Occasionally I used to wish life was more like one of our home movies.
Watching one now you wouldn't have any idea of the hours spent going
through the footage, or the agonizing over which music track to use.
You wouldn't have any idea that it took a bribe to get my eldest son to
say "hello", or that a number of scenes where contrived, that rainy
day footage was jettisoned because a video of our holiday with smiling faces
and amusing sequences to the song "Walking on the Sunshine" wouldn't
work if all you saw was the reality of what a holiday in England can be like
when it rains as much if not more than the sun shines.
When I wanted life to be more like our home movies it was because in
home movies the clips that seem mundane and dull get wiped from the tape.
And the sun always shines on TV.
The thing is that home movies never tell the whole story- the day it
rained so much we wondered if God had changed his mind and allowed a second
flood, or the day I had a pounding headache, or when my niece burnt herself on
the radiator, or the reality that each year we look a little older.
The truth is sometimes we all wish we could edit our own lives into mini
music videos - bite sized chunks of near reality.
If I'm honest there are whole scenes that I would edit out.
The day I got so frustrated I kicked the sofa and the first time I made
a girl cry.
The morning I overheard someone I thought was my friend saying that he thought I was a loser.
The shame of it is that what we miss when we think like this is the
stuff of life- the journey.
The things that we learn from and that cause us to grow, that shapes our
characters.
The difficult conversations.
The pain.
Even grief.
And really what we're saying is sometimes, maybe just for the home movie;
we all want to be God.
To be the master of our own universe. To create alternate realities
where there are no grey days. Where we never have to face the valley and
instead live on the mountaintop.
I did a course a few years back where we had to create a landscape. Not
on canvas, but in our minds eye.
It could be whatever came to mind when we closed our eyes, and then we
had to answer some pretty clever questions about it that would tell us all
about who we were.
I have to confess it took me a while to get the point as I thought I
knew who I was already and wasn't sure how answering some random questions was
going to un-earth the real me.
Ever since I can remember I had a landscape I used to draw. It was
pretty basic as I'm better at imagining than I am at drawing, but it was
essentially a landscape with a house overlooking a slightly undulating mass of greenery
that finished at an ocean where the sun reflected off of the crystal clear
water.
I guess it was kind of my dream house with it's own plot of land with
views of the sea.
Anyway, during the test I was asked about the weather and how it interacted
with this landscape.
As far as I was aware it didn't.
Because in my landscape I could decide on the weather patterns.
And mine was somewhere that was beautiful with luscious green grass
where the sun always shone and the temperature remained at a constant 80
degrees. Kind of like LA.
I actually spent some time in LA a few years back- I love LA. I know
it's fashionable to say the coolest city on the west coast is San Francisco,
but give me LA any time. I'm sure San Francisco is hip, but I never made it
there so I couldn't say for sure.
Anyway, while I loved LA something struck me during my stay- it even
rained there.
I'm not trying to sound ignorant, but I have to confess to being a
little taken a back. Because other than in Blade Runner, which is after all set
in a future dystopia which usually means lots of rain, I had never seen rain in
any movies or TV shows I had watched that were set there apart from a scene in
"Sunset Boulevard" where it was a plot device of sorts, and Billy
Wilder was a genius as far as I'm concerned so he must have had his reasons.
In all honesty I felt a little cheated.
Firstly because it even rained in LA, and secondly because during the
duration of my stay there the only famous person I saw was one of the actors
who had been in "The Goonies" and it was actually my friend who saw
him at a petrol station and pointed out the back of his head to me as we pulled
out onto the freeway.
I know it's something of a digression but it's worth pointing out that,
contrary to what the Los Angeles tourism board would have you believe, you
don't see famous people on every street corner out there, particularly in the valley,
which is where I was staying. Truth be told I've seen far more famous people in
the gym I go to in Crouch End. I even saw the man who played Jesus working out
in there once.
Anyway, as I thought about it I came to a decision.
This year the home movie is going to be different.
This year there are some scenes in it where the sky is grey. This year
rain makes it's debut.
Because I need to be reminded that while the sun may always shine on TV
life is far richer, with greater highs and deeper lows, than a three and a half
minute home movie set to an up tempo pop song.
That even though it did rain a lot the sun eventually made it's
appearance, my headache cleared, and that my nieces burnt leg got better
and the truth is that we had a fantastic time.
As much as I'm tempted to try edit my life differently, the truth is
that it is during the journey we live that God shapes us into the people we are
becoming.
Even when it rains.
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