Kris bullshit
I have just finished watching "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." One of several movies I've watched today (I have been a lazy movie watching bastard ever since I have gotten my new Comcast package and haven't yet gotten promoted at work.)
I also got into an argument with Kris tonight as well; one of a several dozen this year alone, as an unfortunate number of my friends are aware. Neither the movie nor the argument themselves merit a livejournal entry. Neither were particularly mind-expanding.
So why am I writing this entry? I will tell you that it has very much to do with the argument I had with Kris being directly before watching this movie. The result, in my extreme tiredness, is that in that specific exact recipe of terrible Kris argument followed imediately by that above-average meaningful movie, I have indeed had an experience that is qualifying as mind-bending. I have decided to sit down and write about it in my livejournal. I'm not even sure I will post it; this is merely a rare time in my life when writing seems to be the only way to synthesis what I am thinking, or attempting to find a truth that isn't immediately evident to me. If this written moratorium gets me to a place that had best not be posted publically for mutual acquintances of Kris and mine, I will save it perhaps on my computer for select eyes only, if any other that mine. My last apology/disclaimer will be for the undoubtable nebulous character of this explorative essay, as I reiterate is being typed by a very confused and tired version of my normally thought-aligned self.
It might benefit any prospective readers of this essay for me to here impart (and possbily ruin) a strand of the plot to "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." This I will attempt to remedy here speedily...
The main premise is that there is a device owned by a company that can eliminate a person from another person's memory. For example, If "Jack" was hit by a car and died, his fiance "Jill" probably would have gone to a place like this to forget Jack, to eliminate the pain. Jill would clear her house of Jack memorabilia, and the company doing the "erasing" would send letters to all of her family asking them not to mention Jack. So despite sounding somewhat Sci-Fi, the movie is actually pitched in a believable modern-day montage. The only other necessary part of the plot to reveal is that certain characters come to the realization that they have had this procedure done to themselves, something that supposedly should never happen, ergo chaos theory once again shines brilliantly in a film to show us the errors of our human designs (think "Total Recall," "Jurassic Park," etc. for this reference).
So, after much babbling on my part, we finally get to the thesis question of this literary mission; Would I pay a company to erase Kris from my mind?
Before one reduces this question to being dramatic or zealous babble, please read on.
I am honest almost to a fault; I think any potential reader would agree. But I am coming more and more to the conclusion that perhaps I have been forgiving of Kris when I shouldn't, i.e. not being entirely honest with myself (a rare occurence). That is really a key to this essay; for all of the people who have heard me lament my relationship with Kris yet repeatedly invite her back into my life, understand that each time hasn't been exactly like the last. There has risen slowly a resentment of our relationship.
This resentment would probably have remained very dormant for a much longer, unhealthier time, except that this movie I have just seen makes the "I wish I never would have met you" mentality a concievable option (note; not possible, just concievable as a rhetorical examination).
I won't deny my desire to air out our relationship online; that would involve to some extent "trash talking" and I don't believe in that. But I believe in being truthful about things, especially to myself. I will therefore write a sentence that I hope all parties that might read this could call fair: Almost everything I've done to Kris that might be considered rude or deconstructive has been, at it's core, a constructive effort to counter something she did that she should not have done. Kris has in turn come to see this as truth, and on more than one occasion has admitted to me that she sees the good in almost all that I do for her. I believe it fair then to say that I do see myself as more the victim in our relationship, though it may be said that my right assert that opinion may be null and void because of my constant conscious reacceptance of this somewhat abusive relationship.
So what is the point of the previous paragraph? Reader, I do not want your sorrow or your pity. I assure you I will be fine, and that I indeed have the right to end this at any time. Kris is not holding me prisoner, my love for her is.
Nor do I want you to promise you'll root for Kenny in the next Kris vs. Kenny battle royale that gets aired via Livejournal, gossip, or any other inadequate media.
The point of that paragraph was to say that I truly belive the only next step that I could take to help our relationship is to end it. There is nothing I can do better that I am aware of. Kris simply will not stop lying to those she claims to care about, and now our relationship is potentially hurting other people, people that did not sign up for this. I'm fine with the hurt I cause myself, e.g. continuing consortium with Kris; I'm a big boy, and getting me to stop trying to care for someone I love is certainly more painful than trying to maintain a shitty relationship with them (but I fear I could "unlove" Kris at the rate I am growing to dislike our friendship). And I'm fine if she gets hurt pursuing a relationship with me; to be honest, most of the hurt I have cause her, intentional or otherwise, has been for the greater good. It has been a sort of tough growth for Kris. I'm fine with those types of hurt. They have come to be recognized as love.
