Has it been over a year? To my credit, I was working on a novel, and, when lightening strikes, I needed to follow through. I also have been terrific this working year to journal on a daily basis. That, alone, probably helped me ponder on the page more than usual this year. I take the daily time to list my aggravations, but, once upon the page, I see how short the list is.
I have been wanting to write since I finished the novel, but, alas, inspiration has been far and few between. Strangely, I've noticed, without the book hanging over me, I'm able to read a bit more and I'm consuming media at a different rate than I normally do, watching Netflix and Hulu without the guilt that floats in the back of mind that I should, in fact, be doing something in relation to writing.
As for today? I have a topic for the day on the journals, but I'll go ahead and make the comments, here, in public, to put pen to paper and to get the words a bit more flowing. The coffee is strong, so that helps.
MOVIES THAT DESCRIBE WHO YOU ARE:
This is an interesting topic, and let's go with it. I'm fully aware that I'm a different person for friend I have. You have your likes and your dislikes, and I, of course, have mine. You may have yelled at me in the past about something mundane, so my choices are colored and tainted. We may share an opinion or two.
So the movies I'm choosing here? They're titles of two stripes. One? Movies that didn't necessarily like (I've posted those elsewhere on this listing, besides), but more like I see something I can relate to or I feel is something I should or do reflect. Or, and this is due to my beloved husOtter, there are things that your significant other know about you that you just don't. They can go into a store and buy that one thing you wanted that you didn't know existed. From that? When they say things like, "that's so like you," I tend to listen. His terrific perspective is vital and deep, so even when his comments are flippant, I take heed.
SIDEWAYS
*) There's some stuff right off the bat about the lead character in this movie. A teacher who is still stuck in the tedium of being a teacher, but has passions beyond the four walls of a his profession. Stifled creatively, he seeks solace in those pastimes and therein lies someone I can relate to.
The only thing I don't have in common with the writer/teacher is, well, basically, he's a wacko, losing control on too many aspects of the reality around him, and suffers from screaming fits because of it. THis? That is not me. But I do believe the writing, if not necessarily the performance, is something I can relate to. Just someone who is searching, and, in his case, a muse to get the writing flowing. Of course, he gets more than he bargains for when love is the result, but, still, this is incredibly close to someone I can see myself as.
CHILDREN OF A LESSER GOD
*) The movie that got me into teaching with my current population. No, I'm not a speech teacher, like the antagonist, but there are several aspects of this superior piece of filmmaking that I can personally relate to, even before I became a teacher.
For one, the Deaf exist in a world that was, at that time, wholly their own. The lead character, James Leeds is very aware of it, and jumps in and out of that world, long before meeting the love of his life, played incredibly by Marlee Matlin. At the time, I was accepting my own place in a very unique culture, so the parallels were immediately evident. The hearing world and the Deaf world are, like, every other community, essentially the same. Filed with hopes and joys, but also pettiness and resent. Cultures do that. They find a common ground and language. I saw those parallels for my 17 year old self and wasn't accepting them, but the evidence was there on the big screen. I was also already an avid signer, so that helped me connect to that culture.
And now? I still have many Deaf people I'm more culturally Deaf than I am, because I'm completely aware of the struggle, even if I am not totally part of the culture. Just like Mr. Leeds.
There's also something else really unique about the teaching aspect of this movie I find I still do to this day and it was not something I've seen in other movies about the profession. Deaf kids aren't stupid. These kids in this movie? They're not stupid. Not exactly thrilled, but, heck, they're teens. And? With that? There's a huge amount of humor in the scenes with teaching involved. Not this heavy handed, "awww, those poor Deaf kids!" Not at all. In fact, they come off as every other kind of teenager--and with a huge amount of comedy.
That's me. I LOVE teaching and I believe, strongly, about find comedy in what I do with my students, because THAT makes learning bearable. We have to do it. This teacher, forced to teach speech for proud Deaf students, uses speech to make the unwanted (and, in this day and age, unneeded, really) topic much more approachable. And the comedy isn't mean, either. Like telling kids about communicating with sign but you're doing a handstand; or learning how to pronounce swear words.
This is my job, folks.
KUNG FU PANDA
Look.
Something not about writing. Enjoy. It shall be short-lived.
I have enjoyed these movies so much. They actually really do address the ancestral faiths of the Far East and China in a way that is so subtle, that I actually see them as terrific ways to teach Buddhist faith in the fact that there are no accidents; that the Tao naturally seeks realignment whenever it is jarred or thrown offs; that history is worshiped and studied in ancestral worship, so that it is succeeded and not repeated.
These are some thematic elements that are blatantly symbolized in the film. All three faiths make an appearance in each movie in some form. And, while I don't necessary go to the nearest temple, I take the messages of these three faiths to heart.
I am, basically, Po...which loosely could mean spirit.
