Josh Hartnett

Josh Hartnett


Josh Hartnett in Armani Beauty's Perfume Ad

I just finished watching Black Hawk Down on tv. I was never into war movies because of the gore. The tv station kept advertising the film on prime time and a familiar face came up in one of the war scenes.

I knew he acted in Pearl Harbor, but his name kept eluding me. It's on the tip of my tongue, but I just could not recall it. I just remembered that I liked his character more than Ben Affleck in Pearl Harbor. Out of the blue, while watching some commercial after dinner, his name popped up, Josh Hartnett.

I looked up his biography. Aside from acting, he is also featured in ads. His most recent one being the first male spokesperson for Armani Beauty. It's a perfume by Emporio Armani, "Diamond". Well, he was voted the sexiest male for many years, so it's not a surprising choice.

I have only seen 2 of his films, Pearl Harbor and Black Hawk Down, but I really like his portrayals. What strikes me though, is the similarity in roles he's been casted. You can switch his character in both films and you will see the same guy. He will be the more sentimental, idealistic and intellectual guy, basically the good guy.

As an actor, being stereotyped is supposed to be a bad thing because the roles lack versatility, but Josh Hartnett is such a believable good guy. I guess it's the earnestness in his eyes, but I like him being the good guy and he is a very good looking one I might add.

(Photos : www.flickr.com & www.finchsaquarterly.com)

Closure

Him that I love, I wish to be free - even from me.
~Anne Morrow Lindbergh

I have always thought that when two people enter into an intimate relationship with each other, the natural tendency is to feel that the other person would be more special, more precious, more exclusive and worthy to have a loftier place in your heart.

To me, it is the most natural thing in the world. I was completely caught off guard when I was told that having expectations was a bad thing. Having expectations meant I wanted that person to fill my insecurities. Huh?

I didn't know that wanting to hold hands with someone you like was a sign of emotional insecurity. I was in an entanglement, not anywhere near a relationship, with someone who wanted to keep a distance far, far away in the galaxy, so it would not compromise his freedom.

I wanted Closure, but I was told by different people that I was the problem because I had expectations. Huh? They suggested that instead of ending it, I should stay in it. This entanglement was totally normal, he was simply doing what guys do. Huh?

I stuck with it for another 2 weeks. I even apologized to him for not wanting to hold my hand, that I was nuts. He was so gracious. He accepted my apology. Then the cheering came, the "I told you so....see, he did not want to end it with you". It was my expectations, my insecurities and my emotional baggage tricking me to believe that he failed my expectations. Huh?

Perhaps I live in a different era. I totally do not understand this concept. I believe that having certain expectations in a relationship meant you respect and treasure it. Unmet expectation is excruciating. I do not want to debate whether I am antiquarian in my beliefs. One thing I know is that the most important thing I treasure is compromised, my peace of mind.

Retrieving my peace is the most important task for me right now. I still believe in romance, but not in this compromised way. I feel so stupid to have listened to all this nonsense and wasted two weeks doubting my sanity.

( Peony Posy by Bonnie Wong)

Holding Hands

There are lots of ways to express intimacy, embracing, kissing or simply gazing into each other's eyes. Everyone has a unique interpretation of what intimacy is.

I believe in body langauge. It speaks louder and clearer than mere words. When you hold a person's hand, you could feel the undercurrent of emotions. Because you are actually touching, you could sense love or love missing. Hands don't lie.

Holding hands then, to me, is the sublimation of intimacy. It's an affirmation that the other person is your significant other. When you see a couple holding hands, it's usually the guy who envelopes the girl's hand. It's rarely the other way around. It's a way to say that the guy wants to protect the girl and the girl assents to entrusting herself to the guy.

When a father gives away the bride, he is entrusting his daughter to the groom, by placing her hand in his. I always tear up at this point because of all the love, trust and blessing, in one gesture.

Somehow, it also reminds me of Courtly love in the midddle ages. The Lady would give her hand to her worthy knight and the knight would kiss the back of her hand as a seal of love and loyalty.

