Everyone experiences the same basic human emotions, but it's really how we deal with/express them that makes communication hard. I, for instance, tend to leave things in draft blog posts (my last actual one was nearly two weeks ago. er. Belated merry Christmas and that jazz.) or type out extremely lengthy notes and musings to myself that will never see the outside of my head or my hard drive. I withdraw. A lot. I withdraw from the internet even, reduced to lurking and maybe a picture of cute otters on Tumblr.
In response to Alex's (currently) most recent post, I feel like it illustrates a lot of the differences between us. I'm not saying this is good or bad or anything, just different.
Firstly, I didn't particularly care for Catcher in the Rye. Holden's narration is alright for, say, a blog, (if 50s prep school kids had blogs) but is off-putting in an entire novel. But more the problem I have with it is just my reaction to all the feels that Holden expresses in the book. I am not Holden. I'd never (I'm tempted to say "whine" here, but I recognize my own bias...) be that open about the aforementioned all the feels. I certainly didn't cry when I read it nor did I care about other people who had.
I have a different example that kind of illustrates what I want to say better.
A verse from a blatantly anti-suicide song*:
"Oh no, love, you're not alone.
No matter what or who you've been
No matter when or where you've seen
All the knives seem to lacerate your brain
I've had my share, I'll help you with the pain
You are not alone."
Which is a wonderful message, and if it helps anyone I invite them to take their own personal meaning out of it, help is oftimes necessary and should be sought in the form of people instead of songs etc etc, but when I first listened to it (when the knives were metaphorically lacerating my brain), I kind of raged against it. I wanted to be alone. I didn't want to be encouraged by or connected to anything. Which is kind of what Catcher in the Rye did to me. I refused to relate to it.
What I have connected to recently though--initially in a really self-pitying way that has gradually (in three days**) turned more uplifting--is Eagle vs. Shark. (I text-posted a bit about the self-pitying on Tumblr. Tumblr is good for things like that.) While I was drawn to it because it seemed in the vein of Juno and Napoleon Dynamite and suchlike cinematic indie fluffiness I hold dear to my heart, I wound up really emotionally invested*** in the characters and their fictional relationships. I didn't care about connecting to other (real) people's histories; I loved that the atmosphere of it was so personal, so close that viewing it seemed a little voyeuristic (which is kind of a given, considering that major hunks of plot take place in a two-person tent). Nothing existed but the characters and me, the only person watching them.
My reaction to this particular film (one of many media portrayals of Romantically Entwined Socially Awkward People--made by Socially Awkward People, for Socially Awkward People.) was viscerally horrible. My thought process (resulting either from my inability or unwillingness to separate Fiction from Real Life) was along the lines of "God, look at them. Even these two awkward nerds with intensely dysfunctional backgrounds can find love, and I can't. I can't even do quirky-indie-film-romance right, let alone real-serious-romance. This is undeniable proof that I'm going to die alone." But the female lead's--Lily's--optimism was infectious to me. At a different point in time I may have found it sickening, but not right now, and I'm embracing it.
This movie is not proof that I'm going to die alone. It's not "real" proof of anything, strictly speaking, except that good dramatic-romantic-comedies still exist. While I've come to realize that my success (present or future) as a person can't be determined by comparing my life to those of fictional people, fictional representations of hope and humanity can still be valid. Which is basically what I've been looking for, in any context. That's the important thing, whether found in classic literature or hipstery foreign films. There's nothing selfish about that.
* Ironically (?) called Rock 'n' Roll Suicide.
** I've literally watched it three times in three days. Between the hours of midnight and two o'clock when Tumblr starts getting slow, I'll shove it in the slot in my computer and focus intently on one thing for 88 straight minutes, which is something else I haven't been doing a lot. (It's probably a bit more selfish/lazy to rely on a movie for comfort instead of a book. There's a lot less effort involved in watching something on film, and it also allows for mindless consumption of candy.) The repetition, the familiarity has become weirdly soothing, knowing the end doesn't spoil it, "You're a bitch, and you're going to die of diabetes." has not once failed to make me laugh, without caring that diabetes is not a laughing matter and so on and soforth. I don't know why I even re-watched it (wanting to wallow in self-loathing more because for some inexplicable reason I'm a sadist? Probably.), considering that my initial reaction should have stopped me, but I'm glad I did.
*** Such a scary phrase. I've been avoiding it lately. (I can't tell if this is a conscious effort or mere happenstance.) Gosh, so much italics in this post. So many titles. So much emphasis.
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