Me and Breakfast at Tiffany's

Trapped in a flying metal tube, 10,000 of feet above the ground, there's a wonderful phenomenon: one cannot feel guilty about NOT being as productive as one could be, because you're trapped in a flying metal tube 10,000 feet above the ground. So sometimes one has the luxury of 6 uninterrupted hours in the middle of the day, where one can read a book in one, albeit forced, sitting.  Last week, I had the enormous pleasure of one-sitting, in-flight reading: "Fifth Avenue, 5:00 AM: Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and the Dawn of the Modern Woman." 

I highly recommend the book--interesting historical factoids about Truman Capote, the movie's production, the fashion and social trends at the time, and why the movie was so revolutionary. (Did you know that Audrey Hepburn hated danishes, and wanted to shoot that opening scene with an ice cream cone instead? But was convinced that ice cream isn't a very good Breakfast). 

While reading it, I thought the author's flowery and romanticizing language might have aggrandized the film a bit. But then I watched it for the first time in ten years. 

It was magic. t's stuck with me. No, more accurately, it's sticking on me. Like the residue of a peeled-off band aid, or glue. It's still on me. Like I just walked through a Breakfast-at-Tiffany's perfume cloud, and the scent is all around. I can't stop thinking about it. Something about it lingered, followed my memory, something about it... 
bothered me.. 

"Holly: You know the days when you get the mean reds?

Paul : The mean reds. You mean like the blues?
Holly: No. The blues are because you’re getting fat, and maybe it’s been raining too long. You’re just sad, that’s all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you’re afraid, and you don’t know what you’re afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling?"

absolutely.  

Holly Golightly is fabulous. She's feverishly independent. She's impulsive and careless. She's elegant and a complete mess. She feels so deeply, but can't really let anyone into those depths. Maybe one time she allowed that, but then one day realized a surface-level interaction is much more easily manipulated, and so she stayed there. 

Then it hit me. why I'm so bothered:

I am Holly Golightly. 

“Never love a wild thing...If you let yourself love a wild thing. You'll end up looking at the sky...

It's better to look at the sky than live there. Such an empty place; so vague. Just a country where the thunder goes and things disappear.” 

I am Holly Golightly. 
Oh dear. 

Paul shouts to her in frustration: 
"You call yourself a free spirit, a "wild thing," and you're terrified somebody's gonna stick you in a cage. Well baby, you're already in that cage. You built it yourself... It's wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself.” 

But the people who have had the guts to call me out,  have not stayed around in my life to see if anything changes. That's because I usually didn't want them to (for other reasons). But still. Starting over again on a frequent basis can lead to a lack of identity. Which Holly has. So afraid to be tied down to anything, even her own identity. 

That heartbreaking moment at the end, when she shoves Cat into the rain, you could replace her name: 

"I'm not Holly. I'm not [Averill], either. I don't know who I am! I'm like cat here, a couple of no-name slobs. We belong to nobody and nobody belongs to us. We don't even belong to each other." 

I am Holly Golightly.

But I think we're all a little bit Holly Golightly. 

Trying to charm our way to any sort of stability because there's no rules or maps as to how to get there any other way. 
Internally, we're afraid, 
and reckless
and sexy
and confident 
and terrified
and chaotic
and passionate 
and careless
and all of those things together.



We're sorting all of the fractured elements of one of iconic literary figures within ourselves. 

I guess maybe I'm waiting for my dramatic scene in the rain where true belonging feels possible. 

                 Or maybe I should get a cat.