***Transcribing this off my journal...the writing of this took place over several days. ***
Life and how much, how little it means to me
I know I'm supposed to stay away but this is just one of those moments where I just felt compelled. I was watching one of the best movies ever, Before Sunrise (Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy, written and directed by Richard Linklater). Actually I'm watching the sequel now, Before Sunset, right now, back to back! Just watching the two lovers live, love and struggle with time... It made me feel, well, I'll let the rest of this journal say it.
I started thinking back to high school again, this guy I knew. During my senior year I was in a lot of after-school clubs and all sorts of activities. (I had long hair back then too!) It's so very much NOT like me as I'm really shy and basically antisocial in temperament. It's a long story, boring but not unpleasant story how I got to this point at that time in my life but it's way off topic. At that time I was totally passionate in eveything I did. And I was totally love sick too. Plus, despite having the time of my life, I wasn't handling the "love" very well nor handling the conflict of my future, what I wanted to do versus what my father wanted to make me do. I thought about death, death by my own hand, constantly. (I know, cliche high school angst.) I guess that time resonates with me because fast forward twenty years, it seems like the same situation has cropped up again...love, life, conflict about the future and wishing I could just make it all go away.
But this time there's one difference..well actually two. This time the "love interest" has, well, a much stronger character than the previous; the connection I feel seems to be on much deeper levels.
However it's the other thing that I want to talk about.
During senior year I was the head, the president-elect of this club called The Gamer's Guild, which was basically a bunch of D & D-ers. The most passionate gamer was this kid named Harvey, who was a bigtime fantasy enthusiast. He was always telling me about how cool stuff like Elric (Michael Moorcock) was and other stuff like that. No other kid in school that I knew of was that hardcore into that type of stuff. And my club would have been where they would be. So naturally I made him my vice president.
Later, after we all graduated and most of us went to college, I found out he had gone to the same school that my "business partner" had gone (my lil comic book business) in Riverside. And I also found out he had blown his brains out in his dorm room. That was a bit of a shock as a it was known which few of us in school were "depressed" and he wasn't one of them. He never mentioned he had any problems; he was just a little bit weird, not suicidal. Maybe not talking about it was his issue? I often wondered
Fast forward again many years later. I'm in a theater watching Lord Of The Rings: Two Towers I think. It's that big battle scene at the end of the movie. I'm pretty much riveted as I've never read the books so I'm entranced with what the story might bring next. And I'm thinking...How great is this to be alive right now and be able to see this moment. (Forgive my geekness) For some reason, Harvey entered my mind at that moment just then. I couldn't help but feel that he would have loved to see this too. But HE couldn't. (Later, I had another similar feeling in the theater seeing Return Of The King as well. ) And then that feeling expanded... When we were in high school, the closest thing to mainstream acceptance of geeky gamer stuff was the cheesy D&D cartoon on Saturday morning TV. Now we have so much...an entire culture that embraces us geeks, caters to us even in a big way including motion pictures, stores, internet, even SG with so many girls who love geeky stuff and even geeks themselves. I think whatever drove him to end it, he would have found his solace now at this time. But there was no indication then of any of the great stuff now. We were into this shit way before it was cool.
This whole thing occurs to me right now because I'm enjoying the Before Sunrise/Before Sunset movies. The first movie was so divine, so magical. But it made no money and its ending is incredibly open-ended. Only due to a die-hard cult following's endless pleas did the writer/director and the two main stars of the movie (both of whom were very early in their budding careers) all decide to reunite and do the sequel to finish the story somewhat. Over NINE years later. And I was there to see it. It made be glad to still be alive and watching it again, well...I feel the same.
Sometimes no matter how desolate life can be, staying alive means getting to experience magical moments like this one. And you never know what might happen and when. It's all I have to hold on to right now but it's something.
- R
Oh, also for fun, each blog from now on, I'm going to link one song that's really special to me. It will be a bit retro like my old blogs from 2004/5 when I would have a song, picture, topic and other stuff "of the day."
