“Oh, Dave….FUDGE!”

Sometimes movie quotes are the most effective way I have for expressing myself...and maybe the most entertaining.

“It’s like fate.”
“Exactly! It was my fate to meet her.”
“But it wasn’t your fate to BE with her. Unfortunately my friend, fate has a different plan for you. You will grow-up, go out into the world. You’ll forget all about the things that happened here, Ethan, Angela, the shit we pulled, those hookers that we THOUGHT were girls. And ya know, you’re gonna go out there and no one…NO one can shoot you down, because a woman one time stepped on your heart and left a scar in its wake. That is your FATE, Dave…

…just as it is my fate, to someday become Shogun.”

“We have been getting screwed by the system. The system that forces us guys to like girls. All right? We're getting pushed into this. What if we just take the girls out of it? We can have our own system, it's a counter-system. And then, you do things together, you swim, you row, you... boat, you eat, you stink. We can just be guys! You can have sex, you can do it, you know, many guys at a time, but it's not gay…

…I have a comment. Just so you guys know, I’m not gay.”

“I want to make sure that you and I are best friends – ‘gnome’ matter what.”
“Ethan, that's a troll. “
“‘Gnome’ it's not.”

“All right Jack. If you could describe yourself in one word, what would it be?”
“Hmmm, I'd have to say... slave-to-the-freaky-ass-booty.”

A stream of my thoughts, and those are from just one movie...slacker.

“Now put your clothes back on, and I'll buy you an ice cream.”

I’m a rainbow sherbet kind of guy. Almost without fail, I go to Baskin-Robbins with hopes of a new surprise, a new flavor to tantalize my mouth. I enter filled with ambition and ideas for the future of my ice cream frenzy. I enter with all of that and I exit with rainbow sherbet. Why do I come back to rainbow sherbet? Because it’s my favorite; the flavor I like the most. I could try other flavors and every so often I do. But I rarely find anything to compare to the elation I feel for rainbow sherbet. Actually, when X-men 2 came out in theaters, Baskin Robbins held a promotion where they gave away free cones of the cross-promotional tie-in flavors of Xtreme Blue Rasberry Blast and Mutant Mint Shockwave or something catchy and fresh like that. I tried the blue raspberry and I liked it and for the better part of that summer, that was my flavor of choice. It was my favorite. But somehow I was back to rainbow sherbet, I guess it just fulfilled my needs. I have one favorite at a time, and that’s what I prefer.

“Come, ice cream. Come to my mouth. How dare you disobey me!…What are you looking at? Damn you all... and such.”

My brother Todd is different. He can have a different flavor each time he walks into Baskin-Robbins and enjoy it just as much as any other flavor. I use Todd as an example because several of his high school buddies worked at Baskin-Robbins and so on any given trip to the Mall, one was usually on duty and would give us free scoops. So naturally a bulk of my Baskin-Robbins experience includes Todd. Todd could go in and get mint chocolate chip one time, rocky road the next, and then turn around and get bubble gum. It boggles my mind how someone can like so many different flavors. Sure I like chocolate peanut butter, Mutant Blue Sherbet Bonanza, and even bubble gum. But not as totally as I like rainbow sherbet. Todd can see the good in each of the different flavors. Things he enjoys about this one or that one. I can only see the total sum of all its qualities. I can have only one favorite.

“There can be only one!”

Maybe it’s a problem of perception. I see things singularly, while others see them plurally. If I preferred a different flavor, then the former, by very definition is NOT my favorite. I have but one “favorite” flavor at a time, all the other 30 flavors are merely secondary to that flavor. I could try to enjoy other flavors, thinking that maybe they could be my favorite. But really all I would be doing is trying to pretend that I was not totally devoted to rainbow sherbet.

“Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick.”

