start up the time machine
Let's go back in time to when everything was okay.
Surely, that's a time that exists. Movies call us back, make us remember the past in very specific ways, offer up rose-colored glasses and limited perspectives to make the past be just a smaller version of itself. If it can fit in a script, fit on a screen, then we don't have to remember how it really was, don't have to remember that life was always difficult. As kids, sure, we didn't know enough to know enough about what was wrong. Or maybe we grew up in a cult that told us the world was ending and all those Cold War news stories and movies were going to come true so we never really figured out how life was supposed to work, never imagined the far off future would really come. And, now it's here. And, I just want to watch this nice little movie set in the 1980s because sometimes it feels like this future I've found myself grown up in is too far outside my control to be any good. Don't get me wrong; sometimes it's wonderful, sometimes I have great times with my kids, or play fun games with friends, sometimes I get to spend time with amazing people, an amazing person, someone who makes it all seem better. But, sometimes... Sometimes, a good day can twist into a bad day in naught but a moment. And, I need something like Sing Street to untwist it...
I think back on my own private school, wooden paddles and overbearing teachers. Ridiculous demands based on some imaginary god's rulings from longer ago than most of our societal norms were even put together yet. I remember getting into trouble a lot. I remember having fun. I remember being sad. I remember being happy. I remember playing games on the playground, climbing on and jumping off the bars. I remember having crushes on girls and finding stupid ways to let them know... or not. I remember being enamored, enlightened, enraged, energized. Mostly I remember being afraid to express myself a lot of the time because I knew someone was going to punish me. A teacher with a paddle. God. Someone.
I wish I had an outlet like a band in high school. I wish I had something more... normal? I'm reminded sometimes that I'll never be normal, that I've never been normal. There's no point sometimes to making certain changes because they won't work or won't stick. I am who I am. I thought years ago I was past the point of thinking I didn't deserve good things in my life. Then, in a stray unpleasant moment, I'm reminded of that feeling. And, I'm not surprised.
What I want is to go after the girl, go after the dream, run away on a boat for England and all that. Well, not really a boat, and not really England. The real girl is too good for me. So, I imagine the movie girl--Raphina today--and the real one can live her life, I can live mine, and we don't have to ruin it. I don't have to ruin it.
This is why this blog persists. It doesn't matter how few people read it. I need somewhere to talk to myself, if to no one else, about movies, about life. Most of the time, it helps.
Other times, it's like my kingdom for a time machine. I could go back in time to the real 1980s, tell my young self to keep dreaming big, to start ignoring all the bullshit in church and school sooner and actually imagine the future.
Surely, that's a time that exists. Movies call us back, make us remember the past in very specific ways, offer up rose-colored glasses and limited perspectives to make the past be just a smaller version of itself. If it can fit in a script, fit on a screen, then we don't have to remember how it really was, don't have to remember that life was always difficult. As kids, sure, we didn't know enough to know enough about what was wrong. Or maybe we grew up in a cult that told us the world was ending and all those Cold War news stories and movies were going to come true so we never really figured out how life was supposed to work, never imagined the far off future would really come. And, now it's here. And, I just want to watch this nice little movie set in the 1980s because sometimes it feels like this future I've found myself grown up in is too far outside my control to be any good. Don't get me wrong; sometimes it's wonderful, sometimes I have great times with my kids, or play fun games with friends, sometimes I get to spend time with amazing people, an amazing person, someone who makes it all seem better. But, sometimes... Sometimes, a good day can twist into a bad day in naught but a moment. And, I need something like Sing Street to untwist it...
I think back on my own private school, wooden paddles and overbearing teachers. Ridiculous demands based on some imaginary god's rulings from longer ago than most of our societal norms were even put together yet. I remember getting into trouble a lot. I remember having fun. I remember being sad. I remember being happy. I remember playing games on the playground, climbing on and jumping off the bars. I remember having crushes on girls and finding stupid ways to let them know... or not. I remember being enamored, enlightened, enraged, energized. Mostly I remember being afraid to express myself a lot of the time because I knew someone was going to punish me. A teacher with a paddle. God. Someone.
I wish I had an outlet like a band in high school. I wish I had something more... normal? I'm reminded sometimes that I'll never be normal, that I've never been normal. There's no point sometimes to making certain changes because they won't work or won't stick. I am who I am. I thought years ago I was past the point of thinking I didn't deserve good things in my life. Then, in a stray unpleasant moment, I'm reminded of that feeling. And, I'm not surprised.
What I want is to go after the girl, go after the dream, run away on a boat for England and all that. Well, not really a boat, and not really England. The real girl is too good for me. So, I imagine the movie girl--Raphina today--and the real one can live her life, I can live mine, and we don't have to ruin it. I don't have to ruin it.
This is why this blog persists. It doesn't matter how few people read it. I need somewhere to talk to myself, if to no one else, about movies, about life. Most of the time, it helps.
Other times, it's like my kingdom for a time machine. I could go back in time to the real 1980s, tell my young self to keep dreaming big, to start ignoring all the bullshit in church and school sooner and actually imagine the future.
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