A Word on "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" Then...and Now

I remember the cold winter when I went to see "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" at the Kips Bay movie theater. The timing of the movie's release coincided, by design, with Valentine's Day 2004. In the film, Jim Carrey's "Joel" and Kate Winslet's "Clementine" are the guilty parties of a tumultuous relationship that ends very badly. In the movie's alternate reality, however, it is possible for a person to erase the entire recollection of another soul who has hurt them. This is done through a medical procedure that "maps out" the location of each of the memories you have of the estranged person, and methodically zaps them one by one as the patient sleeps . Impulsive Clementine is first to opt for the erasure of all her memory of Joel, and Joel in turn decides that his only recourse is to erase Clem as well. Joel does this, at first, out of what he deems to be retaliation but what is actually raw pain.

At the time this movie came out, I was 23 years old and I was going through the anguish of my own first heartbreak. Three months earlier I had (bravely, though I didn't give myself credit for it at the time) pushed my first love, Rick, for a "D.T.R." A "D.T.R." is an acronym that stands for "Define The Relationship".. in essence the term is a verb that's been turned into a noun. A DTR is the terrifying name for what occurs when one party of a nebulous relationship-like-arrangement has the courage to confront the other party for a more specific definition of what they are doing together...and what it should be called. To put it in simplest terms, a DTR is usually a call from one person to the other to "shit or get off the pot."

As I've already hinted, my DTR did not go well, at all. I remember sitting in Rick's Honda as he told me that he loved me, but wasn't *in* love with me, and I  was thinking "wow, so this is what it feels like: rejection...and unrequited love." In the years that have followed since that night, I've come to appreciate the courage it must have taken for Rick to be honest, but, my biggest issue with it at the time was the simple fact that I did not believe that he was not in love with me. Five years later, after Rick was already married, we saw each other from a distance at a street fair and the look on his face told me, after all that time had passed, that my instincts were correct. There are no doubt thousands of reasons why he and I are not supposed to be together: my pride, the plans God has for each of us, etc, etc. But back on Valentine's Day 2004 all I knew was this: he had hurt me badly...and I wanted him to hurt, too. The thought of him discovering that I'd erased all memory of him seemed like an ideal solution and in my youthful pain, I missed the point that the movie was trying to make.

This past weekend, I re-watched Eternal Sunshine for the first time in many many years. This time I of course also had the benefit of 8 more years of living and loving under my belt. It is also a particularly poignant time for me to have seen the movie again because 4 months ago I was left, hastily, by a man who had previously told me every day before that that he loved me. In the span of half an hour, Alan methodically and coldly dissolved our relationship as if it had been a business transaction that was no longer profitable for him. In the 120 some odd days that have followed, I've battled intensely to regain my self worth, my belief that I'm attractive, and to repair my badly broken ability to trust another soul. There have been many times that I've wanted to "erase" Alan from my memory, but unlike Clem and Joel, I cannot bid Mark Ruffalo and Elijah Wood to come into my apartment to zap these images while I sleep.

In seeing this movie again, however, I was struck by the journey that Joel takes through his own mind, as he travels backwards through his memories of Clem. It is as if he's hit rewind. His most recent memories of her are of course bitter and abrasive. As they near the end of their relationship, Clem and Joel are ugly to each other, and it's frankly hard to watch. As Joel is brought further and further back into his memories with Clem, the "temperature" slowly changes on the things that he remembers, and when he finally comes upon their most recent tender memory together he suddenly begs "Please. Let me keep this one." The remainder of the movie is a cerebral voyage as Joel's subconscious engages Clem's subconscious in a struggle to hide Clem in his mind, in a passionate struggle to save his memory of her. It does not work, however. When they both wake up, with no recollection of one another, they are drawn to each other once again. Joel and Clem re-meet and they get what so many of us wish we could have: a truly fresh start.

