Are you recording?
Hmm?
Are you recording?
Maybe.
Yeah, you are.
Pardon my interruption.
What you are about to see
is a short film entitled
How Would You Feel?
Created by one
Terence Nance in 2006.
How Would You Feel? is an educational
film that examines theories
about how humans come to
experience a singular emotion.
In its original form it was
presented as a work of fiction.
We will interrupt the fim How
Would You Feel? from time to time
with a new film entitled An
Oversimplification of Her Beauty.
We will do this in order
to provide the context
necessary to tell
a complete story.
So let's say that one day
you arrive at your home.
It has been a long day,
during which you have wod
no less than
12 consecutive hours.
This is in your case
a typical day.
However, this particulary
a young lady who you know
and a little more than like
has told you that she is coming to
be in your company this evenin.
So as you empty your pocs
and begin to get settled,
you see that she has telephoned you.
Of course you telephone her back.
She answers.
She tells you that she has
just arrived at her own home
and won't be coming
to yours tonight.
At that moment,
given the circumstances,
how would you feel?
Now let's say that this particular
day began at 8:00 a.m.,
when you woke up too late to arrive
at your place of employment on time.
Your daily commute
is no less than one hour.
Although you arrive on tim,
you are disappointed in your inability
to awake yourself consistently
in situations when
you are in a bed alone.
You are disappointed because this disability
speaks to a lack of self-control.
Self-control that you feel entitled to,
but do not possess.
The evening before
you worked late
and consequently
slept for only three hours.
And let's say that you
have no bed and no money,
and a stubborn yet quixoc
do-it-yourself attitude.
So, you built your bed
in a wood shop
using Japanese wood
joinery techniques
that you learned from a book
you found in the garbage.
You possess no means
of personal transportation,
so you elected
to transport this bed,
piece by piece,
on the train ride home,
rushing yourself
because you expected
to be in the company
of this lady quite soon.
After all, she has told you
she would be in your
company this evening.
So, you empty your
pockets, get settled,
and notice you have missed her call.
You call her back.
She tells you she has just
arrived at her own home
and won't be seeing you tonight.
At that moment,
given the circumstances,
how would you feel?
Now, let's just say that over
the span of four to eight weeks,
this young lady has become a
very good friend of yours.
This friendship is platoni.
Let's say that
you are attracted to her.
You do not know if she,
in the deep recesses of her soul,
harbors any amorous feelings
for you as you do for her.
But when parting from
each other's presence,
she lightly kisses you
on your lips.
Seldom, but with intenti,
and a hint of mischief and
doubt opaque in her pupils.
Let's say you and this
lady friend have slept together
on between four
and 18 occasions.
And by "slept together"
I mean just that, sleeping.
Each occasion occurs in either
one of your full-sized beds.
Each time you share a bed,
you grow closer physically,
until you cannot get any closer.
And let's say that this growth
seems mutually fulfilling.
It is gentle, subtle, but fortunately
it is accelerating in intensit.
Of course, each morning after
and for varying lengths of time
during the days between
these encounters...
...you daydream about
this most enigmatic of connections.
You allow the taste of your time
together to linger in your mouth
and coat your hands.
You think of the food
you cook together
and the way her navel
feels against your fingert.
A sweetness prevails.
Today, during your frustration
with your bed, your income,
and your commute,
you found respite in the fact
that on that particular...
Evening you would have
the opportuniy to be in her company.
You would have been uplifted by just
the thougt of spending this time
with this woman.
The night before you are
to meet this young lady,
you dream a dream
that you remember.
Seldom do you
remember your dreams.
In this dream you ascend
above your existence
and shed among other things a
Western understanding of time.
You meet her in a sky.
She has taken the form of a sun,
but does not emit heat.
You ask for the time.
She refers you to
a moon who unfortunately
does not have the same
gravitational pull as she.
You fall from the sky and
are awakened by your alarm
too late to arrive at yor
place of employment on t.
Let's say that
this frustrates you
because it evidences
a lack of self-control.
You also overslept because in
an exercise in self-discipline,
you worked much
later than usual,
attempting to meet
your daily income quota.
After work you finished the
remaining pieces of your bed.
Incidentally,
the bed did not fit together quite right
because you are not
a very good carpenter,
nor do you read Japanese.
When you brought it home,
you stood on the train platform
and watched
three full trains pass...
...each
more full than the next.
People pushed themselves
against each other.
You imagined a collective amorous
feeling floating in the air,
even though there wasn't enough
room for you and your bed.
Still, you rushed yourself
home, wih this woman in your head.
And as you get settled,
you see that you have missed her call.
Hello.
You call back.
She says that she has just
arrived at her own home
and will not be seeing you tonight.
Now at that moment,
given the circumstances,
how would you feel?
Now, let's say that in life you
are not chronically lonely...
...but the vast majority of
your days and nights are spent alone.
All the same usually,
because you are very busy.
Busy with finishing
your education...