Po is upset when Fate shines upon him, but he is giddy at the violence because he wanted to be part of that so much so (see? Taoism, great fear with happiness). Also Taoism? He takes sacred items and debases them, showing that lack of need for reverence in all faith.
"One does not wash one's pits in the Great Pool of Reflection..."
Things like that flow throughout the picture. And he is scared, to be sure, but the horrid increased burden, but he is thrilled with the potential of the adventure.
I like to think I am Po on many levels.
Chubby, even.
But it's more like I can learn from Po on how to be.
BRIGHTON BEACH MEMOIRS
There's a great scene where young Eugene, lounging on the front porch where he was banished to by his mother, while his mother chats with his aunt, and the mom says, without so much as a pause, "Nah. Don't worry, Eugene will do it."
The youth balks.
This has been my life. So much so, that when I saw the play (the movie is basically a filmed copy of the stage play of Neil Simon's famed autobiography), mother leaned over at this moment and whispered, "I know, I do that."
And, of course, that never stopped her.
Even moving to Colorado, the horrible stereotypes of being in a Jewish and Irish and have Italian family friends never escaped me. I cannot completely complain, in that, such struggles, while potentially harmful, had moments that provided for our well being. We ate like a small nation, but that thematic representation left the comedy at the door and I knew the spread was illustrating that food was, indeed, love. That being sensitive to sensitive topics was alright and not shame, it was to make sure everyone was comfortable.
I'm thinking of the comedic scene as they whisper about a cousin's bout with cancer. "Why are we whispering," Eugene asks and is shushed.
Eugene is also a writer, so natch. And, later, after his notes are discovered, the family takes him to task about the things he notes and scolds him about the importance of writing. All ethnic groups find a profound depth in the arts and take it very, very seriously and this comes to place in the show and, yes, something I, too, learned with a mother who was a dancer and a brother who is a musician. Come to think of it, TWO brothers who are musicians.
Eugene's humorous misery is probably the closest to the realities I grew up with, even in suburban Colorado. The manipulative guilt, the constant haunts ("My father and us realized he were about to have a few hundred refugees arrive from Germany, and we had to clean the bathroom), the unspoken but omnipresent awareness that you are appreciated, and that comedy heals.
All of these things Eugene experiences and to see that echo brought the film to my attention.
And, because of this, I have to bring up, YET AGAIN, My Big Fat Greek Wedding. It's so true. I experienced every little bit of that movie as it happened. I asked my husOtter to marry me, but I thought something small, something between us in the living room with a few friends. Clip out the vestiges of a huge stressor of a family.
But then Ma found out.
But like Tula did in the movie, only when I embraced what my family was did the whole celebration truly become something to be reckoned with.
No, no, no, I'm not a fictional character.
Wait.
That I am aware of, that is. I've heard the repeated evidence that we're living in some kind of Matrix-world as it is, and we Buddhists tend to believe that this plane of existence is really just a trial-ground for souls and that we truly exist, you know...elsewhere... and that was a fucking tangent.
I'm referring to Karen Eiffel, the author who discovers that one of her characters is actually living.
There's a few things going on here. No, I'm not like her that I need a constant companion to monitor my self-abusing habits. That's me, taken to an extreme. For me? It's more of her tiny little beats that I felt connected to. As a horror writer? There's a fix in authorship-this weird need to wax off specific characters for the sheer sake of waxing them off. To hear and see characters as real people with wants and needs and then to deny myself that they are, in many affects, indeed, real people (that exist in my head, but...fuck, that is Matrix-y, isn't it?). And yes, I do tend to find character in the real world. For example, there's a older gentleman, with a recently coiffed 'do across from me at the coffeehouse. Blazing emaciated, he still elected to wear a tight tshirt to some some of dialogue he's having right now with someone that arrived late. There's no wedding ring, and he is sitting back, away from his counterpart and...and...and.....yes, characters are born that way, and this is just like Ms. Eiffel does it in the film. She creates characters so real, they become so.
It's a skill I seem to have forgotten.
What isn't here?
MODERN FAMILY:
While I LOVE the show, I find that they bicker more than I feel a couple should, because, well, as we know, conflict is comedy.
But for me? It makes me uncomfortable.
QUEER AS FOLK:
There is a huge part of the community who live for the night. It's fun, it's exciting, there's dancing.
And it hasn't changed since 1982. I found this show focused on people I kept wanting to wash my hands after meeting. They were mean to each other, which I suppose is what a soap opera is all about, but I didn't ever want to see anyone live from that show.
TALES OF THE CITY:
A GREAT BOOK.
AND A GREAT PROGRAM.
But this thread is to discuss where I see myself. If I had their abs, paychecks and opportunities, I would feel so inclined to point this tale out. I absolutely LOVE this show, truly. But that's because it is quite excellent. Not something I can relate to in any way.
No comments:
Post a Comment