That's one of the many questions I asked in FOUND. My answer, the one you don't hear in the film is, "No, because some things aren't meant to be shared or re-used."
Derivative works and homages aside, there are a few things that should remain with the original intended meaning. Sometimes it's hard to tell when sincerity is being feigned, because the actor himself doesn't know the difference any more.
I received an envelope yesterday, as I seem to do every other day or so, from my previously mentioned paramour. Like the others, this one contained articles that he thought I might like and saved scraps of paper from our time together with notes from him scribbled on them here and there.
Yesterday's package had all of the above mentioned notes and sundries, with the added bonus that it contained poetry... something new from him and also having an air that the idea comes from somewhere or someone else. In addition to the recycling of someone else's thoughts toward him, he gave me one sheet that was literally a recycled note meant for someone else... one of his previous paramours, with whom he was spending time when we met. My guess is that he gave it to her at some point, she kept it and cherished it until, having gotten her heart broken by him, she returned it to him along with any other things he might have given her or left behind.
This poem/notes combo, along several other similar examples, are things that make me thankful on some level: I get to release yet a little more of those beautiful memories that try to cling to parts of my heart and mind with such resiliency.
There is a more bittersweet consequence to these kinds of experiences in life, however. The most lingering will be that trying to discern "Mr. Right" from "Mr. Right-Now" becomes murkier and cloudier and grayer. There are collectors in the world who simply exist to collect more and more and more, who don't care if what they collect is original or unique really, just so long as it's another one to add to the growing pile. It must be quite a thrill to look at the numbers and think: I did those.
But some of us can appreciate a truer thing of beauty in simplicity and less. We downsize our hearts so that we may more deeply enjoy the connections we make. When you amass so much bric-a-brac, eventually you forget where you put what or even if you've already got one of those. But when you stop collecting and choose to simplify things, the experience can yield a treasure trove so much deeper and richer than any 1000 others combined.
I too save things, but I don't save everything. The contents of these envelopes of the former paramour have been getting discarded since the very first, because part of me felt no real connection to any of it. At the time, I thought it was merely my heart being stubborn; now I think it was being realistic.
Five-and-a-half years ago, I was in a Chinese restaurant on a date with a man who had just matter-of-factly stated that I wasn't his "Ms. Right," but he had no trouble with keeping me around until she came along. Inside my head, my spirit began to sink as a laundry list of numerous times this would happen to me in the future played out before me. Sometimes being able to see the future isn't so much fun.
While I sat there feeling like "what's the point" in this information age of too much quantity and not enough quality, the waitress arrived with our fortune cookies. One cookie seemed to roll off the mini-tray and come right up to me, so I figured that it must have picked me. I held it in my hands and announced to the tactless man sitting across from me, "This cookie contains the answer to the question: 'How will I know my Mr. Right when I meet him?'"
I opened the cookie and the message read: "He who loves you will follow you."
My first thought was, "How'd the fortune cookie know I was into males? Did it magically put in 'he' in the pronoun section based on whoever touched it? What if I had been a woman's pro golfer or John Travolta? Ok, bad example."
I tend to ramble when I think, so if you see me deep in thought, it's usually some sort of conversation like this going on in my head. Don't ever ask me, "Whatcha thinkin'?" if you're not prepared for the onslaught of odd theories, postulations and multi-sided debates that are being concocted on the spot and will then bubble up from my brain like a baking soda volcano after the vinegar is poured.
And my second thought was, "Great. Guess I have a stalker."
But after I thought about it for a while (and had time to search the bushes around my house), I came to the conclusion that maybe this was one smart cookie. The person that I wanted in my life was someone who followed me... both in life and in thought... someone who not only wants to be with me come what may, but who also gets me. It might seem simple and generic, because who deep down doesn't want that? But I think most people forget about what's real and go for the superficial ideals or a flash-in-the-pan. Our biggest downfall is distraction via an unending stream of newer, better, faster, bigger, slimmer, sexier, more, more, more.
As I looked back across the table that night in that Chinese restaurant, I remember feeling a bit of pity for the jerk sitting across from me. He knew nothing of what really mattered, as all he was looking for was a redhead. He was convinced that he'd find happiness in what was on her head rather than what was in it.
I'm not waiting so much like Sleeping Beauty for this fantasy to come true, mind you, and I'm not hoping someone will be a puppy dog either. But that cookie did help me to realize the importance of a person's interest in you and how they think of you.
"Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow. Don't walk behind me, I may not lead. Just walk beside me and be my friend." That was on the poster nearest my desk in my 4th grade homeroom class, right next to the "hang in there" kitty. I had no idea that it was Camus or even who he was, but looked at it every day and thought about the meaning of those words and it has stuck with me.
(Was the "hang in there" kitty Nietzsche? I bet it was.)
When I got home that night from the restaurant, I taped the fortune to my computer monitor, where it greeted me every day for over 4 years. I finally gave away that monitor and I decided it was time to retire the paper, since it was permanently under glass inside my head next to Camus and the kitty.
("Camus and the Kitty" ... the new film from Ron Howard.)
The fortune cookie was incorporated into that same thought. Sometimes you need to be followed... to be understood and to be admired in a way that others don't get... to be the teacher. And sometimes you need to be led... to be protected and shown the right path... to be the student. But always there is balance.
I don't mean to sound morose or possibly even critical of others at this point, and if I did, I truly apologize. My only intention is to illuminate my own path. Whatever doesn't sit well with any of you, please discard it the way you would a paper fortune, as maybe it wasn't meant for you. But if you find a slip of truth while you consume this, add that slip to your own collection of knowledge and use it however it fits.
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