“After all, what would the world be like without Captain Hook?” – Captain Hook (Dustin Hoffman)

I have a nemesis.  I have chosen her carefully.  Allow me to explain:

Today ended up being a very quiet day.  We started with a late breakfast and ended up – as I hope other people occasionally do – watching ridiculous Sunday television.  The Three Musketeers was on: the one with Charlie Sheen sporting a mullet and Keifer Sutherland before he was Jack Bauer. Best of all was Tim Curry’s performance as Cardinal Richelieu.  Mark and I often judge a movie’s appeal on the quotableness of its lines – and Tim Curry, with his, “All for one and more for me,” provides ridiculous entertainment.

It did get us talking about the best movie villains.  Alan Rickman in the atrocious Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Glenn Close as Cruella in 101 Dalmations, or even Thomas F. Wilson as Biff Tannen in the Back to the Future movies.  Fabulous villains in the proper sense of the word, not just bad or evil or scary but properly fun, very quotable and always dastardly and compelling.  In Ocean’s Eleven, Basher says, “It will be nice working with proper villains again.”  And we secretly agree.

Does every story need a good villain?  Does every hero or heroine need a nemesis?  Is Sarah Ban Breathnach right when she says that it is “simply not an adventure worth telling if there aren’t any dragons?” Are the hard and scary parts of our lives as vital to our story as the sunny ones?

I myself have a nemesis.  It may seem crazy to think of her in this way, but when I do our interactions cease to stress me out. Instead of letting her get to me as she used to, I now look at her with amusement and a certain level of comic detachment.  In my head I am looking at her with narrowed eyes, tossing my hair back and getting ready to do battle.  I imagine her with her red cape flapping behind her as we circle each other with purpose.  She is as silly to me as the best of the fabulous villains. By letting the energy out of our interactions I get to live that moment when Sarah says, “You have no power over me,” to an inappropriately crotch-stuffed David Bowie in Labyrinth. Doing this sounds silly, but it means that I get to decide who the heroes and the villains are in my life.

So just for a moment, try seeing the world around you as characters in your own movie.  Try seeing the people who drive you crazy as ridiculous partners to your hero or heroine self.  Who is the Vader to your Luke or the Hook to your Pan?  Then delight in knowing that they have no power over you.

And know that the heroine of this particular story is going to win.

xo

Viva La Vida: Live the Life

I think everyone has had one of those weird moments when you realize that even your cells are responding to something.  It’s never when you expect it and it always sneaks up on you.  I had one of those watching Coldplay perform at Glastonbury on the BBC.

In the spirit of full disclosure,  I am a real fan of Coldplay and love watching love perform. Viva la Vida always makes me want to really get up and move.  But when I was watching this performance where you could see the whole band clearly, I was completely caught up in watching the drummer, Will Champion do his thing.  Holy crap.  Talk about putting your whole self into the moment.

Go here and watch out for him (although they don’t show much of him here, if you are in the UK you can watch lots more here.)  If YouTube has taken it off, just trust me: turn up the base, put on Viva La Vida and feel that drum.

Will Champion: I am a fan!

ox

Lost

Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you.
If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.

No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.

-David Wagoner

I’m off tomorrow for a trip home.  Me and the family and the trees need some time together.  I may see you here while I am there but if not, I’ll see you when I get back.

Photo by my Dad.

xo