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Entry tags:
Once Upon a Time / Loving Clark
As many of you know, Julia Ormond is one of my favorite actresses. She isn't brilliant, but I love the way she combines delicacy with strength, and intelligence with passion. Plus, she looks like me if I were to achieve my ideal body.
The original Sabrina (with Audrey Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart) is a sweet movie, but Ormond's version hits very close to home for me. Young Sabrina, with her long brown hair and glasses, gazing wistfully at the unattainable object of her crush, reminds me very much of myself in junior high and high school. I was never as slim or beautiful as Julia, but this image of her (see icon) reminds me of what it was like to be a teenager.
She is looking down on a formal party given by the Larrabees, who employ her father as a chauffeur. She and her father live in an apartment above the garage, and Sabrina has a hopeless crush on David, the younger Larrabee brother, who is several years older than she is and a playboy. She gazes into their world, and it's not the money she wants, it's David's love.
When I was in the seventh grade, I was hopelessly in love with Clark, a high school senior who was the helper for my church youth group. Everyone loved Clark: he was a very special person, genuinely loving and open, respected by other young people as well as adults, a fine musician and an athlete, and the best example of a "Christian youth" I have ever known: his faith was real and meaningful, but not stuffy. I was twelve, and I knew he would never see me as anything more than "a nice kid" -- but he was always sweet and kind to me. I would watch him at church, listen to the radio when his high school basketball games were on the air, and attend the concerts he played his violin in. Just to see him. I never hoped for anything but his notice when our paths crossed, but my life was brightened by his presence in it, and my love for him.
It was pure courtly love, and although I didn't realize it at the time, it taught me that loving was very often sufficient unto itself. To love someone unattainable might be poignant sometimes, but it was not necessarily tragic. Loving Clark was one of the best experiences of my girlhood.
The original Sabrina (with Audrey Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart) is a sweet movie, but Ormond's version hits very close to home for me. Young Sabrina, with her long brown hair and glasses, gazing wistfully at the unattainable object of her crush, reminds me very much of myself in junior high and high school. I was never as slim or beautiful as Julia, but this image of her (see icon) reminds me of what it was like to be a teenager.
She is looking down on a formal party given by the Larrabees, who employ her father as a chauffeur. She and her father live in an apartment above the garage, and Sabrina has a hopeless crush on David, the younger Larrabee brother, who is several years older than she is and a playboy. She gazes into their world, and it's not the money she wants, it's David's love.
When I was in the seventh grade, I was hopelessly in love with Clark, a high school senior who was the helper for my church youth group. Everyone loved Clark: he was a very special person, genuinely loving and open, respected by other young people as well as adults, a fine musician and an athlete, and the best example of a "Christian youth" I have ever known: his faith was real and meaningful, but not stuffy. I was twelve, and I knew he would never see me as anything more than "a nice kid" -- but he was always sweet and kind to me. I would watch him at church, listen to the radio when his high school basketball games were on the air, and attend the concerts he played his violin in. Just to see him. I never hoped for anything but his notice when our paths crossed, but my life was brightened by his presence in it, and my love for him.
It was pure courtly love, and although I didn't realize it at the time, it taught me that loving was very often sufficient unto itself. To love someone unattainable might be poignant sometimes, but it was not necessarily tragic. Loving Clark was one of the best experiences of my girlhood.