So now I’m thinking I might not move. I might just renew my lease for another year.

I have this idea that life would be better if I lived in Manhattan or Brooklyn or something. Meanwhile, right now I have a great apartment, not much noise, lots of space, my own washer and dryer, rent’s not too bad for the great place I have, I’m closer to most parts of Manhattan I like to visit than I’d be if I lived on the Upper East Side, which seems to be the only neighborhood I can afford without a roommate, according to Craigslist. (I live here, give or take a few blocks.) My commute to work’s not too bad.

But it would be one more year of the goddamn PATH train, and I know once the weather turned warm again I’d regret having renewed my lease.

I just wish I were making enough money to live in Manhattan in a decent enough place.

Maybe in joining this chorus, my social life will improve. Maybe it wouldn’t automatically improve if I moved to Manhattan. Maybe I can somehow (how? I have no idea) meet people in Jersey City.

Maybe after living there three years I can stick it out one more year, and then next fall when my commitment to my job is up, I can get something that pays more, and I can move.

Ugh. I have no idea what I’m going to do. My landlord left a phone message a few days ago and asked if I’m planning to renew.

What do you do when both choices are kinda sucky?

OK — I take back what I said here about not being thrilled with Peter Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” movies.

I bought “The Two Towers” on DVD last Tuesday, and I’ve been back on a LOTR kick ever since. I’ve watched it, I’ve watched some of the special features, and so forth. Finally, last night — really needing an escape — I decided to sit down and watch the entire 3 1/2-hour extended DVD version of “The Fellowship of the Ring” in one viewing. I’d seen the original twice in the theater; and I’d watched the extended DVD version before, but never in one sitting. So at 8:30 last night I sat down, turned off the lights, and began at the beginning. I took a 30-second pee break, and then another quick break to switch to the second DVD as fast as possible. Other than that, I didn’t pause the movie, I didn’t go back and listen to certain bits of dialogue over again or watch certain shots again. I just let the whole thing roll, so I could get as close to the moviegoing experience as possible. I really watched it, really listened, really paid attention. I finished just after midnight.

My God, what a beautiful, beautiful movie. It’s really baroque, or even rococo, in its scope; actually, a better word would be decadent. It’s longer, more elaborate, more detailed and more dramatic than any movie has a right to be. And that’s OK, because “The Lord of the Rings” deserves that.

The movie is so long. How long is it? It’s so long that when Boromir, Legolas and Gimli first arrive at Rivendell and jump off their steeds, it feels jarring, because for at least an hour and a half you’ve become absorbed in the story of the four hobbits, and you feel like you’ve already watched an entire movie, and then these new characters appear, and (if you’re familiar with the books) you realize you haven’t even gotten into the meat of the story yet! You’ve still got almost two hours to go. And yet the movie is so long that by the end, these “new arrivals” have become your dear friends.

Howard Shore’s music — gorgeous. There are some moments that always get to me. For some reason, the music that moves me the most is the slow, sad, majestic melody that is heard when the Fellowship walks through the enormous halls of the Dwarrowdelf in Moria, built for a civilization that no longer exists. The music has history and age and mournfulness. Gets me every time.

I’ve always loved the last 20 minutes or so of the film, with the death of Boromir and the breaking of the Fellowship. But you only get the full emotional payoff if you’ve been sitting there for three hours already, absorbed in the adventure and drama and combat. Finally it ends, quietly and poignantly, with Frodo and Sam slowly hiking down the Emyn Muil, and our 3-1/2-hour adventure is over. We fade to black and the credits roll.

Fellowship has always been my favorite of the three books; similarly, I like the first movie more than the second. And I’ve realized that watching this movie in one viewing is one of the most effective escapes there is. It really is a world.

I can’t wait until I have all three extended films on DVD and I can sit there and lose myself in Middle-Earth for more than 11 hours. Guess I’ll have to wait until November 2004 for that, though.
—–

I stayed at my parents’ house last night. My parents were away for the weekend.

I went for long walks along the residential streets of my hometown. I walked past the beautiful old houses that filmmakers love so much. I thought a lot. I wandered into the past, the future, the present. Yes, I wandered into the present.

Everyone’s alone — even the person with the most friends is born alone, dies alone, showers alone, commutes to work alone, dreams alone. We’re all alone.

My goal in moving is to live in a neighborhood where I have friends. Or at least a neighborhood where I can find friends. So I’m beginning to think about Brooklyn again, as opposed to Manhattan. I don’t know.

Brooklyn: longer commute to work, the F train, a pain to get to Manhattan, not as much life as Manhattan. But it has its own gay bars, and cool gay people, and Prospect Park, and Seventh Avenue, and Smith Street, and better apartments.

Manhattan: a shorter commute than from Brooklyn (depending on the neighborhood, anyway); closer to things. But, smaller apartments, perhaps noisier, perhaps too big and anonymous.

I can’t decide. So I’m going to look for apartments in Manhattan and Brooklyn until I find one I like.

I want to be around people, but also have my own private quiet space when I want that. I want to live in an apartment building where all my friends live in different apartments. Or I want to live in a big old house with them. We’d cook together. We wouldn’t watch much TV, but we could if we wanted to. We’d play cards and read and listen to music and talk.

Sometimes I just want to be a kid again — I want to have a life where I knew what the future was going to bring, where someone else cooked my dinner, where I didn’t have to worry about making enough money or paying debts, where I could play with my toys or just read, where I could sit in the back seat on car trips.

Sometimes I just want to get away from people. And sometimes I really miss having people around.

I wander into the past, the future, the present.