Compost Studios

Last night the E-Man and I watched “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants.” For those not familiar with the movie, it traces the lives of four 17-year-old girlfriends during one unforgettable summer. It’s a classic coming-of-age story, well done and well acted. It’s also a three-hankie tearjerker, something I wasn’t expecting.

I cried and cried and cried.

I normally avoid movies like this because the tears don’t stop for me when the credits roll and the lights come on. No, sad movies, even those that end on a positive note, unearth every grief and loss I’ve ever suffered and all the fears I won’t consciously entertain. Such movies can leave me totally undone.

I remember seeing “Beaches” in college and coming unglued. I cried for hours afterwards because it reminded me of my sister, who died young. The melodrama of the movie evoked so many emotions in me, and I couldn’t sleep at all afterwards and was too broken up the next morning to attend classes. When I watched a movie on C.S. Lewis’s late marriage and his wife’s early death (“Shadowlands”), my funk and my tears lasted all weekend. I felt hopeless and angry and torn to shreds. It was brutal.

I’ve never seen “Saving Private Ryan” or “Braveheart.” I walked out of “Gladiator” during the first five minutes, and generally find war movies of any sort insufferable, no matter how well done they are.

I was not one of those people who queued up to see the “Passion of Christ.” I have a hard enough time listening to the church readings on Good Friday. I don’t need a more graphic representation of the crucifixion to make it real for me.

My 10-year-old son, A, is much the same way. For years the only movies he would watch starred Winnie-the-Pooh, and even some of those were too scary for him when he was younger. He hated most Disney movies (“They’re all so mean, Mom”) and was particularly upset by any storylines that put animals in danger or showed them getting hurt (Forget “The Incredible Journey” or "Ice Age").

Unlike most boys his age, he’s never seen action thrillers like “The Incredibles,” “Harry Potter,” “Spiderman,” and the Star Wars Trilogy. He prefers watching movies at home rather than going to the theater because the big screen at the cinema magnifies the story and the emotions for him and it can be too much. Like me, the experience for him doesn’t end when the TV is shut off, and in his case, even a mildly scary film will trigger insomnia for days.

Last night after “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” put me through the emotional wringer, I desperately wanted to hold my kids. I wandered into my daughter’s bedroom and kissed the sleeping E-Grrrl twice, and then grabbed a fistful of Kleenex and crawled into bed with my son. I'd laid down with him countless nights to help him ease off to sleep. I knew he’d understand that I needed the sound of his breath and the scent of his hair coloring the darkness in order to let my grief go.

January 23, 2006