Another Weekend Laid To Rest

The weekend wasn’t bad. It moved along like it was in a hurry(as usual) to get back to whence it came, but that’s par for the course. That’s the nature of the weekend; here and gone like Haley’s Comet. Friday afternoon is but a distant memory(did it really happen?) I sometimes feel like it’s the same distance to last weekend as it is to a random weekend from 35 years ago. It’s the same feeling; that the weekend came and went, but instead of going to work on Monday morning it’s just back to Leesburg Elementary to Mr. Teeple or Mrs. Cook’s class.

The weekend is a black hole; a dying star collapsing into itself creating this compressing void that devours anything and everything that comes near it.

Random theories on a Monday morning.

Besides snagging a new(to me) dual cassette deck, I also got a chance to watch three horror movies. I watched VHS85, The Boogeyman, and Totally Killer. Not only that, but they were all pretty good. A rarity these days.

VHS85 is a continuation of the V/H/S horror anthology franchise, and the most consistent of the series since the first one which came out in 2012. If you’re not familiar, it’s a found footage anthology horror film that are typically loosely connected by a thread of a narrative(usually someone or a group coming across these VHS tapes with horrors recorded on them.) VHS85‘s connective tissue is that all the stories seem to be dubbed on the same old videocassette, which is of some government experiment on an alien lifeform that can change its form.

Overall I enjoyed it as a whole but two of the segments stood out, David Bruckner’s Total Copy and Scott Derrickson’s Dreamkill. Two outstanding short films that were totally immersive and feel like they could support an entire feature-length version of their short film. Highly recommended.

Next is Totally Killer, a horror-comedy starring Kiernen Shipka(Mad Men, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina) as a teenager who travels back in time in a photo booth time machine in order to prevent her mom from being murdered by a decades-old serial killer. Imagine Back To The Future, Scream, and Final Girls all mixed into one funny and gory film. If you like your horror with some laughs, look no further. Two thumbs up.

Finally my son and I watched The Boogeyman, the latest Stephen King adaptation starring Sophie Thatcher(of Yellowjackets). I was incredibly surprised at how good this one was. It was genuinely creepy with great acting and a creature design that was jaw-dropping. The boy and I were blown away, to say the least. Well worth your time, if you got it to spare.

I do this every October, I tell myself I’m going to watch an handful of horror movies on the weekends during Halloween season. But then something comes up and I never do. Well, this year will be different. Horror flicks are a year-long hobby for me, but it’s especially important to fill your head with as many scary movies as you can during October. That’s when it counts the most. That’s when those horror movie points add up, and the spirit of the season is the strongest. What better way to honor spooky season than to watch what the season has to offer? Three in one weekend. I’m off to a good start, I think.

Sunday I wasn’t all that motivated. Felt like I never quite woke up completely. I started watching The Deer Hunter early on, before anyone woke up. I got an hour into it before I shut it off. Not that I didn’t like it. I’ve seen it a few times over the years and I thought it was a great film, but once everyone starts waking up an mulling around the house, it’s hard to concentrate. So I made my wife and I omelets, then after breakfast I took a three mile walk. I thought maybe that would wake me up, but not really.

I don’t know, I think it was this feeling that I wanted to create something. I wanted to work on some music or draw or something, but there was some kind of mental block. It was like a cloud was hanging over me, preventing any creative light to shine down. I did end up going downstairs and working on some music. I was in the mood to create some season-adjacent sounds. So, like a John Carpenter score or something that sounds slightly sinister. I got a good start on a piece, despite having the motivation of a sloth.

The rest of the day was spent getting dinner around. My daughter comes over from her apartment every Sunday and we have dinner. I really didn’t feel like cooking anything, but I kicked myself in the ass and did it anyways. I’m glad I did, because I know she appreciates a good homemade meal. I know she doesn’t get one until she comes home for a visit, so I feel like I “need” to do that for her. And I “want” to do that for her. It’s just sometimes I get burnt out. Maybe it’s mild depression, I don’t know. Just a lack of motivation or inability to focus and get to the task. Wanting to be creative, but just not doing the creative thing(yeah, that might be depression.)

Anyways, I’m better today. Though I’m working, so it’s not like I can spend the day painting or making spooky music in the basement.

I definitely feel like this dark cloud business is something I’ve dealt with my whole life. Even as a kid I could spend an afternoon wanting to do something that was well in my power to do so. Yet, instead I’d just sit around wasting the day away in some kind of funk and getting nothing done. I could get lost in negativity pretty easily. Like focusing on a bummer thought and soaking in it for hours. Sometimes not getting out of it till the next day, after a good night’s sleep(which I got last night, thankfully.) I’m always thinking about wanting to do something and being excited about the thought(playing guitar, working on a painting, writing a memoir), but that step from idea to action gets weighed down in mental muck and mire. This isn’t an everyday or even every week problem. It’s just something that pops up every now and then.

I think I just get a little overwhelmed. All of our kids are grown up, yet two out of the three still live at home(including my son’s girlfriend who’s been living with us since May.) And with the ongoing drama with trying to get our daughter’s dog returned to her(court date is now a week and two days away), and yes the whole “When will I be unemployed” quagmire that hangs over me like low-hanging rotten fruit, it all does get to be a bit much.

But hey, this will all pass. Everything will work itself out, one way or another. Or maybe it won’t. Either way, we plow through and deal the best we can. Much like those elusive weekends that come and go like pockets of respite from the 9 to 5 work week we all(or most) cannot wait to end. So then we can get back to those weekend horror movies, being creative in our own ways, cooking dinner for family that appreciate something home-cooked, or just savoring those ideas until you can manifest them into something real.