While the kind of fresh start that Joel and Clem experience is not possible for us, the ultimate lesson of the movie finally clanged me over the head. The lesson is that when it comes to people we've loved who have hurt us, the ability to travel "backwards" through our memories of them until we reach the memories that were Good...where we gave and received pure love...that ability exists within us all the time. The question becomes whether we can get past the pain of the fact that we "know how the story ended," wading through all that bile before we get to the moments where we soared together. If there is anything to be learned here, it's this: the love that we give another is never a mistake. It warrants repeating: the love I have given to another has never been a mistake.

The other, albeit somewhat 'new-agey' lesson of the film that I strongly believe is that there are a select few with whom we bear a connection that transcends light and sound. Though I now know that Rick and I are not supposed to be together, I still send him light and love often and I know he sends it back to me because of this simple fact: I can Feel It. In my dreams, Alan comes to me sometimes to apologize, and that has brought me a great deal closer to bestowing the forgiveness toward him that I need to for my own sake. Though our minds can never be Spotless, we can choose to face the sun by consciously selecting what we choose to remember. And that will make all the difference.

A WORD on: The Words I Still Don't Have.

Late one summer several years ago my good friend Gwen decided there was only one thing she wanted to do for her birthday. She wanted to gather up her close friends on a Saturday afternoon to go down to New York City to have a birthday celebration at Serendipity. Since this was a special day, Gwen's boyfriend Vito generously offered to drive everyone from our Connecticut college town to Manhattan. And that is how one Saturday I found myself driving down the Merritt Parkway towards New York in a Jeep with no top on it, my blessed hair whipping me in the face.

What an awesome experience, however, to be so close to the open road. We arrived in The City a little after four, and it was just a regular joyous Saturday on the streets of the Big Apple. Soon after we got there, Gwen mentioned that we needed to pick up friends of hers who were students at NYU. They lived in a dorm all the way down on Water Street. Turning to me, as the car's resident New Yorker, Vito timidly asked "Mary, how do we find Water Street?" Based on the streets' name I knew that it was "way-the-hell" downtown. So I said to him "Find the World Trade Center, Vito, and start driving towards it, thats how you find anything that's South in New York City."

Find it Vito did. At one point we were driving on a large avenue that had the Towers at its base. Never in my life did I have such a breath-takingly close view of the Trade Center. Gwen's roommate Kate was next to me in the backseat, and she asked me quietly "The Twin Towers are also the World Trade Center, right?" I was so mesmerized by the view that I was distracted when I told her that yes, they were the same thing. At the same time, I had been feeling extremely uneasy, like I'd made a terrible mistake sneaking home to my city that day. It was September 8th, 2001.

My unrest only grew as the day went on. My feelings didn't really make any sense. I had gone down to the City from Fairfield for the day before without telling my parents. It wasn't that I was afraid I was going to be caught and reprimanded, it was much more of a gut feeling-like my survival instinct was kicking in. We took a cab from Water Street up to Serendipity's on the Upper East Side and during the ride it seemed almost as if I had to take deep breaths. I remember that I picked perhaps my first New York fight ever with the maitre d at the restaurant because after waiting almost an hour to be seated, the Little Snot informed us that our entire party had to be there. The entire party was not there because Vito was still driving around aimlessly lost in Chelsea. My sense of dread grew as the night wore on, and I was glad when Gwen finally admitted that she wanted to stay in the city overnight, because it gave Kate and I the permission we needed to high-tail it up to Grand Central to get on a train back to Connecticut. When I made it back to my Fairfield apartment two hours later, I felt safe again.

That Monday night I went to the ATM to withdraw 20.00, for what I still can't recall, and I went to Monday Night Mass with my roommates. I came home late that evening, did not-enough of my reading for Art History class at 11 am the next morning, and fell into a blissfully guilty sleep. When my clock radio went off after nine the next day, I could hear snippets about a plane crash. I shut it off, brow furrowed, and toddled off to the shower anyway. My roommate Stacy and I were the only ones at home on this morning, and we joked about how Stacy's boyfriend Corey had left his glasses in Stacy's room the night before. I can still hear Stacy saying "I don't know how the kid drove home last night!" The phone rang, and Stacy said to me "That's probably him going 'Yah seen my glasses??'"

