We exited the highway and sped through a valley of winding roads. The sun and mountains were everywhere and everything seemed to be rushing at us.

Our driver (Lesley of Scotland) told us we were lucky because it’d been raining for days before we arrived and hopefully the sun we’d brought would stay.

(of course… back in New York it’d been pouring for weeks… I thought I was bringing the rain)

As we made our way up “the Mountain”, as they called it, I was thinking…

Wasn’t it just back in late Feb/March I’d forced myself to sit down and get the script out (in three intense weeks).

I’d been thinking about or rather resisting writing it for two or three years. Wasting time?

Before that it was life, screwing up in relationships, film school, working, dreaming, running from wanting to be a writer/director… and of course my marathon sessions of “LOST”.

But nothing settled on me as heavily as that morning of September 9, 2001 coming back to me… we’d lost my brother to a heart attack while he stood in our mom’s kitchen and our lives were transformed forever as a blinking world turned towards and then away from 9/11.

This was our story and I was barely able to endure my attempt to capture it… And now suddenly everything I’d dreamed about since I first whispered to myself I wanted to be a filmmaker was staring back at me… expecting something from me…

“Welcome to Bob’s Mountain”, I heard someone say through a wide grin.

I didn’t have time to finish my thoughts or savor that phantom coffee taste in my mouth because we’d arrived.

I snatched a few short breaths and decided to open up. Open up to this place, these people… to this process… to my work.

That brief moment right there was easily the best decision I’d made in months…

The first thing I saw was a small complex of buildings nestled at the base of a mountain.

I was a little stunned.

I didn’t expect the vibrancy of everything. The thin air made everything look crisp like it was falling on top of you. I’m sure it adds to the mystique of the place for everyone visiting for the first time.

And this was my first time.

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In front of me was a week where I’d be asked to explore my screenplay (and my writing process) deeper than I’d ever done before:

Now of course all of this happened over a week ago. But it turns out there wasn’t much internet to be had (or rather my computer didn’t like the compound-wide wifi) so I’m sharing my experience at the June ‘09 Sundance Screenwriter’s Lab now.

Check back soon… more to come…