Poker Face

Although it’s only 9:00AM on Saturday morning, I just got done watching Good Will Hunting. This isn’t exactly the type of movie I normally watch. Usually I watch things that have action, or excitement, or suspense, or that I can label “cool.” This movie didn’t really fit into any of those.

Looking back on last night I can’t really remember why I grabbed it while I was at the video rental place.

I also grabbed Enemy At The Gates, which I’ve seen a few times before and even though I didn’t think it was spectacular I wanted to see it again. I dunno, I guess it’s like when a person gets a craving for a certain food even though it may not be their favorite.

Maybe I just grabbed Good Will Hunting because it was sitting in the same relative shelf area. I know it wasn’t because Ben Affleck is in it, because personally I think he’s a rather crappy actor.

But anyways, I woke up today and watched it since I had, and still have, nothing better to do. If you’ve seen the movie you know all about Will Hunting and who he is and the things he dealt with. In case you haven’t seen it, well, I’m not gonna tell you. Go get it yourself. Even though no one dies, there are no explosions, and not a single gun in the whole movie, I still think it’s worth the $5.00 to rent it.

The movie made me think about myself though. In many ways I think I’m similar to Will. There are lots of things in my past that still affect the way I am today, many in ways that shrinks would term as being “negative.” Although I’m a guy and have a natural inclination to come across as being okay all the time, I suppose if I’m brutally honest I have to say that most of the time it’s just a show. It’s a poker face so that no one knows what I’m holding.

I had a meeting with a mortgage banker on Wednesday and found out that I’m prequalified for up to $160,000 for a home loan. If I got something up in that ballpark I’d be paying around $1,100 a month, which I don’t really want to do. So I have to make a choice.

Choice number one, I could find a decent house and get a payment that’s over $1,000 a month, but try to find a roommate. The thought of shaking up with a stranger honestly doesn’t appeal to me at all. That means that I would have to get a roommate that I know, which is a bit of a problem itself since I honestly could count on one hand the number of single people that I know that would maybe need a place to stay. Even with a roommate though, I’d spend the much of the foreseeable future strapped for cash and holding on as hard as I can to make ends meet.

Choice number two, I could find a house that is less than the $160,000 that the bank said I could get. This is something that is rather difficult to do. I really don’t need a whole lot, I could deal with a little square with a bedroom or two, a bathroom, living room, kitchen, and laundry room. But the biggest catch to this option is trying to find something like this. I do think this is what I’m hoping to do, since this way I’ll have a bit more slack in my finances and I HATE not being able to do things I want or buy things I want. I lived most of my childhood like that and I’m really not willing to do it again.

Choice number three is t just say “Screw it” to the whole idea of a house and just get a cheap apartment. I would have much more money to work with than if I bought a house, so I could still get toys and entertainment and have money to do stuff whenever I want. But I wouldn’t get the tax breaks of owning a house, I’d have to worry about being quiet for the neighbors (which I’m not at all, between music, movies, and video games, I’m loud), I’d have to get a roll of quarters every week to do laundry and either sit there watching it, or hope that no one steals my clothes.

So that’s where I am and I really can’t decide. Like Will, I’m almost content to just stay in a semi-crappy situation just because this is where I am and it’s familiar.

When I do move out I’m going to find out how I deal with being alone.

I’ve lived alone for about a year after I first got out of treatment. Well, technically I had a roommate then, but he was only there for a total of about an hour a week, just long enough to wash clothes and stuff. He had kids who lived on the north side of Minneapolis (I lived on the south side) so he stayed with them.

Back then though I worked with the guys at the program. Every day I ran a 50+ man work crew, so I was around them all day. Back then I had a group of friends that I hung out with almost every night, although no matter what we were doing it usually turned into a Bible study or something, since I was into that back then. On the weekends I always came back home to hang out with the family, so I guess even though I was living alone I wasn’t really alone.

Fast forward to now. I drive a semi and spend most of my day alone in my truck. I ditched all my friends from high school when I disappeared off to treatment for 13 months, then I ditched all my Christian pals when I couldn’t pretend to be like them any more, and I really haven’t gone out looking for a new “group.” I’m living in my parent’s basement again with my brother, but when I move it’s going to be in order to get out of here so I won’t be spending weekends here. And Nate ships off to boot camp in July.

So I suppose I’ll get to see how I handle solitude.

I could go out and try to make friends, but where? Where do people hang out? Bars? Sports games? Movie theaters? Malls? Do I really want another “group” of friends that I may dump someday too since that seems to be my modus operandi?

I really don’t know. As I said though, even if Will Hunting and I have a few differences in details, I think we have lots of stuff in common. Even if he’s just a fictional character in a movie.

Perhaps that’s why I liked the movie, because even though it was just a character being played by Matt Damon, I could convince myself for at least 126 minutes that someone else was in my shoes.

Time will tell if I get hopeful ending that Will got.

*
“Down in a hole and I don’t know if I can be saved
See my heart I decorate it like a grave
You don’t understand who they thought I was supposed to be
Look at me now, I’m a man who won’t let himself be
*<
Down in a hole
Loosin my soul
Down in a hole
Loosin control
I’d like to fly
But my wings have been so denied.”
*
Alice In Chains