Zen-less

Disclaimer: Anyone who feels they might be offended to read the honest, confused, irrelevant and disturbed reactions of a strange fan, please leave now. You won't like this. And you can't leave me nasty comments because registration is required, so you might as well move along.


Just when I thought my head couldn't get any more fucked up.

I've been battling a migraine for the past five days, and now I know why. It was the harbinger of abysmal, soulcrushing depression to come.

It's not like this is a complete shock. Except it is, in its way, because of all the denials. Except those denials weren't really denials, were they? They were carefully worded dodges, witty retorts and (in her case) intimidating refusals to answer bolstered by publicists crawling around on all fours during interviews. I have actually been telling myself for weeks that I would be relieved if Jake made a relationship public, because then, all the speculation would be over, Jake could go about his business and stop facing the irrelevant questions that reporters and talk show hosts had no right to ask. I thought I wanted this.

So why does it hurt?

Jake Gyllenhaal does not owe us anything, least of all any kind of insight into his private life. But for someone like me, who has staunchly defended his right to privacy and even suggested that some people were a little overeager to believe the tabloids, it's like a dirty trick. Hah! You tell people to stop speculating about me? Here's what you get: proof that those tabloids actually were right. Now I must resign myself to never doubting another bloody word I read attributed to US Weekly, People and OK.

I guess this means we should all be bracing ourselves for Brokeback 2?

Sigh.

What the hell, Jake? Don't you understand? You're far too special to be sharing yourself with another Hollywood type, no matter how respectable she may appear to be. You are supposed to be with me. Only me, forever. I'm the only one who knows how truly unique you are, who appreciates all your little quirks, who noticed the gray spot in your beard before you did, who dreams of you not because you're the most beautiful man in the world, but because you are sweet, and dorky, and funny, and warm, and sometimes a bit of a prick, and frequently can't articulate your way out of a paper bag, and more than anyone real in my life, you feel like a friend. See, I've only ever really loved my friends. I'm not one of those women who has friendships with one type of man but prefers another as a partner. I don't lust after the bad boy or the guy who treats me the worst. I might even be unique myself, because I don't know anyone else who has been alone her entire life, always the friend, never the girlfriend or lover. Never the lover. I can't be with just anyone. It has to be someone I love and trust. There have only been a few men who fit that description, and they were the best friends I ever had, but that's as far as it could go for them: friendship.

I am confused by fans I see online talking about jealousy over this, who clearly have partners in their real lives. If I had someone, I wouldn't fucking be here. Yes, Jake is talented, and I'd still enjoy his movies, but I wouldn't need him. And I do need him. He's my surrogate boyfriend, the lover I don't have, the fantasy man. That he's probably been seeing someone for months while I successfully used him in this fashion might rationally sound like a reason to relax, but I'm here to tell you it hasn't helped me.

I'm not particularly concerned with whether or not you like me. 'Cause I live to like you, and...and I can't like you any more. -- Duckie Dale (Jon Cryer), Pretty in Pink

I'm not an idiot. Just because he wasn't with someone else never meant that I had a chance, and yes, I recognize that fact. Nor do we have any guarantee that this is the last relationship he will ever have. And more than anything I want for him, I want him to be happy. My irrational reaction is my problem, not his. Why this should have any effect on my fantasies, I can't really say. It just does. Not being able to constantly escape into thoughts of being with him is a terrifying prospect to me. On my way home from work tonight, I honestly started to panic; my life is so colorless and flat and I have literally no clue what to do with myself, professionally or otherwise. Having filled every (oh, so many) hollow moment with contemplation of Jake in some form or other for so long, I can't imagine anything else suffusing me with that ebullient passion. Nothing's as easy as loving Jake.

The bookstores are infinite

...and so are never full, except in September.

Homework avoidance always goes better with Jake.


Stephanie, you rock. This scan from the Toronto Star is my favorite shot so far from the series snapped in that hotel room at the TIFF. Naturally, it's the one that isn't available online, except in this form. I'll take what I can get.

One of Jake's frequent comments is that he still doesn't know who he really is. It's starting to sink in that this is a major contributor to my attraction. And that's not necessarily a good thing. It's one more example of my bizarre tendency to appreciate in others everything I loathe in myself. In someone Jake's age, with a beyond successful artistic career, that's an honest, even romantic thing to say. But for a woman of 35, who hasn't managed to get past the mild-to-moderate interest stage in any subject, ever, it feels like a well-deserved condemnation of self, a longer way of saying Me? I'm a loser. At least Jake does something creative that he loves right now. Who am I? There are things that I love, and things I love to do, but there is no one thing that has ever stood out to me as my thing. Instead, I do a job to earn money and pay bills. And I feel my self dying a little every day. Everyone I know, since I was in high school, has been asking me when I'm going to write a novel and get rich. Guess what? Not everyone who can write is a writer. There's just not enough in my head for that life, and it's something I've always known but been unable to explain to others.

So instead, I'm trying to find something that at least makes me feel like I'm using my intellect while I fail to blossom as an artist. That's why I'm back in school, studying computer science. That's why I have homework, which I am avoiding this very moment.

By the way, I am totally not as depressed today as all this sounds. I just watched Hal Dobbs make the most tender, beautiful love to Catherine Llewellyn (yes, again, because that never gets old) and I'm convinced that if I can just find myself a math geek who plays the drums, all of this will be a non-issue.

Besides, how could I be blue when Jake's talking to a director? Noah Baumbach, to be precise. I've been meaning to watch The Squid and the Whale since it's been on cable recently, but never got around to it. I guess now I could consider it research. Fingers crossed.

All photos: IHJ.

Happy birthday, Swoff!

No, not that one.

This one.


