Miranda July

I'm awkward. I'm also alone. I sit here with myself as my company, watching a movie called "Me and You and Everyone We Know." It's a wonderful little film I've seen before, full of awkward, lonely characters. None of them are carbon copies of me, or even close, but I feel I know them all away from the screen. Maybe that's the point of the movie, but it's not the point of this post. This post is about trepidation. My fears aren't based in pain, or power. I fear the open knowledge of my peers. It always seems the people I like the most expect me to be someone I'm not. I can't be anyone but myself: a socially and fiscally conservative guy who reads the Bible and tries to live it. I don't want to hurt anyone for simply who they are. I don't want any notches on my rifle, but I want to keep it. Most of all, I want love, peace, and understanding.

I think I understand this movie, "Me and You and Everyone We Know." I want to see more out of Miranda July, the creative force behind the movie, but I have the same feelings of fear. Right now, this movie is perfect to me. I see bits of me throughout, but lots more to explore in the characters. The last time I felt this way about a poet or an artist, I was thoroughly enamored of Naomi Nye. She had the best little poems, quaint and well-crafted. I thought that was her art. Then I heard her and met her. I learned what she's about. She's a highly-politically motivated poet who writes highly-political poems. I felt estranged, not only from her politics, but from her work as a whole. Before I met her, I bought a book of hers, and read it so much, it dog-eared. She signed it, I listened to her drivel, and I haven't touched the book since. I don't want to feel that way about an artist ever again.