Stacy turned her back on me to retrieve the phone, and I got a cold feeling. I thought "That's not Corey." and "It's bad." It was Stacy's mother calling to tell us that the Trade Center was on fire. I think that in our lifetimes, the distinct moments that change Who We Are are very rare. This was one of those moments. I turned on the television and saw that there was only one Tower remaining and right there, in that instant, my life was never really the same again. There in my Fairfield living room, with Stacy-who is still one of my best friends, I watched the remaining tower fall, I frantically tried to reach my parents-particularly my mother who was at home a mile and a half from the site, and I stole away to my bedroom to double over in tears whenever I thought no one was paying attention.

In the days that followed, I walked around in a bit of a haze. It was September 13th when my mother called to tell me that the eldest son of a family whose children I'd grown up with in our apartment building had been in Tower One, the same building I'd watched fall, and that he was now missing. Aaron worked for Cantor Fitzgerald. He was outgoing and boisterous and just a little bit diabolical and I wish I'd known him better. When his obituary appeared in The New York Times later that year, a line from it read: "he seized souls, not letting go until he made them merry." He also reminds me to be thankful and happy when I return home from work safely each day. I've thought of Aaron on every birthday that I've had since I became older than he was when he died.

My mother's birthday came at the end of September, and it was always an occasion that I was expected to come home for. This year I was scared, though. I couldn't imagine what the city would be like after such a devastating event, and the longer I waited to return, the longer it would be until I had to deal with it. At the beginning of that week, I was on the phone with her, and casually tried to say something like "Sooo...it's been rainyand how would you feel if I didn't come home...?" I was met immediately with a "WHAT?!?!?!" and quickly back-tracked "Just kidding, I'll be on the 2:40 train." I felt like a ghost walking through Grand Central, especially when I got to the bulletin board that was plastered with signs of those who had gone missing in the towers. Grand Central kept that bulletin board up for over a year. St Vincent's Hospital had a similar display that they just took down at the beginning of this year. Our grief became a part of our daily lives, but in those first few weeks we were still struggling to get used to this.

The worst part of that first return to the City was when I got to the corner of 14th Street and Fifth Avenue. For years, I would get to this corner and look downtown at those amazing buildings. I would always sum up the view of the Twin Towers from 14th and 5th as the one image for me that encapsulated the thrill of living in New York City. When I got to that corner that day, it was the very first time that I saw with my own eyes that yes, the towers really weren't there any more. While I was in New York on that visit, I noticed that there was this dark ashy gray cloud over the city and thought it was a storm cloud, neglecting to notice that the sky all around it was crisp and blue. It wasn't until I took the train back out of the City a few hours later that I realized that cloud was no rain cloud, it was a cloud of dust and debris. Back in Fairfield later the next week, I was watching the evening news one night before rehearsal and literally felt my heart rate speeding up without reason and pounding in my chest.

The weeks began to pass, and became months, which have worn on into years. When I moved back to New York City after getting my degree from Fairfield in 2003, the place I returned to was not the place I'd left four years earlier. In spite of the fact that I was so afraid to come home in those days right after September 11th, I also had and continue to have an enormous amount of guilt that I wasn't in New York City on its darkest day. I made my first trip to "Ground Zero" on New Years Day 2002, the second trip later that summer. Since then I've made many more. I've watched the documentaries, I've read the accounts, I was in the audience at "World Trade Center." It seems what I'm looking for is closure, and, perhaps, even forgiveness for not being here. One thing that seems clear, however, is that September 11th taught us to be passionate in our quest to care for one another. With our five years of retrospect, it's now clear that when those planes hit those buildings on September 11th, nothing the FDNY could have done would have prevented the buildings' collapse. Those firefighters refused to accept it, however, and the nearly 3,000 lives that were ended that day were not ended without a huge struggle.

