i'll fix the typos later..i promise?

Recently I heard of Simone Weil's (pronounced 'way') childhood. It's no surprise that you've proen her name once or twice, alongside a master-post of philosophers, in some bolded, 16 pt. font, quote underneath the thing you really wanted to see or read. Throughout the whole podcast they talk about her doubts of religion, and one striking example of the human relationship with god being the same as two prisoners separated by a wall, one man talks about how--even without a clue or sight as to what goes on the other side of the wall--that knock is our blind faith/belief. 

Last night, I was trying to watch Trois Coleurs: Bleu, but instead-randomly clicked on "The Vanishing," made in 1988, a mainly french film with some dutch sprinkled through the early parts, about a man in search of his "copine" who has gone missing while they travel to the far out parts of lyon for vacationing. The strange part I'd say was this gap in time-probably the fault of book to movie translations being terrible-but later I checked and the book, "The Golden Egg" received terrible reviews, I actually laughed, and felt a bit like the sociopathic villain, whose passion for the intricacy of killing is a strange one.

As the podcast began, they speak about something I almost teared up over in-live-time, on the bus, next to a man scented of day old clothing and cigarettes which i didn't mind, Weil's childhood was spent comfortably as she was of middle class-her father being a doctor and her mother a home-maker, but her older brother-of exactly three years, same as my older sister, was of an effortless brilliance who overshot the pass of all his exams and spent free time reading classics in Greek, which he knew very little of. It was the female speaker who said in a small note that Weil became very depressed because of the shadow of her brother-whom they admitted she admired and appreciated. And towards one part of the movie, another character, seems emaciated by the stealing of thunder, which isn't to say any party deserves this, to feel depressed by the lack of talent, seems selfish, and the speaker goes on to say Weil realized she needed focus or close attention to detail to get anywhere close to her brother, but they do not talk of relief of that feeling.

I too feel like this a lot of times, and on asking a question to someone whom I admire, about this knowledge problem, that he/she/they have something better than what I have, or what I put out, and how to forgive this part of ourselves, how the other person must struggle too. Their response was that we cannot trust everything our brains tell us, and that they too (who might I add are the reason I still seek out independent knowledge of schooling--regardless of the argument that it's useless) often times think, oh but so and so is off better and doing this and that.


 And I'll come back to the movie, the villain, or perhaps I should use his name? Lemorne, of sociopathic nature, calms the qualms he has with the character who lost his friend, Saskia, and between sandwiches, and jokes about french and dutch last names, they become level. (although if you know his trick they obviously are not) Lemorne says at one point how, many depressed because have the opportunity and the thought to jump (from a building etc.) but the premonition of death and the like, are reason that they will not jump, his says it's certain because they want to jump, that they will not, but he says he wanted to prove that wrong...and of course jumps.

This ability to foresee (maybe only in a dream), of course if I jump I'll be gone, and yes that is scary, but I have the thought so I will comply and not jump. It's kind of how admitting that we're less than one or another, by comparison only, is the same thing, by thinking we become sort of. Although Weil meant more of a focus to make up for the lack of natural talent, (see: grit), I am speaking to the inner focus or perhaps outer microscope that dilutes the shadow a bit, more-so that instead of another shadow, your own comes to periphery, which is indeed what you should be focused on in the beginning.  Throughout the movie there is a famous bike race going on, and this race, between the villain and the friend, seems important, but reality and my own experience of the depression that I will not be as amazing as my older sibling, tells me the race is more against himself. That indeed both characters are racing themselves; Lemorne against his itch to hear the screams of others-his perfectionist release when he kills, and Rex, the friend, who race is to live in the present, to be satisfied with what he doesn't know, which seems at first, that maybe Saskia isn't missing, but chose, and left.


what a dilemma,
cb