Blame it on the Rain
As an update to my last post, this has apparently been the weekend for gaining sympathy for criminals of various ilk...I (finally) watched Capote yesterday, and I read Joyce Carol Oate's Zombie today, an incredibly disturbing book written in the voice of a serial rapist/killer. Nothing like a dark, depressing, rainy weekend for cuddling up with some books & movies about psychopaths.
Capote, by the by, was brilliant, in case you're the other person on the face of the planet who hasn't yet seen it. I was rooting for Heath Ledger at the Oscars, but in the first 30 seconds of watching this movie, it became clear to me that Phillip Seymour Hoffman's win was well-deserved. I also thought the man playing Perry Smith - the death-row murderer Capote befriends and betrays for his novel In Cold Blood - gave an exceptional performance.
Zombie was less brilliant, but about ten times more disturbing. I'm not quite sure why I picked this weekend to read it...it's been sitting on my shelf for about two years now (picked it up with a dozen or two other books at a garage sale or library sale or something sometime back), and I didn't even know what it was about till I opened it up last night. When it rains, it pours, I suppose. (In keeping with this weekend's theme of rain, rain & more rain.) The book traces the thoughts of a serial killer over a several month period, setting you voyeuristically on his shoulder as he abducts, rapes, attempts to lobotomize, and eventually kills a series of young black men. The man's name is Quentin, and the novel is written in a style incredibly reminiscent of the Benjy section of The Sound & The Fury....I'm trying to decide if that is purposeful or coincidental. (And this highlights the main difference that not being in college makes in my life...in college I would have researched that idea and written a paper on it. Now, I think about it absentmindedly for a moment and put up a line on my blog about it.) Anyway, I'm not going to go so far as to say I enjoyed the book, or that I thought the writing was all that great, but it was definitely food for thought.
On an entirely unrelated note, I wanted to recount an odd encounter I had at a party this Friday. I met an incredibly attractive man that, in a rare occurrence, became even more attractive the more he talked. Very smart, very witty, very beautiful. (Also very taken, which didn't concern me a whole lot, as I'm currently considering myself sort-of-kind-of-not-really-on-the-market at the moment anyway - yes that is a category! In other words, this felt like a very harmless, non-action-provoking flirtation.)
And then he stood up and walked across the room. Turns out, the man is bowlegged...or has a leg or hip injury...or something. Whatever it is, he had a very unusual gait, one that would not normally be considered sexy.
But oh, was it ever. Every time the man walked across the room that night, ostensibly awkward but with no sign of it on his face, I sort of wanted to jump him. Which came, frankly, as a bit of a surprise to me every time.
I think it's a little problematic that I was surprised by my own reaction to this situation. I don't think it's a good thing to automatically assume a disability is a turn-off, to assume that someone with a disability will have a harder time with the ladies (or the gents) because of it....but let's face it, clearly that is exactly the assumption I had. A man with a limp will not equal attractive, right? We pity people with "abnormal" physical features, we don't want to sleep with them. So go this guy, for challenging my assumptions without even knowing he was doing it. Also, go this guy for being hot. Well done.
Just re-read this and realized I have absolutely no connecting theme whatsoever. (I swear I am not trying to draw a connection between serial killers and the disabled, by the way.)
Whatever. Connecting themes are over-rated. Blame it on the rain.
Capote, by the by, was brilliant, in case you're the other person on the face of the planet who hasn't yet seen it. I was rooting for Heath Ledger at the Oscars, but in the first 30 seconds of watching this movie, it became clear to me that Phillip Seymour Hoffman's win was well-deserved. I also thought the man playing Perry Smith - the death-row murderer Capote befriends and betrays for his novel In Cold Blood - gave an exceptional performance.
Zombie was less brilliant, but about ten times more disturbing. I'm not quite sure why I picked this weekend to read it...it's been sitting on my shelf for about two years now (picked it up with a dozen or two other books at a garage sale or library sale or something sometime back), and I didn't even know what it was about till I opened it up last night. When it rains, it pours, I suppose. (In keeping with this weekend's theme of rain, rain & more rain.) The book traces the thoughts of a serial killer over a several month period, setting you voyeuristically on his shoulder as he abducts, rapes, attempts to lobotomize, and eventually kills a series of young black men. The man's name is Quentin, and the novel is written in a style incredibly reminiscent of the Benjy section of The Sound & The Fury....I'm trying to decide if that is purposeful or coincidental. (And this highlights the main difference that not being in college makes in my life...in college I would have researched that idea and written a paper on it. Now, I think about it absentmindedly for a moment and put up a line on my blog about it.) Anyway, I'm not going to go so far as to say I enjoyed the book, or that I thought the writing was all that great, but it was definitely food for thought.
On an entirely unrelated note, I wanted to recount an odd encounter I had at a party this Friday. I met an incredibly attractive man that, in a rare occurrence, became even more attractive the more he talked. Very smart, very witty, very beautiful. (Also very taken, which didn't concern me a whole lot, as I'm currently considering myself sort-of-kind-of-not-really-on-the-market at the moment anyway - yes that is a category! In other words, this felt like a very harmless, non-action-provoking flirtation.)
And then he stood up and walked across the room. Turns out, the man is bowlegged...or has a leg or hip injury...or something. Whatever it is, he had a very unusual gait, one that would not normally be considered sexy.
But oh, was it ever. Every time the man walked across the room that night, ostensibly awkward but with no sign of it on his face, I sort of wanted to jump him. Which came, frankly, as a bit of a surprise to me every time.
I think it's a little problematic that I was surprised by my own reaction to this situation. I don't think it's a good thing to automatically assume a disability is a turn-off, to assume that someone with a disability will have a harder time with the ladies (or the gents) because of it....but let's face it, clearly that is exactly the assumption I had. A man with a limp will not equal attractive, right? We pity people with "abnormal" physical features, we don't want to sleep with them. So go this guy, for challenging my assumptions without even knowing he was doing it. Also, go this guy for being hot. Well done.
Just re-read this and realized I have absolutely no connecting theme whatsoever. (I swear I am not trying to draw a connection between serial killers and the disabled, by the way.)
Whatever. Connecting themes are over-rated. Blame it on the rain.
posted by Melissa at 6:08 PM
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