I know many of you find this hard to believe, considering my youthful appearance, my can-do attitude, my joi de vivre, etc., but........today is a monumentous occasion, i.e. my 29-for-the-11th-time birthday. Yes, it’s true. And to this end, in my honor I bring you scenes from the movie Adaptation, which features Nicholas Cage as Charlie Kaufmann, a just-turned-40, wanna-be writer who sits and stares morosely at his computer all day, attempting to write something, anything:
(the scene)
Beamed ceilings and ostentatious fireplace. A few birthday cards on the mantel, two of them identical: "To Our Dear Son on His Fortieth Birthday." Charlie Kaufman, a fat, balding man in a purple sweater with tags still attached, paces the room. His incantational voice-over carpets the scene.
KAUFMAN (voiceover)
I am old. I am fat. I am bald. My toenails have turned strange. I am repulsive. How repulsive? I don't know for I suffer from a condition called Body Dysmorphic Disorder. I am fat, but am I as fat as I think? My therapist says no, but people lie. I believe others call me Fatty behind my back. Or Fatso. Or, facetiously, Slim. But I also believe this is simply my own perverted form of self-aggrandizement, that no one really talks about me at all. What possible interest is an old, bald, fat man to anyone? I am repulsive. I have never lived. I blame myself. I........
To begin... To begin... How to start? I'm hungry. I should get coffee. Coffee would help me think. Maybe I should write something first, then reward myself with coffee. Coffee and a muffin. So I need to establish the themes. Maybe a banana nut. That's a good muffin. I don't want to cram in sex or guns or car chases or characters learning profound life lessons or growing or coming to like each other or overcome obstacles to succeed in the end. The book isn't like that, and life isn't like that, it just isn't.Do I have an original thought in my head? My bald head. Maybe if I were happier my hair wouldn't be falling out. Life is short. I need to make the most of it. Today is the first day of the rest of my life. I'm a walking cliche. I really need to go to the doctor and have my leg checked. There's something wrong. A bump. The dentist called again. I'm way overdue. If I stop putting things off I would be happier. All I do is sit on my fat ass. If my ass wasn't fat I would be happier. I wouldn't have to wear these shirts with the tails out all the time. Like that's fooling anyone. Fat ass. I should start jogging again. Five miles a day. Really do it this time. Maybe rock climbing. I need to turn my life around. What do I need to do? I need to fall in love. I need to have a girlfriend. I need to read more. Improve myself. What if I learned Russian or something, or took up an instrument. I could speak Chinese. I'd be the
screenwriter who speaks Chinese and plays the oboe. That would be cool. I should get my hair cut short. Stop trying to fool myself and everyone else into thinking I have a full head of hair. How pathetic is that. Just be real. Confident. Isn't that what women are attracted to? Men don't have to be attractive. But that's not true. Especially these days. Almost as much pressure on men as there is on women these days. Why should I be made to feel I have to apologize for my existence? Maybe it's my brain chemistry. Maybe that's what's wrong with me. Bad chemistry. All my problems and anxiety can be reduced to a chemical imbalance or some kind of misfiring synapses. I need to get help for that. But I'll still be ugly though. Nothing's going to change that.- - - - - - - - - - - -
Okay, well, if I wasn’t depressed before, I am now. Yeesh. Earlier I was prepared to be all positive about the fact that I’ll be spending my 40th birthday driving downstate to good ol’ Le Roy, IL, pop. 400, trying to get to the Tri-Shark site early so that I can get in a ride, and then going out for the usual pre-race pasta dinner with a bunch of people from the club. But then as “luck” would have it, last night, as I was going through stacks of mail I started reading my
college alumni magazine, and just like a kick in the teeth, there were all the tales of my former classmates celebrating THEIR 40th birthdays in Bermuda, on yachts, in Paris, etc. (Clearly, I need to stop reading my mail, because I also opened a letter from my stupid health insurance company which informed me that because of my “new age group”, my insurance would be going up a whopping 15%. WTF??) While my other friends here have done the surprise parties, the trips to NYC, and so on. And I’ll be in Le Roy, IL. I don’t know – I feel like I should be more bummed out about that than I actually am. Oh sure, it would be nice to have someone in my life who cares enough to plan something big and fantastic and fun........but since that’s not happening, being in my own company, biking along my beloved country roads with their endless rows of corn, just me and Sálome and Dino and the great outdoors.......I think I’m okay with that. Though it doesn’t sound very good on paper.Besides, I’m sure there’ll be cake involved at some point this weekend, probably when I order it
at the restaurant to go with my frothy alcoholic beverage, and that right there trumps my 30th birthday, which I spent in a muddy pit of a border town between Tibet and Nepal, walking around with my traveling companion Milu as we looked for something round-ish and vaguely cake-ish in form to put a birthday candle into. We wound up raiding my Powerbar stash instead, and as we all know, a Powerbar does not a cake make. Hey, at least I’m not one to go with the typical celebrations......
No comments:
Post a Comment