Sun shining, feeling accomplished, looking forward to finding a better job, glad Jeff is home, happy that Katie looks so good, glad Keith is coming home, happy with a warm happiness.
Which doesn’t last, so I bless it while it lasts.
Author: Allegra
Born when atmospheric carbon was 316 PPM. Settled on MST country since 1997. Parent, grandparent.
Theology at the movies… homily from today
I have a confession to make. I love the movies. I read about them, I watch them, I critique them – I even had a bunch of movie reviews published in the early eighties. I’m not as obsessive as some, but I’m a good deal more obsessive than most. I jumped at the chance to speak about theology at the movies. But then, I realized with a sinking heart, I would have to reveal the great love, verging on mania, that I have for the art form; digital or analog, rotoscoped or all one continuous take, animated or live action or CGI. I love movies for their pounding soundtracks and their wistful lietmotifs; the energetic and subtle performances of human chameleons; the polish and precision of the planning, technology and execution of a really great shot; the behind the scenes dramas, tempestuous romances and epic legal battles; the way you can watch a really great movie twenty times and appreciate it more with each viewing; the way trashy movies from your childhood can cheer you up in no time; the way a movie that is an all ages cross cultural hit can make everyone feel, however temporarily, like we are all members of the same family.
As Willa Cather remarked in a novel, There are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before. There are a lot of lists of plot types, but to me there are only three. Human vs. Human, human vs. Self, human vs. Elements. There are story traditions without conflict; the Japanese in particular have perfected ways of making movies in which there’s no struggle, just life and all of its pains, pleasures and changes; they get called art films because ‘nothing happens’.
Every time I hear somebody complain about the repetitiveness of modern movies, I have to laugh. Recycling plots and characters has been a feature of plays and entertainments for 2500 years. While a conformity of explosions and cleavage has taken over big budget movies, let us be thankful for the improvements in affordable cinema technology, which have allowed people like actor/writer/director/composer Shane Carruth to bring his visions to the screen with his science fiction movies Primer and Upstream Color. The drop in cost has allowed poor people and marginalized people to record and document and publicize their lives as Kimberley Rivers Roberts did in the documentary about Katrina called Trouble the Water. It has allowed us to bring our imaginings to bear on photographs of the deep sea and the forest canopies and the vastness of outer space, and tell new stories with new energy, a firmer grasp of what it is to be human, and less concern with commercial success. It is now possible to make a movie – a good movie, an interesting movie – for less than it costs to buy a new car.
My love of the movies comes from my parents. When I was little, my parents had 16 millimeter silent films; Chaplin and Keystone Cops and Laurel and Hardy; they had a sound projector too, so I watched the Weavers sing their songs, including an incredibly young and slender Pete Seeger. I associated watching films with family bonding time.
These days I ask two things from movies; one is “Can you take me somewhere I haven’t been before?” so that I am removed from my normal concerns and brought into a world I could not have imagined.
This demand for novelty isn’t just ‘show me something new’, but “I wish to be told a compelling story by a confident and competent storyteller. Take me out of my comfort zone. Put me in a situation I would never find myself in, and walk with me and the characters. Avoid the cliches and the tropes and the bad habits of modern filmmaking; no explosions today, thanks.”
The other thing I ask is the very simple, “Tell me your truth.” If I am to fully live my values, I hope to spend more time asking myself how a particular film is going to bring more compassion, wisdom, or self-knowledge into my life. In documentaries, I want accuracy and accountability; in fiction I want a story that can be told no other way. For films which seek to uplift, a clear call to action is part of the experience.
Which is funny, because movies make you sit in one place for a couple of hours.
It’s after the movie is over that the magic really starts. A good movie makes memories; memories of sitting around the coffee shop after the show and arguing about what the point of the movie was with your friends. A good movie becomes part of your artistic vocabulary, part of the catchphrases and in jokes of your family. A good movie is made by people who understand that it’s going to have an effect on your nervous system and they won’t make you pull out your handkerchief without a good reason. A good movie makes you think and feel and stretches you a little, shows you your mental quirks and cognitive biases – and loves you anyway.