...so that you can
finish knowing who you are,
so that you can finish
with those years in life
during which you have
no clear answer
to the question...
"What do you do?"
Generally speaking,
with a few notable exceptions,
those that desire your company
do not interest you in a
way that would provoke you
to set aside time
to engage them.
Those that do interest y,
those for whom you would manufacture time,
do not live in your vicinity,
or do not seem so interested
in you as you in them.
And let's say that a womn who
you are presently in love with
has decided to enter an
exclusive romantic relationship
with someone
who provides for her
the stability and maturity
that you cannot.
You marvel at the contradiction
between the intensity
of your love for her
and your in ability to accurately
express this same love.
You wonder aloud
when you will grow diffet
and occasionally
allow yourself to wallow
in this gingerly
debilitating self-doubt.
Now, let's say
that at this very moment,
you were introduced to this
young lady by a mutual friend.
You quickly crafted a ren
to work closely with her.
You collaborated
on designs for T-shirts.
You became good friends,
real friends with inside
jokes and clear recollection
of the intricacies of each other's
body odor even when apart.
You were, from the very moment
you laid your eyes inside her eyes,
intensely attracted to her.
You don't have much self-control and
you acted clearly on this attraction.
Let's say that for a good while,
she entertained your flirtatious advances
with the timbre and grace of someone
with mutual romantic feelings.
Let's say that this went on for
between four to eight week,
and during this time facilitated
a concrete attachment,
grounded in a sincere care for this
young lady's wellbeing and peace of min.
This care and concern,
possibly one-sided,
but at the least entertad
by her words and actions,
went unchecked and
flourished in a direction
clearly departing the platonc
in pursuit of the romantic.
One evening,
maybe not at the height
of the aforementioned
flourishing,
but at some point
when it was steadily growi,
let's say this young lady
friend reveals to you
that she is engaged in an
exclusive romantic relationship
with a young man whom
she has described to you
as both charismatic and caring.
She directly tells you that his charisma
only kees her periodically content,
and he is thus forced to compensate
for this in a variety of ways.
Also, from both her complaints and your
observations of their relationship,
you note that although
you are completely differet
from this young man in both
sensibility and style,
you are likely to meet a similar,
if not identical fate.
When she tells you this, you perform
some simple arithmetic and conclude
that she has been withholdg
this information from you
for between four
and eight weeks.
Let's say that in one of your
moments of acute self-awareness,
you admit to yourself
that you knew all along..
...about her
exclusive romantic relationship.
She was, indeed,
not adept at hiding it.
You, of course, chose to ignore it,
telling yoursf that her and her boyfried
must have an agreement
or understanding
that would allow for relationships
just like the one you have with her.
You told yourself
this was the case
no matter how implausible
that inference was.
Their relationship aside,
you focus on the fact
that you perceive her
to be attracted to you.
She has yet to say as mu,
but let's say that after
the initial hardship
that the news of her exclusive
romantic relationship brought about,
your rapport with this lady friend eases
back into the way that it was before,
and your relationship is now
augmented with quotation marks,
to illustrate the fragility...
...and moral destitution of the situation.
And let's say that this is the current state
of affairs when you experience this day.
Again, not the best of day.
You wake up slightly late,
you arrive to work late,
you to stay later out of guilt,
and subsequently you are late
for a course
you are enrolled in.
When you arrive,
the professor looks at you coldly and says,
"You should have been here"
You do, however,
manage to finish building and transporting
the last few pieces of your bed.
Unfortunately, the bed
does not function propery
because you made it out of pine,
which is a soft wood.
For the proper strength
required for a sturdy bed,
you would have
needed a hard wood,
like maple, oak, or mahogany.
Of course, you rush home.
Kids on the train often tease you
because of the length
of your hair.
You are amused.
You are shamefully dirty because
you have not showered, shaved,
or applied deodorant
in two days.
When you get home, you realize that you
have left your apartment in disarray
because you have
not had time to clean it.
You, of course, were planning to clean
for ths occasion with this lady.
You start to get settled.
You notice that
she has telephoned you.
Of course,
you telephone her back.
She tells you that she has herself
just arrived at her own home
and will not be able
to come and see you toni.
Now, at that moment,
given the aforementioned
circumstances,
how would you feel?
During your romance
wi you were reading a book.
The book tells the story of and
is trying to g
to fall in love with him.
This all takes place on a
reservation in North
What page is it?
90 something... Early 90s.
Okay.
It says...
"I felt him looking at me.
"It's what happens
with boys like him.
"Less said, more felt.
"He was bad at that
look exchange game.
"You always know when they
are looking your way,
"when if you return the look,
they are lookig directly the other way.
"The smooth ones either keep looking
at you, or subtly divert their eye.
"Boys like him turn away
because they can imagineu
"being wherever
they are looking.
"I was dancing, and in so doing,
"paying close attention to the
exciting realities of my flesh.
"Probably more attention than
"where on me
was exposed to the air."