C'est romance, pour moi.
(photo: http://www.charlieandnick.com/images/holding_hands.jpg)

Teardrop

I went for my monthly manicure today. My manicurist is a very young lady, in her early twenties. I really look forward to meeting her every month. Not only do I leave with perfectly manicured hands, I'd have two hours of nice chat.

After I sat down and chose a new color, we started our usual chat. Five minutes into our conversation, she suddenly blurted out that her boyfriend broke up with her. It was a week ago today. She said the day after the breakup, she went to work in a daze. She said seeing me was a relief because she could finally tell somebody while she was working. We had become good friends in the span of two years.

I couldn't see half of her face because she had to wear a paper mask whenever she's working. What I could see were tears welling up her big, clear eyes. Then, a tear dropped. My heart dropped, too. She then told me the details, but they did not register. In that two hours, tears swam in her eyes and an occasional tear would fall. She'd then say, "Sorry, I didn't mean to...."

I don't know if this is the breakup season or not. I still have a very vivid picture of that sad girl's faraway look in my earlier post. Today, seeing a cheerful and optimistic girl whom I know hurting is truly heavy. When she asked me to go for a puff, I could feel that every breath was painful. She was hoping exhaling the puff would let go some of the hurt.

I smiled a sad smile. I totally know how she feels. Again, this empathy comes from been there, done that. Getting older does not mean it hurt less. In a way, I think it hurts more, because "you [do] carry with you every relationship, every hurt, every joy, every pattern, somewhere embedded in your memory." You could even feel another person's pain.

The silver lining is that it makes me a better listener because I could relate to these feelings. I hope I'd helped a little listening to her story today.
(photo : www.thepissedoffbride.com)

A Far Away Look

A couple nights ago, I went down to dinner at my favorite haunt, the cafe at the corner. Since I brought Porky along and dogs were not allowed indoors, we sat outside. I didn't much notice the table in front of us. We sat down and ordered. While waiting for my order, I accidentally listened in the conversation at the next table.

One girl was telling her girl friend about how hurt she was, how she did not expect this, how there was this other woman....

Her girl friend tried to console her, to trash the guy, the other woman, it didn't help the case and the tears flowed....

The storyline was not what caught my attention.

What caught my attention was when the girl friend got up to go to the bathroom, the hurt friend just sat and waited, looking at the street with the saddest faraway look. She wasn't focused on anything, anyone. She just sat there with red rimmed eyes and looked into the distance, into the past. I could still see her pretty profile. That faraway look....what was she thinking?

In my previous post (the excerpt), it said, "When you love someone, you are also loving everyone you have ever loved before. You carry with you every relationship, every hurt, every joy, every pattern...." Somehow, sitting there looking at her, I could feel her pain, her longing, her tears, her trying to be strong, her wanting to go back in time, her wanting to do things differently if she had the chance, her wanting another chance with him.

I was surprised at my degree of empathy for this girl. I think it's akin to the feeling you get when you cry at a sad movie, only this is more acute because it's not fictional. Love wounds are the most difficult to heal because it's a third degree burn. The skin needs to grow over the wound and it takes time, plus, the process is painful. You have to revisit the wound each day to clean it, and feel the rawness of the pain again.

As I am writing, this quote by Alfred Lord Tennyson popped up, "Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all."

First Love

Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds.

~ William Shakespeare

Laura writes : I'm remembering my first love as a teenager. I find myself thinking that I should put quotation marks around the word love, as if to say that I realize, being an adult, that it wasn't really love, that it was some adolescent approximation of love, and therefore less worthy.

I stop myself and let myself remember Ted and not insult him or myself or the intensity that we shared by allowing my adult censor to rule the day. Who among us doesn't look with fondness on the rush of excitement, the stir of new sexual feelings, the intense connection that occurs in early relationships?

There is a saying in the increasingly dangerous world of sexually transmitted diseases: When you have sex with someone, you also have sex with everyone she or he has slept with before. I think of this in relationship: When you love someone, you are also loving everyone you have ever loved before.

You carry with you every relationship, every hurt, every joy, every pattern, somewhere embedded in your memory. This makes your later loves heavier, at times, with the voices from the past, but also richer with experience - and it gives to your first love a lightness of being that is one of the greatest wonders of life.

(Excerpts from A Year of Living Consciously by Gay Hendricks)