A Haunted House and An Octopus Romance.
Because all my articles shouldn’t be 25 minutes long.
I’ve just watched two great Netflix shows: the series The Haunting of Hill House and the documentary My Octopus Teacher.
And now I am going to spoil them for you, so if you haven’t seen either, and plan to, please stop reading.
*Spoilers Below**
Both shows really resonated with me as appropriate metaphors for two sides of the same coin.
I’m probably overthinking it (me? overthink?).
The Haunting of Hill House tells the story of a loving mother who is so terrified the outside world will cause her children pain, that she’s willing to kill them to keep them ‘safe’. By killing them within the haunted house she preserves them in the perfection of youth forever. They will never feel pain, age or die. But they will also never truly live. Fear of the unknown keeps her as an eternal prisoner.
My Octopus Teacher tells the real-life story of a photojournalist. Early in his career he works with master trackers in Africa and envies their profound connection to nature. After a personal crisis, he starts free diving, bare-skinned, in the cold, stormy seas off of the coast of his native South Africa. The freezing water forces a reconnection with his body and he slowly learns to love the sensation. He befriends the ‘alien’ intelligence of an octopus and spends months observing and learning from her. He directly experiences the complex interrelationships within the ocean ecosystem, as well as his own part in it. He also learns about vulnerability and death. The story ends with him deepening the connection with his son and the community around him.
It brought to mind a tweet I saw recently.
“Relax into the moment and let the universe do the driving. If there was a secret to happiness in life, I’d say that was it.” — Jed McKenna
I have decided I need more poetry in my life. A friend sent me this today, from David Whyte.
We shape our self to fit this world and by the world are shaped again.
The visible and the invisible working together in common cause, to produce the miraculous.
I am thinking of the way the intangible air traveled at speed round a shaped wing easily holds our weight.
So may we, in this life trust to those elements we have yet to see or imagine, and look for the true shape of our own self, by forming it well to the great intangibles about us.
Have a great day.
For more needless dissections of light entertainment, follow me @tomowenmorgan on Twitter.
