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"That's empathy," said my mother. "That means you're normal."Sometimes I have the hardest time relating to other people's emotions. Other times it feels super easy. This weekend my sister was married. I was a groomsman, so that means I was up on the stage when I glanced down to see the groom's father barely able to contain himself as my sister walked down the aisle with our father. He was having a hard time, too.It seems I caught a glimpse of fatherhood's goal that day - to send your son/daughter off and place them in the trusting hands of someone else. That hits me pretty hard. My sister's father-in-law and our own father appear to have a lot in common. They are both men of faith who have given all that they are to their families. And now these two families are merged together. There's no denying that much has changed (and will change) now that marriage has bound my sister and brother-in-law. That title alone is my example: "brother-in-law." I've gained a brother-in-law and so has the groom. I'm probably being so reflective about all this because he is, in fact, my only "brother" - having grown up with two sisters. This poses so many questions - ones that I won't have any say in, and for that I'm surprisingly content with. One will be holidays. Whose house will Thanksgiving be at? Will my sister be home for Christmas? This all seems to support my idea that growing up has no correlation with one's age - it all is a matter of when you pack up and leave you're parents' house on your own or through marriage. When you're on your own, you (and your spouse, if that's the case) decide where you'll spend Christmas - not your parents. Part of me wonders if loving parents can ever be "okay" with that. They've spent nearly 24 years caring for and disciplining a child, and now they're suppose to give them complete independence. Can my parents honestly be okay with my sister and brother-in-law going out of the country for a week on their honeymoon (sans any "adult supervision")? Will my sister call each night before bed to say she's okay? Can parents honestly and completely "let go" of their child?I think I've had time to process it all: My sister is officially grown-up now.Back to empathy.Relating to the emotions and situations of all the fathers and mothers this weekend was shockingly easy. It hit me hard in the stomach when I got up on that church stage and waited for the rest of the bridal party to enter the sanctuary. Beyond the excited "this is it" feeling everyone was experiencing, I couldn't help but let all those parenthood emotions emitted from the first pew to weigh down on me. I felt my lip quivering; my legs seemed to grow heavy. Along with all that joy, I could sense the pride of parenthood accomplishment. The look on the groom's father's face exclaimed the triumph of raising his son to manhood. It was as if seeing his boy find the love of his life also completed a chapter in his life. These are all things I've considered to be majorly significant in human life - if not sacred. I think it's official: I want to be a father more than anything else.
Not really. I'm just saying that because in an hour I'll be off to my favorite class this semester: fiction writing. There was once a time when all I wanted to do was study literature and write, but somewhere along the way "critical theory" reared its head and scared me away. It's been about 2 years since I've written something that didn't have the words research and/or response somehow attached to it.
This is fictional writing. That means it's not necessarily real. Two years ago I probably would have taken this literally - writing about nanomachine-infused soldiers and walking battle tanks, stuff that I've learned to leave to Japanese culture (they got it in the bag). Instead I feel like writing about mundane life. Not in an attempt to draw some lofty, artful meaning to it, but instead to just document real-life emotions I experience and see around me.
That being said, I had homework for today. In about an hour I'll be reading one page of new prose to my fiction class. It's a way of keeping us accountable, I assume. We move our desks into a circle and take turns reading aloud the makings of our original stories. Here's what I got:
Mike could see Kelly in the sunrise – the way the piercing orange defeated the morning’s cold drape. The flatness of the road made for the best sunrises, he thought. He loved the horizon. He loved how the deep blue of morning was bested by the power of light and color at the start of the day. To him that was love itself, and therefore, he thought of Kelly. He could see her left eye hiding behind a veil of dark bangs and a dimple in her cheek. He could see her turning around to greet him as soft shades of violet surfaced. Mike stared into the emerging light and tried to imagine her there – somehow existing in the collage of color and cloud. He wondered if, by some romantic coincidence, she was experiencing the same mundane, however magnificent, natural occurrence as he was, and maybe – just maybe – if she was thinking of him. She’s not, he thought. The sunlight began to reflect off the hood of the car and he turned off the headlights. He had driven through the night and now the day had arrived, marking the thirtieth day since Kelly left him for “some douchebag back home,” as he had come to call him.
