Really? Already? Damn, it's time to go home. If only I knew where that was.
"There is a feeling/ That you should just go home/ And spend a lifetime/ Finding out just where that is"
(Cathedrals, by Jump Little Children)
Friday, November 20, 2009
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Quoting favorites I (or: On Missing)
"Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody"
(The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger)
Top 3 ending, for sure. And obviously, top 3 book.
And so very true.
It also led me to my Emptying post. "I wonder where all those people have gone"
We stop wondering a while, don't we? We have to let people fade away from our lives. We stop wondering, and we stop missing them. It's necessary.
How sad.
(The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger)
Top 3 ending, for sure. And obviously, top 3 book.
And so very true.
It also led me to my Emptying post. "I wonder where all those people have gone"
We stop wondering a while, don't we? We have to let people fade away from our lives. We stop wondering, and we stop missing them. It's necessary.
How sad.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Going III
(...)
He turned to go away.
(...)
They opened the door, he entered. His heart gave a leap: there she was.
He would've been able to spot her silhouette anywhere, anytime. His hands had known that figure just once, but so completely it'd been enough. And if he hadn't been able to see it, he'd felt its presence from miles.
There was her hair falling over her shoulders, in startlingly fair curls, and her aquiline nose. She was standing by the window, looking at the opposite wall. Completely still in her blue hospital gown, she'd not seen him yet.
He gave the first steps towards her, with a ready smile on his lips - and stopped. She was stretching out her arms into the nothing with great painful effort, trying to make that suffocating nothingness not close in on her. She shook her legs in a frenzy, as if trying to release them from invisible shackles.
Still not moving he watched her, as she curled up on herself, clutching her heart, and all of a sudden, stretched out her arms again, this time towards Heaven. She clutched her heart once again, jerking her head up and down and then stopped, as if she were tired. She remained perfectly still, staring at her right hand, one inch from her face, knees slightly bent and an empty look on her face.
That was his fault. If he hadn't crashed, if they hadn't sent the "lost in action" letter to his family... now he'd never be able to make amends for that. No one would.He would've been able to spot her silhouette anywhere, anytime. His hands had known that figure just once, but so completely it'd been enough. And if he hadn't been able to see it, he'd felt its presence from miles.
There was her hair falling over her shoulders, in startlingly fair curls, and her aquiline nose. She was standing by the window, looking at the opposite wall. Completely still in her blue hospital gown, she'd not seen him yet.
He gave the first steps towards her, with a ready smile on his lips - and stopped. She was stretching out her arms into the nothing with great painful effort, trying to make that suffocating nothingness not close in on her. She shook her legs in a frenzy, as if trying to release them from invisible shackles.
Still not moving he watched her, as she curled up on herself, clutching her heart, and all of a sudden, stretched out her arms again, this time towards Heaven. She clutched her heart once again, jerking her head up and down and then stopped, as if she were tired. She remained perfectly still, staring at her right hand, one inch from her face, knees slightly bent and an empty look on her face.
He turned to go away.
(...)
Monday, November 9, 2009
Going II
(...)
He'd droped by the florist first. After all, women always appreciated flowers, regardless of their condition. And she'd always loved sunflowers. He didn't even know how to get there - he'd never known, never needed to. Knowing your way down there was for the less fortunate, category he had never belonged to - until now.
The starched buttoned white shirt, the black tie, the bouquet and the address given earned him a commiseration look from the cab driver - look from which he shrinked away, painfully conscious of the sentiment he was liable to awaken in others. But it did not matter in the end, so long as he got to see her. So long as she got to see him alive, back. He was positive her pain would instantly fade away once she saw him.
Narcisistic? No. He just knew it. Because it would be the same with him. If he were in the same situation, he was certain the very sight of her would make it all go away.
He handed the money, not really knowing what he was doing, completely hipnotized by the size of the building. He mentioned her name at the reception, and the girl at the counter looked at him with a glimpse of recognition, as if she'd always known whom he was. As if able to read his mind, the girl answered the non-formulated question: Jean had mentioned him time after time. Everyone there knew him by his name.
Unsure of how that made him feel, he followed her through a series of long white overly clean corridors. The girl left, after showing him to a room furnished with some comfortable-looking chairs, a couple of cream-coloured couches and people just as well-dressed as he was.
With somewhat of a hesitant look at his surroundings, he sat down on the chair closest to the door, while the words "letter", "lost in action" and "mental" whirled around his head incessantly.
(...)
The starched buttoned white shirt, the black tie, the bouquet and the address given earned him a commiseration look from the cab driver - look from which he shrinked away, painfully conscious of the sentiment he was liable to awaken in others. But it did not matter in the end, so long as he got to see her. So long as she got to see him alive, back. He was positive her pain would instantly fade away once she saw him.