But if by trusting Kris I am an accesory to a type of hurt that I would wish on no one, than I almost certainly would rather not associate with Kris on any level.
I say almost certainly because I identified with the main character of "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" (that character being "Joel" played by Jim Carey) at two very distinct and "at odds" points in the picture (warning; more plot-ruining ahead, to all of you "haven't-seens").
Joel wants to erase his ex from his mind, and I certainly feel that way sometimes about Kris. I think as long as I know she exists, I will want to talk to her. She, in turn, will want to talk to me. This is because of a mutual love, which is supposed to be stronger than anything. However, this all-too-common makeup/breakup cycle has perpetuated itself in our relationship to the point of being extremely damaging. I have in my mind made startling realizations of how closely our relationship resembles a drug addiction.
There are moments of ecstatic joy followed by hours of argument and pain. Our relationship affects how tired I am at work, and how much patience I have interacting with others. It makes me a prisoner in my own home, a derelict, and at times I will go to great lengths to try to part myself from this relationship, this bad addiction. The more my friends know about this bad addiction, the less they want to know, until I clam up almost completely and cease talking to them about very important things that are on my mind. That is my argument for wishing that, like Joel, I could investigate a procedure that would wipe Kris from my mind; she is basically lowering my standard of living more than she is raising it, and I'm not "strong" enough to end our relationship, this addiction that causes me woe.
So why haven't I ended it thus far? None of these thoughts are particularly new, the most sobering argument being the addiction metaphor realized about a month or two ago.
I suppose that is my purpose in writing this essay. I think part of it is that, in speaking with Kris, I think we have come to the conclusion (though perhaps better parts of it were not actually spoken) that if we were to one day become a happy family, no amount of pain and suffering right now would have not been worth it. That makes our struggle seem like an investment; a trial, something pure and strengthening, the good of which cannot be seen until journey's end. In that capacity, faith is all that is required, and despite my religious preferences, I have a great deal of faith.
However, the possibilty of us damaging others is, as of tonight, a new and horrible possibility. Suddenly our "trial" is a sick warpath, a trail of other people's hopes and dreams irrevocably bruised, a path we followed despite the hurt we cause others; a sick and selfish road. That I would not travel; I cannot know or atone for the hurt I help Kris cause others whom I cannot identify. Logic would then dictate that our relationship should end.
However, I have yet to mention the second part of the movie in which I related to the character of "Joel".
The reason Joel wanted to forget his ex (ironically named Clementine) is because he discovered that, after they had experienced a terrible breakup, she had had Joel erased. He went to talk to her to reconcile and she did not recongnize him.
This hurt him so deeply that he wanted the erasure done as well. The majority of the film is a scattering of memories from Joel and Clementine's relationship, played out in a difficult to describe "interactive dream montage" as Joel actually lies sleeping, hooked up to the erasing device.
In the final moments of the movie, an erased Joel and Clementine are reacquainted and carpooling together. Due to a subplot, a renegade from the erasing company had typed letters to each past patient attempting to re-acquaint them with their lost past. With the letters of re-acquaintance is a tape made by each patient before the erasure explaining why they wanted to erase that certain person from their memory.
The result is that both Joel and Clementine are with each other as they each listen to a tape they've never heard before; two tapes, in their own two voices, explaining things that they disliked about each other from a relationship that neither of them remember.
The result is an immediate reaction as of betrayal; they felt lied to, robbed. Of course, this is a natural reaction. But upon examination, it is interesting. We don't feel that way about anything else we do to ourselves; why is that? I think the answer lies in truth; the most important thing in our lives is truth. I know it is in mine; it is a self-evident truth in my universe, though it slips in importance for many other people.
Most elderly people don't regret a moment of their lives. This is because they have come to realize the last lesson in life; that we are naught but the some of our experiences, and it is our memory of life events and the choices we made that make us who we are. Therefore, to erase a memory of a major event would be to pervert one's character; to unlearn a hard lesson, and to rape truth.
Before one learns this lesson, they are capable of doing things that they would not have done unto themselves. Truth, the Golden Rule, the meaning of life; these things are all interrelated; you can't easily do something to someone that you wouldn't want done to you after you have learned that you are the some of all of your actions. That would mean that you are making yourself a worse person. A mistake is when you are too blind to wonder if you would have that deed done unto yourself; kids vandalizing public property; a lustful lover having an affair. They are called mistakes because they should result in a lesson and end in forgiveness.