Anthony Swofford, former Marine scout/sniper and author of the bestselling Jarhead, was born on August 12, 1970 in Fairfield, California.

Like many of Jake's fans, I had not read Anthony Swofford's intensely personal Gulf War chronicle before Sam Mendes brought it to the screen. In general, I have always had a distaste for the type of guy (or girl) who wants to join the military, and in particular the Marines; Swofford knows I'm not alone, and acknowledges that he basically hid from his peers his unpopular aspiration in order to avoid ridicule. He was right. Being of the same generation, I am like those kids he went to school with who would not have understood. But perceptions can change.

After being completely fascinated and horrified by the movie, I knew I would eventually read Jarhead. It took me a while to get around to it; even after I purchased it the book sat on my bedroom floor for a month while I finished reading other recommendations. Once I finally opened it, I couldn't put it down.

In fact, after reading the last sentence, I flipped back to the beginning and immediately started again, reluctant to leave the perversely beautiful brutality of Swofford's prose and his ordeal. I have never done that before with any book. It would be glib to say that I now understand his position, but my view of low-level military personnel and those who wish to be a part of that system will never be the same. And while my understanding of the man both then and now is based upon what bits he has chosen to feed me from the dark pantry of his psyche, I won't deny feeling a profound empathy and connection with Swofford, from page one.

His style, a lyrical but concise delivery that makes all the more disarming his unrelenting honesty, has made me an instant fan. I don't know if that's because it reminds me of my writing--and I seem to be all about finding ways to love myself through others, since I can't do it directly--but reading Swofford feels like reading my own journal. Of course I have not lived anything remotely as compelling or formative as his experience, but as I follow him, I imagine myself sharing his reactions, his interpretations, nearly every opinion and emotion expressed, as if he were a version of myself in some other life.

When I first encountered Swoff, via Jake, I thought he was an immature, self-centered asshole. It turns out that 37-year-old Swofford agrees with me about 20-year-old Swoff, proof that Jake's performance was frighteningly accurate. Many viewings later, I love and feel sympathy for Jake's Swoff, as I now do the man himself. (That doesn't mean I won't exploit this opportunity to show you BareAssed!Jake. Life is too short.)

I'm also bemused by a few parallels between Jake and Anthony Swofford.

We all heard about how Jake chipped his tooth during shooting of the scene where Swoff takes his vengeance on Brian Geraghty's Fergus, and subsequently let himself get a bit too abusive in further takes, resulting in the two not speaking for days on the set. What I have never seen or heard anyone else mention is that Swofford also chipped his tooth on a gun, while threatening not his platoon mate but himself. This strange confluence of events can't have escaped someone like Jake, who has professed a belief in "the energy between people." Then there's one of Swofford's STA buddies who was named Atticus, either by his parents or Swofford for the sake of anonymity. Granted, I don't get out much, but that's the only Atticus I've ever encountered, outside of Harper Lee's novel and Jake's beloved German Shepherd (the latter named after the character in the former).

Anthony Swofford loves to cook, specifically citing Mario Batali as a favorite source of recipes. And I can't discount the mesmerizing quality of Swofford's blue eyes; while not on the level of Jake's beauty (and no one is), Swoff does indeed appeal to me. The last time Tony Swofford was with me in the shower, he wasn't entirely Jake's Swoff.

Being impressed as I was with Jarhead, I wanted to try Swofford's fiction novel, Exit A, so Friday while I ran all over town on errands, I stopped in to the local Border's. Their online self-service station did not reveal stock status, only a probable location of "Literature: Fiction." It took me five minutes to establish that "Literature: Fiction" was bereft of Swofford, because their concept of alphabetization at this Border's apparently involves some algorithm for wrapping around multiple freestanding shelves that puts T before S. On my way out I decided to browse the 50% Off bins that I had passed as I entered, and right there in the center of the box in front of me was a copy of Exit A--deeply discounted. So deeply that I don't feel right saying how little I paid for it. Swofford probably doesn't care what I paid for his book, but if it were my book, I don't think I'd exactly be thrilled to learn that it could be had brand new for less than most items at their in-store café.

I haven't begun reading it yet. I am afraid. I'm afraid because while Anthony Swofford is a hundred times more well-read than I, has a superior vocabulary, and has demonstrated admirably that he can write, the hardest part of writing isn't the prose for someone like me; it's the story. I've read articles and correspondence by Swofford, and his mastery of language is evident. But I've not read any of his fiction before. What if the magic of Swofford's prose fails to carry a mediocre tale that does not have the built-in gravity of truth? Clearly, I'm projecting my own inadequacies upon a writer whom I do not know. That's what I do best. I know that even if Exit A sucks, it does not diminish the savage beauty of Jarhead. Still, I will feel deflated, as if the facile words and faltering story really were my own.

Fortunately for us, Swofford is not me: he has had the courage to pursue his writing, has successfully been published. He claims he is driven by a constant fear of failure, something that for me has had the opposite effect. Maybe if my failure meant a humiliating death, it would be more of a motivator. Or maybe it's success that I really fear.

Happy birthday, Swoff. Have a few drinks on me.

Further reading: Chat transcripts Washington Post USA Today Interviews Sydney Morning Herald Das Magazin Combustible Celluloid About.com Mother Jones GreenCine The Stranger FilmFocus.Co.UK BookPage The Portland Mercury

Audio NPR Video Jarhead L.A. Premiere LX.TV with SuChin Pak Tribeca Film Festival By Anthony Swofford "Coming Home: Seven Families Lay Their Fallen Soldiers to Rest. A Photo Essay" (Mother Jones) Publisher Simon & Schuster

Photos: NY Times News Service, Dan Winters, IHJ.