Monday Movie Meme

This week's movie topic is all about Farms...Share on your blog movies that are set on a farm, focus on farmers or reference farming in some way, linking back here to the Bumbles.

Gone with the Wind. It was a farm that motivated one of cinema's most memorable heroines. Ashley Wilkes as played by Leslie Howard was a pallid, clueless twit, but at one point in the movie he did actually seem to understand something about Katie Scarlett O'Hara. He told her that there was something that she loved more than him, and he pressed the rich, red earth of Tara into her hand. And then there was the terrific moment when Scarlett hauls off and lets that whiny wench Suellen have it for saying she hates Tara. "That's like saying you hate Ma and Pa."

Bridges of Madison County. Francesca's life on an Iowa farm gets a lot more interesting when a photographer asks her for directions to that covered bridge.

A Thousand Acres. If life on the farm with Dad Jason Robards and daughters Michelle Pfeiffer, Jessica Lange and Jennifer Jason Leigh seems downright Shakespearean, that's because this heartland epic borrows liberally from King Lear. It's the most obscure movie on this week's list, but it's awesome. See it and it will really stay with you. It may not have many laughs, but instead it's got madness and betrayal and incest and cancer and storms ... both emotional and meteorological.

She knows

Heard from my oldest friend today. She updated me on all of the issues in her life, at least as well as she could. Her 21-year-old son's anger/anxiety issues have gotten the best of him again and now her "coffee table has about a dozen holes in it." Her 14-year-old daughter will be receive an hour of school-mandated therapy each week, but she and her brother are clashing constantly and this causes my friend to have panic attacks. She says she's "reallyreallyreally bad right now and just can't talk."

Most disturbingly, she worries about God and why He continues to let her live. In response, I advised that a shrink is one thing and a minister is another, and I sent her a link to the Unitarian Universalist church nearest her. That's the congregation I belong to and, while I still consider myself a devout Christian, I appreciate how UUs' approach life and faith with a maximum of spirituality but a minimum of dogma. Since my friend feels beaten up and under siege a great deal of the time, I think a welcoming and non-judgmental church would be a place to dip a toe back into religion. She needs God in her life and, while I didn't want to lay it on too thick, so do her kids.

The part that felt like a salve was this: "Sorry, dear -- I don't want to dump on you. I just know that you are a safe place to land my neurosis...and I feel incredibly ashamed that I haven't been as good a friend to you as you have always been to me." So she knows, and that's enough for me. I don't feel we need to rehash it. She knows and she values what we have been to one another since first grade.

"You CAN Do This!"

So read the reassuring and supportive missive from my best friend. I've been sharing my health/menopause travails with him in detail and, while I expect much of it is TMI that makes him a little uncomfortable, he has been very generous with pep talks and suggestions. I'm keeping it all top of mind today, the first day of my weaning from Lexapro.

My best friend hopes the withdrawal goes well, but he advises me to stay close to my shrink during this period because he's heard horror stories. He thinks simple carbs are my real enemy (after all, he has observed firsthand that, if I don't pay attention, I go through life with a red Coca-Cola Classic can in my hand), he is glad my gyne didn't prescribe hormones for me because he's not sure they would do me more good than harm, and I need to do at least some cardio every day.

Ok, so this weekend I slacked off on the exercise part. But I did feel like he was with me at Flat Top Grill today. I can't wait to report that, instead of pad thai noodles, I had brown rice, and I passed on pineapple slices for broccoli.

After all, I CAN do this. I know, because he said so. And my best friend can be very wise. He's had to adjust to life with adult onset diabetes and he's done it with innate grace -- and under the vigilant eye of a well-respected nutritionist.


Image: photostock / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

This made me happy

"Looocy! You got some 'splainin' to do!"

Overheard at lunch today. From a double-booth filled with laughing girls all under 21 (judging by their eye makeup and the dearth of booze) as they celebrated one of their number's birthday.

I Love Lucy premiered 60 years ago. Before these girls were born. Before their mothers were born! And yet reciting one of Ricky's lines can still get a laugh.

I was glad because, well, I love Lucy. Always have.