This is an analogy, I guess, to…dating. Some people can date prolifically. Like this about one person and that about another person. Other people, only date one person at a time. Again a difference between singular and plural perspectives, holistic versus separatistic. Additionally each group finds it difficult to understand the other. Difficult to understand how someone could date one person for 6 months or why someone feels the need to go out with a different girl each night of the week. Neither side is really right or wrong, its just the way things are. I only relate this because I always seem to pick the flavors that either are no longer available or just plain sold out. And I think maybe “Strawberry Cheescake Chunk” will be my new favorite, it’s time for a new favorite, because obviously this flavor is not an option. But just because a flavor isn’t available, doesn’t make it ‘not’ your favorite. You’ve got to find a new flavor that beats the old one, not just one to replace it. And sadly its something you rarely have control over…it just happens. I’m still trying to find a flavor that is actually available at a Baskin-Robbins near me. Cause while I do love ice cream and girls…there really can be only one.

“We can never see past the choices we don't understand.”

…though sometimes it seems more like “There can be only none.”

“Fortune and glory, kid…Fortune and glory.”

Professor Gilchrist is about as Canadian as they come. Which, fortunately, I don’t mind. In fact I find I find it hilarious most of the time, like I’m watching Terrance and Phillip from South Park or the MacKenzie Brothers from Strange Brew. Only instead of fart jokes or calling people hosers, we talk about tyranny, the common good and political power.

“I was like a one-man army, like Charlton Heston in "Omega Man." You ever see it, eh? Beauty.”

After first relating Machiavelli’s The Prince to Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather (awesome), Professor Gilchrist explained that in a Machiavellian view, glory and immortality are the ultimate in ‘virtue’ or success. Causing, through your actions, your own immortality. To illustrate this he used a quote from the movie Troy. Achilles’ mother tells this to him as he must make a choice whether or not to will follow the Greeks and go to war against the Trojans:

“If you stay in Larissa, you will find peace. You will find a wonderful woman, and you will have sons and daughters, who will have children. And they'll all love you and remember your name. But when your children are dead, and their children after them, your name will be forgotten… If you go to Troy, glory will be yours. They will write stories about your victories for thousands of years! And the world will remember your name. But if you go to Troy, you will never come back…for your glory walks hand-in-hand with your doom. And I shall never see you again.”

And it struck me; this was analogous to my dilemma. Like Achilles, I was posed with a choice of destiny. If I go to Brighton, Colin and I will have fun and the snow will be great. But next year or the year after, the memory will fade and life will just go on. Yet if I go to the Canyons, I will ride with my crew, we will make an epic video and the glory of the season will live on for generations upon generations. Go to Brighton and enjoy a fleeting moment, or go to Canyons and live this season forever...

“You're gonna get killed chasing after your damn fortune and glory!”

...and so I follow the Greeks to the Canyons this season...and glory...shall be mine (or at least like a really bad-@ss good time).

"Unite us. Unite the clans."

I hate friends. I know that sounds not only quite harsh but sort of contradictory. It's still true, though. You never feel peer pressure if you don’t have any peers. You never feel split and torn between a personal pursuit or desire and the love and companionship of your friends, if you don’t have friends. But then again I guess you'd probably get lonely. Ok, fine, I don't hate them. Sometimes I just get pissed off with them. Frustrated with how much I like them, enough to seemingly coerce me to action.

“With friends like you, who needs friends?”

I do, unquestionablly, love to snowboard. This love blossoms each winter and as a result, I purchase a season pass to a local Ski resort. The last two years it has been the Canyons in Park City. It’s been the cheapest, easily accessible, and for the most part “THE” place for college students to go. I've been pleased for the most part, though somewhat discouraged at the quality of the snow. But I have managed to have friends to ride with. I had a squad of friends from my floor in the dorms two years ago, and last year a crew from my apartment complex, we call ourselves “The Ninjas.” We even made a snowboarding video. I had a lot of fun.

“Because this is a very big idea, my friends. We're talking about a non-exclusive egalitarian brotherhood where community status and more importantly age have no bearing whatsoever.”