There was a romance to the Indiana interstate that Mike had fashioned in his mind. The fields of harvested corn seemingly longed to be replanted – to return to their desired state of blossom. In the late autumn plainness, Mike found beauty and, as he would call it, love. He loved the road and the passing cars. He loved his ’89 Chevy Caprice and the hours he spent last summer replacing the transmission. He loved how its maiden voyage had taken him out of the refuge of his parent’s garage and into the night, all the way to that diner off the twenty-first exit where he first met Kelly. She was sitting alone at a table, writing something in that tattered leather-bound journal of hers, occasionally looking out the window at that illuminated stretch of road.
It all started at that diner – one of those glorious, grease-ridden diners placed directly off the exit ramp. During his late-night drives, the twenty-four-hour diner appeared like a beacon, its muted fluorescent lights appearing in the distance behind a thin line of spruce trees. Mike had stopped there just hours before only to grab a quick cup of burnt coffee as he made his way south. He wished he had seen her there. Just like old times, he thought. They would be sitting in that corner booth by the window – where he first saw her – talking about old TV sitcoms and art history courses she was taking at the community college. Everything would be perfect. But that wasn’t the case – not now.
-B
Demo (enjoy)
No lyrics yet. I'm just proud of myself for actually recording this tonight. Any suggestions for lyrics would be awesome.
One of my friends will joke about making the phrase "baby bear" a common saying. From the way I understand it, calling something "baby bear" is saying that it's "just right" [a la Goldilocks and The 3 Bears]. Example: "This Lipton Green Tea is so baby bear right now! It hits the spot!"
I've been listening to Vampire Weekend's new album Contra for the past two weeks. It's great. It's baby bear. And I say that mostly because of one song in particular - "I Think Ur a Contra" - the song I assume the album is named after. I love this song. I really do. Could be my new favorite until something else rolls along, but for now I'm keeping it on repeat as I write this.
It totally reminds me of the time I spent at home over Christmas break, and separately, how I feel now - being in the dead of Indiana winter, wanting spring to get here ASAP.
Get here, April.
-B
"Maybe we don't have to find it.
Maybe we are the pieces."
- Michael Cera [via Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist]
Everyone, I have a bone to pick. Tonight is a good night to tear apart mainstream culture and then turn around and say how much I love it in the end. Let me set up some context: I'm setting in my dorm room in a small-town private college wearing an overpriced American Apparel hoodie and listening to my Bon Iver radio station on Pandora. A strand of colored lights outlines one of my walls underneath a collage of over-saturated Holga camera photographs. On another wall hangs posters of several local concerts I've hit up this past year.
Several years ago, some up-and-coming filmmaker made a film about a pregnant teen and spent millions of dollars to make the production look like it only took a couple thousand to make. Trust me, artsy hand-drawn opening sequences are not cheap, but that's another story. This film also spearheaded the use of the popular hand-drawn font type. Of course, we're talking about Juno here - a culturally relevant film about growing up in white suburbia where most tweens/teens/young adults are 90% defined by what music/bands they listen to and their connections to their first sexual experiences. That other 10% of "who you are" is defined by your weekend escapades that would otherwise be utterly mundane if it wasn't for fateful encounters with destiny and/or the boy/girl of your dreams. In other words, the making of true "indie flicks."
"Hi. I'm Michael. I'm just a humble guy trying to be myself/define my personal brand/fall in love/make it in this crazy, suburban world I live in..."
The poster child of this philosophy is none other than everyone's favorite Michael Cera - a guy I believe to be a genuine guy in person. Let's take a look at his most memorable acting roles:
Arrested Development
Probably the first thing you remember seeing him in; the birth of the quirky, insecure archetype - the character who is too nice for his own good. He just wants to be understood and loved.
