Category: Fashion

After a busy couple of weeks of packing and moving and unpacking and settling and school readying, I’ve succumbed to a bug and am feeling very ‘harumphhh’. I would like to ring the little bell from the ManCold Video, and have someone soothingly whisper, ‘Poor Little Bunny’, but instead I’ve been consoling myself with some reading and movie viewing.

Georgia’s acting coach recommended the movie ‘Phantom Thread’ to me. Daniel Day Lewis once again plays an almost maniacal creative genius, akin to his role in Nine. I loved his portrayal of the Italian filmmaker in that movie and his work as a British fashion designer in Phantom Thread is even more impressive.

I hesitate to give away the plot but let me say that while the story weaves a thread of fashion, it is more about relationships: with oneself, and with others. The portrayal of his relationship with a local waitress who becomes his muse, lover and wife is strikingly powerful. I had not anticipated how their connection would unfold. It was extremely curious to me to watch the dynamics of power shift between the two individuals, one the fastidious creative master and the other his initially timid muse.

I love when movies and books leave me processing for days and this one has done just that. The power differential between any two individuals who make a couple is always interesting to witness, and when a partnership lasts for years, it inevitably endures all sorts of challenges which change the dynamic. One of the most common changes/challenges for a couple is the creation of a family, and the acquisition of a home and lifestyle, but there are many other strains a couple can experience. Some face the acquisition of fame, or fortune, (or the loss of either/both), others experience one (or both) of the individuals experiencing sickness or other hardship.

The winding journey of the relationship between the famous designer and his seemingly quiet wife was vividly portrayed. My favorite scene was also one which made me cringe to see myself in it.

The designer, who we have seen enjoying the same daily ritual of sketching and planning his day while quietly eating breakfast, is thrown completely off when his lover spends the night and joins him at the table the following morning. His lover noisily slices butter and scratches her knife on her toast. She holds the tea pot up very high and then tips it dramatically so the water has a long distance to land in the tea cup below. She even manages to make stirring the milk in her tea a noisy and off-putting affair.

As this unfolds, the camera pans back and forth between the noise she is making of eating breakfast as many ‘normal’ people would do and the face of the designer as he gets increasingly annoyed with the disruption of his serene routine. His long curls come out of place from his carefully styled hair and fall maddeningly into his eyes with every obtrusive disturbance she creates. He pushes his curls aside and vainly tries to block out his lover’s breakfast noises. Not being able to withstand it any longer he finally barks at her to please stop having so much ‘movement’ and “distraction’ at breakfast.

I laughed and also blanched because I could relate so much to his frustrations. I spend an embarrassing amount of energy trying not to be put-off by the actions of others. If someone is tapping his pen, or jiggling her foot it becomes an unescapable ticker-tape of annoyance in my head. If someone is coughing or clearing their throat, or worse yet, smoking and sending plumes in my direction I am completely put off. The more I try to block it out, the more obvious it becomes. I find myself looking at others to see if they have picked up on what seems to be an obvious and obtrusive disruption to my thought process, and lament to see that I am often alone in my heightened irritation.

The designer is portrayed as the stereotypical ‘mad’ creative genius who is a tyrant, getting angry at his wife for having brought him tea when he was working. She says something along the lines of ‘Ok, Ok, I will take it away. No harm done.’ but he snaps in reply that the harm of her interruption will remain long after she (and her tea) have left.

The designer is clearly a self-absorbed narcissistic pain in the ass, and yet she loves him and comes to understand his eccentricities. She handles and ultimately tames him in a way I had not predicted. The movie reminded me, albeit in a perplexing disturbing way, that what we often see occurring between a couple is really just the tip of the ice burg.

Conversely, I am enjoying a warm fuzzy feeling since having read Mitch Albom’s “The Next Person You Meet in Heaven”. It is the sequel to “The Five People You Meet in Heaven” which I somehow missed. But I loved “Tuesdays With Morrie” and pulled this off my shelf as I lay tucked under covers this weekend.

The story opens with a young bride, Annie, mere hours before her death. I was reminded of Harrison telling me I needed a strong hook to pull my readers in because Albom’s hook was strong and had me from the first sentence.

Annie had a difficult childhood and feels she is the constant ‘maker of mistakes’. Eddie was a ‘nobody who did nothing of any importance’ and this is a tale of how their lives intersect to create meaning for them both. It is magical fable of how everything that happens in life to us as humans is meant to be, and is all just part of our evolutionary process.

There were some beautiful quotes in this speedy quick read that I would highly recommend. For those of us who are animal lovers, Albom’s portrayal of Annie’s childhood dog is truly heart warming and his description of this dog’s view of heaven made me teary. He also has a keen observation on loneliness:

“We fear loneliness, but loneliness itself does not exist. It has no form. It is merely a shadow that falls over us. And just as shadows die when light changes, that sad feeling can depart once we see the truth.”

(And the subtext is that loneliness cannot exist for the evolved in the presence of an animal. I could not agree more and was reminded of how much I enjoyed Matt Haig’s book ‘The Humans’, and his depiction of an alien learning to love a dog.)

Albom also handles deftly, the parent-child relationship. He observes:

“Children begin by needing their parents. Over time, they reject them. Eventually, they become them.”

He also ruminates,

“On earth, we get the what of things. The why takes a little longer.”

I find this to be a beautiful concept: that our so called ignorance as humans is all part of our evolution. We aren’t supposed to know all the answers as earthly creatures. I love the idea that it takes the transition into becoming a heavenly body in order to understand what all the earthly time meant. It also helps us tolerate the end of life on earth for people which he observes is often very difficult for most of us.

Albom closes the story with a very meaningful take-away. Annie thinks she is on a quest to make peace with the people in her earthly past and Eddie, who has already transitioned to the heavenly realm gently reveals,

“(Your mother) was right about making peace,” he said. “But she didn’t mean with me. You only have peace when you make it with yourself. I had to learn that the hard way.”

“The truth is, I spent years thinking I was doing nothing ’cause I was a nobody. You spent years doing lots of things and thinking they were all mistakes.”

He exhaled. “We were both wrong.”

“There’s no such thing as a nobody. And there are no mistakes.”

This is a quick and magical little read for all of us earthly creatures trying to learn the messages of the heavens.