My Dinner with Andre

Such a fascinating double sided coin between these two seeing how their worldviews clash. I think there’s two stories they told that completely encapsulates their views. Andre’s story of him going into the woods is the example. He goes out in the middle of nowhere away from the usual tendencies of life as we know it to do improv theater acts with other peers. The forest itself has a quality largely of exploration and adventure, always looking for what the vast nature and trees have to offer instead of living in the city with old bars and buildings you know by heart because they’ve been advertised and shown at your face all your life by general media and every block you go. Whereas nature is a thing you explore yourself, it’s a natural landscape sprawling from a seed of life rather than a man made quality made for one specific function or purpose like your everyday city activity, meant to subject you to a habitual quality or monotonous working. There’s something so unexpected and fulfilling that Andre finds about nature and the fact of Just exploring it on your own as well as doing the act of improv acting which is just as spontaneous and challenging you to think out of natural response rather than a recycled habit. It’s a refreshing lifestyle away from the monotony of the world, going by everyday functions and normalities like 9-5 jobs every day, routines and calendars with certain dates for repetition of unsurprising activities.  Andre finds the urban life boring and stale, as it’s programming us to think like robots out of habit and not truly explore all there is to see of reality and the world around us we can discover through the spontaneity and breaking of habits of life. Wallace however disagrees, and thinks habit is good for mental stability and exploring reality in a positive way. He tells not necessarily a story but memories of the everyday things he enjoys. His warm electric blanket, morning coffee waiting for him everyday when he gets up, writing a play every now and again. He says those habits bring him happiness and joy and that’s the reason why we pick up certain habits and tendencies. Because the truth is that he sees, if you enjoy doing something and love it, then why would you stop doing it? Why not make it an everyday habit or simple pleasure you can always go back to isn’t that fulfilling for life itself enough? There’s not true need for a radical change and cathartic open arms experience of changing life’s rhythm because the happiness of indulging in our everyday routines is good enough and fulfilling enough to get us through and enjoy the hellscape that modern society and the economy is. Those moments of catharsis and extreme spontaneous revelations of happiness, Wallace only sees as temporary or a singular fleeting moment, but those everyday habits he enjoys, he can always come back to any time he wants because of the sheer simplicity they bring.  Towards the end the argument continues to flare up in this same topic and Wallace asks, why can’t people look at the woods and nature in the same way they do as a cigarette store? There’s no reason to truly go all the way to the woods to change your perception about the vastness and range of emotions and human reality when all you have to do is open your mind to its possibilities and truly look to what each piece of our world holds value and why it does. Andre then shuts down his opinion and says we can’t look at the cigarette stores or anything around our regular life that way because we’ve been programmed by the makers of our surroundings not to. We’ve been told it’s a regular, simple and merely meaningless function to keep society’s pendulum swinging normally, so we don’t question whether it is because no one’s told us to.  At the end of the day, who do I truly resonate more with in terms of world view? It’s honestly hard to say as I think I wrestle with both. There’s daily habits I love for example like watching movies. I go here everyday to watch a movie and log it on letterboxd because I love the art of film and the thoughtful insight it provides like this through the medium of storytelling. I have a true passion and love for the art form of film, that I consistently get an everyday enjoyment out of purely from the simplicity of sitting down and analyzing a motion picture. So why should I stop? It’s working for me and maximizing my happiness everytime I go back to the medium so why should I really stop doing it for something seemingly more grand but an odd change that’s full of uncertainty and not guaranteeing the same love as the love I have for film? Well sometimes I feel too utterly consumed and obsessed with film, like I’m not exploring enough forms of media and enough forms of life that are fun and enjoyable. Maybe I should pick up another hobby and everyday enjoyment, because that could give me as much fulfillment as Watching film does for what great insight that lane of creativity has to offer. Am I really unlocking my full range of knowledge by mainly watching films or am I truly holding myself back from something more grand and fulfilling than staring at a screen everyday? After all none of my peers are truly deep into film as I am so maybe this habit should slow down a bit and I put my mind to other interests that I can actually bond over friends with, instead of watching a movie alone on a Saturday night that I should be out on. Just a thought that’s been in my head lately that weirdly ties back to the philosophy of the film.