When Maia said goodbye
My daughter’s dear friend Maia moved to Taiwan last year. She was like an extra child around our house for a few years and we sincerely love her. When I said my last goodbye, which was already tough, she hugged me tightly, looked me square in the eyes and said, “you’re a really good dad.” [weep]
The Elvis Costello song “A Good Year for the Roses”
This song so beautifully captures an ambivalence of loss that can only happen when good things fall apart. Every line is perfection.
The end of Twelfth Night
This play is so full of confusion and yearning and then there is the resplendent ending when everything works out joyously. And then Malvolio reminds us of the cruelty behind the laughter. And maybe for just a moment we stop to think that Antonio has lost Sebastian who he perhaps loves deeply but could never really have anyway. Powerful.
When JLaw said “you love me?”
At the end of Silver Linings Playbook. Love her or hate her, she absolutely excels at portraying this delicate juxtaposition of strength and vulnerability. This is the moment she is most honest, most vulnerable, and most ready to transcend. All the emotional weight of the film rests for just a moment on those eyes. I can’t watch it without crying.
Archived Post
This post is archived from my account on li.st, a social media app that shut down in 2017. Some posts have been edited slightly to fix typographical errors and correctly represent the gender of some individuals. You can view the full archive here.