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Bleeding heart

I cried my eyes out last night at Forrest Gump. I absolutely love that movie. I have a pretty terrible memory, so everytime I watch it it seems fresh and I see new things that I didn’t notice or simply forgot over time. I have to admit I got annoyed a couple of times at the sheer improbability of all the things Forrest was responsible for (busting Watergate, making the famous smiley face logo), but I got over that, because really, isn’t that what it’s all about? Overcoming the odds and doing extraordinary things, despite being an ordinary, somewhat hindered person? I WANT to see Forrest doing well, I WANT to see him succeed, because he’s such a sweet, innocent, kind hearted person, and he deserves everything in the world.

Some of my fave moments of the movie:

“My favourite book!” – Pulling out a book from his son’s bag
“Is he…smart? Or he is like….(me)” – Asking about his son
“He’s just so…smart! He wrote you a letter….I can’t read it, so I’ll just leave it here for you” – Oh, how I cried at this one. Talking to his wife’s grave
“Why don’t you love me? I’m not a smart man…but I know what love is”
“It was the happiest moment of my life” Jenny wading through that gigantic pond thing in Washington to get to him….Incidentally, I am dying to know what the “one thing he had to say” about the war was. Would it be about Bubba? Shrimping? Lieutenant Daim? Ping Pong?
“New legs!” To Lieutenant Daim, at his wedding, followed by “This is my Jenny” – finally, she is!
Naming his boat Jenny, “The most beautiful name in the whole wide world”
“Momma said it was just a little white lie, and wouldn’t hurt nobody” About being sponsored by that ping pong bat company
“Life’s like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get” says his mum, to which he tells her she’s so good at explaining things so he understands

Okay…that’s probably enough!

I think I’m just feeling hormonal. I was teary eyed on the bus home, reading the paper and came across this column. Not normally a Colin James fan, but his short yet poignant description of the boy in questions left me damp eyed. Then a few pages on was a feature on the Congo atrocities, where 2 out of 3 women have been raped and the situation is still deteriorating, impossibly enough. Plus a full Africa map with arrows and boxes detailing the humanitarian crises in places like Zimbabwe. It’s all too much. I think about how much needless bloodshed and suffering us humans are inflicting on each other for NO good reason and it’s way too overwhelming. It makes me think how can we celebrate Christmas when this is going on? How can we keep grinding away in our capitalist economies, complaining about traffic and the weather – how can fat cat corporations in all good conscience keep turning massive profits while ignoring the plight of Africa?

What can I do? I’m never going to be one of those souls who devotes their lives to bettering the children of Africa and go over there to live and teach and offer aid, but surely there is something I can do.

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