miraculous garbage

I got really sick while house-sitting for my mom last winter. My nose and ears sealed up completely, my chest was congested, my throat cracked, my eyes swelled up and I couldn’t really sleep because my airways kept closing the second I’d lie down. I’d just lie on the couch on a mound of pillows and periodically fall in and out of a daze.

After about three days of this, I snapped alert all of a sudden in the wee hours of morning, choking, unable to inflate my lungs all the way.

My mom’s asshole cat was huddled down on all fours smack in the middle of my chest, looking horrifically uncomfortable with the situation, PURRING and PURRING like a damn chainsaw.

He cracked an eye to glare at me when I moved to pet him. This doesn’t make us friends, he said.

“Good kitty,” I croaked, rubbing his cheek with one finger. “Nice kitty. Good boy.”

You stink, he said. You disgust me.

Then he brushed off my finger, shut his eye, hunkered tighter, and kept purring. I fell asleep. I don’t know exactly how long he was there, but it was at least a solid hour.

They are both resourceful and determined, used to doing the best they can with what they have, and as a result they encounter each other and decide to team up. Practicality, not romance, is what drives them together and what keeps them together for much of the movie.

Their methods of filling voids with whatever scheme they can concoct, the skills they’ve both gained from their past experiences, become the means they use to achieve their shared goal: get Rapunzel to the city to watch the floating lights and return her safely home. The scrapes and (mis)adventures they get into on their way are not just filler or fluff; they are opportunities to highlight the natural teamwork they have, the ways in which they complement and complete each other and so help each other: Rapunzel solves the run-in with the group of thugs/misfits with vulnerability and openness; together, they escape from the guards and avoid drowning. 

Already this is an improvement on their previous work, their previous “business”. It has more warmth, it has more success, it has more color. But that’s not all. Alongside their adventures, they start to talk to each other. Confide in each other. Nothing huge or dramatic. When he tells her his name he follows it with the dryly delivered “someone might as well know”. And when he asks about the situation at home, his voice is gentle and kind but not full of depth of feeling just yet. But it’s real, honest connection about their pasts and so contains within it the articulation of their emptiness. It’s the realest relationship either of them have ever had. It’s far realer than anything their past endeavors have ever brought them.

When they reach the lights, Rapunzel realizes this and it comes out in her words expressing her fears and worries about the lights. Understandably, she’s scared finally seeing the lights won’t be enough. But then, and here’s the beautiful thing, she’s scared that it will be. “And what if it is,” she says, tears in her eyes and voice. “What then?” This is the moment in which Rapunzel recognizes that she really has never filled the void in her life, the place where real love and human connection should be, and that the lights won’t do it either. Chasing the lights was her noblest effort yet, a beautiful and real and a valid dream, but still not enough. because the lights are not a person and the lights can’t love her back. 

Eugene’s answer to this is hopeful- there’s always another dream to chase. But he still doesn’t really have an answer for her. He doesn’t really understand.

Until they see the lights. 

Until they see the lights together. 

Their golden glow and beauty is enchanting, it’s everything she dreamed it would be. And then, it’s more. 

And it’s more because when she turns around, right at the end of the first verse, she sees him. Holding her dream in her hands, watching her watch it, experiencing it with her. 

That’s when she knows. 

She hands him the satchel and he knows he knows too. 

He knows that there is no new dream, no better dream, than her, than a real life of love with the person in front of him. 

After the lights happens everything I said in the original post. They’re torn apart and beautifully, magically, unexpectedly Mother Gothel’s ploy to sow discord between them doesn’t work. Rapunzel sees through Mother Gothel’s lie to see the truth of everything, including his reasons for leaving, and when he shows up there is no reproach or misunderstanding to clear away. Like I said in my original post, they understand each other now. 

And like I said in the post above, Rapunzel’s bargaining for his life and Eugene’s cutting off of her hair are the means they use to set the other free. And ultimately Eugene wins. He dies and his death, the first time she truly experiences loss, opens her up to a fuller understanding of and use of her magic and her healing. He is restored to her and they live (truly) happily ever after.

Here’s the thing about the air nomads.

I introduced a friend to ATLA a few nights ago, and they had only known two things about the entire show: the cabbage meme, and that Aang apparently wants to ride every large and dangerous animal he can possibly find. We got through the first five or so episodes, and my friend noted that Aang is exactly what a 12-year-old would be like if given godlike powers, and that this is literally just what he could do with airbending. He can’t even wield any of the other elements, and he’s one of the most powerful people on the planet, because he’s an airbender.

And that got me thinking.

This snippet from Bitter Work is one of the few pieces of concrete information we get about the airbenders, at least in ATLA. Iroh is explaining to Zuko how all four of the elements connect to the world and to each other.

Fire is the element of power, of desire and will, of ambition and the ability to see it through. Power is crucial to the world; without it, there’s no drive, no momentum, no push. But fire can easily grow out of control and become dangerous; it can become unpredictable, unless it is nurtured and watched and structured.

Earth is the element of substance, persistence, and enduring. Earth is strong, consistent, and blunt. It can construct things with a sense of permanence; a house, a town, a walled city. But earth is also stubborn; it’s liable to get stuck, dig in, and stay put even when it’s best to move on.

Water is the element of change, of adaptation, of movement. Water is incredibly powerful both as a liquid and a solid; it will flow and redirect. But it also will change, even when you don’t want it to; ice will melt, liquid will evaporate. A life dedicated to change necessarily involves constant movement, never putting down roots, never letting yourself become too comfortable.

We see only a few flashbacks to Aang’s life in the temples, and we get a sense of who he was and what kind of upbringing he had.

