Today is the first day of a big four-day weekend for me. President's Day on Monday, and today off as a kindness granted by the people who help me pay rent through that fancy show that took place last week. Woot! Four-day weekend. Lovely.

I had plans today to go to Houston yet again (and not just for fun, by the way, there are plans in the works). However, it's two o'clock in the afternoon, and I'm still in my pajamas. Can't. Take off. Pajamas. It's kind of nice, seeing how the sky is gray outside, and perfect for pajama lounging. Also, I made up with my feline companions, and they are being ultra cute today - lots of rolling around on the floor and stopping to bat their eyes at me. Not sure if I will be kicking it into high gear today or not.

Last night, thanks to Netflix, I finally saw both Before Sunrise and its follow-up, Before Sunset. I never bothered to see Before Sunrise before this point, because the only movie I can love Ethan Hawke in is Dead Poet's Society. After Reality Bites, my squick factor for Ethan rose considerably. Along with Laura Dern, his movies are on my "too bad this movie cast {insert annoying actor/actress here}, cause I'd rather stick a fork in my eye than watch it now" list. But everywhere I turn on the internets, someone is saying how great these two movies are, so I had to give in and see for myself. (I promise not to spoil the movies in the following paragraphs - but if you haven't seen them and want to, you might want to skip down a bit.)

About twenty minutes into Before Sunrise, I contemplated turning the movie off. Listening to Ethan Hawke (or his character, "Jesse") babble on and on, spouting psuedo-philosophical conundrum after "but wait, listen to how smart I am now" rhetoric is just as bad as sitting next to that guy in class who raises his hand and whinges on and on just to hear himself talk. God. Shut up already. But as soon as the characters in the movie quit talking and things started actually happening... I was drawn in. Not quite hooked, but intrigued, and maybe a little charmed, even. I can see how, if I had seen the movie ten years ago when everyone else did, I'd be excited about the prospect of a follow-up movie. Luckily, I didn't have to wait an agonizing ten years for the sequel, so when the movie ended, all I had to do was get off the couch and put Part Deux in the DVD player.

Before Sunset was the one that really captured me and took me along for the ride. Sure, there was healthy dose of "I think this and I also think this and man, you're going to be amazed to hear what I think about THIS!", but it flowed a little better wrapped in the storyline, I thought. I even had one of those moments when something Julie Delpy's character said hit a tight nerve, and I had to repeat the scene and pause the movie afterward just to contemplate the impact of her words:

"I see the people that do the real work and what's really sad, in a way, is that...the people that are the most giving, hard working and capable of making this world better, usually don't have the ego and ambition to be a leader. They don't see any interest in superficial rewards, they don't care if...if their name ever appear in the press. They actually enjoy the process of helping others, they're in the moment."

Seeing it in print takes away a bit of the impact, I guess, but at the moment that I watched it unfold last night, I felt like one of the people she was referring to. Not that I see myself as the most giving and hard working people in the world, exactly, or that I feel in the moment and a part of a process at all times... but more that I feel my current situation lends itself to being one of those people, but not in a selfless, heroic way. In the sad way that she implies at the beginning of her thought.

Why is it sad, I wonder? Sad that the people who put themselves into the hard work are not usually the same people with the balls to stand at the front of the group and take credit for what the group has accomplished, maybe? Sad that the leaders are the face of the effort, and indirectly earn the rewards of the group, whether or not they took part in the process? Maybe. To be a leader implies in itself that you took the reigns and guided an effort into fruition, though. Does that mean the leader deserves the credit? But what if it's not the leader who is guiding the effort, but rather just standing in front, pushed along by the momentum of the group? That's how I took her words, and that's what hit the nerve, I think. Maybe the problem is not with the leader, but with the people who are willing to put themselves into to work without taking the reigns - but only if those people resent the leader, I guess. If they don't, there's no problem.

Well, apparently watching these two movies back to back has rubbed off me today - I'm starting to sound like Ethan Hawke, waxing philosophical to hear my thoughts out loud. Funny how that works. They say, you know (whoever they is), that the things that irritate you about someone else are the things you are most uncomfortable with in yourself. I'm paraphrasing here, of course, but when I look at situations in that light I always find a bit of truth. That sentiment reminds me of one of my favorite quotes, from a Carlos Casteneda book, The Fire Within. This segment deals with a woman who is particularly nasty to the narrator of the story:

"You should thank La Gorda day and night (said Don Juan, the book's shaman or spiritual healer, to the narrator). She's helping you destroy your self-importance. She is the petty tyrant in your life, but you still haven't caught on to that yet."

I'm not sure I've learned this lesson yet, but it's one that keeps popping up in my life, so maybe I should get on that, hmm? And so, with the moral lesson of the day presented, today's vague and circular psuedo-philosophical entry is complete.

Maybe I should change out of my pajamas now. Happy weekend!

Lucy loves you |