When everyone had come back from summer, I guess I felt like everyone was distant, sort of branching out into new facets of life. We were growing apart. And with that peoples drive to go snowboarding and ride as a crew seemed to diminish as well. Some people were considering not getting a pass at all, others suggested they would probably only go a half dozen times. And with that I felt like the vision of team unity I had looked forward to. began to dwindle and so my ties with the team began to decay. We're not talking complete decomposition, just some mild decay, like that sensitive spot above that molar on the upper right side of your mouth. Nothing was said, school started and everything moved on moderately. In fact, like an early forming cavity, I'm not sure I even noticed it.

F_ck what you know. You need to forget about what you know, that's your problem. Forget about what you think you know about life, about friendship, and especially about you and me.”

In my research and excitement for the new season I looked into some reports of equally cheap season passes at Snowbird. I looked into it and decided that it wasn’t sufficiently worth it to me. However I did find that for nearly the same price I could get a season pass to Brighton. Now I have only been to Brighton maybe 5 or 6 times. And I loved it each time. Brighton, statistically speaking is great, it has a higher average snow fall, higher elevation, more difficult runs, and best of all, offers night skiing. Actually, going to Brighton had been brought up before, but that was when it was thought to cost at least $500. But now it had a competing price tag. Now, I had a dilemma.

“You're gonna listen to me? To something I said? Hasn't it become abundantly clear during the tenure of our friendship that I don't know shit?”

Well one of the Ninjas is a rep for canyons. That means he sells passes for them in the pre-season and in exchange for his services, he gets a free pass to the Canyons. He did it last year and he’s doing it again this year. Well his response to the decision of where the “Ninjas” were getting season passes was basically “I'm going to the Canyons, but if you guys aren’t going then I probably won't go.” Another teammate then stated that “if I do get a pass its gonna be at Canyons.” So like the first of a line of dominoes, the Ninjas began to sign off on going to Brighton for the season. Everyone that is except for me. Why, you may ask. Well, I guess I hate feeling coerced or manipulated. I like to think that I make all my decisions based solely on my own preferences, snubbing my nose and giving the middle finger to the expectations of others. I had been researching and developing reasoning for why we should go to Brighton this year, I had done such a good job that I had even convinced myself. Quite thoroughly in fact. Only to find out that no amount of research or reasoning would change a simple fact: the Ninjas were going to ride at the Canyons in Park City.

“Master's my friend!”
“You don't have any friends, nobody likes you!”
“I'm not listening, I'm not listening.”

So basically I was left with an ultimatum of sorts. Like a car packed with your friends off for some fun after the high school basketball game, with the car door open, asking “You coming?” And then being frozen at that moment in time for the better part of a week. Yeah you can think of dozens of reasons why you want to go with them and yet a few dozen why you want to go do something else. But is my choosing to not go with my friends...unfriendly. What kind of damage does that do? And if I go and never get a season pass to Brighton, what kind of effect will that have? And why is it that I am the one standing outside the car being asked if I in, or if I want to come along, instead of the one driving the car to the social (or perhaps antisocial) event of my choosing?

“I want to make sure that you and I are best friends - "gnome" matter what.”
“Ethan, that's a troll.”
“'Gnome' it's not.”

Basically, I don't know what’s more important to me: the quality of the resort or the quality of the crew. Colin has pledged his alliance, and so I know no matter where I go, he and I will have an awesome time. I want to ride together and have fun together...snowboarding. And perhaps the thing that concerns me is that the excitement around this season pass issue is more about friendship than snowboarding. I thought I had it figured out, but now I've got to figure out, am I getting a season pass with friends to go snowboarding or am I getting a season pass to go snowboarding with friends.

“It’s time to ask yourself what you believe.”

...I guess I better “choose wisely.”

“Say goodbye to your two best friends, and I don't mean your pals in the Winnebago.”

