Heinlein Month: Bad shape

Cloistered SWF seeks poetic SWM, age not important, balcony-climbing skills a must. Send carrier pigeon to Villa Capulet. Your pic gets mine. No bots please.

You’re in bad shape when your emotions force you into acts which you know are foolish.

(Robert A. Heinlein. Have Spacesuit, Will Travel. 1958.)

The Zeffirelli Romeo and Juliet is a beautiful, faithful classic. But — keep this under your hat because I don’t want to be kicked out of the super-cool smart kids’ club — the Baz Luhrmann hamfisted crazy-go-nuts adaptation of Shakespeare’s play is actually my favorite, because I unapologetically love his juxtapositive imagination and didn’t think it defiled the play particularly. A little excess never killed nobody. (Get it? A little excess? Oxymoron? Yes?) I like over the top lushness in a movie — I’m a decaphile and I’m not sorry for that. But I went with the picture of Olivia Hussey to illustrate this idea because she is so exponentially hotter than Claire Danes that Claire Danes just now suddenly got sad, purely from all of us nodding silently, and she doesn’t know why.

Left: Amateur hour. Right: Holy hell.

The mise-en-scene of Luhrmann’s R&J dazzles me, but compared to the chemistry in Zeffirelli’s 1968 version? There is no comparison. Absolutely none. By the way, am I the only one who read that thing where Zeffirelli claims to have totally been hit on by Aristotle Onassis? Still wrapping my mind around that one and weighing its potential truth. (Verdict so far: Depends. Was Onassis trying to get Zeff away from Callas once and for all? Or just bombed on some really good shit?) More on that story here, and don’t skip the comments for the full scope of the debate.

Music Moment: St. Vincent, “Human Racing”

Some turbulence this week to start the year, which is not a thing I seek or enjoy. I’d like to find a cave to hide away for at least a hundred days, but all I can do is slog through. I will not be pulled by the current toward the drowning deep waters of self-pity and away from solid ground, self-improvement, and good spirits. Today this song, together with the support of my friends and family, is the sturdy field of underwater reeds that are keeping me in the shallows. Cling and inch along with me.

St. Vincent – Human Racing

Romeo, where’d you go?
It’s been years and still no sign
But I’m keeping hope alive

Juliet, how’ve you been?
You look like death
like you sure could use some rest
from this place

Still from Romeo and Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996). Every time this scene begins I want to stop them.

Human racing
and the faces of people
who pound at your door
They’ll always want more
they’ll want more

Still from Romeo and Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996)

Hummingbird, what’s the word?
Are you still your mothers child
or have you found yourself a flower?

Flower child, you’re still wild
Under a harvest moon
can we eat of all the fruits of our youth?

Tell the truth now
Your heart is a strange little orange to peel
What’s the deal?
What’s the deal?

Mary, dear, how you feel?
Are you lost without your lamb?
You know I think I understand

Little lamb, what’s your plan?
Greener pastures in the sky?
it’s a shame you want to die, know why,

Just to find
you’ve been blinded
to the greenest of pastures
they’re right here on Earth

For what it’s worth,
you’re not the first to break my heart

For what it’s worth,
you’re not the first to break my heart
you’re not the first to break my heart


For what it’s worth,
you’re not the first to break my heart

Thank god for the grace of my dear friendohs who help me keep whatever semblance of sanity I have, and I know that with their help and my own determination, I will only improve in my outlook.

Coco Rocha as a naïad in Numero, looking like the glorious intersection of Our Lady with Ophelia and Bollywood and the Llorona. One of my favorite pictures ever.

The good thing about nearness to the bottom is that it’s such a known factor. When you can kick your legs and your knees keep striking the sand, then you know which way is up and truly only better can follow.

I believe that I will surface. I don’t think that giving up is failing, it’s just that I’m not ready to let myself quit.