late night indulgences

I have a small, yet embarrassing, confession to make. Chris went back to school yesterday and Nate was off gallavanting about town, and despite having every intention of going to bed early so I would be all bright eyed and bushy tailed for work this morning, I failed miserably. TNT, that marvelous channel for Law & Order reruns and not much else, was showing Titanic last night. And it's not like I hadn't seen it before, this ridiculous, aggravating, and yet in moments strangely moving tearjerker of a movie, yet here I found myself raptly watching that great old ship go down until the wee hours of the morning. And paying the price today at work, let me tell you. It doesn't quite translate to the small screen-- though the acting may be a bit less whiny within the smaller structure of television, all those amazing rushing gushing torrential water scenes lose a lot of their power as well, of course. Small comfort, but at least there was no one around this time to berate me for giving away the end by mentioning that it's hard to watch a film in which you know many of the people are doomed before that movie ship even sets sail. I know it's been almost a century since she hit that iceberg and went down so hard, but still, had we so little sense of our collective history that at least some amongst us had forgotten her until Kate & Leonardo acted out their wee American drama of little-rich-girl-meets-down-and-out-artist on the ship of a thousand dreams?

A dear friend of mine was, many years ago, somewhat obsessed with the Titanic, to the point of joining a Titanic fan club of sorts, I can't remember exactly what it was. I think I teased her quite a bit about this at times, not quite getting her fascination. But there was a poem that she quoted, written by a man whose name I have forgotten, about man's essential faith in his own inventions, and the eternal and ongoing collapse of this faith. This friend of mine had a baby boy last week, an adorable, round little thing. I'm not sure when I will get to meet this child, being so far south in North Carolina that to me, sadly, he seems almost in another world. But I hope that this this boy child inherits his mother's childhood love of majesty and beauty and grace, her ability to get lost in a story who's ending is tragically already known, and yet question in disbelief and rage the inevitablity of that ending, and her compassion for those lost.