If Only We Could See the World in 35mm
Manong and I regularly have this mental exercise in which we create strange scenarios. This is usually started by some weird noise we hear on the street, by a piece of music, by something we see on TV, etc. Almost anything can set us off into our own imaginary world. And we pitch the story at hand to each other like we were conjuring up a concept for the next big hit on TV or some blockbuster movie.
The most recent one was when we heard a song by Belle and Sebastian. We came up with the image of a mascot (all bug eyed and antenaed) running down a beach, being chased by an angry mob. Just like any other mascot, this particular one is smiling despite its predicament. The mascot pauses for a bit and brings out a sniper rifle to shoot a tourist off the nearby banana boat. The mascot then runs along and steps on the head of a guy who is buried in the sand. The scene turns Monty Python as a humongous animated hand from the sky reaches down and pinches off the mascot's head. The blood spurts out ,of course, like a fountain.
Manong and I usually end up on the floor laughing heads off. It doesn't seem all that funny now when I look back at that strange scene we made up but it was enough to make our eyes water from the laughter. I always attributed this episodal shallowness to just that: we were being shallow.
But now, another reason seems to be growing more apparent to me. We laugh because deep inside one of the most hidden corners of our mind, we know that imagination is as good as it's gonna get. We will never see such things in the real world. Perhaps this jaded mind copes with the normalcy of the everyday world by culling up the absurd and the weird.
Manong and I regularly have this mental exercise in which we create strange scenarios. This is usually started by some weird noise we hear on the street, by a piece of music, by something we see on TV, etc. Almost anything can set us off into our own imaginary world. And we pitch the story at hand to each other like we were conjuring up a concept for the next big hit on TV or some blockbuster movie.
The most recent one was when we heard a song by Belle and Sebastian. We came up with the image of a mascot (all bug eyed and antenaed) running down a beach, being chased by an angry mob. Just like any other mascot, this particular one is smiling despite its predicament. The mascot pauses for a bit and brings out a sniper rifle to shoot a tourist off the nearby banana boat. The mascot then runs along and steps on the head of a guy who is buried in the sand. The scene turns Monty Python as a humongous animated hand from the sky reaches down and pinches off the mascot's head. The blood spurts out ,of course, like a fountain.
Manong and I usually end up on the floor laughing heads off. It doesn't seem all that funny now when I look back at that strange scene we made up but it was enough to make our eyes water from the laughter. I always attributed this episodal shallowness to just that: we were being shallow.
But now, another reason seems to be growing more apparent to me. We laugh because deep inside one of the most hidden corners of our mind, we know that imagination is as good as it's gonna get. We will never see such things in the real world. Perhaps this jaded mind copes with the normalcy of the everyday world by culling up the absurd and the weird.
