Newspaper obituaries would be a lot more interesting
if they told you how the person died.
---------------------------
if they told you how the person died.
---------------------------
Hmmm. Getting a bit lax lately, aren't I? No post since Wednesday? No meaning. Just lazy. Winter hibernation mode.
-------------------------
Thursday night I hosted the first of my own meetups, the movie "An Education", at an indie movie house. It was an education. None of the synopses mention the most painful of the lessons, when (at the risk of throwing in a spoiler) the girl stands outside a house, and instead of seeing a carefree harridan emerge, she sees a young housewife, with a small child.
It seemed more poignant because of the Tiger Woods revelations. Tiger had forgotten that tigresses have claws.
Both men, Tiger and the movie's David, played with emotions. That's their major fault, not the faithlessness, nor the lies --- they are both damaged men with emotional problems of their own that they probably don't recognize themselves --- but the callous playing with the emotions of others? That's almost unforgivable.
I am annoyed at the people who consider Tiger's women to be whores and worse, because "they knew he was married". Tiger didn't lay out the truth for those women. It wasn't "an arrangement". He courted and wooed them. People forget that emotions and logic are not connected. When you fall in love, you believe what he tells you. You believe he loves and needs you. Loving him, you can't abandon him to the meager mercies of "that woman", the wife, who, he says, doesn't understand or love or support him, who has trapped him in a loveless and sexless marriage. I have sympathy for the women. I do not despise them. They didn't know the real story, and they were fools for love.
Neither do I despise Tiger. I heard that this all started after his father's decline. I suspect his actions might have a lot to do with having been tightly constrained by his father for so long, and having missed out on the usual experiences and opportunities of the average young man. (I imagine that the father in the movie and Tiger's father may have had a lot in common, in driving their offspring to success over all.) His father's death may have been a release. What matters to me now, to my opinion of Tiger, will be what he does NEXT.
----------------------------
There were only three of us at Thursday's movie, which did not surprise me, as it was selected and scheduled by the assistant organizer on a weeknight, at 5:30 pm. Ack. But the meetup group itself has proven to be of some interest, as a week after the broadcast announcement we already have 12 members.
After the movie, the assistant organizer went home to pack for her Christmas trip, and the third attendee and I had dinner. The third attendee happened to be Roman. It was a relaxed and interesting dinner conversation. I think we're past the awkwardness. I hope.
----------------------------
Last night's movie in Albany was "Invictus", directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela and Matt Damon as the captain of South Africa's rugby team. The basic story could have been told in two paragraphs (or two sentences, as in the wikipedia entry on Mandela), but the main story was the faces, and the movie shows them well. However, it seemed to assume that people knew the social and political background, which I'm willing to bet very few young Americans do.
The real star of the show was rugby. I'd never seen it played before. Man! It's brutal! And the players wear no protection. Now I understand why the rest of the world snickers at American football - a bunch of pampered, armored ballerinas pretending to be warriors.
If you see the movie, I fell in love with the head of Mandela's security (Julian Lewis Jones). He's gorgeous. He turned my head. Which is significant because I've had a crush on Morgan Freeman for at least the past two decades, but I felt no conflict in loyalty at all.
.
No comments:
Post a Comment