fraaan
@fraaan asked:

what was it like the first time you saw Arrival? is there a story there?

there isn't, but i'm happy to tell it anyway.


it was many exes ago, with a girl from my hometown that i dated for two years before we separated for college and couldn't make it work long distance. we met through mutual friends and she broke the ice by mentioning some radiohead lyrics i posted to instagram. she had just returned from iceland where she had visited to go see where interstellar was shot ot or something. she had already learned icelandic for kicks beforehand.

her dad was a mover and shaker at a high rise bank in orlando, and fortunately for us, also a movie buff with a nice setup. he had this curry sauce he bought from somewhere fancy that he used to make a really mean chicken curry, and we'd warm up naan and papadoms to have with it too. that's what we were probably having that night.

so we watch arrival, which she's already a fan of, and i think it's really cool. like, it was cool in the moment, but it's impact would be more of a slow burn as i later came to better appreciate just how subjective people's experiences in the world are.

our other favorite movie was annihilation, and as one of our little in-jokes that couples have, we would pantomime the scene from the end where the shapeshifter entity is mirroring the main character's movement. it's maybe the last memory from that time that i haven't been able to dispel that aching sense of loss from.


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