don’t need a time machine

“I go to sleep alone and wake up alone.  I take walks. I work until I’m tired.  I watch the wind play with the trash that’s been under the snow all winter.  Everything seems simple until you think about it.  Why is love intensified by absence?” - Audrey Niffeneger (The Time Traveler’s Wife)

It is not easy to get me affected by movies.  I am more affected by books, books have deeper impact, movies are a little light.  But The Time Traveler’s Wife is a book, and it is also a movie, so how am I affected by instances as such?  When I read the book more than two years ago, I was so touched.  The strength of the plot affected me for days after turning the last page.  It held be longing.

A while ago, I watched the movie, I forgot little details from the book so I enjoyed the movie.  I believe that how the movie was created from the book, the movie itself, would also affect me for days afterwards.  And maybe because I have been inloved with Eric Bana for quite sometime pre-Time Traveler’s Wife.

So anyway, what’s the point of this entry?  The point of this entry is that I’ve devised a new philosophy for myself so that I would enjoy movies-from-books more.  Books are books.  They are written, you read each word, you get affected.  Films are films.  They are filmed, you watch each scene, you get affected.  They are two different art forms that tend to portray the same story, but just the same, they are different.  A movie (from a book) would be better enjoyed if you watch it from a movie point-of-view, not from the book.

Hence, from now on, I would stop comparing movies from books.  Just to point, why would I watch a movie whose exact plotline I know already since I read the book?  There should be something different to keep it more interesting and to appeal to my untouched mind.

And since I’ve always been told that transitions are not my best of skills, I would then begin speaking of some other things, like back to the story of the movie/book.  It was really just intense.  I did shed a tear.  It made me believe that my own Henry would come someday.  He does not time travel, but he is in my future, both by destiny and choice.

les femmes du monde.

“There is in every true woman’s heart, a spark of heavenly fire, which lies dormant in the broad daylight of prosperity, but which kindles up and beams and blazes in the dark hour of adversity.”

- Washington Irving, The Sketch Book

Last night, I would not put a book down.  You must know it; it is entitled “A Thousand Splendid Suns” by Khaled Hosseini.  It must be saddest book I’ve ever read.  It had me shedding tears once in a while, it must appear silly if I do it in public.  Nevertheless, when I was reading it last night, late past midnight, I couldn’t find it in my heart to stay aloof when I wanted to cry with the characters.

It is a story of two Afghan women who started their lives filled with hopes and aspirations that were instilled in them while they were growing up.  However, due to the circumstances in the chaos of politics and death, they ended up having to serve the demanding needs of the most excruciating antagonist I have ever met. 

The character of this man in this novel will make any reader angry and desperate to reprimand him, only if he exists.  But I’m sure he does.  He is in every household were the position of men and women differ from each other.  He is the man that would have done everything to prevent the people around him, most of all his wives, to make a living so as to make their lives rely on him.   He is the man from a pre-feminist era where his words are the rules and that being a woman automatically renders you way below his league.  It pains me reading this character, I was in total agony having to read about his life and the way he treats his wives.  But I must add, his character was brilliant.

I think I might have spoiled some plot over there, but anyway, back to the point.  This is a story about how a fantasy can easily be changed by conflict and power hunger.  What is ironic is that after reading this, I had to read an article for school which tackles almost the same theme of domestic violence (this isn’t the main plot of the novel, but it is there).  The article spoke about a woman who wanted to change the treatment towards wives and children in the Philippines.  It was great.  It is nice to hear that a woman is standing up for women.

After reading turmoil then solutions I went to sleep.  It was funny actually, my dream consisted of all those stories colliding with one another, only it was me who was standing up for women and children and the poor and the weak.  It was probably one of the best dream I ever had, it was the fulfillment of my ultimate goal in life.  It is what I’ve always wanted to do, to change the world, and having to dream about actually doing that must be a message, a sign.

the weeds of enticement

I love entering this certain shop, the smell, the titles, they are new.  Every time I get a new one, not necessarily new, but new to my vision, to my brain and to my heart, I can’t help but feel.  I feel the soft shivers trembling by my spinal, tears that would later flow like the current of the river.  I feel the circuits of my imagination tangling like webs to enhance an almost perfect image.  Most of the time, I feel my heart deliberately hammering, pang-pang-pang, I could almost hear it.  Yes those are what I feel, from my eyes, my brain and to my heart.

Why do I feel them?  As if it is really important, as if it really matters in life, as if it would help me.  However, the crucial fact is it is able to encompass me; it captivates me and holds me tight.  What is this that is able to manipulate my person without harming me?  It feeds on me with necessity, yet it teaches me the rules of life.  The new one is always a challenge and each portion would either keep my attention or would release me.  And every time I happen to have one, it deliberately keeps me awake at nights.