“I want always to be a boy, and have fun…”

Succinctly put, that is exactly how I feel. Despite what I may say or the plans I profess for my life, I find myself often going back to this principle. Is it out of fear or defense? Or perhaps immaturity and selfishness? I don’t really know. And maybe I don’t care.

“Why don't you call me when you grow up, wait a minute that will never happen so, why don't you just not call me...yeah”

Last Christmas, we went as a family to go see the new Peter Pan film that had just come out. I’ll admit that my vote was in the negation on the matter, but nonetheless it was a movie complete with popcorn and treats, compliments of my parents and I’m no fool. Well, I loved the movie. And all of a sudden I saw that the story of Peter Pan wasn’t about kids going to a far of place to fight pirates, when they should be in bed. It was about growing up, moving on to the future and leaving the past. It was about moving out of the nursery. It was about me.

“What in the hell's the matter with you? When will you stop acting like a child?”
“I am a child.”
“Grow up.”

They call it ‘Peter Pan Syndrome’ and when I say “they” I mean my mom. I’ve heard it used plenty of other places, but it’s a phrase made popular to me by my mother. It’s actually fairly self-explanatory. You don’t want to grow-up (i.e. be responsible, have a job, get married, provide for the needs of a family, etc.) you’d rather act like a boy; to play and have fun. Live and exist in a self-serving, carefree...(for lack of a better word) Neverland. And if this was a true disease, then I suppose I have terminal case. I like the fact that when I come home from work or school, the first (and often only) thing on my mind is “what do I want to do?” I can take a nap, play some video games, go to the store, go skateboard around the block, or just simply nothing at all. Yeah, I guess it’s a bit selfish. In fact I’ve heard it said that the truest and most sincere happiness is felt in the service of others. But I like being in charge of just me and being sure that my needs are met. Besides, I can always guarantee myself a fun time.

“Why do you have to spoil everything? We have fun, don't we? I taught you to fly and to fight. What more could there be?”
“There is so much more.”

But the more I think about it, the more I realize the root of my behavior: I’m scared. Not terrified like the scantily-clad blonde girl in a Friday the 13th movie. Maybe more like Al Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon, a bank robber surrounded by cops and locked in a stalemate (except there’s no gay guy needing money for a sex change operation in my scenario). Trying to stall and have a bit of fun; prolonging the inevitable. All the while the pressure to make a decision grows and swells. It’s as if I feel like the safest action is non-action. Not regression, but stemming progression. The future is uncertain, it could be good or it could be bad. But as long as I can maintain the present things can’t get any worse. The Status Quo. And yet I find moments where the status quo is somewhat lacking to grasp my attentions. I tire of fighting pirates or hunting Indians; video games lose there luster and naps feel like I’m waiting for something. Admittedly these moments are brief, but they force me to think, to ponder.

“Surely you must have felt love once for something... or someone.”
“Never. Even the sound of it offends me.”

Yeah it offends me too. But probably it’s because I’m not in love. When you’re not in love or don’t have a significant other, you become annoyed with the romances of others; most especially when they conflict with your fun and games. I have a roommate who just started dating this girl. He spends an inordinate amount of time with her. The other night he said that he was just going over to her place for an hour and he’d be back to play HALO. Nearly 5 hours later, I went to bed and he still wasn’t home. Not that I’m even jealous, I just can’t understand. I can’t understand why anyone wouldn’t want to fight pirates with me, why anyone would leave me and Neverland. But maybe that’s what it takes to make you leave Neverland. You have to find love. You have to care about someone so much that being with them is fun, caring for them makes you happy. Peter Pan stayed in Neverland until he found the right girl. He didn’t leave Neverland, because it was “about time” or he “needed to,” Peter stayed in Neverland until he found his reason to leave.

You can’t leave Neverland out of obligation or you’ll never feel satisfied or happy. You only leave Neverland when you found somewhere better…someone better, your Wendy.

Oh... Peter's found himself a... Wendy. And Hook is all alone.

“...You say so, Peter, but I think it is your biggest pretend.”