"So did you like the Da Vinci Code?"
"Yeah, I thought it was pretty good. My only complaint was that the foreshadowing was entirely too blatant. Fifteen minutes into it I had already figured out the ending."
I was giving my review to Scott last week over mojitos at Lola. We hadn't seen eachother in several months so we had a lot to catch up on. There was talk of work, travel, family, medical procedures, music and of course, relationships.
"So, what's going on with Mr. Normal? You were pretty vague in the blog."
And since I don't have to be vague with a good friend, I told him everything. Bless his heart, he sat and listened to all of the details. I haven't really gone into the whole story with too many people because everything happened the night before my uncle died. After that happened, the whole thing with Mr. Normal seemed totally insignificant. But apparently, the situation holds some significance because poor Scotty had to listen as I droned on. (Thank you, Scotty.)
The great thing about having a guy friend is that you get a man's perspective when discussing dating. The tough thing about having a guy friend is that they rarely sugar-coat their perspective.
About ten minutes into the story, Scott leaned over the guacamole bowl and said, "I know you want to talk about this and I know you are going back and forth a lot on the whole situation and I understand that. I will listen for as long as you want to talk but I just need to say this: you know there's no fixing this, right?"
"Yeah, I know that."
"Are you sure? Because I hear you saying a lot of things but I want to make sure you know that this is done. It can't be fixed; just too much damage."
I nodded and took a long drink of my mojito. Had to rehydrate to tell the rest of my story. And true to his word, Scott sat and listened while I continued on. At some point, I told him about an incident that happened rather early on with Mr. Normal.
"And you were complaining about blatant foreshadowing in the Da Vinci Code??? I'd say you had some foreshadowing in that relationship."
I laughed because he was right - I should have figured out the ending.
Then again, perhaps foreshadowing is a little less obvious when you're in the middle of the action. I mean come on, that movie was 2 1/2 hours long - even Tom Hanks needed some time to figure out that he knew the location of the Holy Grail very early in the story.
And let's not forget, Leonardo didn't leave me any code so I'm left to my own devices.
5 comments:
Hmmmm...I would argue that you DID note the foreshadowing at the time and DID know how it would end, but thought you'd play out the story anyway in the hopes it would make your heart hurt less.
Very witty title, KC. I have one of those guy friends. The lack of sugar-coating is a bit bitter sometimes (dumb pun, I know). I also know all about disregarding foreshadowing while you're in the middle of a situation. It's not just you. We live, we learn, we write cool stuff that gives people motivation to read our archives.
I can't tell you how many relationships I've been in where the foreshadowing is so blatant it's more of a loud shout in my ear than a mere hint, yet I stay and wait it out, and hope and pray that things turn around. I think when we want something to work, we'll ignore all the signs and make up any number of excuses to try and make it happen. Maybe one day we'll learn the lesson, but I guess in the meantime, we're growing a lot in the process (and learning again and again how we ARE the prize!)
It's always much harder to see what's going on when you're in the situation. I've had times where I could tells omeone something because I had the advantage of distance--literally and/or figuratively--to offer perspective. When you're in the middle of the situation, it's more difficult to sort out, and we lose sight of the foreshadowing, of reality.
Scotty 'reads' wonderful :)
Great post Kendra!
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