Swinging back to the title of this entry, however, something that frustrates me particularly is that five years later, I still don't have the capacity to express exactly what I want to say about the events of that day and how they have colored all the days that have followed. At this point, it's a possibility that I may never find the exact words because September 11th is just so complex. One thing that is clear is that a new era began that day, an era in which we must not take our freedom for granted. For New Yorkers particularly, every day that we leave our homes to go to work in Manhattan offices we are each committing a small act of bravery. September 11th illustrated that tomorrow isn't guaranteed, so take no one and nothing for granted. In the shadow of this day that changed our lives, I think many of us have been living with as much dignity, courage, and love as we can.

A WORD on: Independent Women

In many ways I feel that fate destined me to become an independent woman. It is a little known fact that I am (little known because I've taken pains not to act like:) an only child. From childhood, I had to dig into the depth of my imagination during play-time to compensate for the obligatory companion that I was not granted. And accordingly, any trouble that I got into, or mess that I made was something I had to answer to on my own. Thus, as the years went on, it's only natural that I became an expert in how to get myself into.....and out of: trouble.

That independent streak has continued on into my adult life with adult things. I've learned how to get myself to the doctor when something is wrong, fight with my health insurance plan and actually get what I want, and generally do what has to be done to live successfully as a chick on her own. This past April I woke up to a flooded apartment one rainy Sunday morning. After promptly freaking out, I cleaned it up, got my soggy rug taken out to be dried, and arranged for work to commence on replacing my floor while I was away on business that week. When I walked back into my apartment that Thursday rolling my suitcase behind me, I was relieved to discover all was once again right in Apt 2R. One Saturday morning not long after, I found myself at Citibank, opening a CD. On a rather ironic note, I am the one who usually detests asking for directions....or help of any kind in general. Unfortunately, there are occasions when this doesn't work and I'm forced to admit defeat. One thing I've also learned to do as an independent woman is to reconcile myself to the fact that every once in awhile I need to be rescued...more often than not by a member of the opposite sex.

Case in point: Recently I was walking home one weekend night. I was wearing a pair of wedge shoes that had an intricate leather design, held together with stitching. They were the last pair of its kind on the sale rack at DSW, and I was happy with my find. Around 21st Street, I suddenly stumbled, and my right foot flew completely out of its shoe. "And I haven't even been drinking..." I thought, and looked down, prepared to simply put my shoe back on and continue on my way. When I examined the situation more closely, however, I realized that the toe portion...which held the entire freakin' shoe together...had basically given way. And suddenly there I was on 21st Street with one shoe that I could not walk in. I'd have to tie the shoe back together in order to be able to at least walk the seven blocks home. Thinking on my feet (no pun intended), I hopped a few yards to where someone had thrown the plastic remains of an umbrella casing. Picking it up, I wound it around my finger and threaded it through my shoe, tying the most awkward knot you've ever seen. There....that would work...until at least 17th Street.

From the distance I heard a male voice "Miss, no, no..." It was the man who had a table of wares on the corner of the street (since I knew you'd be interested: it's handbags that he sells). He was digging through his supplies, and came toward me with a clean white piece of string...which was already a better alternative in that it hadn't been lying on the street. He brought his folding chair over and bent down, casting my plastic fastener aside. With care, he threaded this string tightly, and even snipped the edges with a scissors that he happened to have handy. I shook his hand and thanked him profusely. I had no problems on the way home, and I was happy to have another story about why New York City isn't an unfriendly place. Not at all. Ok, so I had come up with a slap-dash solution on my own with the plastic wrapper (and I wasn't even a GIRL SCOUT!), but the help I received provided me with a much better resolution.