That's right?
Yeah, that's the part.
Okay...
"Here on the res,
it was pretty easy
"for them to set up
a lot for the picture show.
"Going to the picture show,
along with the bingo,
"was maybe the only indulgence we were
afforded in Western entertainment,
"that and the firewater."
Have we ever been
to the movies together?
Uh, I don't remember
Hmm, so...
"The pleasant movies always
gave soft edges to things
"and had colors placed
in locales unfamiliar to.
"Yellow roses, bright brown eyes,
stark white pigeon.
"Being around him
may have been like stepping
"into one of
those displayed worl,
"with fantastil displaced colos
"and no knowledge of what
might or should happen
"Nevertheless,
there, in the pictures,
"he was entirely in contro.
"And another thing,
our interaction amounted to glance.
"Portions of fractios of seconds
"that inspired thoe unfortunately girl,
vivid daydreams
"that we tend to get when someone of
consequee invades our sight line.
"Meeting to growing
to marriage to famil,
"only a moment in real I,
but a lifetime in my min.
"It occurred to me that at some point,
he's going to get me.
"My social status as the
beautiful and educated
"but not intensey Christian one
"affords me certain
permissis in behavior.
"I can stand closer to peop,
"breastfeed my son or anyone
else's child in the open air,
"and stare at people withot seeming
rude or mal-intentioned in any way.
"So after I had danced,
I was left to people-watch.
"It was then that I caught myself
consuming him, strictly visual feasts,
"indulgence in
his details, details.
"Instantaneous swells of guilt
rose around m, and I blinked slow,
"so maybe when I opened
my eyes, he would be gon.
"I did. He wasn't.
"But now I had control
and kept my thoughts
"still, practical,
where they should.
"Because obsessions are futile,
"the dreams they procreae
never come to fruition.
"Why do they stay fiction?
"'Why don't they come
to fruition?' you as?
"Well, realism,
pessimism, and cynicism
"are so much safer
than the alternative.
"You avoid disappointment by not indulging
in your yet to be experienced desires.
"But you do disable
your dres in so doing.
"Their nature is
a cause-and-effect thing.
"You must free them
to work on you,
"and only then will they
oblige yu and come true.
"However, had I ben able to stand it,
consumed him longe,
"I would have come
to the opposite conclusion,
"but they were
just glances."
No. Well,
this is not the...
I thought you was
looking for a Lucille.
But... Someone...
One of May's children.
But, no.
Maybe you have the wrong number.
No, but feel free to call back.
Whoever you're looking for might
be coming here, I don't know.
But who.
But I can't understand who
you say you're looking for.
Uh-huh. Bye-bye.
"Pessimism, practicality,
cynicism, realism, comfort zones,
"I'm actually
against all these things.
"But at least with him,
I still act on them."
No, none of this is like me.
Would you feel vexed?
Slightly irk, confused or confuddled?
Exasperated? Displeased?
Remorseful?
Worn or withered?
Heartbroken? Defeated?
Piled upon? Suckered?
Cheated? Discarded?
Unloved?
Envious? Enraged? Ignore?
Small? Tiny? Microscopic?
Atomic? Quantum? Eternal?
Embarrassed?
Indecisive? Ashamed?
Amused?
Indifferent? Enamored?
Take a moment to ascertain
how you would feel
if these things happened to you.
Why would you feel these ways?
Close your eyes and track the
source of the feelings. Go on.
"Pain," you say?
A subtle pain? Interesting...
Maybe you are feeling the pain
that lies in the void
between expectations
and reality.
Maybe the unnamable emotn
you are feeling that eveg
is, as emotions tend to be,
entirely irrational.
An organism without reason.
Insecurity, for instance,
that parasite
has got the best of you.
This series of events is not the
cause of your momentary feeling.
It cannot be that.
Consider the emotions.
What actually happend
is not important.
What you must take note of
is the self-doubt,
the void between who you actually
are and who you think you ar.
The void between how you actually
feel and how she thinks you fee.
The void between your perception
of your capacity to love
and your actual skill set
in this regard.
Maybe it's your
self-assuredness.
You have an extraordinary
amount of faith
in the fidelity
of your expectations.
Emotions should be expressed.
If the cause of your momentary
feelings are simply irrational emotio,
you need to release them,
let them go.
Write out the events
of the evening in detail.
Review the details,
consider their absurdity,
connect your emotional se
to a series of actions
performed by people
whom you can blame.
Blame yourself, blame he.
Debunk the rationality
of these connections.
Sleep, wake up,
draw a few images
that illustrate how you feel.
Do not finish.
Draw until you feel lighter.
Write more, sleep, wake up.
Entertain the idea of calling her and
telling her you are madly in love with her.
Let the impulse pass,
cower from it.
Most likely the heartache
from the previous night,
a physiological symptom of your feelings,
has yet to fade.
Allow this to amuse you.
It's funny
if you think about it.
