Lightning - It may strike twice.

When we say things like "people don't change", it drives scientist crazy because change is literally the only constant in all of science - always love my chemistry and physics classes. Energy. Matter. It's always changing, morphing, merging, growing, dying. It's the way people try not to change that's unnatural. They way we cling to what things were instead of letting things be what they are. The way we cling to old memories instead of forming new ones. The way we insist on believing despite every scientific indication that anything in this lifetime is permanent. Change is constant. How we experience change that's up to us. It can feel like death or it can feel like a second chance at life. If we open our fingers, loosen our grips, go with it, it can feel like a pure adrenaline. Like at any moment we can have another chance at life. Like any moment, we can be born all over again.

why it matters?

I, recently, saw Blue Valentine. I was bugging myself to find a copy of the movie anywhere I could, to a point of driving up to Wangsa Maju at 2 am checking out at a pasar malam there. I even almost wanted to subscribe to Netflix using GE's office IP address - stay up late in the office and turn on the Netflix. And I finally found it at Low Yatt - duh! It was worth the effort. Such stellar performances from both Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams supported by a talented kid, Faith Wladyka.

If there's only thing I've realized or found from this piece is how scary or frightening life could be out there. Brutally honest on the most possible reality in relationship of human beings, the piece offers a refreshingly honest perspective of situation in which "happily ever after" is hard to be sought after. An autopsy of a failed relationship (or marriage in a certain extent), in contrasts the giddy honeymoon beginning with the heartbreaking and wrenching sad denouement after dysfunction has devastated the groundwork of hope and newness.The whole storytelling, for me, is driven by a majestic performances and brilliant lines (rumors say that most of them were improvised, more credit to the performances). There's a great deal of intensity in the acting and some of the confrontations between Dean and Cindy are difficult because of the amount of feeling brought to their roles by Gosling and Williams. It is so packed with honesty of the actual character's feelings. Audience may say that Gosling and Williams are just being themselves, but i've gotta prove them wrong if they have done some acting before.
Here you go. Usually, in your acting 101, the acting teacher will pass a handout pretty much like this -

Physical. What does the character look like? How do the character’s physical attributes play a role in the story? How does the character feel about his or her physical attributes? How does the character change physically during the story? How do these changes affect the character’s experience?

Intellectual. How would you describe this character’s intelligence? What does this character know? How does this character’s intellect compare to others in the story? Is this character smart enough to thrive in the world in which he or she lives? What does this character learn as the story develops?

Emotional. How does this character feel most of the time? How do his or her feelings change throughout the story? How does this character feel about himself or herself? When faced with challenges in the story, what emotions come up for this character?

Social. How does this character get along with other characters in the story? Who does this character choose for friends and why does this character choose them? Where does this character stand in the social order? How does this character’s social standing affect events in the story?

Philosophical. What does this character believe about the way life is? What are these beliefs based on? How do these beliefs affect the choices this character makes? How do those beliefs change throughout the story? Do others in the story share these beliefs?

And you'd be like me, 'Can we just get some acting goin on now. Read the lines and say it on stage. You say your lines and i say mine. If it doesn't sound right, let us know'. But, the teacher always knows better! That's what i just realized after watching this movie.

There are few scenes in this movie where squabbling happens between Dean and Cindy. It's one of those scenes where both people are in an argument that they are both talking simultaneously to prove the other is wrong. It escalates and bursts or stops. Classic acting scene. But, it ain't that easy. If you do not 'own' the character well, or answering honestly the questionnaire above and truly live under that imaginary circumstances, the lines memorized will be spit out like nothing or worst, you stumble on some words.

It's all because you are living as YOU, not the character. The character has history or those answers to the questions above that it'll make the words come out almost spontaneously. You will not feel the emotion perfectly and trust me, if you do not feel it, the audience will not feel it too! Unless you totally psyched by the character's life and fully 'own' it, it'll come out easily up to a point that you do not feel like you're just spitting out lines. Let say the lines go as "I didn't want to be somebody's husband and I didn't want to be somebody's dad, that wasn't my goal in life. But somehow it was. I work so I can do that". You've gotta believe in those words you say and you won't believe it until you know that you really wanna be a husband and why?, a father, why? whose father? whose husband? what it feels like to be those two? what about it you want them so much?

Gosling and Williams totally master this art - in fact, some of the same league thespians. When they pull out such scene, it feels like humanity is just lying naked in front of me. And when that is clear to me, the journey of the beings could be seen in the simplest manner but brutally sad!

