Phew, I’m almost moved in to Somerville- why do I have so much furniture? My calves are damaged in a way that I hope is not permanent. So, time for the quarterly report.
So far, so good. Dog: Healthy. Me: Healthy. Cut back on TV, selfhelp books, wasting time. Got some very solid writing done and happy with my writing progress and new writing group. Set some ghosts free.
Will post apartment photos soon.
How is this better than The Hangover? Rob Corddry’s hilarious alcoholism and mania is used right away to drive the film. (Go UMASS!) I felt like I was back at 88 Pelham Road (the dawg pound, home of my UMASS friends)- don’t go on the trampoline with your forty and all those mushrooms! The Hangover, despite being in Vegas with an actual tiger, declawed Ed Helms- their best asset showed none of the poorly repressed rage he brought to the early seasons of The Office. John Cusack, Craig Robinson, and even the young guy that A.O. Scott compares to John Hodgeman combine extreme cuteness, myopic self obsession and pathos that no woman can hope to get close to. The idea of them working together on anything is laughable, except in a movie with a time machine.
“I love how much you hate yourself,” one of the fleeting female characters says to Corddry.
One note: John Cusack’s hair piece makes me sad. Is he right that we could not love him the same as an adult with male pattern baldness as we love his full haired eighties self? Also I think he’s had a facelift. I adore him anyway, but I don’t understand him. The character he played in Say Anything, all grown up and turned into a miserable insurance salesman, or hired killer, or asshole record store owner, he’s got that same accessible untouchability. Is everything okay? What are you thinking about? Can I get you anything?
As a woman I am on the outside of these stories, technically- the only women who appear are sweet pieces of ass and floating breasts. Though they haul in a Deschanel lookalike as a romantic interest, she isn’t allowed to Ringwald. But I identify with these miserable men. Oh, hot tub time machine, I’ve tried you a few times. Do men have any idea how women think and want and do just the same things? They must, since we buy so many film tickets for movies that show hardly any women we can recognize.
Leaving the mall I walk to my car, a facsimile of the car I learned to drive on, and turn on the radio. The Red Hot Chili Peppers. I drive to the small New England town I moved to and think about how I’ve been reliving my teens these past 18 months- but with a different pov. Two weeks ago I watched the high school musical with all the proud grandmas. Sunday I’m moving in upstairs from Carina and her husband. Stay tuned for the sitcom. Should I act like I’m eighteen again and light out for the west coast, make some movies with actual women in them?
I can’t look at this month’s writing assignment straight-on. Is it generational, the discomfort with strong feelings and desire? The “kind of amazing” syndrome? Or just human- knock on wood, don’t attract too much attention if things are going well, god laughs at woman’s plans sort of thing.
Desire is so changeable. I’m reminded, excruciatingly, of a high school psychology assignment to write about your perfect 24 Hours. NOT a lasting statement for the ages or reflective of my inner self. Are all desires so superficial? Alternatively, you can end up sounding like Miss America “I would like my family to be happy, and the whole world to achieve enlightenment and end climate change.” etc.
I can think of a lot of delicious things I’ve tasted before that I would like to taste again: DuMont burgers, Neptune’s oysters, Ornella’s pasta. That rice ball I had in Naples that turned out to be full of clams. I can picture the perfect backyard pizza party in an imagined future, with all my current favorite people. But I think there is more to this assignment. That if you really looked directly at you might find something true.
The Buddhists would say, I think, that all desire is like this- smoke. You can’t capture it, it just wraps itself around a thing and as soon as you get what you want the desire quickly departs for a more distant object. There is also the danger that once you truly declare what you want there is a fairly good chance that you will get it.
What I want so badly I can taste it today is to finish packing. What I want so badly I can taste it this month is to write a screenplay. What I want so badly I can taste it this year is …. still a mystery.
Well, not yet, not for two months. But the boyfriend, a skilled manager, after listening to much complaining about packing and moving all by myself sniff sniff suggested I direct my energy toward our vacation. Primary sources consulted: A Time Traveler’s Guide to Medieval England, The Mighty Boosh, Jeeves and Wooster, 44 Scotland Street. I imagine our trip will be something like the above. Not much help picking a hotel in Edinburgh, though.
Now that I’ve started I can’t stop getting rid of things….
A neighbor and I were discussing fear and how you build your life around your fears in some ways, without knowing what you’re missing. I’ve secretly been hoarding my mother’s shopping lists folded in these scuzzy old cookbooks. Every scrap of her writing felt precious- keep it for the archives! Writing about my grief has drained those old heavy papers and books of their potency. My mother isn’t trapped in her handwriting or the books she read to me or the earrings she wore. Schlepping them from apartment to apartment to apartment won’t bring her back or keep her near. Whatever I have of her is always with me.
Having moved 3 times in two years, I like to think I have just the essentials. Sadly false. Some of today’s divestitures:
Packing is a process of despair (“I’m not moving to Spain. Not now and not ever” and exhilaration (“I don’t have to keep this broken marionette anymore!”)
I was sorely tempted last night to drive the two and half hours to Heath to eat corned beef. I knew it was a spring fever and tried to content myself with mixing together Kate Kearns’ family recipe for soda bread. I substituted cranberry sauce for most of the raisins. I’m moving and have become obsessed with using up every last item in my kitchen, including cranberries in the crisper from last fall. Somehow the spell of making the soda bread conjured a delicious boiled dinner – cabbage, parsnip and everything- with my neighbors the Donoghues.
Looky, I’m a librarian pundit! Thanks, Desk Set!
Yesterday I made bechamel sauce for my pasta and peas lunch: truly you can make the sauce while the water boils on your lunch hour. My secret processed food allowance for years has included a few boxes of Annie’s mac and cheese for emergency comfort food. Obvious now that there was some gap in my thinking (damn you Don Draper) how could a powdered mystery substance really be easier than butter and milk and flour. Now Kraft seems as quaint and inexplicable as Bisquick, having lost all emotional control over me.
And then these wonderful molasses cookies that were baked between when I got home and when I went to the neighbors’ for dinner. Delicious modern ingredients that make these better than the old school cookies are 1 tsp. lemon zest and 1/2 cup wheat germ. Recipe comes from Moosewood Classics. I would mail you some, but I ate them all.
I went to the Cabot Cinema in downtown Beverly for this movie with my wonderful neighbors. Any film watched there is improved by the handmade chocolates, mulled cider, and tuxedoed magician playing piano in the lobby.
Long, fun, and silly this is Holmes as Indiana Jones, lacking in depth but making up for it in action. Recommended, especially for evenings when you’ve been thinking too much and need a slight temporary lobotomy.
Posted in movie review
Tagged guy ritchie, jude law, movie review, robert downey jr., sherlock holmes
 | Jon on Time for art |
 | erica on Patience and Fortitude: Update… |
 | lyn on Patience and Fortitude: Update… |
 | Katie P on Patience and Fortitude: Update… |
 | Jessica Hanscom on All You Need is Love (and a jo… |