The un-wielding grip your emotions
have on your physical wellbei.
What follows is a
brief exegesis in which we explain
the nature of your relationships
with those with whom you are in love
as of the completion
of this film.
You met Najja when she was born.
This was shortly
after your own birth.
Currently,
you do not see her because of the distance.
The aforementioned ambivalene
ruined your relationship.
You were at a time in your life where
you were incapable of being direct.
She was, at the time,
a far more evolved being than you,
and was repelled by both your
inability to reciprocate affection
and speak clearly
about your feelings,
no matter their implications.
You and Joy, although fuy in love,
have not attempd a committed relationship
because of the fact that you do not
reside in the same municipality.
However, you hypothesize that
the cause of your separation
may be more so because you are too
sure of the connection's viabili.
A commitment to a woman with whom
you are so intensely compatible
would leave you with
nothing else to search for,
rendering your distance from
her a product of your addiction
to the unpredictability of your
feast-and-famine romantic existence.
On a more pragmatic leve,
Joy may just not be that into you.
At first you think
you do not see Qrescent
because she is no longer
interested in you romantically.
Your ego pushes that thought from
your head, and you convince yourself
that the nature of her
relationship with her girlfriend
does not allow for you all to
maintain a romantic relationship.
You infer,
that she is in a blissful place, where
some combination of disinterest in you
and enchantment
with her new relationship
inspires her to maintain
an un-traversable
distance between her
and you.
Unfortunately, you have not mastered the
art of sustaining platonic arrangements
in the midst of
extreme romantic attract.
All of the rational you formulate to
explain her current disinterest in yu
is simply a way of
ignoring your many faults.
The armor of stoicism you
wear when you are in love.
Your inability to
commit in simple ways,
commit to visiting or calling,
commit to being honest.
Most of these faults played a large
part in the current state of affairs.
Her new relationship
and its blinding beauty
is an easy scapegoat on which to pin
the blame of your current separation.
You will concede to any rationale
in order to avoid the fact that
somewhere inside you,
you know that she may simply
not love you anymore.
Hey, you leaving?
Me?
I would never leav.
But I am shrinking
Kamo lives
on another hemisphere.
You long for the idea
that she longs for you.
She was your first.
You wonder what number
you are for her.
Kudzai lives in
another hemisphere,
and most likely has
forgotten that you exist.
In your non-existence,
your dreams take hold.
They are very powerful.
So powerful, in fact,
that you often miss things you never had.
You intensely miss your
yearlong courtship with her,
even though
it may have never existed.
Let's talk about reality.
There are elements of this hypothetical
situation that are tangibl.
They can touch you
and can be touched.
Unlike your emotions,
they are inescapable.
These elements are as follows.
Number one. You are
emotionally unavailable,
a symptom of the post-traumatic
stress of a previous relationsh.
How you feel is not a ret
of any series of events,
or an irrational emotion fabricated
in orr to distract yourself...
...from the necessity
of addressg your immaturity.
This circumstance is the cause.
It is unavoidable.
So the night greets you with sleep
you do not deserve but need,
and loneliness you have
imposed upon yourself
but do not deserve.
The reality is that she is gone.
You were not available,
so she left.
Number 2.
The time spent releasing,
writing, making films with her,
painting her with light,
shall we say,
was an insufficient
substitute...
...for spending time
with her in a social setting.
You cannot replace those
circumstances with these.
There is little joy
in this new space,
mostly quiet smiles and
internal musings about what
you should have said or done
during the moments
you are reenacting.
Number three.
In reality, you cannot write about
the situation without recalling
the emotions it provoked.
Unfortunately,
the painful ones reconstitute
themselves the most firmly,
brutally beating all the
endless conversations and
comfortable silences.
The shame and pain do not
erase the beauty entirely,
but the beauty stays clear of whatever
emotions find their way onto the page.
What remains
is what bludgeoned you,
confused you,
shamed you,
and emasculated you.
I'm in an exclusive romantic relationship.
Number four.
In reality,
chance does not often fall on your side.
You do not believe in luck per se, but
inevitably, as you begin to write this story,
your pen will run out of I,
your bed will break,
you will kiss her
with certainty and not dou.
She will turn you away.
You will never disclose your feelings.
She will find someone new.
You will imagine her in your bed at night.
She wl occupy someone else's.
She will find someone el.
In reality,
she will hurt you with her silence,
her quiet enigmatic beauty,
her impenetrable stare,
it's blankness,
it's indecipherability,
it's taste.
You will become
distracted again, walk into her magic.
You will kiss her with I.
She will turn you away.
She will find someone new, who will watch
her, watch you, tell her how you feel.
You will watch her not car.
In defense, you will forget
what happened. You will forget her mind,
her mother's name, her favorite color,
her orisha her laugh, her smell.
You will continue to wri,
ignorant, forgetful.
You will oversimplify
her beauty.
You will revise her
without her edges.
In reality, you love this simple
version of h. She is familiar,
benign. You will speak to the real her again.