How should we watch a movie? I want to be experiential, not prescriptive. Nobody wants to watch Old Yeller the week their dog dies, and nobody wants to watch My Big Fat Greek Wedding when they were jilted at the altar. I really don’t want to tell you what to do; but I do want you to think about your movie watching habits. Mine have changed quite a bit in the last five years; I watch many more documentaries, and I’m trying to watch movies that have unstuck themselves from the gender norms and racial profiling that pursued us out of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first.
What to do?
One is to stop watching any movie if you think it is a waste of time. Turn it off. I frequently stop watching movies that I think are bunk, that are gory or sexist or trite or racist or boring. I’ve even walked out of movies I paid for. If we have but one wild and precious life, let’s not watch crappy movies.
Another challenge is to think of a movie not as a piece of entertainment, but as a commentary on our culture.
What is it REALLY saying? About gender roles, about love, about violence, about authority, about the ages and stages of the characters?
Whose voices are being heard, and whose voices are on the cutting room floor?
Whose interests are being served by the assumptions that underly the plot and characters?
What shape is your own humanity in at the end of the film?
Some of you may already know about the Bechdel test, which was invented by Alison Bechdel as part of her amazing comic series Dykes to Watch Out For. In it, a character says that in order for her to feel comfortable about watching a movie, there have to be at least two named female characters, and they have a conversation that doesn’t revolve around the needs of the leading man. There are an amazing number of movies which don’t meet this simple feminist test (including a lot of movies I like) but that will just give you an idea of how there can be theological implications in your movie choices. If you believe in equal rights for women, why not show it at the box office?
One of my theological tests is that I immediately want to stop watching movies which show fathers as stupid, lazy or incapable of appropriately interacting with their own children. My father wasn’t like that. My husband wasn’t like that. If there are fathers in the congregation like that you’ve done a good job of hiding it. Why spend money to support an outdated and morally bankrupt view of men? It isn’t funny!
Trust your instincts. You may not be able to put your finger on or put into words why you find a movie disturbing, or overly commercial, or ugly in some way; but I guarantee that if somehow you object to the moral tone of a movie, you won’t hurt anybody if you refrain from finishing it. Even if you paid for the movie… hey, maybe you can get your money back. And if you’re at home, even more reason not to.
Spend your movie dollars differently. If you have $12 in your pocket for a ‘movie experience’ you might want to consider using that money to fund a documentarian or minority film-maker working on challenging subject matter. You’ll have to wait longer for your movie, but you’ll be living your values in a different way.
There are a remarkable number of Unitarian congregations who run movie nights on social justice themes, and have really great discussions after the movie to consolidate what’s been learned and felt. We could do that. We could rate movies on our facebook pages with a seven star system, one star for each of our principles, letting other Unitarians know when movies meet basic requirements.
Whenever you watch movies, be the part of the audience that stays mindful. Resist the urge to have some sentimental popcorn and turn off your brain. When something offends you, respectfully engage with the producers, directors and studio – leave the actors alone, since in most cases they didn’t finance it. And when something is good, and respects all persons and the world we live in, don’t forget to share it with your friends!
I will let Willa Cather have the last word, since it sums up my fierce obsession with the movies. “There is no God but one God and Art is his revealer; that’s my creed and I’ll follow it to the end, to a hotter place than Pittsburgh if need be.”
and now for some out and about
Paddy’s wake was conducted in a hobbit hole (the basement suite of her daughter Steph’s house in East Van, memorialized so many times on this blog in happier times) and it snowed food and rained drink, in keeping with the theme.
I sang The Housewife’s Lament very creditably although I did just about lose it halfway through when I thought of how John used to sing it along with me. Paul still can but it’s not the same. There was a ukelele jam, led by a woman who would AND THIS PART I TOOK OUT, BECAUSE, HEY, INAPPROPRIATE but I knew that sooner or later the non musical people would wish to turn the floor over to the anecdotes. And so it was. There was no weeping; there was love and mutual support. Kindly fate, grant that my rellies have something similar when I go.