Narcisistic? No. He just knew it. Because it would be the same with him. If he were in the same situation, he was certain the very sight of her would make it all go away.
He handed the money, not really knowing what he was doing, completely hipnotized by the size of the building. He mentioned her name at the reception, and the girl at the counter looked at him with a glimpse of recognition, as if she'd always known whom he was. As if able to read his mind, the girl answered the non-formulated question: Jean had mentioned him time after time. Everyone there knew him by his name.
Unsure of how that made him feel, he followed her through a series of long white overly clean corridors. The girl left, after showing him to a room furnished with some comfortable-looking chairs, a couple of cream-coloured couches and people just as well-dressed as he was.
With somewhat of a hesitant look at his surroundings, he sat down on the chair closest to the door, while the words "letter", "lost in action" and "mental" whirled around his head incessantly.
(...)
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Begging (be it for mercy or for a chip!)
Now who will say life doesn't indeed imitate art?
"So You Think You Can Dance", 2008:
Video captured by a callous and/or insomniac neighbor, 2009:
You bang on that door, sister!
"So You Think You Can Dance", 2008:
Video captured by a callous and/or insomniac neighbor, 2009:
You bang on that door, sister!
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Going
Being alive was nothing. At least, being alive someplace else was nothing. This place, here, this was where being took shape and conveyed a meaning to him. He was finally back.
He ignored the shrill in his spine, as the remembrance of his plane crashing crossed his mind once again. The despair of not having his cries for help listened to, that blue wilderness drawing dangerously close, being utterly alone, looking at her picture and knowing he would never see her again. Never again hold her in his arms, wrap her, shelter her.
Being stranded from everything and everyone he knew, lost in a foreign land unbeknownst to the enemy, always in hiding, always alert, forever in fear.
But then, all of a sudden, they'd won. Just like that.
He'd gotten his decoration, oh yes! But his true award was finally being able to come home. He was finally going back to life. To her.
He'd lost the count of the days, once lost. It wasn't until his being rescued that he found out: seven months. Top it off with the other six months in the Air Force... But then he'd had the comfort of her letters, whereas in the East...
He shrugged it off: why focus on that now? He was going. His parents had been duly notified, and his "lost in action" rectified. He then wrote a letter, telling them the day and the time of his train. And with that, a private letter to her, bearing the same good tidings. She knew he was going back to her, just as he'd promised.
He ignored the shrill in his spine, as the remembrance of his plane crashing crossed his mind once again. The despair of not having his cries for help listened to, that blue wilderness drawing dangerously close, being utterly alone, looking at her picture and knowing he would never see her again. Never again hold her in his arms, wrap her, shelter her.
Being stranded from everything and everyone he knew, lost in a foreign land unbeknownst to the enemy, always in hiding, always alert, forever in fear.
But then, all of a sudden, they'd won. Just like that.
He'd gotten his decoration, oh yes! But his true award was finally being able to come home. He was finally going back to life. To her.
He'd lost the count of the days, once lost. It wasn't until his being rescued that he found out: seven months. Top it off with the other six months in the Air Force... But then he'd had the comfort of her letters, whereas in the East...
He shrugged it off: why focus on that now? He was going. His parents had been duly notified, and his "lost in action" rectified. He then wrote a letter, telling them the day and the time of his train. And with that, a private letter to her, bearing the same good tidings. She knew he was going back to her, just as he'd promised.
***
Oh, that the human hand could becomingly describe the joyous tears of the reunion! With what abandon and candour were them shed! The pain of losing your son can only be surpassed by the incomparable blessing of having him back from the sea deities! Their happiness seemed endless, and it tears one apart to tell that it was not so.He had to go to her, and bring her there. Only then would his blessings be fully accounted for.
But the other two smiles faded. And with a shattered heart they told him she wasn't there anymore. He stared.
- Why? Where is she?
(...)
(...)
Monday, October 26, 2009
Belonging (or: On Fairy-Tales)
A new point of view, a fight, a casual conversation and BANG! There you have it, your idea.
I'd run out of ideas, hence my not writing here for a little while. Hard to be a genius 24/7, after all. But here it is, a new egg has finally hatched.
Speaking of hatching eggs... I assume everyone knows the story of the ugly duckling? It's always been my favorite fairy-tale. I pretty much learnt how to read because of it.
So let's skip the whole narration. My point is: the morale of it all can be well summed up as "never judge a book by its cover", "for beauty is found within". But I also look at it as "birds of the same feather flock together". Literally.
But it's really hard to find your flock, ain't it?...