Case in point: A few weekends ago my good friend Tamara packed my friend Julia and I up and whisked us upstate to a beautiful house that her family owns. It was just supposed to be us girls (so we could talk about the guys, d-u-h) and we quickly made plans to sun, swim on the lake right by the house, read trashy magazines, and grill. During the course of our sunning ourselves, we soon noticed that Tam's neighbors appeared to include a trio of tall, brunette, and possibly underage males. We began to make the cliched Mrs. Robinson jokes, snickering to ourselves, but when one of them held his beer bottle up to us from the distance, we raised ours just the same. While Tam went off to prepare the grill, Julia and I stayed behind to soak up the last of the sun and talk. We noted that the boys had gotten out their row boat...and soon after we realized that they were slowly making their way towards us. They were being neighborly, of course, and adolescent at the same time, we looked at each other, shrugged, and accepted this unexpected Boy Attention. They were thorough, and made sure they stopped by to introduce themselves to Tam as well before departing.

Having made our new friends, we returned to our independent existence and focused on the topic at hand: getting this grill fired up. As the minutes ticked on and we still hadn't managed to produce anything from our grill hot enough to cook, our hunger started to get to us. Tam made the remark that since the era of the caveman, fire has pretty much always been a man's domain. With eyes sparkling, Tam cocked her head to one side and called out, non-chalantly, to the porch in the distance where we knew the boys were eating dinner..."Hey..John??? Could you come over for just a little bit."

Within five minutes all three of them were there. They cooked us the best burgers I've ever tasted with sweet corn to match. They were unbelievably attentive, making a trip back to their house quickly to bring the last of their beer to share with us. Lesson learned is that "Girls Only" weekends are all well and good, but it seems that sometimes going the independant route may lead to starvation.

Case in Point: Having worked at my company now for three years, I've come to accept that there are certain unspoken patterns that emerge. One of these strange patterns is that I go through a printer cartridge approximately once a year. That's just the way it is. Every July-August, the documents I print at my desk start coming out gray and streaky. When this happens, I toddle off to our giant supply room, pick out the cartridge that matches my HP 1300, and toddle back to my desk to change it.

This year, however, I had an entirely flaky-moment when I went about performing this task. The printer cartridges are labeled with very explicit arrows. How I did not see them remains a mystery to me, but before I knew it, the new cartridge was ferociously jammed into my printer. It was entirely bizarre, the more I pulled at the cartridge, the more the printer wedged it in. It reminded me of a boa constricter strangling its prey.

With a sigh, I picked up my phone to call in the First String, my coworker Holden, who would certainly do all he could to help, but who would also never let me live this down. Alas, Holden was currently nowhere to be found. I then called in the Second String, my boss Tom, who would also not let me live this down, but more in a "you graduated from college magna cum laude but can't change a printer cartridge?!" kind of way. I ended up with the right person because Tom became determined that my printer was going to release the cartridge. He was so convinced that he began using office supplies as tools. A Bic pen isn't a bad lever after all. A crowd of our colleagues gathered to watch this spectacle, and just when we thought we were seriously going to have to call our systems support staff with the dumbest computer issue ever, the printer relented-and we once again had a printer cartridge in our hand-albeit a mangled one. The printer cartridge did not survive, but the printer did. As for whether my dignity survived...the jury's still out on that one.

I think it's fair to say that no matter which gender you are, it is sometimes very difficult to ask for help in sticky situations because we feel it makes us admit defeat. In all three of the situations I described above, I literally calculated each time if there was any way that I would be able to get away with fixing what was wrong by myself. In the case of my shoe, help was thrust upon me, which I feel made things turn out for the best. Regarding the fated grilling incident, it was really Tam who made the decision to call in the Boys. Looking back on it, however, I really think if we hadn't asked for help, it would have been another 2 hours before dinner instead of the 28 minutes it took for the guys to get everything straightened out. And in the case of the printer cartridge, I can look you in the eye right now and say that if I hadn't asked for help, that damn thing would still be jammed into my printer as we speak. It's just humbling to realize that, although we generally do an excellent job of taking care of ourselves, there are rare occasions when we have to drop the "In" of "independence" leaving us with....dependence. Ok, I'm off now to rewire my stereo.