She was much loved, she will be much missed, and if I can bring more of her love for children and social justice into my weary life, I will be a better woman. It was glorious to see Steph, even under these trying circumstances. Mike took some of Paddy’s ashes; he will dispense them by kite over Buntzen Lake, and a more appropriate farewell I can’t imagine. Mike is very saddened by her going.
I am off to New West to spend money on mundanities like batteries for the smoke detectors. I may just have myself a lamb lunch.
Jeff and I are experiencing some of the benefits of clean living; our rent has not gone up for the second year in a row. We are getting A STEAL and good landlords to boot.
Resigned
I resigned from my job effective May 30. I don’t want to talk about it publicly as nothing good would come of it.
I am off to a wake tonight and will likely be back late. I have to finish some writing before church on Sunday. Katie and I are meeting up after church.
Here’s a person who takes childsplay seriously
Also, I started saying Sing It Sister on my facebook, and now about half a dozen people have adopted this. heee I am a very influential person, but it’s hard to tell sometimes.
An open letter to J.
who wants all the kinksters to stop promoting BDSM on the UU poly feed. Best of British luck with that, darlin’.
letter begins…
I guess it all depends on whether you consider the uu-poly group to be a place to talk about kink. I do, but it’s for the moderators to decide, if we aren’t a democracy.
I used to take what I thought was a moral stance on the subject of other people’s wacky sex practices, in line with how I was raised, of course, but once I figured out that what ‘paraphilias’ are, is a normal human response to various kinds of stress, plus wiring, plus repetition, I quit thinking it was necessarily a bad thing. The moral issue is not whether it’s healthy by a narrow definition, but whether there is genuine consent. Human beings of their nature have long childhoods and are incredibly social, and so experimentation with hierarchy in terms of dominance and submission is not just normal, it’s inevitable. And along with inevitable, we will get extreme.
Paraphilias have been defined as a trifecta of sexuality that is extreme and dangerous and abnormal. Funny thing; I think of rape the same way and yet we have a large constituency of people, both men and women, who think rape is part of the normal course of events – and a desirable one too, as it allows rapists to provide tools of social control for the society at large.
If we want to travel down the path of having our sexuality defined by those who will profit by othering us, then we’re getting off the UU train entirely.
In that regard the kink community has been leading the way for a number of years with an emphasis on consent for scenes. Humans contain a multitude of sexual possibilities and as long as all parties are able to give and obtain agreement for activities my opinion on whether those activities are harmful is just wind.
Paraphilias concerning those who cannot by nature give consent (children, animals, unconscious and disabled, as examples) need a better class of scientists and therapists to figure out what’s going on so it can be controlled for the benefit of all, because the people who came up with the DSM have harmed our culture almost irreparably; each successive iteration has been an object lesson in legitimized othering. I could start raving about the drug companies too and how long it took to get queerness out of the DSM but that rant’s been done better elsewhere.
Paraphilias involving consenting adults who play in safe spaces and in a fashion that isn’t a menace to public health are not my concern. Which is why I choose to call THOSE paraphilias kink, and will use the freighted medical term for people who get off forcing their violent imaginations and lust on those weaker than themselves. Solitary paraphiliacs I just feel sorry for but I always was a softie.
I don’t want to other people. Draw the circle wide, friends. We all need love and acceptance, and we have to model it, whether we feel like punching each other out occasionally or not, or want the (pick a minority group) – oops, I meant kinksters – to leave the room while we’re talking about our serious matters.
Letter ends
At least I didn’t say tone troll, evoke Hitler or tell her to go fuck herself, so there’s that. I didn’t have permission to quote her letter, which was a masterpiece of liberal uptightness, srsly.
Wake
I’m going to sing at Paddy’s wake. Mike is taking me.
Still plugging away at the homily for Sunday – the children’s story is coming along nicely.
Pictures of food
There is a long standing tradition of people showing other people food on the internet. And there’s a long standing tradition of people being bitchy about it. If you google “people who take pictures of food” you will get an assortment of comments, some going so far as to say that it’s a sign of mental (deep breaths) illness, that it’s selfish, that it’s faux-arty, that it’s a status thing, that it’s a hyped up kind of cluelessness with a side of privilege. I suppose it could be all of those things, but I like putting the scalpel in past the bone.