We never know what we'll grow up to be. And then, not knowing we do not fit in, we try to hang out with whomever's around, and in our not wanting to be alone, we mind not the huge differences between them and us. Heck, we even try to live among those who are drastically different from us, like day and... a sandwich. But their powers of observation do not fail them, they notice it. And they mock you out of their lives. (Ok, that sounds a little like bullying...). They scorn you, and you decide to leave. Henceforth, you'll be alone, for being in society has obviously not worked out well for you.
But you can't help envying the ones who have their pack. Or flock. Or covey, herd, cohort, whichever collective noun comes to your mind. Point is, you ask yourself why everyone seems to have a group where they belong, but not you.
Every other fairy-tale has already approached the subject: when The Beauty and the Beast starts (the Disney version, I mean, let's not get into the original Brother Grimm's tales, they can get rather gruesome...), Belle sings about finding a place where people understand her; in Hercules, the hero sings about a place "where a great, warm welcome will be waiting" for him, where "a voice keeps saying 'this is where I'm meant to be'." And finishes: "I will go most anywhere to feel like I belong". In Mulan, the heroine sings (hell, do they all sing?! Can't they just... I don't know, say it?), about not being able to play the perfect chinese daughter and bride. Not to mention Quasimodo, Victor Hugo's creation, distorted (a huge understatement!) by Disney almost 15 years ago - the hunchback hunted by the entire city of Paris just for being ugly, taking the ugly duckling complex to levels never dreamt before. And Esmeralda, hunted for an even lesser evil, if such a thing is possible: being a gipsy.
But Belle eventually finds ampler horizons; Hercules finally finds out about his olympic origins; Mulan joins the army (!), and gets a bow from the emperor himself. Quasimodo and Esmeralda are finally accepted by the parisian population (do NOT get me started on the humongous distortion here!).
And the ugly duckling, the one who made me all big-eyed and teary as a 5 year-old child, he too gets his happy ending: he gets to be in a flock of swans.
But before finding his flock, he had to adjust to the idea of being alone, and grow comfortable in his own skin.
Well, that sounds about right, given that all fable and fairy-tale animals resemble humans enormously.
Speaking of hatching eggs... I assume everyone knows the story of the ugly duckling? It's always been my favorite fairy-tale. I pretty much learnt how to read because of it.
So let's skip the whole narration. My point is: the morale of it all can be well summed up as "never judge a book by its cover", "for beauty is found within". But I also look at it as "birds of the same feather flock together". Literally.
But it's really hard to find your flock, ain't it?...
We never know what we'll grow up to be. And then, not knowing we do not fit in, we try to hang out with whomever's around, and in our not wanting to be alone, we mind not the huge differences between them and us. Heck, we even try to live among those who are drastically different from us, like day and... a sandwich. But their powers of observation do not fail them, they notice it. And they mock you out of their lives. (Ok, that sounds a little like bullying...). They scorn you, and you decide to leave. Henceforth, you'll be alone, for being in society has obviously not worked out well for you.
But you can't help envying the ones who have their pack. Or flock. Or covey, herd, cohort, whichever collective noun comes to your mind. Point is, you ask yourself why everyone seems to have a group where they belong, but not you.
Every other fairy-tale has already approached the subject: when The Beauty and the Beast starts (the Disney version, I mean, let's not get into the original Brother Grimm's tales, they can get rather gruesome...), Belle sings about finding a place where people understand her; in Hercules, the hero sings about a place "where a great, warm welcome will be waiting" for him, where "a voice keeps saying 'this is where I'm meant to be'." And finishes: "I will go most anywhere to feel like I belong". In Mulan, the heroine sings (hell, do they all sing?! Can't they just... I don't know, say it?), about not being able to play the perfect chinese daughter and bride. Not to mention Quasimodo, Victor Hugo's creation, distorted (a huge understatement!) by Disney almost 15 years ago - the hunchback hunted by the entire city of Paris just for being ugly, taking the ugly duckling complex to levels never dreamt before. And Esmeralda, hunted for an even lesser evil, if such a thing is possible: being a gipsy.
But Belle eventually finds ampler horizons; Hercules finally finds out about his olympic origins; Mulan joins the army (!), and gets a bow from the emperor himself. Quasimodo and Esmeralda are finally accepted by the parisian population (do NOT get me started on the humongous distortion here!).
And the ugly duckling, the one who made me all big-eyed and teary as a 5 year-old child, he too gets his happy ending: he gets to be in a flock of swans.
But before finding his flock, he had to adjust to the idea of being alone, and grow comfortable in his own skin.
Well, that sounds about right, given that all fable and fairy-tale animals resemble humans enormously.
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