A WORD on: A New York Moment

The other night I was walking down 14th Street between Fifth Avenue and University Place. Out of an apartment building, a most interesting couple suddenly appeared. They were wearing matching outfits that were truly bizarre. The garments were skin tight, pants on the bottom, tank-like shirts on the top and were comprised of two fabrics: silver pleather and lime green netting.

Ok, alright. I guess no one told me Cirque D'Soliel was in town. As they bounded up the street, it became evident that the female component of this pair was wielding a hula hoop, which she began using expertly. Yes, apparently you can hula hoop and walk at the same time, if you know what you're doing.

As they passed Tasti-d-Lite, a frozen treat customer scampered up to the door to get a closer look. The back of her shirt said "Anything is possible."

You can't make this crap up.

A WORD on: The Wisdom of Elders

Today my parents and I were visiting my grandmother in her Michigan nursing home. While my grandma slept, we talked with her 92 year old roommate Genevieve, who is simply a stitch.

Genevieve often tells me about my "mischievious eyes." Apparently I have them. But then again, if you speak to any of my coworkers about this, it will be met with a "duh." response.

Today Gen paused, looked at me, and said to my mother "That kid of yours always has a smile on her face. I like it. I bet the boys are tripping after her..." (making a stepping motion with her index and middle fingers). My mother thought about it, and replied "she does!"

Disclaimer: There are many instances in my recent and very distant past that would serve to refute as well as prove my mother's assertion.

Having received this affirmation, Gen looked at me and said, simply "Run!"

I peeled over laughing at this. I could not help it.

Gen went on..."Run. The ones who are worth it will run after you and fall in line. The ones that drift off...PHOO-EY (making a swatting motion with her right arm). They aren't worth it. Run, girl."

After regaining my composure, I said to Gen "That's the truest thing I've heard in a long time."

Genevieve sensed this, but she still was glad to know.

A WORD on: My Retail ESP

Daffy's is one of those stores that remain a secret to be cracked. I always manage to get into conversations with people who shop there successfully, yet whenever I venture into that store I'm left baffled with how unsatisfying the experience is. It's almost as if they pump gas into the air in that store that works with the receptors in my brain, sending the message: "Keep your wallet in your bag, Mar, there's nothing here for you but regret."

When the Daffy's on 18th Street and Fifth Avenue closed, I suppose it wasn't very surprising. I made one last attempt during its last days to shop there one last time, but was only reminded of my past distaste. The one major selling point of that particular Daffy's location was its physical space...multi-level, and on a prominent corner. I thought to myself..."what a prime location for a store to sweep in, and with the way the store is laid out, the only chain that makes any sense to take this space over is H&M. In fact, H&M is crazy if they don't buy this space" Within weeks of Daffy's departure, the facade of the store was enshrouded in white boards, just begging for the grand announcement of whatever was going to be ushering itself into the neighborhood.

Tonight, while walking home from Grand Central, I received sweet validation. The folks at H&M clearly think the way I do. Indeed, apparently either I belong in the marketing business, or I just shop way way waaayyyy too much.

A WORD on The Bigger Picture

If Jose hadn't have made this Friday the Friday that I get to take off....
Then I wouldn't have swapped Late Nights with Ann...
And worked last night until 6 o'clock.
After which I stopped at Circuit City...
Because my internet cable needed to be replaced...
And if I hadn't stopped for a minute to see whether they had Season Two of Project Runway...
Then I wouldn't have gotten on line to pay when I did...
And run right into my beloved friend Mike who I haven't seen in a year and a half.

Obvious Conclusion:
EVERYTHING HAPPENS FOR A REASON!!!