Movie Mentality

I’ve always felt like I’m in a movie. Somewhere in my childhood my brain realized it couldn’t tell the difference between reality and fantasy and ever since, the two have both existed simultaneously within me. You know when you’re watching a story unfold on the big screen in the theatre you just get sucked in and nothing else matters. Life outside the building doesn’t mean anything because you’re vicariously experiencing someone else’s made-up life. You’re seeing how the characters act and you’re thinking with pride or shame about how much you’re just like them. You find yourself in the story and suddenly you’re just lost.

Whenever I finish a really good movie and I’m walking out of the theatre, I usually feel sad and I don’t want to talk to anyone because the daydream is over and the last two hours weren’t real. I didn’t slay a dragon or catch a serial killer or get the girl. But for those few moments I did and there’s some comfort in that.

People like to sit on their thrones and pass judgement on lowly folks who can’t get their heads out of the clouds. But they can go fuck themselves because life is miserable the way it is. Black and white and concrete and cycling, always cycling. Don’t you ever wish you could make that cycle stop? Even for a few minutes? Even if it meant lighting your psychiatrist’s office chair on fire while she stepped out of the room for a second? I thought about that once or twice. It would really change her day. And mine. For a bit.

I walk around always believing that something fabulous or horrific could happen at any moment and then I’d be right in the middle of a real life movie. Like a building collapses suddenly or zombies chase me (They would catch me because I’m very slow).

I over think everything a lot too. I attribute that to my movie mentality. Like I picture super ideal situations happening and they never do. Maybe I imagine I’ll be really brave or charming or funny and then when the event is over I realize I wasn’t any of that. It’s like I can’t help it because when I sit in anticipation of something happening, these scenarios play over and over. It’s crippling. It makes a lot of things difficult to ever really enjoy. I don’t have a hold of my mind in those situations especially when I’m really sad or anxious. I think that’s why I have trouble sleeping too. I just lay there and think about the future and hopes and fears and everything. Then I either get too excited or depressed to sleep. So it’s Benadryl to the rescue. It puts a dome over my volcanic thoughts so they don’t explode everywhere so much. Then I can sleep.

For awhile I forgot how much I enjoy reading. I still lose myself and find myself in movies, but I do the same in books. I got myself hooked on books again last semester. I’ve been trying to read classics and modern works too. I read Orwell’s 1984 and some Stephen King, and The Old Man and the Sea, and I just finished A Farewell to Arms which made me cry because it was so fucking sad in the end. Here Hemingway takes you on a marvelous journey with Lieutenant Henry and his army buddies and Catherine the English nurse he falls in love with, and brings it all to near perfection. My favorite part of the book is probably where he and Cat escape being arrested and wind up in Switzerland, free and together at last. She is pregnant and they live in the mountains with an amazing view of the valley and the mountains on the other side. They haven’t a care in the world except to be with one another and get ready for the baby’s arrival. Then the baby dies at the hospital and Catherine dies from hemorrhaging and Henry walks back to the hotel alone in the rain. The end. And I didn’t want it to happen, but I knew it had to be that way.

I don’t know why I write any of this shit but it beats the hell out of reading boring stuff for homework. It’s amazing how mentality can change from one day to the next with me. Last week, maybe at the beginning or the week before everything felt so optimistic and here we are today and it’s all gone. Everything is gone. Everything feels lost and pointless and useless and I always sleep too long and waste all my time. But what would I have done with that time anyway? Nothing worth anything most likely. And my time with my therapist is pointless too because he can’t understand anything I really mean because I don’t know how to say it unless I’m typing it out like I am now.

And it feels like there’s too much to figure out and not enough time in a lifetime to manage it. And I just wish I had more plaid shirts so I wouldn’t have to think about what to wear and if it would match. I don’t even know if I’ll post this on my blog or not. It’s pretty scatter brained and I don’t like editing my thoughts very much.I’ll just post it. I’m reading The Catcher in the Rye and I like it so far. I can find myself in the story and that’s what really matters.