the film in less than three months. I guess that’s fairly common for some films, but it felt fast. Now I’m six months into a documentary and just cracking the surface. That’s the difference though; the last doc took almost two years.

Life has been busy, in addition to the doc. I took on a short film and a commercial, both of which I just finished. Thank goodness, because working on two things at once means doing double days. It’s harder than it used to be to do that.

I incorporated myself, finally. I am now Zac Edits, Inc. Death and taxes are things that you can count on, eh? I got killed (not literally) last year with a self-employment tax.

Now I need to be paying myself as an employee and taking out taxes along the way, plus I will file quarterly business taxes. Personal taxes will be taken out by the employer (me) before sending the money to the employee (me). Point is, I’m getting old, but at least I like math.

Someone told me that the chances of living into your later years increase dramatically if you make it past 27. I don’t know if that’s true or not but it seems like it could be.

There is, of course, the infamous 27 Club. Rock legends who died too young at 27. Robert Johnson, Janis Joplin, Jimmy Hendrix, Kurt Cobain, Jim Morrison and now Amy Winehouse. I’m not part of that group for many reasons (I’m not a rock star) but now also because I made it to 28.

And actually, 28 isn’t such a bad number itself. It’s a “perfect” number. Which means that if you add up the numbers it is divisible by (1,2,4,7,14) you get the number itself.

That actually won’t happen again until I turn 496. So I better make this one count.

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