Before doing so, you will prepare yourself,
pray the new her seems
the same as the old her.
She tells you she is in an
exclusive romantic relationship
with a young man whom
she likes quite a bit.
You retreat, keep your distance,
she catches your eye as you pray to a
Western god for a closeness with her,
a shared secret, a kiss, a hug,
a child, a family, a fight,
one where you make up
and make another child.
You are floating
involuntarily toward her magic.
You will tire of this dance.
But never so much as to disengage with it,
turn off the music.
Even though you know
that you should.
Even though
it may have never existe.
What are you doing?
One's identity
is most often bound
in the objectifying eye
of the beholder,
even if one finds themselves
beholding themselves.
Thus, disposition and identity are entirely
defined by individual interpretation.
We will call this phenomenon
"the lens."
For this exercise,
you must imagine an entirely
unfiltered and unapologec
view of yourself.
This self-awareness
is necessary
in order for us to formulate
accurate conclusions.
We need accurate facts
about who you are
and the idiosyncrasies tt
define an independent yo.
These facts are as follows...
And note,
like a list of ingredien,
the component that dominats the very
simple formula is listed first.
So first, them.
The sight of a certain type of
woman causes you to stumble.
She is most often brown,
maternal, well-read,
well-traveled,
and capable of holding a note
or playing an instrument.
By the grace of the goddes,
this archetype usually takes
notice of you in a way
that would divert their
attention from your clumsiness.
Often, their attention is
diverted long enough
for you to come across composed
and even intention-less.
These moments are
few and far between,
so capitalization is a mus.
Rule number two, never, ever
let a beautiful person
pass you by.
You are meditative
and masochistic
in a way that facilitates
your creative functional.
You like the poetics
of sad songs more.
You are, shall we say,
more enamored with the bad news.
Third,
your hope and idealism
stem from a far-gone reali,
a childhood that took
place in a community
that provided a wealth of love,
knowledge, and support.
You are supremely privileged
in the sense that you were,
throughout your childhoo,
provided with a pristinely healthy
emotional environment.
Your childhood was
conspicuously void of an,
conflict, and repression.
Thus, the trace amounts
that are present now
have a profound effect
on your emotional dispositio.
Number four.
You assume a persona of
ambivalence, aloofness,
and at times stoicism
in matters of love.
You assume this persona as a
means of attracting women.
It seems to work out better
if they believe you to be calm under
the pressure of heated attraction.
This behavioral mask has been the
direct cause of three discrete
and meaningful happenings and/or
experiences in this hypothetical situatio.
The first of these happenings is
something that did not happen.
You have not been able
to tell her
how you feel about
the relationship directly
until of, course,
the short film How Would You Feel?
Was finished and subsequently
screened for the public.
I feel pretty strange.
No. I mean,
it's weird.
How many people
do you say that to?
It's not really
a normal situation.
It's normal.
I have a bit of a...
I generally avoid the fact
in conversation
and direct interaction.
Well, if you don't know
what to do with it,
you might misuse it
or abuse it or...
Or enjoy it.
They're all dangerous things.
Because enjoying it, you let go
and give yourself in to it,
which is completely an
uncontrollable thing. So...
So...
To not be in control,
for people that like to be in control, is
risky, dangerous.
Not so good always.
It was definitely weird
to see on
a big screen in front
of other people.
Maybe if they didn't
know me, that was cool.
But I happened to see it for
the first time in a screening
with a whole bunch
of my friends,
who happen to know
all about you, Terence,
and some of our situation.
They've heard stories.
I've told them stories.
I take it that the
movie seems to be a critique
or an invitation to
revisit the notion of...
Of having exclusive,
special love.
So, the notion of
being able to love
or being romantically involved
with more than one person.
But, nevertheless,
every single one of them is special.
Mmm. Well, um...
I completely agree.
You know what I mean? But I think...
As explained in the film,
especially that conversation at the end,
it's just, like, really
a rumination on
how relationships
or how each relationship
is so intricately
defined by the
circumstances around it.
At times.
Nothing.
So...
No, I felt uncomfortable because
certain private
interactions were publicized,
and mainly from
one point of view.
If we both got to have
our little commentary,
a little dual-screen
action,
it would have been
a different story.
And it's your film, that's fine.
But it was like my life
put on screen to
your music.
It's apparent to me that
you make movies about your life.
No, everyone doesn't.
You feel bad?
That's true.
The only problem is that
your truth will never
make you feel bad.
Hopefully.
But it's definite.
It's a definite fact that
everyone has their own truths.
And that's the eternal
cause of conflict,
and it's not really negotiable.
Like, everyone sees the world
through their own eyes,
so to see it through
someone else's eyes,
but still have it
be an experience that
you remember is a jarring
experience sometimes
if it doesn't coalesce
into my truth.
Is it?
Is
coming to theaters this fall.
Oh!
Your silence in regards
to your feelings was not absolute.