It is not a mistake when we realize it is something we would not have done to us, yet do it anyway; in this instance, the perpetrator often tries to mask his or her guilt, supressing it with drug abuse, dissociation or displacement of that guilt, etc. Cheaters themselves do not trust their mates; con artists make few close friends; abusive fathers tell their children that it is their fault they must be struck. In these instances, the abomination of truth causes only hurt.
This seemingly deeper tangent is related to how Joel and clementine felt when both of them realized that they had shared a very long, meaningful, hurtful relationship, but had both chosen to lie to themselves on the grandest of scales. They knew that, for some reason, truth was obscured and they had cheated themselves. They now knew that they had shared a relationship that was so hurtful that they had to do controlled brain damage to undo that hurt. Yet we know that the opposite of love is not hate, but indifference. It is therefore fair to say that, regardless of the consequence of their previous relationship, Joel and Clementine had shared a powerful truth that had better been left remembered, hurtful though it was.
So what of this dichotomy? What exactly in the fuck am I blathering on about? I suppose that it is this; my entire system of logic says that truth is our ultimate friend, and should never be obscured. Therefore, I would not have Kris erased, but endure the pain of the hurt her relationship costs me in the name of truth.
Yet I cannot pursue that relationship according to my system of ethics; it may hurt others, and that is not doing unto others as I would have them do unto me. This then seems to obscure truth. So, I am at a standstill.
What if--perhaps I could pursue our relationship without it hurting others? This would clearly allow me to embrace truth without disrupting my logic or my ethics. Yet this is reliant upon a single factor; Kris not lying to anyone, to me or to any other potential important relationship. No other action will suffice; lying is the opposite of truth, and will only lead to hurt. No other action will suffice, so Kris; stop lying to me and to them.
We have only then one problem to address; many people never stop lying to themselves.
I have done it. I have smoked, drunk driven, worked for people I couldn't stand and tried to save relationships I shouldn't have tried to start in the first place. For some unknown reason I have passed through these trials of character with remarkable speed and little self-loathing. I fully believe that I do not lie to myself almost ever. I have been made to look at myself and see a monster, something that most people aren't strong enough to bear in an expedient fashion. I have become what I know to be an honorable person, a true adult, motivated by truth to confront, not by fear to be non-confrontational.
As no demerit to her, I do not think that Kris has done this. She still supresses, she still lies, she still speaks in riddles and contradictions. I refer to these as "untruths," not necessarily lies, but deviations from what we know as truth. The ugly monster of untruth rears its ugly head many times in every one of our arguments. Because of my adoration of truth I feel it strongly when Kris and I argue, every time. In tonight's particular argument, I pinned an untruth down almost quicker than I have ever done. I also called her out on an untruth I knew she would do if I would let her. I was so focused on untruth this particular time that it was intense; I could feel the lie just as a blind man can say which way the summer sun is by turning until he feels its heat upon his brow; and I predicted another lie before it escaped Kris's subconcious. It was an intense experience; had I any partiality toward the paranormal I might refer to it as such a thing as ESP.
I am not saying now that I am pyschic. I probably will still lose money at poker, I won't be able to catch you if you try to test my ability at detecting an untruth in conversation with you, and I have just as much of a chance finding the light switch in the dark as anyone. I suppose why I felt to mention those facets of tonights argument is the conclusion it yields; that every argument that Kris and I have is me searching for untruths, and it has happened so much that I am an expert at it with Kris.
And so I say I think that no one should lie to others. Kris, I know you can do that. Say nothing but the truth, and avoid untruth by constantly expressing doubts, concerns, and fears to all about you. That might get us far.
The trick is to stop lying to one's self. That is not as easy. Kris, I don't think that you can do that. I think you lie to yourself about things that I will not here discuss. Until you address them, we have no hope.
It is, after all, truth that should motivate us, not fear. Truth uncovers; fear runs, clouds over, makes us hide. Truth confesses; fear lies. Truth helps; fear hinders all it encounters unless used as a cruel weapon.
The question remains; if I could, would I have Kris erased from my memory? Unfortunately, I cannot answer that. I fear something dreadful is coming, but I will not let fear stop me from searching for truth. Until I have the truth, which I cannot have without Kris becoming more truthful than she is, I will most likely come closer to pushing the erase button, to cutting my losses and being thankful for her absence in my life. Despite how much sense that seems to make, I cannot help but think that end would be a tragic one.
Kris, you are probably the only person still reading this, the result of 2 1/2 hours of thoughtful typing. Feel free to respond by LJ, email, or both. Anyone else still reading this, I would hope that you would be moved to respond. But to anyone who has stopped reading, I do not blame you. Kris and Kenny, once a fire that helped to warm many lives about them, is now an ember dying in the lonely dark.