As I contemplate Sundays past, I am reminded that Sunday should be a spiritually focused day--a day of calming, uplifting music, meditation and time spent reflecting. I have forgotten this day of spiritual recharge in the past few years. No matter your spiritual development or belief, I think it is essential to take time at least once a week to escape the confines of everyday life and break out of the day to day to contemplate the who am I and what am I doing here question--those times that you realize all of the contrivances of our lives and you wonder who and what you really are--pondering those questions that not even religion have seemed to really satisfy over the years. Religion has given an explanation but not a visceral answer to the fundamental question and wondering.


The most important parts of my life: my family, my mind, my thoughts and my preferred literature seem to regain their proper place in perspective when I have broken out of the humdrum. It seems to be easiest to make that break when a Sunday is devoted to spiritual matters, and service to one's fellow beings. I think it important that one serve selflessly from time to time--it is one of the most satisfying acts one can accomplish.

Drew and I watched Stardust last night. It was a refreshingly different movie from the norm. The story was relatively unique, it was lighthearted, didn't take itself too seriously and had some funny moments. The special effects and sets were spectacular, though it seems as though The Lord of the Rings set a bit of a precedence for the fantasy genre, ie if you want to produce a fantasy movie, it should be shot in New Zealand. Not to blame them, the countryside is beautiful, but it seemed a bit of a copy-cat move.

That brings me to a thought I had today whilst standing around. I find it interesting that. . . someone, I don't know if it was the Screen Actors Guild, or whom, decided it would be better to remove gender from the title of a performer. Everyone now is an actor whether male or female--used to be males were actors and females actresses. Seems a bit of a quiet change that took place sometime in the past 10 years. I'm sure it was made for "sexist" reasons--equal treatment and all of that nonsense. Interestingly enough though, for all of the awards shows, they still make the distinction. Egotistical actors can't pass up the opportunity to receive even more awards. It seems if they were concerned with equal treatment, they would be doing away with the gender distinctions in the Academy as well.

I'm reading a bit of Nabokov right now. What an interesting writer. It always seems to me that he has more going on beneath the surface than what he initially gives away, though he insists, in an essay I read by him, that he doesn't believe literature should be didactic in its purpose, it should exist for the beauty of it. I don't have the patience or the desire right now to pursue those phantoms beneath the surface that he toyingly reveals at points. He is definitely a talented writer and it amazes me that English is an adopted language for him (he constantly laments that English doesn't have the "plastic" flow that Russian does).