Saturday, January 10, 2009

I'm Not Getting Any Younger

When I first saw the previews for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button I was miffed because a few years ago I had thought, "I wonder what life would be like if humans were born old and got younger as time went on?" I thought someone stole my idea until I looked it up and found out good 'ole F. Scott Fitzgerald thought of it first. Shoot!

I dragged Tommie to the movie because I absolutely love the concept. My sister says it's creepy and scares her and she refuses to see it. In a way, she's right—it was creepy watching a man (even a man as studly as Brad Pitt) get younger while the love of his life gets older. It was tragic, sad, but it was also completely romantic. The theme of life and death so intricately woven throughout the film emphasizes the idea that each of us has a timeline that stretches from birth to death, and regardless of which way that timeline is moving, it's what goes on in the middle of those two fixed points that counts. Tommie and I really enjoyed the movie even if it did leave us in an overly contemplative mood.

I can relate to Benjamin because my friends and family like to tease me that I'm really 85-years-old (only in reality I am and look like a person in their mid-twenties). I can't help it if I say words like "yikes" and "snazzy" or phrases like "She's a dish," or "What a snoozer," or if whenever I act my (real) age and go out to bars or parties I have to recuperate for several months afterwards because I'm pooped. Being young is exhausting. I don't like getting older but Benjamin didn't have it easy going the other direction either.

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