Summertime sadness and Gatsby

Once you leave and come back, people expect you to be the same but you're not nearly the same person who left. This is why coming back is hard. I came back home after a year in Turkey and it surprises me when people ask me about my time there. I have so little to say. When you're out there on your own, there is a strange air of solitude that takes holds of you. Nobody to come home to, nobody to ask about your day and even if they did, nothing you say can explain to them the change you feel in yourself. They still see you as the same person who left but you know better. 

How do you explain to someone the longing you felt looking at hazy islands drawn on a horizon smudged by the receding light of the sun from a ferry boat? How do you tell them of the freedom you feel walking home with a friend at 4 in the morning with your head up, marveling at the white birds circling a brightly lit building? Nothing you say can make them understand the euphoria of joining a protest in a foreign city, along with hundreds of roaring civilians, all the while knowing it has nothing to do with you. Heck! You don't even know what they are chanting. How do you tell someone of the inexplicable peace you felt 2..300ft up in the air, attached to a parachute, looking down at the sea, feeling bigger than the world? The answer is, you can't because they weren't there with you. So I don't even try. But I hope I'm more articulate at writing about the books that I took along with me than I am at talking about my experiences.  

Up in the air!

What am I itching to write about? The Great Gatsby! We readers have had the misfortune of watching our favorite novels being turned into horrible movies time and again but that wasn't the case with Gatsby (at least not for me).Never before has contemporary music been featured in a period film and I think it worked extremely well, especially because it was in a movie like this. I went to watch it three times! And every time my heart broke a little when Daisy, with her perfectly coquettish accent said: 'I'm glad it's a girl. And I hope she'll be a fool – that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.' 'Cant repeat the past? Well, of course you can', I murmured with Gatsby trying to say it just like him. And every time, I left the theatre satisfied after hearing that iconic line: 'So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.'

Somewhere, Fitzgerald sitting among teary-eyed authors with unfaithful adaptions is looking down at us with a glass of champagne and a smug smile because Baz Luhrmann did complete justice to his work. I imagine he looks like this-

Do I want to watch the movie a 4th time? Will I sever all relations with you if you speak ill of the movie? Will I throw a brick at the critics who gave the movie a bad review if I ever see them? The answer to all those questions is a big YES :) 

To Mr. Luhrmann, I have only one thing to say (and here I assume Nick Carraway's awe struck voice): "They're a rotten crowd. You're worth the whole damn bunch put together."