On two or three occasions you
did write her short-form poetry,
mostly sent via text message,
saying things like...
"I want to
speak to you in a languae
"that only you understan"
And...
"Where on Earth
can you tell the truth
"without negative consequences?
"Esoteric and ultimately
meaningless, I know."
Before making the film,
you did write r one rather loaded letter.
In it, you reveal that
when you leave her prese,
you stare at your feet
while you walk.
She said
she liked it quite a bit,
but has not replied.
Obviously, with things
such as mail,
the gesture is more loaded
than the content.
B, the second effect
of this behavioral mask
and assumed ambivalence is also
something that has not happened.
It is that
you almost never inquire
as to the nature of her
relationships with other men.
This leaves you to infer that she is
as flirtatios and intimate with you
as she is with
her other male friends.
So, you may
or may not be special.
Maybe she saw you stumbl.
The third happening is that one
evening she sent you a message.
It read,
"I think I love you?"
Question mark.
"I know I love you,"
was the response that immediately
jumped inside my mouth.
But instead, because
you wanted to maintain
your facade of
even-keeled ambivalence,
you did not immediately reply.
You waited.
She called you.
You missed the call.
Of course
you telephone her back.
Hey.
She said she had to get on
the subway and couldn't talk.
Nothing more was said about it.
So, you did your best to believe
that it was a lighthearted,
humorous transmission.
What is this acting?
What am I doing,
acting-wise?
Your just enjoying my company.
Oh, so I'm enjoying
your company.
Like when I tell you
bedtime stories and stuff.
You tell me bedtime stories?
Pretend like we're in bed.
Oh. Okay. Tell me one.
This feels like we're at home.
This does feel like we're at
home in Union Square Park.
Really?
It does.
You just got to tell me
something about you.
No, that doesn't feel like home.
You got to tell me a
story about something.
Like the stars?
That's not a star. It's a plane.
That's a star!
How do you go about...
Kissing someone?
You don't head-bump, eh?
You make your lips available.
So, you like...
You go 80% of the way,
and let them go 20%.
Right?
I go 80, you go 20.
Note one,
as of the completion of the short film
How Would You Feel?
had yet to create a film
illustrating her perspective.
You assume she had not
because of her full-timeb
and active social life.
After a few years
of waiting for her film,
you took matters
into your own hands.
The following is a trailer
for the resulting film.
A lot of stuff over here.
What kind of stuff?
A whole lot of stuff.
Stuff like this.
See that?
No Speak softly.
I'm learning how to speak softl.
What are you guys trying to...
Thank you.
This is your first film.
I think, yeah,
it's your first film.
And you are gonna,
you're going to make more after, I think.
What's the name
of this film gonna be?
First, there was the void.
A temporary void that lasted
between two and three weeks.
The void was preceded
by an explosion.
The story begins
either after the void,
or in the middle of
the explosion.
You cannot remember whic.
You fell in love
with her in 2001.
The last time you saw her
you said goodbye,
and left her in her
in a third-floor dorm ro.
You broke into tears when you
arrived at the second floor.
By the time you left the building,
your eyes were swollen shut
and your sinuses
filled with mucus.
While making the 15-hour trip home,
you saw an ext off the highway
with her first, last,
and middle name on it.
Then, there was the explosion.
After or during the explosion,
you fell in love with her
during the summer of 200.
You expressed this by giving her
a flower made of a gum wrapper.
You never chew gum.
Sometime after then
and before now,
she became very close to
you in a romantic way.
The two of you felt a mutual
urge to build a life together.
During the fallout
of the explosion,
you re-united with her
in 2004.
You had kept a picture of her
as a child in your wallet
for several years as a teenager.
When you later fell in love,
you noticed the picture was gone.
The Universe decided that you did
not need the picture anymore.
You moved to South Africa
in 2005, fell in love tw.
Hey, don't make fun of me.
Of course,
given the fallout of the explosion,
she fell out of love.
Maybe not so much
because of the explosion,
but because of,
well, you don't know.
She fell out of love
and in love with her,
the young lady,
enter stage left.
And she was with him.
And she was with him.
And she was with him.
And she was with her.
And she lived on the
other side of the world.
And she lived on the
other side of the world.
And you were with this movie.
So, in March of 2006,
you made the movie.
A shorter version of it that
did not allude to the fact...
...that it was true.
You showed volumes one through three,
to be exact.
You did not tell her that the
film was about you and her
when you all were making it,
but you thought she may
have already known.
When you screened the film
for about 100 people,
they did not know that
the film was a retelling
of the story of you and her.
You hoped only she would notice.
That the film would talk to her.
And only her.
The following letter was written t
by Terenc in the summer of 2006.
It was written and sent a few
weeks after the screening of
How Would You Feel?
The day afte told Terence
she was ending her exclue
romantic relationship.
June 14th,
2006, 5:27 p.m.
Remember how you told me
that you met this new guy
that you are dating
in Union Square?