Superbad
Similar context as AD - but loads more edgy this time. Cera plays a high school senior who wants the push the limits of his sexuality and find himself in a meaningful relationship. Sounds pretty nice, doesn't it? And it's not half bad! Despite the film being completely insane and exaggerated, Cera and that one fat guy actually learn a valuable life lesson: It's not all about sex/parties/beer/etc. There's a life beyond high school. Overall, a decent feel-good family flick.
Juno
Ah yeah. Now we're talkin'. This time Cera finally did it - and now there's a bun in the oven. Surprisingly enough, Juno received a Heartland Truly Moving Picture Award. His character has an overprotective mom and he even runs cross-country - the least aggressive of all scholastic sports. He simply is a humble guy trying to learn from his mistakes. Growing up is hard, y'all. No one can relate to my quirky taste in music.
Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
It just keeps getting better. Michael Cera is living the indie dream - despite the fact that his lousy girlfriend left him. But still, he seems to have a lot going on for him. His band has dreams of "making it big" and he lives in New York - the concrete jungle where dreams are made of. Not only that, he majorly scores over the course of one night with a girl I find both attractive and seriously intimidating at the same time (a rare and scary combo). This could very well be the one Cera role I find myself most infatuated with - and driven to a near-blinding rage over. Here we see two teens find true love over the course of one fateful encounter. Let me just say that every Friday when I put my shoes on in the morning I remind myself that tonight's "playlist" could very well redefine my seemingly mundane young adult life. Gotta keep those fingers crossed.
This is admittedly the last indie flick I saw starring Michael Cera. I can still remember my initial reaction upon seeing the trailer for this gem of a movie:
"It has the word "playlist" in the title. I'm not sure how I feel about that. It's clearly appealing to the iPod/Mac/my-music-defines-who-I-really-am/indie generation. I bet "older people" don't understand what this movie could possibly be about because they've never seen that word before..."
Humbleness + attainability = true love = what everyone truly wants in life. Amen.
I'm reminded of a comment I read on the popular "alternative" blog Hipster Runoff regarding "Nick and Norah's Infinite Lameness":
"you know a scene is dead when hollywood goes and makes a movie about it"
Yeah, I think that happened here. Hollywood killed it for me. I watch this movie and can't feel more detached from reality - and I recently saw Avatar in freaking IMAX 3D - which speaks volumes. Nick and Norah here turn the mirror around and let me see that I, contrary to everything the film stands for, have a gaping hole that even the indiest of the indie experiences can't fill. My life isn't like that - and I'm pretty sure no one's is. Talk about frustrating. I mean, what can I possibly be living for now? I truly doubt one fateful, random night out on the town will redefine the essence of my young, pseudo-indie life.
I need to make a bold claim now - and I'll admit I'm getting a little "vullney" (means "vulnerable") here. Films like Nick and Norah and Juno are like porn. It's a teasing, self-indulgent experience - which admittedly is what most movie-watching experiences are, but roll with me here.
I can't help but hate Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and all that Michael Cera's iconic character stands for. Relationships, no matter how awesome/serendipitous/perfect they seem do not cut it for me - at least not yet. I've tried and my only conclusion is that the hole in my being that's longing to be filled isn't shaped like a relationship - they're only puzzle pieces that kinda fit...but not really. There's still some gaps and the picture itself doesn't come together when you look at it from afar.
It's a simple reminder for me that man was made for more than this world has to offer - despite all those playlists we scroll through in our minds.
-B
This isn't a music blog and I don't do concert reviews - so this is a first for me.
I met Bradford Cox last night. He asked me what my major was. I told him film production. He said that's cool - he even mentioned how color-correcting would be one of his dream jobs if he wasn't making music with Deerhunter or doing Atlas Sound stuff.
Overall, an amazing concert - the best I've been to in a long time, maybe ever. I'm so impressed we got him to play here at school. I know our students' personal tastes are all over the place, but really, those who didn't come to the concert and could have really lost a great opportunity to hear an amazing artist play.
-B
I can't help but think there's something fundamentally wrong with relationships ending between people. It just feels like people aren't made to be heartbroken.
That's really all I got for today. I swear I'll be more optimistic next time.
-B
