stories
A bad day, is when everything, right from the very beginning of the day, goes wrong... and then even when it looks like things are brightening up, will suddenly go even more wrong than before, so that it ends up just being all wrong. sigh. My day's now ending with a very stuffed nose, a sandpaper throat, and a searching heart.On Saturday night I think, I watched "The Story of Us" on tv. Under a different set of circumstances, in fact I think under any other circumstances than the ones I was in that night, I would have found it extremely banal, contrived, full of bad writing and maybe even painful.
But that night, I caught myself tearing over parts of this silly show, and sat watching it to the end. After that, getting ready for bed, I wondered why I was being so foolish. And remembered what John Connolly said at Goodwood Park Hotel last week. (I thought he was absolutely charming! Not at all intimidating even though he'd been a journalist before writing his books, and had himself interviewed authors so interviewing him was kind of surreal. And nothing like what I'd imagined from his books, or rather book since I'd only read a bit of The Black Angel, and full of these funny little stories. but back to what he said...)
He was recounting the time in his youth after that "first real break-up: the one that everyone goes through and thinks their broken heart will never heal from, and really your heart might mend but is never quite the same way again". So anyway he was talking about being all down and out, working as a barman at some Irish pub in a small Irish town full of bachelors (workers who'd come down from the mountains) and spinsters (from all over), and stuck there with "the desperate and the lovelorn", he was reading a book called "The Sportswriter". (I recall the title because it struck me as unusual) And a line from the epilogue jumped out at him. It was something about love, but I didn't catch it. What I recalled on Saturday night, was what he said about how sometimes when reading, a line just stares you in the face, and there's the sudden feeling of: I'm not alone.
But sometimes the exact opposite happens, I read something and think, why am I not like that. Or I read something and think, I can't believe this person is like that. Though I still agree with him when he says that he doesn't like people who look down on fiction reading. :)
Anyway, the reason why what he said last week popped up, was that in some ways watching films, even the worst ones, can sometimes be like that. And I found little things in Katie (the story of us character) I could identify with. Trying to solve crosswords to answer the little questions amidst bigger ones, feeling rightly or wrongly that every burden in the world rested on her weak shoulders alone, flaring up over the tiniest comment etc. Of course it didn't help that (I thought) she was made to look like the ultimate villain!
But in the end, it's just a show right? And in trying to portray all the mundane facts of a relationship, they couldn't have been entirely honest either. How futile to watch a bunch of lies and stupid jokes (like: hey your butt's not a butt it's just the fatty extension of your thighs and so in the same way life and love is just what you make of it. cringe.) and then cry!
Still, there's too much to learn, too much to perfect, too much to accept that sometimes you can't help but grow weary right? So what's the harm in crying and laughing over something meaningless once in awhile, no harm done. :)
Back to my bad day: a little pondering has shown that it wasn't all bad. Just the phonecalls and sms-es to a single annoying individual, and the taxi driver who almost got me into an accident and still swore at the rest of the world including me, and I couldn't even tell him not too because of my sorethroat. But other than that, it was mostly good.
I've got less than two weeks less at the new paper, have got wasted about six already, so I must must must make the most of the remaining time.
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