Do you want to play make believe?
What I learned on my Christmas vacation January 1, 2009
If you’ve never watched a show called Joan of Arcadia, it is worth Netflixing. (Is that a verb yet?) A teenage girl, Joan, played so honestly by Amber Tamblyn that sometimes it’s embarrassing, begins receiving visits from God in various manifestations. There is Dogwalker God, Library Lady God, Goth Teenager God, Little Girl God, Cute Teenager God and many others. God seems to be there to give Joan tasks and to teach her, but what Joan tries to accomplish and what she ends up learning always seem a little bit different than what God really intends. Her parents, two brothers and friends at school are involved in the plot and God’s plan, and the writers weave their lives together brilliantly. Oh, and there’s great music.
This particular dialogue from the first season struck me the third time around, particularly the idea of romance as a meditative state. What do you all think (all two and a half of you who occasionaly read this blog)?
- Little Girl God: And they all lived happily ever after? (Joan turns) There’s a surprise. (Joan scoffs) You guys really like that ending.
Joan: Yeah, well, you have a better one?
Little Girl God: They all moved towards spiritual growth and enlightenment?
Joan: Yeah. That’s gonna work with the kids.
Little Girl God: Ever notice that the guy always has to risk his life and the girl is nearly dead when he finds her? It takes a kiss to wake her up and they ride off together. It’s a nice metaphor.
Joan: For what?
Little Girl God: Death and resurrection.
Joan: Yeah. Well, that’s a fun party game.
Little Girl God: It happens all the time. The illusion dies so that something deeper can take its place.
Joan: (sits down) Are you saying that… Adam and I are an illusion?
Little Girl God: Romance serves a purpose. It’s a meditative state. It puts logic to sleep so that people can come together. Otherwise you guys probably wouldn’t risk it.
Joan: Why did you have to make love so complicated? I mean… couldn’t that one thing been easy?
Little Girl God: Love is big. It’s a bright light in the universe and a bright light casts a big shadow. So, what do you wanna do, Joan?
Joan: (sighs) How am I supposed to know?
Little Girl God: By looking at it. Real love is hard work; you have to decide if you want it in your story. Or if you’d rather just stay in the dream.
Some of my creative friends July 8, 2008
Into the Hill, an online magazine for music, film and literature lovers is going strong.
And while I have you here, check out the goings on at Bare Hill Barn. They have been visited by a film crew.
http://www.barehillbarn.blogspot.com/
~
Now YOU tell ME what to read. Seriously. Go.
Jessica
Media update April 22, 2008
The newest Office was really nice. Painfully funny, but not so painful as last week’s, and the sweetest little segment of Jim talking to the camera… You know what I mean if you saw it.
At the request of the inimitable Dub-P I’m reading Pagan Christianity and disagreeing with most of it. I’ll try to post a review when I finish it. Just to clarify, I don’t think Dub-P swallows the book hook line and sinker, but was stretched and challenged by reading it.
Next in queue for reading are a bunch of books on Catholicism that another friend of mine wants me to read, including Rome, Sweet Home and By What Authority. Pretty much the polar opposite perspective of Pagan Christianity? (Incidentally, I don’t think you should have question marks in titles; this may just be my opinion, but it seems stylistically wrong to me. Titles don’t have periods in them, and exclamation points are a mark of the author’s [or publisher's] failure to find language strong enough to stand on its own. IMO)
I am about to hop over to abc.com to see if there is a new Gray’s Anatomy yet. Life has been stressful lately, and I’m feeling the need to get lost in fictional melodrama for a while.
And WHO are YOU? (the caterpillar in Alice in Wonderland)
