xoxoxoxo All You Need Is Love xoxoxoxoxo

“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast” ~Ernest Hemingway


Midnight in Paris, Woody Allen’s latest “moveable feast” is uniquely delightful
and appealing, not only art and history buffs, but any and all who dare to enter
the magical world of pretend. Set in Paris in the early ‘20’s; a time of artistic
free-for-all and mayhem sprinkled with magic, Allen serves up a platter of wonderful situations and causes us to ask ourselves, “Why are we never content
in the now; but rather have either an acute craving for the past or an unquenchable curiosity for the future?”

Perhaps the moment is much too boring, lengthy or busy that savoring it seems
an impossibility. And is the future an exciting mystery yet to be explored?
Finally, where the hell did “the good old days” go?

I almost opened a vintage shop in the ‘80’s because of my obsession with old metal lunchboxes adorned with the super heroes of my childhood.
I dreamed of selling Nancy Sinatra knee-high boots, Fiesta ware dishes and
my grandmother’s jewelry. The shop would be filled with kitsch items from the ‘50’s, and ‘60’s; the time when everything was “happening’ clothing wise, music wise, quality wise. The good old days. Nostalgia takes you right out of your current shit, doesn’t it? So does some futuristic quest for undiscovered mysteries.

Woody’s time traveler is Gil who proves to us all, at least for 90 minutes,
the grass is in fact greener on the other side. I wouldn’t say this film is of magnitude depth, but it’s charming and clever, and at times wickedly astute
and hopeful.
Hope. That ever-alluring, on-again-off-again muse that teases us every once and awhile and keeps us from taking a serrated blade to our throats when things get heavy like plaster. Hope.
Obama won his entire presidential campaign on it, unlike me who, in 7th grade, won the seat of Girl’s Vice President by having an ample supply of Tootsie Pops before, during, and after the election. Hope.
It’s what America was built on, what dreams are made of, why women stay with their dirt bag husbands and certainly why Oprah is the highest rated show on primetime. When I dig into a bag of roasted pistachios, I have hope that I won’t get that one bad one that tastes like burnt charcoal.
(I have no self-control when pistachios are involved.)

In looking at this morning’s paper, I saw glimmers of hope:
CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS TO REQUIRE GAY HISTORY AND ACHIEVEMENTS IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS, FILM ABOUT NADAR TO SCREEN FOR FREE, FRIENDS OF BETTY FORD SAID: “SHE JUST KNEW HOW TO LOVE.”…
Now that one struck me right in my heart-chord.
I would love to be remembered for knowing how to love.
Any of us would, because to know how to love, in all its depth, honesty and conviction, is perhaps the boldest and richest endeavor one can pursue on the planet, wouldn’t you say? Perhaps it’s the nostalgia thing again, but I have
this sudden urge to quote a man of my childhood.
Dr. Seuss once said about love, "When you are in love you can't fall asleep because reality is better than your dreams."
Ahhh…”in love.” Yes that too, but I am speaking of the purest form of love
and that would be love of life itself:
The morning sunrise, the appreciation of every feather on the heron, which are detailed like a painting, putting a pal first, or the family of sow bugs living under the watering can.
Indeed, I said, “the family of sow bugs.” My partner almost committed me to the psychiatric ward last weekend because I had a small emotional meltdown when she started removing the weeds and lumber scraps by the potting table.
Her actions killed a few creepy crawlies and totally disrupted a large community of sow bugs.
I lost it.
You see, my love for life, every form of it, exceeds my love for Ben and Jerry’s
Chunky Monkey. Truly. When I taught school, the first thing I taught my lads was “Every life has a life to live.” And then we’d take plastic cups and thin cardboard, trap the spiders on the walls, and set them free out
in the grassy soccer field.
Now that’s love.
I’m hoping that those students, now adults, transferred their love of spiders to protesting the NRA and leading anti-hunting rallies in their hometowns!
Save the deer and all that stuff.

Love, like Paris, stays with you.

~tpg xoxo