I return to my original thesis, which is that every human behaviour has its roots in biology, and that the cultural overlay determines how we express that biology. Nature brings the players and the culture determines the game, so to speak.
From the top; in a state of nature, human beings share food with close family and kin; the traditions of hospitality, of sharing food with strangers, goes back so far that in my view it’s one of the behaviours that allowed humans to differentiate themselves from animals when we became self aware. Bonobos, who share just under 99 percent of human DNA, share food, trade food and bribe with food among and across troupes. In a state of nature which includes the internet, we will share virtual food with our virtual friends, most of whom exist in real life and aren’t going to judge the living fuck out of us for wanting to prove that we get to eat yummy food. The reasons for doing it are the same as we do in real life. We will share out the yummy stuff, and that is what we prefer to remember. I don’t see people posting pictures of the power bar that prevented them from passing out from low blood sugar, or the lunch they brought from home; they share pictures of high quality calories and artful tastiness. Sometimes if they get something gross they will share a picture of it; “I bit into my KFC and lookie here at the special treat they gave me!” because they were disgusted and they know that even total strangers will see the picture and feel the disappointment, disgust and aggravation they felt.
Pictures of food are a completely normal and natural movement of our biology into technological space. You can shame people into doing it less, but you aren’t going to stop them, and even the people who say they never do it or find it really offputting occasionally do it. Enough with the shame. We’re sharing food, and IF YOU WERE HERE you could have some. I’d really like you to join me!
Paddy’s wake starts at six on Friday. Mike and I are going. It is going to be very tough and probably some fun too, as wakes often are. We must love each other while we can.
Had a lovely long chat with Katie and a briefer one with mOm to catch her up, yesterday. Now to see if I can get Jeff to watch Costumes of Assholes with me.
Look at these men
Look at this man….
because he is awesome. Warning, there’s a farmblow in there that just puts my tummy in a knot, but the rest is awesome. It shows a guy playing hard with thin ice.
Sorrow
Paddy’s dead; she died last night holding her daughter Steph’s hand. I was supposed to go visit her but working full time and not having a car – I said – prevented me. Now I feel very stupid. Visiting the sick is something you do without feeling sorry for yourself. I will give some money to an organization that assists young genderqueer people in her honour, and ask for some peace on the subject.
Paddy was my buddy Mike’s former mom in law.
And I looked up and it was 3:45
Well, the work days sure go fast, I’ll give it that.
I stopped off at the store at New West Station to get some groceries, and then got some beer, and home again.
Gratitude
Rev Samaya did her thang at church yesterday, and it was a wonderful, chatty sermon on gratitude. In gratitude for the weather gods lightening up, I actually got Jeff to examine the gas mower and get it running (after sitting idle all winter I didn’t find myself competent or comfy with doing that, and I am very glad I did the mowing yesterday because the grass was getting big enough to hide hunting cats in. I also made meatballs. They are quite tasty, Jeff appears to approve.
It was a restful weekend, and I’m ready for more training. I think I’m getting my feet under me, but I should not be over confident….
Cousin Alex fed Keith and Paul yesterday, which was awesome.
bragging
I just got a perfect game in Sherlock, 8 tiles by 8 tiles, with a time of 5:52. This means that in a logic puzzle of 64 tiles, with 111 clues, I solved it in 352 seconds. For me a good time is less than ten minutes, so I’m thrilled.
Sherlock does actually exercise the brain, so I am very happy about this.
Note from 2020 (5:15 in 116 moves) ha ha and you can buy the game here: (website was born a long time ago, be nice) https://www.kaser.com/sherwin.html
background and foreground
Foreground is work and the ordinary run of domestic stuff; in the background, there are romantic rumblings, projects being thought about, and a prayer for the dejunking fairy to kick my ass into something resembling activity.
Other than that, I haven’t much to say. As I get older, I wait for more news before commenting. By the time I get it I find I was right not to get too upset.