Life is Beautiful

On a rare occasion I will stumble across a movie that shakes me to my core.  I saw such a movie just last night, “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”.  It was not the silly notion that a person could be born old and then actually grow younger throughout their lifespan.  Rather it was the intimate viewing of a person’s life, the changes one goes through.  It was as though I was seeing a reflection of my own life displayed on the silver screen. 

 

Although the movie was nearly three hours long I could have watched it again, if it were not already late into the night and 4:30 in the morning comes early.   I love the fact that we got to see each part of Benjamin’s life.  To tell you the truth I almost felt ashamed of myself, as if I was prying into every nook and cranny of his life.  As the onlooker we saw his adventures that he embarked on, the women of his life, the one true love that he always longed for, and we got to see the ordinary everyday things in life that help define who we are. 

 

I love the scene where Daisy, Benjamin’s one true love comes back to New Orleans from New York to see him and they are at a gazebo, and Benjamin says, “even the opportunities we do not take change and alter our lives forever”. That statement is so true as I look back at all the opportunities in my own life that I did not take a chance on.  Some were good ones and some were bad ones.  But what would have happened if I took just one of them, would I be where I am today or would life have taken a totally different direction?  It is almost too scary to think about that the everyday decisions I make can change the outcome of my life forever. 

 

I also like the idea that the movie portrayed the fact that the people in our life can make a huge impact on us, more so than we probably realize.  There’s a theme throughout the movie of being unsettled and restless in life.  Wanting adventure and going anywhere and doing anything to find it, but no matter how hard we search for this adventure – we always find ourselves wanting to go back home to get re-centered. This is true for me anyway. 

 

I think the reason why I like this movie so much is because I see a lot of myself in Benjamin. One being that he is a dreamer and the other he is a romantic at heart.  I just hope that as I get close to the end of my life I will look back and think that I loved well, that I raised my kids well, that I made the best of my opportunities, that I got to live life a little dangerously and recklessly, and finally that I made the most out of the life that I was given.