Exodus 8:2

There was a vintage globe.
There was a hand carved Pacific Northwest totem pole, and a bottle of Mezcal.

I remember walking into his apartment. Each time was like the first.

He had a wall of black milk crates filled with maps, postcards, travel books, itineraries, and atlases. Over the couch there was an antique map of Greece in a gilded frame. Stuck in it's corner was postcard with a souvenir tourista map of Minnesota.

He was the kind of guy that goes. He doesn't just talk about it. He does it. He goes.
He sees it for himself.
He knows.

"Why do you want my opinion of this? Why not just ask your editor?" I remember sitting on the floor holding his pages, holding his Words in my hands.

He had a beautiful jawline, not too far removed from the big bad wolf. He had beautiful eyes. The kind that see you. The kind that see the world. He said, "Because your opinion matters to me."

"Me? Why?" I'm looking at the pages, I'm looking at the Words.

"Because of last week."

I think about that. "We went to see Magnolia last week."

"Yeah. And you got it." He sits down on the floor beside me. "You haven't shut up about it since. You keep discovering it. You've gone back every night to see it again and again." He gestures to the box of papers, to the story it took him the better part of 8 years to create. To write, the way we all dream about writing. "Just take it with you. I'll be back in the States next year. Keep it for me. Tell me then. Tell me what you think."

He's someone that goes.

There are moments when you realize you're a victim of society. Of the public masses. Of their limits and their downfalls. And then there are moments when you see, clearly, it is society that is the victim.

That night we talked about what defines us. And what we see. We talked about what makes his view only his, all his own, and no one else's. We talked about postcards and weird beer, and music. And Mezcal. And places not speculated, but actually seen.

I remember his apartment, and his maps, and his Words.
I remember his postcards.
I remember the moment.

He grinned. "You really got it."

He came back even better. He came back with even more. But I didn't like the beard. We were in a little bar just us, just talking. We were in a little bar, but nothing was little. He was holding my notes. He was holding them with more than his hands. "Very, you really got my story. You really did."

I hate to break the moment, but I do. I was asked. "I don't know how many people will, though." I think this might have mattered to me back then. I think it was there, on my plate, in my mind. I think this is the moment I learned.

He is smiling. "Will what?"

"Will get it. It's far, far beyond the comprehension of most people." I'm sipping a Mickey's Big Mouth. I drank weird beer when I was with him. He made me want to taste new things.

"And so was Magnolia." It had become the threshold. It has become the masterpiece by which all minds would be measured.

Why, in the world, would anyone ever strive to write anything less.

I can't argue with that.

I want to say it was 2001. I want to say it was early. I want to say it was just starting to rain, but maybe I only want it to be a rainy day, in homage. I want to say a lot of things. I remember that bar, and his old apartment, and antique Greece, and the moment. I remember thinking:
How strong of you, to be you.
To be as smart as you are.
And not to concern yourself with those that can not follow.
To know, without doubt.
This, surely, is what it is to be truly free.



"And so it goes,
And so it goes.
And the book says, we may be through with the past,
But the past ain't through with us."
- Magnolia
Paul Thomas Anderson:
Writer, Director, Producer, Genius

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