Can someone love too easily? Be too vulnerable all the time?
I feel so stupid some days – so fractured. Perhaps the truth is that I have always been uncertain about my identity. My life has been characterized by the dichotomy between black and white, disrupted by my own appearance and very being (I’ll write a Black History Month post in a few here).
… two people in love reach across the supposed ‘lines’ drawn between races, raising questions about the futility of borders…
Is love as unchanging as the sea? Does it have to be either / or?
The obvious answer is no.
We are usually such fluid creatures that our love comes to reflect the fact that we change – change, the one thing people like me get anxious about and never know why… like an old farmer stuck in their ways, my mind morphs into a bucolic stereotype that I can’t seem to escape.
January has been a month to remember.
I started my Master’s degree; managed to secure a supervisor for my Creative Project (more to come on that!); met someone who is me but in a body of the opposite sex (also, see way less Jamaican and way more Italian); and Charlotte and I have agreed to a December wedding in 2020!
The ball of life is rolling and it’s showing no signs of stopping anytime soon (*knocks on wood*).
Yet, at the centre of it all I feel this rising tension. Could it be something wicked on the horizon? There are no “weird women” here to forecast such a thing, which might mean a positive outcome belies me.
Forgive me, I’ve been reading too much Shakespeare lately (no surprise there).
I wish I could love the world.
Shakespeare seems to have had a complicated relationship with it all but he nails the human spirit, I think. While his experience of the world will always be his, I believe it’s been stated countless times before by academics much more intelligent than me: something about Shakespeare’s plays are so universally engaging and enduring.
Though I do not wield a sword, I feel the complicated facets of identity which a character like Coriolanus wrestles with.
Without a doubt, I’m just as indecisive as Prince Hamlet when it comes to my own machinations (or making big decisions, in general).
I could go on…
I’ve always found a way to relate to the characters I’ve watched on stage or in film. I’m sure I’m not the only one.
I was singing “Music of the Night” after my first-ever viewing of Joel Schumacher’s Phantom of the Opera (2004) – it was my first exposure to the musical and I immediately fell in love. Phantom has had a lasting impact on my life and how much I love the people around me; it taught me about compassion and true love (AND NO I DON’T THINK CHRISTINE SHOULD HAVE ENDED UP WITH THE PHANTOM AJIDHUFYSTGJHGSEBDSKUDH&*^^&%GU).
I digress…
I’ll leave off this post by apologizing again for not posting quite as often as I’d like to be.
The end of January into the beginning of February was not only a crazy-busy time but also a depressing period. As the city of Thunder Bay seemed to be clawing it’s way out of the snow, we were blanketed again – countless times now. There were seminars and papers to mark; the Artery had printing issues; and as always I was having financial issues (cause what would my life be without those?!).
But I can now say that I’ve gone skiing, been making a ton of new friends and mingling with colleagues from my department, and I get to look forward to my Creative Project this summer – not to mention the launch of the 10th anniversary edition of The Artery early next month!
Speaking of The Artery: ESA President Clint Fleury – someone who I’ve gotten to know fairly well over the past year or so – was interviewed for a piece in LU’s newspaper, The Argus.
I have a lot to be thankful for and a lot to be happy about.
A lot to look forward to.
By the way, check out the 1982 rom-com Kiss Me Goodbye. It’s schlocky but I kind of love it. Why am I so drawn to doomed love triangles? What is it about love’s contrivances that keep me so hooked?!
Damn my sappy heart.
thatfroninja. 