The End Of The Weekend
By Anthony Hecht
A dying firelight slides along the quirt
Of the cast-iron cowboy where he leans
Against my father's books. The lariat
Whirls into darkness. My girl, in skin-tight jeans,
Fingers a page of Captain Marryat,
Inviting insolent shadows to her shirt.
We rise together to the second floor.
Outside, across the lake, an endless wind
Whips at the headstones of the dead and wails
In the trees for all who have and have not sinned.
She rubs against me and I feel her nails.
Although we are alone, I lock the door.
The eventual shapes of all our formless prayers,
This dark, the cabin of loose imaginings,
Wind, lake, lip, everything awaits
The slow loosening of her underthings.
And then the noise. Something is dropped. It grates
Against the attic beams.
I climb the stairs,
Armed with a belt.
A long magnesium strip
Of moonlight from the dormer cuts a path
Among the shattered skeletons of mice.
A great black presence beats its wings in wrath
Above the boneyard burn its golden eyes.
Some small gray fur is pulsing in its grip.
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My horoscope was wrong: I did not once get caught in traffic today, not even driving older son to Hebrew school which usually takes far, far longer than it should. I did have to navigate two terrible parking lots where people park as if it's perfectly natural for them to sprawl their SUVs across two spots so that the rest of us have to circle around looking for someplace to park, but that hardly counts as traffic. I had a lovely lunch outdoors in this gorgeous spring weather with two of the usual suspects, did some running around for stuff my kids needed, wrote two articles -- oh wait, I know what kind of traffic I got caught in! It took me so long to download an interview I was supposed to write up that by the time it had finished, I had forgotten all about it, so it will not get done till tomorrow. I suck, heh.
Veronica Mars was the highlight of my evening, and while I enjoyed many aspects of the episode, I found the revelation and the way in which it was shown rather anticlimactic. I had no strong opinion on whom Lily's murderer should be, though I felt very strongly about who it should NOT be, and it wasn't him so I appreciated that.
Given the number of jittery distorted flashbacks we saw last week, I was unhappy to get so many again, and while I guess maybe that was important since this is likely the last time we'll see Lily, I find it a little bit troubling that we saw the murder scene through Veronica's fantasy-vision. It fits with what we've been shown that's ostensibly objective, like Duncan's parents' perspective on him and why they believed him to be the killer (though it reminded me unfortunately of that recent Smallville with the dad who had his son's memories altered to after his brother was killed accidentally). But it also fits in with a lot of Veronica's own experiences -- Lily spotting the camera was very eerily reminiscent of Veronica in the same position, and I've wondered whether she was overidentifying when it came to things with Logan, too. The minute she took down tapes it was obvious where everything was going, and I almost feel like it would have been better had they not shown the murder but just had her explain, in words, to Duncan what she thought happened; I'd rather have seen his face as he heard it than watched Aaron murder Lily, which was disturbing in the way voyeuristic television and horror movie murders of nubile girls are always disturbing.
That said, I am very happy that 1) Veronica's dad is her biological father, since that obviously mattered a lot to both of them (I love that she signed away her rights to the Kane family fortune before he told her that she had no legal claim on it anyway); 2) Duncan is therefore not Veronica's brother (and not the murderer, yay) and she can make decisions about whether they have a future together based only on their feelings rather than biological destiny; 3) Logan apparently lied about the note, which I suppose it's possible that Weevil swiped or something but then why wouldn't he have found the tapes too, so even if Logan is not a murderer he's still a liar and covering his own ass (and yeah, it totally sucks about both his parents but I just cannot warm up to him); 4) Veronica told her mom how it is, even if it cost her and her father $50,000. Not so happy Dad had to rescue her in the whole damsel in distress routine after a season of her rescuing herself (she should have stayed on the phone the whole way home, we were all yelling at the TV for her to do just that). Hoping it's Wallis who showed up at her door, as I assume Duncan was coping with his family stuff, Logan was either coping with his own family or recovering from getting the shit kicked out of him by Weevil, and in neither case would I expect her to smile and say "Glad it's you" rather than "Oh my god, do you need help?" And that, I suppose, is that, till next season.
Okay, I've been tagged before and pointedly avoided this meme, but
1. Total number of films I own on DVD/video: Thousands. For ten years we taped everything we thought we might ever want to watch again at EP, so three movies a tape, over 400 tapes, and that's not counting the DVDs. We suck. *g*
2. The last film I bought: If it's me personally, An Awfully Big Adventure. If it's things
3. The last film I watched: In the theater, Kingdom of Heaven. On DVD, National Treasure.
4. Five films that I watch a lot or that mean a lot to me:
1. Monty Python's Life of Brian
2. Kiss of the Spider Woman
3. Tempest (dir. Paul Mazursky)
4. Crimes and Misdemeanors
5. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
5. Pick on five people. Tag 5 people and have them put this in their journal: Oh hell, I can't even remember whose journal I've seen this in and/or ducked it if they tagged me! Let me do it this way: if you haven't been tagged and you feel like sharing said information, consider yourself tagged. *g*
The Cormorant, Portchester. This was one of my favorite pub signs.
And look what
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