A Head in the Clouds

Watching A HEAD IN THE CLOUDS, Gilda’s character reminded me of how perhaps my personification of free-spiritedness was out of place even in this time of modernity and open-mindedness.     This love story of 3 people divided by values survives time, distance, and separation.  It was sad not because it did not survive World War II  but because Guy could not get to Gilda before her demise.  Yes, one day would have made a difference (had I had someone beside me, I would have told him or her, “I told you so…”) …and so I live my life in a hurry, it seems by the average people’s standards.  I have to remind myself that I am no longer in Singapore but in Metro Manila, and though it is a buzzling city, it still doesn’t quite match up to Singapore’s pace in at least most aspects of living; looking out for the bus impatiently, hurrying to the train station, checking my cellphone, shopping at the supermarket, etc…and thinking about it, I do things fast when I am alone.  It is when I meet a friend over coffee or when the family is in town, that I do slow slow down NOT for their benefit but for mine.  How selfish I am.   The word “savor” comes to mind when I breathe and live the moment to cherish, to remember…partly because I have to remind myself that I am such a forgetful person afterall!

Oh, the horrors of being Lora Morier.   Rushes are fixtures in my life so much so that accidents just wait to happen for everyone else’s entertainment, which doesn’t primarily bother me.  I must thank someone up there that I still have my limbs and digits intact to enjoy what each day presents.  One would think that each life-changing event might bring someone down from the clouds.  Perhaps so in ordinary circumstances but I refuse to be mediocre preferring to believe that another world could be possible if everyone were selfless despite our contrasting personalities.  We could not possibly live without such because the world would be such a boring place to live in.  I just wish that we could be more charitable, considerate, and compassionate.   All we need is pure love!  The answer is so simple.  I would rather remain in the clouds than bend to  the reality; to admit to our weaknesses as humans repeated time after time without remorse.  Of course, some people might feel remorse for a time.  Then, all is forgiven, forgotten…and another cycle of tragedies begin again.  How people easily forget.  Will we ever stop?  A tragedy is replayed over and over again.  The characters remain though the actors may be changed.  Then again, the same actors may reprise their roles.

…so I continue to live in my own world still loving and being loved…and the music  plays again.  The music played again.   At the end of the movie, it  created a bigger sense of tragedy.  The music…the piano…affecting me so easily but in a nice way.  It awakened emotions without asking my permission.  The extract below was from the last scene when Guy was back in Gilda’s apartment apparently too late.

Well, my love, I’m trying to make sense of things of how I was and how I am now.  I have always believed our first duty is to ourselves, to live life to the full but I have also been haunted by another conviction – that everything is preordained, lying in wait and time is running out.  I seem to have charged through my life in a kind of panic and looking back I feel I have achieved little of worth beyond our friendship, yours and mine, and Mia’s.  …and one day, I woke…and found I had lost the 2 people I cared for most.  Only then did I begin to realize that we cannot live alone aloof from the world and that to believe we cannot fight  against fate as an act of surrender. You were right when you said that once I cared for your opinion of me… but wrong in thinking I ever stopped caring…I love you.