The kind of movies or piece of arts, I like to see, is the kind that leaves something in me after i walk out of the venue. It makes me think or question the reality of my life - note, it ain't just from dramas. Blue Valentine comes on like a bittersweet cautionary tale. A story, I supposed, I've gone through, not literally, close enough not to be able to pull myself out of it for quite a while. A searing portrait of failure of not just a wonderful and hopeful relationship, but more importantly, the love that once fueled it.

The petals fall

I miss my stroll

I used to take a long stroll on campus, after regular evening-study for my FM exam, over mid-winter, where snow starting to get frozen plus chilly-wind blowing on my dry face. Starting from Greyhouse - my second 'home' after Purdue Memorial Union's Starbucks, I would walk pass Smoothie King, Brothers Bar and University Book Store, then taking the pathway along West State Street leading towards Harrison Residence Hall, getting into the hall to warm up the body and check out text messages, and continuing to cross Hillenbrand Residence Hall hitting Intramural Field.

This was where the walk got interesting. It was where the actual stroll would start as I would turn on different film's soundtracks on different evenings, dramatically, walking thru the icy-grass field. This scene portrays exactly what it feels like. (I seem can't get the embedded version). I do own that same long coat except that mine is gray-ish.

The last walk I had over my last winter in the States was with Evan, who suggested soundtracks from Pride & Prejudice (2005) - despite his reluctant on just staying at Greyhouse watching Moon & Tides performing. It was a 2-mile walk in 0-degree Fahrenheit. It was one of the coldest walks I've ever had and I felt bad dragging him along as he was the kind who liked heat. We didn't talk at all throughout the whole walk, neither holding our hands as we would do most of the time - may be because it was too cold to keep our full-gloved hands outside of our favorite triple-layer The North Face Ama Dablam Gore-Tex XCR's pockets, but what I like about it was that we seemed know where we were going to. The thing about these walks I loved the most was that I never specified pathways to take, but I know where exactly the end was (I think I was fully brainwashed by Twyla Tharp creative life - loving the process more than the start or the end). Though we were walking on the same pace side-by-side, Evan, not knowing where the end was, seemed to get along very well.

The end was at a lake, the one that cut by Lindberg Rd/ W 200 N. It gets frozen over winter. I was told by Dillon that that lake is safe to skate on if you could see the whole surface of the lake is frozen. I pulled out two pairs of skates from my backpack which I borrowed from Dave. It was my first time ice-skating.

I miss him.

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Neglected Tribute

And I, of ladies most deject and wretched,
That suck'd the honey of his music vows,
Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,
Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh;
That unmatch'd form and feature of blown youth
Blasted with ecstasy.

Can I handle it?

Pain comes in all forms. The small twinge, a bit of soreness, the random pain. The normal pains we live with everyday. Then there's the kind of pain you can't ignore. A level of pain so great that it blocks out everything else . . . makes the rest of the world fade away, until all we can think about is how much we hurt. How we manage our pain is up to us.

Pain. We anesthetize, ride it out, embrace it, ignore it, and for some of us the best way to manage pain is just to push through it.

Pain. You just have to ride it out, hope that is goes away on its own. Hope the wound that caused it heals. There are no solutions, no easy answers. You just breathe deep and wait for it to subside. Most of the time pain can be managed, but sometimes the pain gets you when you least expect it, hits way below the belt and doesn't let up.

Pain. You just have to fight through, because the truth is you can't out run it. And life always makes more.

Void

I found it rather funny, when the world betrays you, you come back to your comfort zone, which is exactly what i am doing right now. Back to my blog - my comfort. Putting my feelings and thoughts together. Accumulate them all and dump it all here. Or on something or someone else (perhaps there's one).

I went out to put my bet to the world. Betting on the most precious thing I've ever owned - my heart. Forgetting this place where I nurtured this heart. And people whom I ignored over that period of time exploring that world.

I took all the risk of breaking the heart or even losing it. It's all for the sake of getting something better out there, selfishly, or to offer my greatest treasure to the humanity (lame).

What was i thinking? Do i even have enough tools/skills in carrying this heart and putting it at risk? Before stepping out to that world, have I ever thought of these comfort zones, people or things who helped me nurture the heart of whom for sure won't do any harm on it?

What scares me the most is not my heart, but, people who helped to nurture it. A person who had sacrificed his whole entire life for it. Bones break. Organs burst. Flesh tears. I can sew the flesh, repair the damage, ease the pain. But when the heart breaks down, when I break down, there's no science, no hard and fast rules. I just go back to the roots and I have to feel my way through.