My mind works in mysterious ways. To put it less blasphemously, my mind works in non-linear ways. The phrase “train of thought” has always seemed a fallacy to me, as it seems to imply that thoughts should all be on one vessel heading in a set direction along a track. Mine never do that. They run off in every direction like children playing hide and seek, some to be found, others to reveal themselves when they please. Clearly this is not a frame of mind that lends itself to understandable writing. In the past, I’d either try my best to piece my thoughts together as best I can so that I might record them all before they slip away or pick the one I liked best and run with it. Tonight I’m trying something different. Here are three of the many thoughts that crossed my mind upon watching the movie Garden State.
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So I just sat through Garden State for the 2nd time*, and it affected me just as profoundly as the first time around. It’s really weird because the first time I saw it was on the night that I broke up with my girlfriend and I was a fucking emotional wreck. By the time I finished the movie I was so agitated that I ended up just pacing in circles around the room before excusing myself to drive really fast until I could find an ocean to scream into (because it wasn’t raining). Ever since then that movie has been closely associated with one of the most emotionally traumatic nights of my life.
When I sat down to watch Garden State tonight, I fully expected to watch it like I watch any movie the second time around: with a stoic face and a wandering mind. Somehow that didn’t happen though. I still found myself hoping desperately for the ending I already knew was coming. I still felt myself feeling that indescribable feeling between contemplation and depression. I still wished, if only for a moment, that I was capable of tears. And it didn’t have much of anything to do with the memories. I wasn’t trying to cry because I was reminiscing over lost love or anything like that. I was trying to cry because I was seeing my life play before me on a screen and realizing what a tragedy I truly am living. Yet at the same time, this movie motivated me in a way that few other things can. I couldn’t watch it with apathetic eyes. I cared what happened to these characters I was observing and I cared whether or not I do or could face similar issues. Because I care, I am seriously thinking about changing my life and seriously making plans to do so (even if any such plans only last until the movie’s spell is broken). Garden State is my Rosetta Stone. As I learn how to translate my own feelings and desires, hopefully I can begin to decipher the mystery of who I am.
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For a moment I considered editing my Myspace and Facebook accounts, deleting all of my personal information and writing, in the “about me” section, “Questionable Content, Garden State.” Then I thought about it for a moment and saw it through ethnic eyes. I had to wonder: Why are the only stories that are meaningful to me those written by and about white people? But that question soon led to another, more important question: Why do (most) black authors (that I’ve read) never write these types of stories? Why is it so hard to find a story that I can fully identify with. On the one hand, it shouldn’t be an issue because if I identify strongly with a character it shouldn’t matter what their race is, right? But every time I really start to think about this type of thing, I can’t help thinking, if even for a split second, that maybe I’m idolizing the lives of white people. Maybe, as a person of an oppressed people, I find myself idealizing the values of the dominant culture. But I know in my heart that that isn’t it. I think I just stopped giving a fuck about race, not in a “racism doesn’t exist, what are all you black people complaining about” sort of way but more so in a “we have more in common than not.” And by “we” I mean whoever it is I find myself identifying with. I guess race is no longer the primary identifier for me. Lately it seems that I care more about perspectives, positions and outlooks in and on life. And though race can be a factor in these things, it’s no longer the most important. Certainly it’s not a prerequisite.
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In one defining scene in Garden State the main character, Andrew, explains to his father that he’s been “numb for most of my life” due to the Lithium-derived drugs his father/psychiatrist has had him on since a young age. That numbness and Andrew’s attempts to remove himself from it, is one of the major themes of the movie. It’s possible that when he wrote the script Braff was speaking solely of the effects of over-medication. I took it a different way though. To me, the word “numb” seemed a bit broader of a term, a sort of a catch-all for any lack of feeling and even though I’ve never really been on any serious medication, I identified strongly with that aspect of the character. In a way, I too have been numb most of my life. For reasons I don’t completely understand, I’ve always been a little adverse to emotions. I’ve never cried from sadness, only from extreme frustration and even then, only once every few years. I sometimes wonder if other people get as excited as I do when they watch a movie and it actually makes them feel something. I wonder if they would even use such a term, with its implications of feeling nothing the rest of the time. Wondering such things can make one feel quite alone, which may be (one reason) why I love this movie so much. It’s a story of a person who’s fucked up in much the same way that I am. But he gets the girl in the end, even if she’s equally as fucked up as he is. Perhaps Garden State is nothing more than a fairy tale for people too jaded to believe in fairy tales.
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Posted by Jesse 