Well, he must be
very lucky, 'cause
I'm in Union Square right now,
and I'm here pretty often,
and I never see
anybody like you.
I guess I spoke too soon,
'cause she looks amazing,
but, alas, there are
"too many in the wolf pack" as they say.
Anyhow, on to the chase.
I am writing this letter
to tell you that I have e
to be in love with you.
And before, you know,
you were in a relationshp and everything,
me being in love with you was
as much a source of angst
as it was pleasure.
But now I feel...
I feel...
I feel fortunate,
the word is "fortunate"
I feel fortunate
that I love you.
And it's a relief because
I don't have to worry abt
things that
I used to worry about.
Things like sucking
on your lip too long,
or being at your houe
certain times of nig.
I have a new freedom, I guess.
It's a new
and welcoming freedom.
And freedom even at
its least intense is stil
powerfully sensual and exciting.
Do you remember that day we were at
the lounge by your old apartment?
And we were talking
about high school,
and high school intimacy,
and whatnot?
And how there are these little
things that our age has
rendered no longer excit.
You remember that?
Anyway, I was thinking ty
about the rare occasions
when I was lucky enough to
kiss a girl in high school,
and how back then you knw
that kissing was as intimate as
it was gonna get that night.
So kissing was more epic,
it was narrative.
Like at the beginning,
you're all scared,
so you peck around the rs of each
other's lips and breathe all heavy,
and it's...
It was always really funny to
me that people have a taste.
It's actually a kind of scary thought
because if you taste a certain w,
then that means there has o be some
sort of predator out there craving you.
I digress.
But the tasting is le
the story ending 'cae
their taste lingers
on your tongue. Anyway,
all that to say,
I am going to kiss you like that.
You know how at the end of
letters people always write,
"Love," then comma,
then their name?
I don't like that
'cause when you use the phrase, "Love
"comma Terence,"
who would really know what kind
of love I'd be talking about?
Anyway, I'm gonna replace
the standard "Love" salutation with my
well-thought-out definition of love,
just to make
my message more exact.
An art form slightly removed
from its intended context,
Terence.
Terence, how is it that you
have come to like so much this girl
that sits atop your bed
at night,
just sipping beer, fighting the
fatigue of really hot summer nights
as her complaints trail y
into soft sighs?
As an astute observer of life,
I always find it a slighy
odd yet intriguing idea
that a man's heart
can be warmed by my presen.
Self-hate or pure inquisition?
I may never be sure of the
source of my disbelief.
Actually, I find
I hold my disbelief so strong that
sometimes I subconsciously reject
the love beams
that are cast at me.
It's like an invisible shield.
If I can't imagine why,
then just maybe
it doesn't really exist.
And if it doesn't exist then,
well, I don't really have
to do anything about it.
If friendship were measured in
how much a person understands
and accepts another,
then would that make you my best friend?
I know, I know, it's the word that
every guy hates and runs from.
"Friend." Ooh! What is the state
of a world that runs from friends?
But
I think I might have
lost you in my world.
Follow the bright lights
down the tunnel,
up to the seventh floor.
Now, there.
Terence.
I know you eagerly await
my response,
so here it is.
Because I love the electrodes
that dance around your brain
and your relentless friendship
and understanding hands,
I will tell you.
As I come to know and
love myself, so will I you.
I am that I am, and one day,
I may love you, too.
Emotional memory is your memory
of how you felt as opposed
to what happened.
You have been making this movie
on and off for three years.
You no longer live in the same city,
or know the same people.
You value different
things in life now.
You know that she has
forgotten how she felt about you.
The memory of the touch of your
lips has faded from her mind.
You are to her a regrettable sin,
seldom enjoyed,
pushed away on account of the guilt.
Or, more than likely,
your relationship with her is a
memory so faint in the first plac,
it was not valuable enough to keep,
to love as you have done.
You hope it is the latter,
if anything at all.
You have been making this
movie for so long now
that you struggle to
remember what happened.
You are also starting to
forget how you felt.
Luckily, you are reminded
by the editing process,
which forces you to
look at her moving
in front of you, living often.
You think that she has not
forgotten how she felt,
but in her maturity has dismissed
her feelings toward you as juvenile.
The memory of the touch of your
lips may have faded from her mind.
You are to her a past attraction,
once enjoyed,
pushed away on account of a new,
more necessary engagement.
You have been making
the movie for so long now
that you struggle to
remember what happened.
You are also starting to
forget how you felt.
Luckily, you are reminded
by the editing process,
which forces you
to look at her
moving in front of you.
Living often.
You don't speak to her,
so you don't know what she has forgotten.
The memory of the touch
of your lips was
probably not her fondest memory
of you in the first place.
She believes you are a slae
to the wills and whims
of the mysterious
and beautiful.
And maybe you are.
You have been making
the movie for so long now
that you struggle to
remember what happened.
You are also starting to
forget how you felt.
