Swelling Rock Music
I’m having a difficult day today. I like to think I got my mid-life crisis out of the way in my early twenties, but apparently that was just a delusion brought on by all the whiskey. I’m sinking into a realization that should not, and does not, come as a surprise to me, however it is having a more profound effect on me than it ever has.
It’s Jeff Bridges day on the cable system, apparently. In the last 18 hours I have watched “The Fabulous Baker Boys” and “Stick It,” the second being a little-known and little-watched almost-straight-to-DVD cheese festival about so-called elite gymnasts. I started sinking with the first film, and I am closing in on the bottom with the second.
If there is one film like “Stick It,” there are at least a hundred a year. Rebel upstart with uncontrolled talent meeting the washed-up guru who tames the wild horse and helps them fight their way back to glory. The climactic scene where it’s all on the line, pressure mounting, the sneering arch-enemy looking on, the suspicious crowd with the lone brave supporter, and then the rock music cranks up and the rebel cranks it up to eleven, scoring the goal, completing the pass, nailing the three-pointer, earning the perfect score, striking out the last batter, or achieving whatever achievement that will cause the crowd to explode, the guru to cry and hug people, and even the sneering arch-enemy to realize that the rebel is better than they are. The rebel looks into the crowd to find the lone supporter who never lost faith, and falls in love with them all over again.
You’ve seen that movie, or one like it, several times before. You’ve experienced that swell of emotion as the rebel wins the gold, or gets the girl, or lands the job. You’ve walked out of theatres (or away from your DVD player) feeling like you should go and join that rock band or submit that manuscript for publication or try out for the Olympic winter biathlon team. You’re charged up. You’re on top of the world. You feel like you can do anything.
* * * * *
In “The Fabulous Baker Boys,” when Jeff Bridges and his real-life brother Beau are having the argument about their relationship and the act and everything, Beau Bridges says something along the lines of the following. “I get to make sure the numbers balance out at the end of the month so that everybody ELSE can go on LIVING THEIR LIVES!!!”
That’s me. To-do lists. Rush-hour traffic. High school band concerts. Parent/teacher conferences. Car insurance. Snow shoveling. Picking up milk, baking soda, and Clearasil on my way home. Scooping the cat box. Scraping the callous off my aching feet. Trying to avoid getting overdrawn at the bank.
No crowds. No swelling rock music. No victory in the face of incalculable odds. I never had that moment. Few of us will ever have that moment. In fact, that moment is really a concoction of Hollywood writers appealing to the little space inside of us that believes we can do those things. Nobody has those moments in real life. But this fact is not reassuring, not comforting, not calming.
I’m thirty-nine years old, the potential for any of those moments to occur (even though they don’t really occur in Euclidian space, but that’s immaterial) is long past. I’m not a rock star, not an athlete, not a genius, not a millionaire, an actor, a pilot, a writer, nor an entrepreneur. There will be no crowds, nor any swelling rock music, at least not outside of my head. And that’s the problem.
Apparently I continue to cling to the illusion that there might be. Someday when overweight, middle-aged fathers of three can join rock bands or become star athletes, in my imagination, there will be crowds and swelling rock music. This sounds funny even as I write this, but it is very literally eating away at my soul. I find myself sinking deeper into the throes of depression, with this issue as the cannonball strapped to my ankle.
You’re supposed to come away from these movies feeling like you can do anything. I feel like I’ve never done anything, and I never will.
* * * * *
Most of the time I can end these missives with some reasonable assessment of the situation, some way to put it into perspective and move on with my life. Not this time. My financial life is in near-collapse, my job is about to end, my health is deteriorating, and there is no end in sight for any of it. Nothing makes me genuinely happy these days, nothing gives me hope, nothing is reassuring.
On top of it, I have movies with Jeff Bridges in them making me feel like an even bigger failure.