This is a preteen with the power to fucking fly. He’s got no fear of falling, and a much reduced fear of death. There’s a reason why the sages avoid telling the new avatar their status until they turn sixteen; could you imagine a firebender, at twelve years old, learning that they were going to be the most powerful person in the whole world? Depending on that child, that could go so badly.

But the thing about Aang, and the thing about the Air Nomads, is that they were part of the world too. They contributed to the balance, and then they were all but wiped out by Sozin. What was lost, there? Was it freedom? Yes, but I think there’s something else too, and it’s just yet another piece of the utter brilliance of the worldbuilding of ATLA.

To recap: we have power to push us forward; we have stability to keep us strong; we have change to keep us moving.

And then we have this guy.

The air nomads brought fun to the world. They brought a very literal sense of lightheartedness.

Sozin saw this as a weakness. I think a lot of the world did, in ATLA. Why do the Air Nomads bother, right? They’re just up there in their temples, playing games, baking pies in order to throw them as a gag. As Iroh said above, they had pretty great senses of humour, and they didn’t take themselves too seriously.

But that’s a huge part of having a world of balance and peace.

It’s not just about power, or might, or the ability to adapt. You can have all of those, but you also need fun. You need the ability to be vulnerable, to have no ambitions beyond just having a good day. You need to be able to embrace silliness, to nurture play, to have that space where a very specific kind of emotional growth can occur. Fun makes a hard life a little easier. Fun makes your own mortality a little less frightening to grasp. Fun is the spaces in between, that can’t be measured by money or military might. Fun is what nurtures imagination, allows you to see a situation in a whole new light, to find new solutions to problems previously considered impossible.

Fun is what makes a stranger into a friend, rather than an enemy.

Fun helps you see past your differences.

Fun is what fuels curiosity and openmindedness.

This photo means a lot to me. And I’ll tell you why. 

Natalie Portman, as we know, was shut out of Marvel. She chose not to sign any new contract not just because of the way her character was treated (though there is that) but because Thor: The Dark World was slated to be the first Marvel movie directed by a woman, her friend (and eventual Wonder Woman director) Patty Jenkins. Portman hadn’t planned on being in The Dark World, but lept at the chance to be a part of feminist history and to be directed in what would have beenJenkin’s first film since her 2003 Oscar-winning Monster. Portman signed a new contract with Marvel. They fired Jenkins soon after. Portman was crushed because she essentially had been duped into a contract for a film that would keep her away from her young son and force her back into a one-dimensional role under yet another male director. And we all remember how awful that movie was. 

When it came time for the third Thor movie, they tried to get Portman under contract again. And she said no. Marvel decided to spin the story to make it seem like it was all their idea. At first, they went for the lame and nonsensical: 

When Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige was asked about why she wouldn’t be in the third film, and said there were “many reasons, many of which are in the film, so you will see that” continuing with “There are only a couple of scenes on Earth in this movie. The majority, 95 percent of the movie, takes place in the cosmos.” (x)

Seeing as The Dark World also took place in space, this answer didn’t have a lot of credibility. When Portman said she was “done” with the Marvel Universe, Feige got vicious in interviews, telling reporters that Valkyrie was in Ragnorak to be better than Jane Foster and a better match for Thor. 

“We wanted Thor to encounter somebody that was near his equal and that his relationship with Jane may have evolved in unexpected ways in between The Dark World and Ragnarok, and we wanted to pit him against a character who was much more his equal and in many ways his superior.” (x)

Feige implies that A) Valkyrie was in Ragnorak to be a romantic interest for Thor, B) Valkyrie is better and more powerful than Jane Foster, and C) Jane Foster was always Thor’s inferior. 

What’s ridiculous is that Ragnorak had a “sorry Jane dumped you” throwaway line to explain Portman’s absence. And instead of saying that Jane and Thor broke up in interviews, a line that does not spoil literally anything about the film, Feige chose to attack Jane’s strength and capability, which would have been a very special dig at Portman. 

Do you want to know what none of this sounds like? Taika Waititi’s opinion. Waititi is a master storyteller who does not sacrifice his feminist views for laughs. You can bet that Feige’s ridiculous slams on Portman and her character Jane– disguised as “promotion” for WAITITI’S FILM– would have troubled him immensely. This is a man with a Māori father, who had to use his mother’s maiden name– Cohen– for earlier work because an indigenous last name kept him away from opportunity. This man does NOT fuck around with entertainment that gets its power off of sexism and inequality. He knows from experience just how infuriating it is when it comes to directors missing out on opportunities because they aren’t a white man. 

So how does he fix this? How does he fix the idea that Jane Foster can’t go to space, or that she’s not powerful enough for Thor, the god of thunder? 

He makes her Thor. 

Waititi saw Portman / Jane Foster’s name dragged through the mud by Kevin Feige in order to promote his movie, and when he got hired to direct again, he decided to right those wrongs. This picture means everything. He is on his knee, handing her Thor’s hammer, essentially saying, you will never have to go through that shit with me. With me, you’re a god. And the expression on her face, after Marvel attempted to break her, doesn’t need words. 

I learned how easy it is to ask a stranger for a pad.

I learned to share my lotion.

I learned how quick women are to compliment.

I learned how easy it is to make a girl smile.

I learned how to find good sales - hint: compliment an item and you learn where it was purchased and if it was on sale.

I learned how to see fear on a face across a bar.

I learned how to step in.

I learned how to ask for help with my eyes.

I learned about bathroom friendships and how deep they can feel for their short lived lives.

I learned how to signal complex thoughts and ideas through straw placement and head tilting.

I learned how to feel safe and make others feel safe.

“Have you seen…?”