Memory and Life

It's hard to believe that it's been almost 9 months since my father passed away. When I think back to 9 months ago, it's hard to really remember everything that was going on. I had just resigned from the Peace Corps, was taking care of my father, and in the end, was spending all day in the hospital with my step-mom and sister, amongst a cast of rotating family members and friends of my father's.

While it is so difficult to remember, I have an acute awareness to every detail of what was going on. I know this seems to contradict the whole "not remembering" thing, but it's almost as if I was outside of myself. When I think back to the memories of this time, I don't see things from my own eyes; rather, I see everything from a bird's eye view. I see myself in pictures and memories like I'm watching a film. I see snapshots, frozen in time, sometimes blurry like paintings, but completely realistic.

There are things I will always associate with this time: cell phone tetris (which I played compulsively in order to avoid all the drama that was happening when there were more than 3 people in the hospital room), the crummy parking garage at the hospital, eating cereal in the cafeteria, candied pineapple from Whole Foods, and a bunch of other stuff that would make absolutely no sense to anyone else.

I've always been fascinated with memory - mainly because I have a notoriously bad one. This year has been one of the most fascinating years of my life in term of memory retention. Everything is pretty vivid, whereas before everything was sort of murky and unimportant. It's been a pretty remarkable year. I started it as a Peace Corps volunteer in Moldova and 2 months later was at my father's funeral. I moved to Seattle and started life over again and later found myself cutting through the rugged Norwegian landscape aboard a train. And I started a new job.

If there's anything I've learned this year, it's that life is fleeting. There's no time to get lost in the complications of it. There's no time to waste in front of the TV for hours at a time. There's no time to make excuses for not going on your dream vacation. There's no time for staying in a dead end job that makes you miserable. I live by the day and I determine my future based on happiness and fulfillment. People say "life is short" all the time. Is it? It's only short if you live it this way. If I died tomorrow, I'm not so sure my life would have been cut "short". I've done a lot in my almost 27 years of life. The ratio of things that I'm proud of greatly outweighs things I regret or wish I could change. I've lived my life, and will continue to live my life, with purpose and urgency. It may seem naive, but I'm happy and satisfied.

In the vein of all of this talk of memory, I recently came upon these pictures of me, my dad and my sister that were saved on my external hard drive. Now these are times I absolutely cannot recall for the life of me - but, they're still important to me and it's nice to look at pictures in order to help fill in the blank periods of time for which I have absolutely no recollection.

You'll Eat it Up or I'll Eat You Up

If you haven't seen "Where the Wild Things Are" yet, you're missing out.

Wednesday night, I went out with a friend to the IMAX at the Pacific Science Center in Seattle. There on the huge screen, in front of about a hundred (on a Wednesday!) popcorn-eating, chair-reclining, innovation-craving Seattleites, the wild rumpus started. To say that Spike Jonze's interpretation of "Where the Wild Things Are" is unique, clever and envelope-pushing would be a massive understatement.

Now, I'm no movie critic - I don't claim to be, nor do I want to be - but I bet there are probably a lot of people out there who have a problem with this movie because it's so sad and doesn't really have the happiest of endings. This is a feel-good movie though. It's feel-good in the sense that throughout the movie, I laughed out loud, gave in to the characters emotions and really let go of reality. It felt good to feel like my money was well spent.

The voicing of the characters was incredible in my opinion. The characters talked over each other, genuinely thought out loud and reacted realistically as any human would to physical and emotional punches. I've never seen anything like it. The simplicity too - Max says, "What's that?" to which Carol, a wild thing responds, "Oh, it's that dog. Don't feed it. He'll follow you around." It's totally random, but it's life.




It all seemed so ... real. I know, I know, I must sound like an idiot when I say watching a bunch of fictional, wild beasts making a scene seemed real, but honestly I felt a connection and I think a lot is owed to the acting ensemble who voiced these characters, but also to Spike Jonze for directing them so casually in a way that really allowed for a ton of creative freedom. I give an A+ stand out to Lauren Ambrose who casually voices the seemingly indifferent "KW" - I was drawn in with every word. Catherine O'Hara gets an A for being amazing as well, as usual.

The movie has "big people" themes that are tackled through the eyes of a pre-teen already rife with anguish and despair given his home situation. They're issues that we all went through as children and they're things we all deal with in life still - depression, feelings of unworthiness, handling hyperactive energy and general feelings of inferiority/superiority.

I really do recommend this movie. I don't want to sit here and try to convince you with my words - this isn't a movie that can be written about in words. It's too difficult to describe. Just enter the theater with an open mind and a child's sense of wonder. Don't listen to people saying it's not for kids, either - they're just typical, overprotective American mothers who think when their child gets genuinely scared, it's going to scar them for life. Everybody relax. I think the best thing to do for children is to expose them to their own feelings through a venue such as this. Why hide it - bring it all out on the table. Validate those feelings. Adults don't give children enough credit for what they feel. This movie reminded me how heartfelt the emotions of a child can be and how important and relevant they are to life and the world.

Go.

Oh, and I almost forgot - the soundtrack is incredible. Karen O of the "Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs" must live in the head of a 10 year old. Genius.

Where the Wild Things Are

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince!

