3.03.2008

Movie & a miracle

So today was Casimir Pulaski Day. Big day in the Land of Lincoln. Sufjan Stevens even has a song about it. And that means Kates gets the day off …

Tonight, I arrived home from work and found her sitting on the couch. Playing the dice version of Phase 10. By herself.

“I’m bored,” she says while I laugh at her.

Sure, she said she was bored. But it must have been some game because then I couldn’t get her to stop. She played two full games …

As I continued teasing her, I brought up the infamous imaginary friend from her childhood -- Jeremy. “Is Jeremy playing too?” I asked, insisting that she couldn’t possibly be playing a good game without somebody else.

“I haven’t talked to him in years,” Kates says.

* * *
I experienced today what I’m calling a miracle.

A couple months ago I lost something very important and valuable to me and my daily work. It’s a tool that almost never leaves my side, including when I sleep. And when I lost it, I was so crushed and so depressed that after a couple days of racking my brain about it, Kates screamed out loud, “I want my husband back!”

Suddenly it was just … gone. I questioned my cohorts about it and none of them could remember me having it that day -- they knew how engrained it is in my routine. I retraced my steps two, three times on consecutive days. And I nearly tore the house apart searching for it. But no matter how hard I tried to think it through, there seemed to be a five-hour block completely erased from my memory of that day …

I kept saying if the right person found it, they would have no problem finding me. But if it fell into the wrong hands, there was no telling how much damage could be done. I prayed mightily that it would turn up … But nothing ever came of it, and I had nearly forgotten about it.

Until last night when I received an e-mail from a stranger indicating he’d found it. I could hardly believe what I was reading … And today, I had it placed back in my hands, completely intact.

Turns out the stranger found it in one of the three places I believed it to be -- a place I’d returned to search multiple times. A place that, like every other sidewalk, curb and road, had been buried in winter’s elements. And when he did find it, he did exactly what I had hoped the right person would do to track me down.

A miracle.

* * *

Kates and I finally got around to seeing “Once” tonight.

I say finally because it had been on our list before its two stars even appeared on the list of Oscar nominees. But it took a work assignment for me to purchase the soundtrack this morning and push the play button on the DVD tonight …

It is indeed a wonderful film -- especially if you’re a fan of the singer/songwriter types -- whose beauty is in its simplicity. It’s a simple story about two starving musicians who meet by chance and their admiration for each other stirs their music. So pure and simple it only takes 86 minutes to tell.


The characters are real, charming, easy attachments. The music is passionate. And there are some great camera shots, particularly the colorful traffic passing and reflecting off the windows against the Girl as she sits with the Guy in a diner.

Seeing the movie makes me even happier about their Oscar win.

And c’mon, how cool is it that their names are never spoken throughout the entire movie?!

Highly recommended.

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