Love Rain On Me

Over the weekend I managed to watch to very powerful movies. I don't watch too many movies, so it's always a pleasure when I get to. The first of the two was the Sean Penn epic Into The Wild. Probably the better movie, but not my favorite of the two. The movie is based on the real-life experiences of 23-year-old Emory University graduate Christopher McCandless (Emile Hirsch.) Who leaves the privileged life he has known to become a self-styled vagabond. On the road, he complaines about the evils of ''society,'' and he nurses family wounds: the father (William Hurt) who was a materialist, and violent to his mother (Marcia Gay Harden) who enabled him. What happened to him on his journey transformed him into an enduring symbol for countless people. A fearless risk-taker who wrestled with the balance between man and nature.

The second movie was the post- 9/11 Reign Over Me. Adam Sandler plays a traumatized widower who lost his wife and children in a 9/11 plane crash (Charlie Fineman.) Alan Johnson (Don Cheadle), a successful Manhattan dentist, finds himself overwhelmed by his responsibilities toward his family, including his beautiful wife Janeane (Jada Pinkett Smith), their children and his demanding business partners. Feeling increasingly detached and discontented, he's almost grateful for the chance to focus on someone in far worse shape, that ofcoarse being Charlie. The two were once roomates back in college, who have lost contact with one another over the years. Both are now hurting in different ways. In fact thats the major thing that ties both of these movies together. They both deal with the pain of life and the brokeness of man. Everyone of us is broken in someway or another. Most people are just really good at hiding it, like myself.

Both movies managed to make me tear up. Especially Reign Over Me, during that one I found myself really wanting to let it out. I really wanted to cry. But for some reason I couldn't. In fact I can't remember the last time I cried. I have carried this guilt with me for over a year now since my Father Arden died. I never cried when he died, why I don't know. I loved him, he sacrificed a lot for us. Unlike himself I am a pretty happy person. But just like him I have an ever-evolving struggle with sadness that chases after my soul, day after day. Some days, some weeks I manage to outrun it. But as of late it's running side by side with me. Making me evaluate life and the people that I share my life with. For some odd reason I have been focusing on the brokeness of man. And I'm finding it everywhere. So I don't find it weird that my friend Tim suggested we watch Into The Wild. Or that after viewing many choices to choose from I stopped on Reign Over Me. I truly believe that focusing on positivive things in life is the way to go. But why do I always end up at negativity's door-step. Now that I have once again recognized this struggle I have. Things will go back to normal. I will slip back into my happy positive ways. Until negativity slowly creeps back. It could take weeks, usually it's many months, before I fight that battle again. Now I will rid myself of the guilt of not crying when my father past on. I envy women for being so intouch with their feelings. Men are sometimes so detached from our feelings. I wonder why that is?