Life and how much, how little it means to me
I know I'm supposed to stay away but this is just one of those moments where I just felt compelled. I was watching one of the best movies ever, Before Sunrise (Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy, written and directed by Richard Linklater). Actually I'm watching the sequel now, Before Sunset, right now, back to back! Just watching the two lovers live, love and struggle with time... It made me feel, well, I'll let the rest of this journal say it.
I started thinking back to high school again, this guy I knew. During my senior year I was in a lot of after-school clubs and all sorts of activities. (I had long hair back then too!) It's so very much NOT like me as I'm really shy and basically antisocial in temperament. It's a long story, boring but not unpleasant story how I got to this point at that time in my life but it's way off topic. At that time I was totally passionate in eveything I did. And I was totally love sick too. Plus, despite having the time of my life, I wasn't handling the "love" very well nor handling the conflict of my future, what I wanted to do versus what my father wanted to make me do. I thought about death, death by my own hand, constantly. (I know, cliche high school angst.) I guess that time resonates with me because fast forward twenty years, it seems like the same situation has cropped up again...love, life, conflict about the future and wishing I could just make it all go away.
But this time there's one difference..well actually two. This time the "love interest" has, well, a much stronger character than the previous; the connection I feel seems to be on much deeper levels.
However it's the other thing that I want to talk about.
During senior year I was the head, the president-elect of this club called The Gamer's Guild, which was basically a bunch of D & D-ers. The most passionate gamer was this kid named Harvey, who was a bigtime fantasy enthusiast. He was always telling me about how cool stuff like Elric (Michael Moorcock) was and other stuff like that. No other kid in school that I knew of was that hardcore into that type of stuff. And my club would have been where they would be. So naturally I made him my vice president.
Later, after we all graduated and most of us went to college, I found out he had gone to the same school that my "business partner" had gone (my lil comic book business) in Riverside. And I also found out he had blown his brains out in his dorm room. That was a bit of a shock as a it was known which few of us in school were "depressed" and he wasn't one of them. He never mentioned he had any problems; he was just a little bit weird, not suicidal. Maybe not talking about it was his issue? I often wondered
Fast forward again many years later. I'm in a theater watching Lord Of The Rings: Two Towers I think. It's that big battle scene at the end of the movie. I'm pretty much riveted as I've never read the books so I'm entranced with what the story might bring next. And I'm thinking...How great is this to be alive right now and be able to see this moment. (Forgive my geekness) For some reason, Harvey entered my mind at that moment just then. I couldn't help but feel that he would have loved to see this too. But HE couldn't. (Later, I had another similar feeling in the theater seeing Return Of The King as well. ) And then that feeling expanded... When we were in high school, the closest thing to mainstream acceptance of geeky gamer stuff was the cheesy D&D cartoon on Saturday morning TV. Now we have so much...an entire culture that embraces us geeks, caters to us even in a big way including motion pictures, stores, internet, even SG with so many girls who love geeky stuff and even geeks themselves. I think whatever drove him to end it, he would have found his solace now at this time. But there was no indication then of any of the great stuff now. We were into this shit way before it was cool.
This whole thing occurs to me right now because I'm enjoying the Before Sunrise/Before Sunset movies. The first movie was so divine, so magical. But it made no money and its ending is incredibly open-ended. Only due to a die-hard cult following's endless pleas did the writer/director and the two main stars of the movie (both of whom were very early in their budding careers) all decide to reunite and do the sequel to finish the story somewhat. Over NINE years later. And I was there to see it. It made be glad to still be alive and watching it again, well...I feel the same.
Sometimes no matter how desolate life can be, staying alive means getting to experience magical moments like this one. And you never know what might happen and when. It's all I have to hold on to right now but it's something.
- R
Oh, also for fun, each blog from now on, I'm going to link one song that's really special to me. It will be a bit retro like my old blogs from 2004/5 when I would have a song, picture, topic and other stuff "of the day."