If you haven't seen it, please do. It lives up to the hype and comfortably nestles itself into the exceptional series.

However, that's not really what I am here to write about. It did happen when I saw Harry Potter though. When I was a boy, my favorite book in the world was Where the Wild Things Are. I remember reading it endlessly, each time being disappointed that it always did, in fact, end.

The illustrious world created by Maurice Sendak both fascinated and scared me. The exotic island that nurtured the Wild Things versus the familiar domestic setting from which Max dervies; the initial brutality of the beasts contrasted with their surprisingly friendly attitudes; the hypnotizing illustrations that worked despite an unusual lack of color and sharpness often found in children's literature.

Sitting in my horrifically uncomfortable movie theater chair (is this what we get for $10 now?), I somehow survived previews for G.I. Joe (shame on you, movie moguls, for greenlighting this material-driven monstrosity) and Holmes (somehow, I don't remember Sherlock Holmes being so adventurous and "stunt-y" when I read about him in school). But all was redeemed the moment I recognized Max's white beast outfit. I have to admit, I was a little skeptical about how they could possibly turn this book into a movie, but this movie trailer has sold me. Combined with the knowledge that this was a Spike Jonze project as well as the beautiful and totally appropriate music blaring in the background by one of my favorite bands, Arcade Fire, I got a little teary eyed at the end of the preview and for a moment forgot that I was actually there to see Harry Potter. It all just...resonated.

Are You There Henri? It's Me, Complete Stranger.

A new hobby of mine is shopping at Goodwill. I told somebody this recently and their response was essentially, "How can you do that... you're taking away from the poor?" Why do so many people believe this? It's the other way around. Goodwill is a wonderful organization that takes the profits from the sales of used items and puts them to use with educational programming and job training in order to provide more opportunities to people who are already denied way too many. So, basically if you shop at Goodwill, you are helping pay for these programs. You're not taking away from anyone, you are essentially getting treasure finds at dirt cheap prices and still supporting a good cause. It doesn't get much better than that.

Anyhow, one of my favorite things to do at Goodwill is to peruse the CD section. There are 3 crates at my Goodwill with thousands of used CDs to choose from. So far, I've scored quite the trove - albums from Massive Attack, Jill Scott, Everything But the Girl - and have been listening to them non-stop in my car. I recently bought "The Commitments" album for $1.50, and every song that comes up brings me back to my childhood when my mom used to be away at work and I'd be home alone, so I'd blast some of her CDs and sing and dance to them in the tiled door entryway. Not only are these albums providing hours of unexpected entertainment, some are also feeding that nostalgia portion of my brain that is tragically so undernourished.

This morning I went to Goodwill to participate in my own personal Saturday CD Safari. I bought No Doubt's "Tragic Kingdom" (memories of a middle school boy stealing the tape from his sister from time to time flooding my head and my ears with each song), an old Harry Connick, Jr. album (more Mom music - me mimicking his voice in the confines of my childhood bedroom) and one very interesting find...

Right in between an Enya album (she's HUGE at Goodwill!) and Garth Brook's Greatest Hits, I found a Dany Brillant album, "C'est Ca Qui Est Bon". Now, I've heard of Dany Brillant before - maybe in French class, I'm not sure - but the only reason I bought this album is because there was a piece of paper taped to the front of the CD with a phone number for somebody named Henri. (See below - I've covered two of the numbers so nobody harasses anyone.)



I just couldn't resist. How mysterious! Who is this "Henri" character? Why did he give someone this album? Is he French? Hasn't he heard of Post-Its?

Holding the CD in front of me, my imagination immediately began to run wild. You see, Henri was a foreign exchange student from Paris studying at the UW. He fell in love with a girl, Suzette. Everything about her was so French - her name, her swagger, her beautiful, pursed lips - but she was just as American as all the Heathers and Ambers he came across. Plus, she had no idea who Henri was. He was so insecure about his command of the English language that he never got the guts to speak to this girl, so on the eve of his flight back to Paris, he slipped this album under her dorm room door with his phone number attached in hopes that one day she would call him.

No, that can't be. Why would he give her an American phone number to be reached at in Paris? Oh yes, that's right, because Henri was actually a first-generation American with Tunisian parents. One day, in his mid 40s, he remembered it was his mother's birthday in two days. He had no gift and no ideas. After reminiscing about his childhood, he remembered how his mother would sing to him old Dany Brillant songs to help him get to bed as a small boy. The perfect gift! Why not remind his mother how much he appreciated those times and that comfort with one of Brillant's albums? Oh, and his mother didn't have his new phone number either, so he had to tape it on the CD so she'd remember it. Also, he couldn't email her, because this happened in 1981. What's that you say? Dany Brillant was born in 1965 so this story is impossible?

Oh, forget it.

For those of you who know me well, you know I am a very curious person and don't have too much fear with random human interaction or awkward situations. So, the only thing left for me to do was just call the number. I did...

Straight to voicemail and it definitely was NOT Henri. It was a woman with an American accent.

I guess I'll never know who Henri really was, but he provided me with hours of imaginative thinking and mind escape that I'll never get back. Regardless of it all, the album's pretty good so at least it was worth the money!