It is able to bind me and bring me to unknown places.  One moment I could be on top of the vast mountain ranges of Switzerland while conversing with the most wise man on earth, the next I can be bought to the grand rapids of illusion in the middle of the Pacific while trying to stay alive.  Sometimes, it brings me magic and flying brooms and the next I will enter a deserted attic with all the traditional trinkets of joy.  If it is new, I am often amazed by this, always unsuspecting to me what might happen succeeding each moment, the disarray of perceptions confusing me into an eclipse of unknown quantity. 

I feel my heart skipping a beat once in a while, this particular title is good.  Every time I turn a page, it is often fast, as if I’m afraid to miss a second of the life I’m living whenever I am inside.  Why do I find the life the new one portrays more interesting?  Because it is written, unlike my life that is not.  Having the events unfold in ones mind seems to captivate me more than having real events unfold beyond my eyes.  Will my life, if written, be as interesting?

When I am with the new one, the unfamiliarity will stream around my veins, seeping me from my reality that I consider dull.  I would either be in wonderland, roam happily or I might be suffering, but oblivious to the people around me, it is my little secret they can see.  Sadly, whenever I finish one, the truth in life seeps me back and then I could either feel sad or happy about it, depending on the effect of the new one.

Nevertheless, there are special moments where I might always be inclined to get something old, something I’ve been acquainted with, familiar.  There would no longer be surprises, I know how it ends.  But it is always a great joy to see the old again, to remember the events and to awaken once more, the heart that remained quiet.  It feels like meeting an old friend, and him/her restoring everything you’ve done together; there is no awkwardness, no introductions. 

Consequently, what the new and the old would always try to do is to make me realize the truth, yet ironically rejects reality.  They are certainly escapes from the world and often create the illusions of idealism.  “What must be?” is the wonder of it.  I don’t really care either way.  What is of importance to me is its effect, the drugs running inside of me and would often leave me scarred.

I always turn to them when the world I am living on is in disproportions.  I take them and let it engulf me into a more logical alternate, logical for me at least, even if it is a fake life.  People would always question why I waste money on them, I tell them, “I don’t waste money on things that would always help me understand.”  I am able to understand scenarios in real life when I relate it to how it was understood inside the pages.  There are people who think that how I approach these things and how I let these things over take me is unwise, I ignore them, they don’t understand my connection with these.

All throughout, the magnificence of it is that it is able to expose from me different emotions: I cry, I laugh, I get angry and I get touched. However, the last page of the fiction remains to have me elicit only two major emotions: satisfaction or disappointment.  It might end terribly, hanging, and confusing but it can be a good form of art.  It might end happily, joyfully and complete but might always be a mere façade that can leave me feeling empty, maybe because my life must be more interesting.  The last page would always even out my heart afterwards, my life versus the fiction.

My experience with the thing would replay on my mind and then I would judge whether I really wasted money on these books or not.  And after finishing one, sometimes, I feel sad, as if I’m leaving an old friend, as if I’m going back from vacation, back to truth.  Although not all of them takes a special place in my heart and in my person, there are unique ones that would always capture me, like a best friend, who was able to entice me completely and help me understand my purpose of living, I might feel more blessed and I might feel worse.  How the lesson of the book would have stayed and reflected is what matters when reading.  In a life full of confusion and disaster, I result to the book to take me away and teach me what I wouldn’t have known otherwise.  It can also, however, make me feel like a failure if my life is less interesting than fiction.

******

I just had to share this. 

submerged in longing

As always when I write, I feel very sentimental, or whatever.  I just finished reading a romance novel.  One by Nicholas Sparks, so it’s not contra-feminist, as I tried to prove in my paper last term.  I proved it effectively, I proved one thing and contradicted myself after, still proved the reality of both sides.  Romance novels are contra-feminist, regard the mediocre simpleton characteristics of the woman, however in a slightest chance as we are unfolding the 21st century, various feminist once emerged.  As I was saying, I just finished another of his novels, I don’t read much of him because I prefer human-pain stories,  I’ll expound why.  I like reading those that depict human pain because I would like to see how they are able to handle it and how they would, in the end, arise victorious.  I don’t take fond on their pain and suffering, but I take fond on their strength. 

Coming back to Nicholas Sparks, as most of his novels, it left me feeling sad.  Sad once again, I am. It was the novel "Dear John".  I don’t want to expound on it, I’m not a critic but it always leaves me longing.  What should I say?  As I must have said thousands of times before, I’m longing.

lessons that i learn from voiceless materials.

