Austin

 

On "The Way We Were"

"There may be no greater refutation of the auteur theory — the notion that a great film is a product of a single directorial genius — than the number of fine movies that were assembled by scrabbling, sometimes squabbling parties, operating with no clear end in sight. Movies as diverse as “Casablanca,” “Laura,” “The Wizard of Oz,” “Beat the Devil,” and “Apocalypse Now” emerged from a welter of (take your pick) fired directors, fired actors, overbearing producers, minute-by-minute script changes and a sequence of postproduction Hail Marys. The more closely one peers into their chaos, the more the idea of any one person authoring them degenerates into absurdity."

More here. 

What I look like today

 

Joan Didion

 “I’m not telling you to make the world better, because I don’t think that progress is necessarily part of the package,” she once wrote. “I’m just telling you to live in it. Not just to endure it, not just to suffer it, not just to pass through it, but to live in it. To look at it. To try to get the picture. To live recklessly. To take chances. To make your own work and take pride in it. To seize the moment. And if you ask me why you should bother to do that, I could tell you that the grave’s a fine and private place, but none I think do there embrace. Nor do they sing there, or write, or argue, or see the tidal bore on the Amazon, or touch their children. And that’s what there is to do and get it while you can and good luck at it.”

More here. 

Green Apple last Friday

 

Today's writing

Being the mother of a suicide victim means always having regrets. It means that the what-ifs can rule you if you let them, and I often do. I mean, how can you help it? Tell me you don’t let regret rule you every now and again and I’ll tell you you’re a fucking liar. I once had a friend who told me over coffee I don’t have any regrets. Lofty bitch drinking her macchiato. I didn’t see her much after that.

Today's writing

She delivered our drinks, then slid onto the barstool between us. That felt weird. Granted, no one else was in the bar. It was a slow night. Hell, for all I knew it was a slow week, a tired month, a not-too-taxing job. She might have just been bored and amusing herself. All the might-bes, and still she’s sitting between my husband and me. She smells like something. Citrus, maybe, but maybe not. Something a little darker, a little danker. Cloves. Maybe something different. No one ever accused me of having the perfect sense of smell.

 

“You two seem smart,” she says. “You seem like you, I don’t know, read.”

 

I raise an eyebrow at Rob. He smirks and turns back toward Lydia. “I’ve been known to do that,” he says.

 

She swivels her head in my direction with the rest of her body facing him. This all seems very bizarre, but I’m not quite sure why. It’s just someone being friendly. Can I not accept that?

 

Answer: no. No, I cannot. Friendly people so often have an agenda. What’s hers?