Day 95

Nothing insightful. Just a tidbit from the past that seems worth sharing. I've found that sharing something random often brings you closer to people and eliminates any sense a barrier around yourself. Being labeled often times an introvert this is my attempt to bring yall in. Plus this allows others to share. I do warn you. You won't see me the same ever again. Stop reading if you prefer my image untarnished.

The first movie I ever cried to was titled "The General's Daughter." It was a murder mystery/military movie featuring John Travolta that released back in 1999. I didn't watch it while it was in theatres, but I did manage to rent it and check it out. I thought it was a pretty good movie the first time I saw it. The second time I watched it was slightly different. I am going to guess that I watched it back in 2000 which means I was about 22 years old and probably still jockeying my clerks role at my local Mr. Video rental store. During this second viewing I was alone in my room and just doing the usual thing any slacker fake college student does. Nothing! I admit that even now I am an emotionally suppressive individual and nowadays when it actually does come out it usually explodes outta me. I was even worse back then. I didn't really feel much of anything towards anything or anyone. A movie brought an end to that all and in an unusual way as well. If I am about to ruin the movie for you, once again stop reading.

John Travolta plays a military investigator charged with finding out who has murdered the General's daughter. Throughout the course of the movie more details are revealed as to how the murdered daughter came to her demise. Basically she was an overachieving military brat who took a turn for the worse after being brutally attacked and raped by her fellow officers during a training exercise. She began to act out and spiral down into the her eventual death. Much of her transgressions were targeted towards her father, the General. It is eventually revealed that the General had been involved in quite the cover up following his daughter's rape. Because of the position he held and his loyalty to the military as well as to his own progression through the ranks the General made a decision that was quite disturbing. At the end of the movie we are flashed back to the night of the rape. The General walks into his daughter's hospital room and proceeds to cease being her father. The fall out of having a female officer expose the military as a male dominated, over-bearing organization would not go over well for the General or the armed forces. As the General walked in that room and began to convince his own daughter to not say a thing about the entire incident I began to get too connected to the scene. I could feel myself being saddened by the actions of this man. I even said out loud, "I would never do that to my daughter." Then it happened. A tear. Then another. I kept repeating the same statement as I watched the life drain from the Generals daughters' eyes. The General told his daughter he would take care of everything, but just please don't do anything or say a word. All I saw was the bruises on her face and the blood covering her and the worst sight I took from it all was her eyes. It wasn't her tears so much as it was how hollow they seemed. Like her heart had just been ripped from her. I lost it. I immediately locked the door in my room to make sure no one walked in on me as I cried for seemingly no apparent reason. Crazy, right?

To this day I haven't watched that movie all the way through again. I haven't seen that particular scene either. I don't think I have avoided it on purpose, but it just seemed to turn out that way. I am single. I have no kids of my own. I may never have a daughter. But one thing is for sure. That moment and that movie probably made me more inclined to want a daughter more than a son. It probably made sure that I would never ever have that moment occur to me in my life. I would never do that to my daughter. I guess you could say this means I have a heart, but it's all just theory really. Maybe I'm just a soft-ass. Maybe I was just having a bad day that day. I have to admit that I have cried to other movies as well, but that was really based more on what I was going through at the time and my own emotional state rather than the movie itself. This was the original and probably the only that made me think I was completely in that moment and experiencing it as if I was looking at my own daughter. Probably why I still cry when I start expressing too many emotions. Should have seen me last Friday. Dammit! I should stop talking for now. Rabble Rock people!