Saturday, December 15, 2007

T.S. Eliot Meets The Rock

Today I met up with a fellow Gawker commenter who I'd never met before, but had been speaking with online for the past couple months. We had decided to meet on the stairs at Union Square, setting as specific a location as possible because she doesn't own a cell phone (amazing!). Well, I am a fairly anxious person to begin with, so imagine my panic when I came upon Union Square and realized that the steps were gone. Not torn down, just covered up by the annual Christmas village craft fair thing. Luckily, after only five minutes of wandering around, I found her, wearing her bright red coat. I had been nervous that it would be awkward, but right when we hugged hello and started talking, I knew it would be fine. We walked to a Boston-themed bar on 2nd Avenue. We're both from Taxachusetts so I thought it would be fun. We sat and drank Guinness and talked about all manner of things.

We had a lovely conversation about our love lives, our writing, our strange expereinces on this computer interweb. It's so great to talk to someone who you feel like you know, but with whom there is so much unknown territory to cover. You find yourself rethinking yourself, putting your stories into different, but true, contexts. I suppose it's a bit like therapy, but shared.

We drank some more and then went to see Southland Tales. It was wild and weird and kind of all over the place but also kind of great. The most exciting thing about it was Justin Timberlake. He was, no joke, excellent. There is a set piece where he lip syncs to a Killers song, and it's just perfect. In it he is angry and sad and confused and hurt, something shown only through movement and facial expressions. It's a surprisingly potent comment on the rage and befuddlement of young soldiers. It's terrific and the film is worth seeing for that short scene alone. Though, there were some other rather brilliant parts (and, admittedly, some rather awful ones.) The whole thing was about beginnings and endings, change and reconciliation. It was the perfect sort of mind-bender for this first meeting, confusing and exciting and brand new.

When we got out of the theater it had begun to snow. "Well, this is weather, you know? Real weather" she said. And it was. So, we walked fast to the 2nd Avenue F station. We hugged and parted ways, she going uptown, me going to Brooklyn. As I walked onto the platform I could see her on the opposite one, parallel to me. Though going to different places, there we were, walking together.

7 comments:

moff said...

This is so exciting! It's like when Skeletor and He-Man had to team up to fight an even greater evil! It's not like that at all, actually.

Kewgr said...

Aw, that's nice

jolie said...

yay! I love this story - and! you're BOTH from the baystate???

ima be back in january to visit my commenter friend, can we all go out and play?

Anonymous said...

"That's BLOG love."

Green Eats said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Rich, I have to admit I totally drug myself to see southland tales because I just found your blog and read your story etc. I had been meaning to go and really wanted to see it in all of it's crazy futuristic bla bla (BAI LING!)...but hadn't managed to as yet. JT was great and I have missed Larroquette lo these many years. Hope you're doing well!

Biggy

Anonymous said...

That was cute. And I agree, Justin Timberlake = waaaay underrated.