Since I love to read, my mother once told me to write significant quotations I encounter in books.  I did what she suggested.  Whenever I read, I have a pen and my "quotes" notebook in hand and take down these lessons that I see.  Therefore, an extension blog was created in order to preserve and somewhat share to others lessons that I learn from voiceless materials.

http://undertheaquasketch.i.ph/blogs/betweenthenavyscripts

Also, take note of the particular pattern of my titles.  Under the aqua sketch…Between the navy scripts.  All imply positions.  There are symbolisms that I’m trying to convery.  And there is the presence of the color: shades of blue.  Well, whatever they may be.

noelle decides to die

Have you ever read "Veronika Decides to Die" by Paolo Coelho?  This might actually be the best book I’ve read done by him, well so far.  I’m not yet finished though.  However, in the more than a hundred pages I’ve read, I felt something I’ve been hiding in my life.  I’m quite embarassed to mention it, so I won’t, but if you happen to read it, then you’ll understand what.  I often feel morality issues regarding that topic so I don’t pursue anything, I don’t do anything.  I’m still young and have all the idealizations I’ve created just so to escape from that reality that builds in my mind.  Is it sinful, or is it not?  I don’t know which to believe.  I’m not exactly a saint, but I’m no sinner.  How then would I face this issue that I can’t speak with anyone.  Not my friends, especially not my parents.  It really is embarassing and it might cause unnecessary grievances to anyone who might know.  They might feel ashamed as well because they keep it a secret too and I managed to extract something they’ve been hiding.  I’ve been hiding from myself too, afraid of the abnormality that this might bring up.

I really wonder, "why in the world?" but I just don’t do anything.  I stop before the need arises.  I guess I’ll just have to wait to get married. 

voices left unheard

God spoke to me in a very concise manner.  He must have been speaking long, answering me while I talk to Him discreetly, but it took while for me to comprehend, He was comforting me in the most miraculous way.

I wasn’t planning on smiling yesterday, even for a second, after the tragedy of my Accounting exam the other night.  I planned on mopping the whole day along with my peers and every one else who took Accounting.  We have been training pingpong, mastered it’s arts and manuevers, not knowing that we will be battling in tennis instead.  I’ve been praying and God knows how intent I was that I pass this Accounting exam, to hell, get an A to prove something to the world.  I made lots of sure answers but the bigger points went to waste when I couldn’t balance the problem.  Despising everything in the world was my plan at 10:00 pm on Monday after the exam.  But I still prayed to Him for some divine intervention.

While going to school, I drove as fast as possible, almost hitting other cars twice.  I went to the gym for some relief which didn’t actually help as I was smug the whole time.  After gym, I went to get some light breakfast.  I passed the book sale going on on one of the buildings.  I saw a couple of people putting things together for the sale of the day.  For some very strange reason, I stared at them while I was walking away to where I was suppose to buy food.  While I waited for the food, I decided to enter a the book store in my school.  It was here that I found the 12th book in my list and it suddenly occurred to me that this would be a perfect gift for my father.  The title “The Twelfth Angel” by Og Mandino.  Interesting. 

Anyway, after getting the food, I was suppose to eat at the tables provided there but there were no vacancy so I decided to sit on the open benches in front of the book sale, they were still fixing books as I watched them. I wasn’t planning on going and to give in to temptation again by buying another book for I bought two from there less than a week ago.  But I was carried over there.  I did a little scanning and saw very good books that are quite rare here in the Philippines.  I slowly scanned each book.  And for some reason, I did an action I wouldn’t normally do, I opened the boxes of books that they haven’t stacked, as if I’m actually looking for something.  Funny indeed that I would find the most interesting book in the most unexpected place.  I found the 2nd book on my list “The Lovely Bones” by Alicia Sebold.  It is no longer sold in the Philippines and I thought I was going to die not having read the book but it was there.  It is as if in my instinct, I would find that book inside closed boxes.  I was very excited of course and bought the book without second thought.  I actually found the 1st book on my list, unfortunately, it was reserved and there was only one left, much like “The Lovely Bones”.  I settled for second but couldn’t care less.  It made me smile.

This might actually seem like an ordinary story.  Simple and might not actually have any effect on whoever would read this, but I actually felt something different on such a simple situation in my life.  It might have always been happening but I was too distracted to notice.

as i turn the pages

A friend asked me a question once: "Which do I prefer, movies or books?"

I thought for a while which I actually really liked better before answering.  Movies are feasts for the eye, yet books are feasts for the imagination.  I then answered "Depends on the genre."  However, for both books and movies, I prefer only certain genres: romance, drama, suspense, fantasy.  Generally, life.  If I were to either read or watch Star Wars or Matrix, if there is such a book, I would rather do the watching since all the special effects that would take place in the movie would never be expressed in the book.  Other than that, then yes, I prefer books over movies.

When you read a book, you see everything better. Why would an author write "when her hands lighted on his chest, not when her hair tickled his neck" (Picoult, Jodie "Salem Falls") if it is insignificant?  If you read that phrase directly from the book, you would feel the importance of that very line.  You would feel the emotion the author attached to that line.  You could see clearly the significance of a line for the characters.  These are gravities that would never be captured in the movie.  Although some movies might, in passing, actually practice such lines, the emotion that is meant to be passed to the viewers would never be delivered, unless a character says a significant line.

Why then do I prefer books?  Because books are captivating, and as I turn each page one by one, read each word one by one, I become more entranced to actually love every emotion that has come about in the book.

"When I read a book I seem to read it with my eyes only, but now and then I come across a passage, perhaps only a phrase, which has a meaning for me, and it becomes part of me."  - W. Somerset Maugham