Luckily, you are reminded
by the editing process,
which forces you to look at
her moving in front of you.
Living often.
You know that she has not
forgotten how she felt.
She has long ago forced the memory of
the touch of your lips from her mind.
You are to her a healed cancer,
rightfully excised
before he metastasized.
Turn off the music.
Even though you know
that you should.
Let's recap what
you learned in volume th.
Reality, part one.
First, that you are
emotionally unavailable.
Second, you are lonely, and making
the film with hr did not repair that.
Third, you cannot write
about the situation
without focusing
on the worst of it.
Fourth, you are
quite an unlucky chap.
The following adds to this list
and further explores
the nature of reality.
Is it an organism that
grows independent of you?
Is it ever-present?
Is it possible that
something that
transpires in your real life can have
less of an effect on your emotions
than something you imagine?
What is the code of reality's
inescapable and adaptable influence
on this momentary feelin?
We left off at number
four, so number five.
In reality,
you have never been punctual in your life.
You come from a long line of
ancestors who operate time
based on celestial happenings still
undiscovered by the Western world.
You are thus out of sync
as opposed to late.
It is both unfair
and culturally insensitive
for you to expect yoursef to
transform into a model of punctuality
within any
finite period of time.
Number six.
Your ineptitude with bed
fabrication and construction
had more to do with your lack
of time than lack of ability.
Like cooking,
with carpentry, patience
is the all-important
coefficient in the equat.
Seventh and very importa,
again dealing with reali,
somehow along the way
you became gravely, deep,
and intensely in love wit
Thus, no film
nor explanation, nor poe,
nor kiss,
nor absence, nor presence,
nor reciprocation could erase
how you felt that moment.
It was a symptom of your love.
It is a symptom of your love.
It will be a symptom
of your love.
Today, the days before,
or the next day.
Speaking of the next day, when you
arrive home and start to get settled,
you again see that
she has telephoned you.
Of course, you
telephone her back.
You arrange to meet
to talk about the film.
You want to interview he,
get her perspective, include it.
You arrive at her home and sit
close to her in a beanbag chair.
You ask her questions,
she answers.
In the answers
she tells you that
she was significantly enamored
with you for a good while
after meeting you.
But as your relationshp
subtly intensified,
she choose the practicality
and constraint of her and him
over the irrationality and
freedom of her and you.
She also tells you that she has
one day previous to this day
chosen to dissolve her exclusive
romantic relationship.
You smile inside.
She continues.
She tells you that
she is dating someone new.
After a few moments,
the possibility of this information
taking the form of a joke
fades.
Your inner smile fades with it.
Of course, after you talk,
rewrite some of the script, laugh, hope,
the time comes for you to sleep,
somewhere.
As you would expect for
a woman who is taken,
she will not be able
to house you that evenin.
You walk to the door.
She lightly kisses you
on your lips,
with a look
of doubt and mischief
opaque in her pupils.
Now, at that moment,
given the aforementioned
circumstances...
...how would you feel?
Hurt, disappointed, confused.
All the bad adjectives that you can
attach to a romantic relationshi.
And how do you salvage that?
How do you...
I'm dating someone that
might be watching
this right now,
and I don't want to
say anything about it.
I got into a...
At the end of the day you
listen to you heart. Right?
My heart
is
excited
at the thought of him, and also
very tenuous.
Because when you walk into
a situation knowing that
you're about to be hurt
at some point...
It's a weird thing.
Like, why would you logically do that?
It doesn't make any sense.
But I'm learning that
some things just can't
and don't make sense. Ever.
I do think that I could
get hurt with you.
Because I think you're...
Hmm...
I think you're an artist.
I think...
What?
You have a wandering heart.
You don't get into a
relationship or not based on
the probability of a good
or bad thing happening.
There is this emotional impulse that I
can't explain or understand or control.
I hate it for that reason,
but I have to also follow it because...
How often does that happen?
At times.
Because I was normally
in a position that
I would be a bad person
if I obeyed it.
I get it sometimes,
but I think I've been...
I think I've kind of
conditioned myself.
After so long of being in a
situation where it wasn't
a viable possibility,
I started to see you in a different way.
In layman's terms,
I got friend zoned.
Hello?
Hey.
Hey.
Where you at?
I'm at home.
Am I supposed to be
somewhere else?
I don't know.
Oh, my God!
I'm so sorry, I was supposed
to come over today, wasn't I?
Or actually,
maybe it was tomorrow?
No, it was today.
Sorry.
I just got home from work.
My mind's just...
Anyway, how was your day?
It was okay.
It was really frustrating.
But what are you going to do?
I'm going to quit though.
When are you going to quit?
I know.
I can't quite tomorrow.
I'm gonna quit,
but I just need some time to work it out.
So, I'll see you another time?
Yeah, I'm sorry, but we can definitely
reschedule for really soon.
I'll just check my schedule and let
you know how soon I can get together.
Is that okay?
Okay.
Okay, bye.
Bye-bye.