by me and mine (part 1/?)

Ever since I had my last heartbreak, I've been unable to fantasize happiness for myself. I can imagine scenarios for characters in my films, tell you exactly what they look forward to every day when they wake up and what's their purpose. But when it comes to me, I don't know what would make me happy. Is it films, television, something else? I don't know. I don't know when it started, but it might've been sometime back. I'd begun to look back at all the events happening to me as a story, and although it was my story I'd stopped feeling the gravity, the emotions and the weight of myself as a part of that story. I'd expected a credit for DOP or the camera guy at least, because if this is a story for a film. It's rich with complex characters foremost, but it isn't written by me. Neither is it directed by me. Nothing that happens is as expected nor the directions for what to do or what to say in any situation pre-defined.

I go to bed at around 11PM, it's quiet and I'm all ready for tomorrow. But then I begin to think. It's not doubts, it's not fantasies even. It's a rerun of past hits, times when I remember being happy. And this wasn't feeling like it. I'd taken myself for granted as the camera in the story. Not for the lackluster of bad visual storytelling, neither was it that I was unhappy about what was to come when I go to the airport tomorrow but rather the fear that when I do actually see her, what if I still feel empty?

Over the course of the night, I toss and turn. I throw pillows to the floor, then try sleeping over them. Yes on the floor. But to no avail, so I get up and drink a sip from the remaining portions of Cranberry juice in the fridge. I'd spoken to her sometime back but the thought's still fresh in my head. I imagined myself as Jess Mariano for a minute. Because maybe it's her. My Rory. She's the one who adds meaning to my life, I think. A valid argument but is that what it is? Another part of me replies. Maybe it's the sugar-headed Val speaking, he argues that whatever happens will happen. If you don't feel the moment maybe that's what is intended to happen. An older, hidden Val has been sitting like the lone ranger at the back of the bar. He's a gunslinger. He commands the rest of them yelling at them, you were once a romantic heart. You were once a 'real' lover. Where is that boy who'd cry at night if he'd upset his love? Who couldn't go through a day without clammy hands if he felt lonely? One who would cry at the sappiest songs or Micheal Jackson's They Don't Care About Us. I hear the gunslinger. But I'm quick to realize he's old and from an even-more upsetting past which I have no wants to remember the night before the love of my life shows up.

I use the phrase the love of my life a lot. I throw it around like an aggravating child hurling cards at the floor when he's losing the game. I hope I don't lose the game that I'm playing. The game being holding on. You may ask holding onto what exactly, Val? 

My emotions.

Myself?

My humanity. Perhaps.

I don't understand what I'm looking for these days. Even in films, or poetry or when I read something and it feels like it knows me. Most of my own writing doesn't feel like it knows me. But when I read phrases from scripts such as Aftersun or In The Mood for Love. I know that that is me. It's Vallance. Don't ask how I know. I just do. I'm afraid I'm lying about things sometimes. I don't like lying. I swear to myself I'll speak the truth. And only the truth, no matter how twisted while she's here. God, I hope I love her as much as I think I do. And I hope I feel it.