Poston Prattle

the flyers

I decided to go by the board where anoopa and i posted the 'kidney donor wanted' signs. After around three months, they were still up, right where anoopa had jumped to poke the board. Part of me wanted to leave them...a constant reminder of that evening, and her kidney, and the other part didn't want them to be thrown away. So, i took them done, as a memory...and a donor is no longer needed.

A memorial service for her is at Emory today. I think it will be good for all of us to have some closure.

Anoopa

I miss my friend....
Several months ago Anoopa and i were heading to a Hunger charity dinner, posting flyers on our way across campus. The flyer was requesting a kidney for her Aunt, mother of 2. We talked for a while about what family should do in situations like this and if Anoopa was going to be tested as a match. Never in our wildest dreams would we have thought that Anoopa herself would end up as the organ donor after a horrible accident. It seemed fitting though. I remember that conversation so very distinctly. She was nothing but a joy to have as a friend.

Background from Uttama, her sister:
Many people have written requesting information about what happened to Anoopa, since previously there was no mention of the car accident. Anoopa was in a car accident in rural Alabama on March 5, 2005. She had been at a conference organized by Physicians for Human Rights at the University of Alabama at Birmingham with fellow Emory student and friend Jed Stevenson. They were on a two-lane highway when a car coming from the other direction pulled into their lane. They collided, with the impact at the drivers side corner of Anoopas car; Anoopa was driving. She was cut out of the car and flown to UAB Birmingham Hospital with major injuries to her brain, lungs, and her left leg. She hung on in a coma for nearly nine days, some of those days showing slight improvement in the condition of her lungs. She gave us a little time to say goodbye, and she kept the uninjured parts of her body strong and healthy for organ donations. The damage to her brain was severe, and she passed away in the evening of March 14, 2005. She would be proud to know many of her organs were transplanted to people in need, and she would be grateful that Jed is recovering well from a broken rib and broken finger.

belated thoughts

‘Before sunset’ definitely redeemed ‘before sunrise’, and yes, explained a lot about the first movie. It did seem more realistic and contained a lot more believable chemistry. Overall, i walked away enjoying the couple’s relationship, tainted with a picture of Delpy singing with her puffed up lips. But I did feel like the movie will die with the times. I felt that Richard Linklater created a generational piece that will only last in minds of its kicking-against-the-goad, philosophic, young followers. He pulled them in during their young adult years with philosophic jargon and thought provoking (yet overzealous) conversations on life, death, and our purpose...exactly how we were all feeling. Now, that generation has grown more jaded and rough around the edges from experience, no longer contemplating the purpose of life, but rather just trying to kind joy in it. They wish for the ignorance they had when they were younger, but now having knowledge, they know they can never return to those times. Despite their getting married, running from person to person to test the waters, and all other attempts to find companionship and purpose, they are still just as empty and discontented as ever. Richard Linklater, alone, stayed faithful to his ‘Before-Whatever-Heads’ during their years of need, 9 years later giving them a nostalgic taste for what they are wanting and lacking. I was also drawn in by the comfort Jesse (Ethon Hawke) and Celine (Julie Delpy) found together, abandoning his spouse and her world-activist job, in which neither found comfort. They had a companion now, a friend. And although this appealed to me, it seems just a bit too trite, just as did the first movie. Nine years from now his followers will be need another pick-me-up, others-feel-the-same-way fix. Maybe I was never captivated by the first movie. Maybe I was too young for ‘before sunrise’ and again too young for ‘before sunset’. Maybe I am still too jaded and not yet trying to hold onto the nostalgia, as Linklater knows his fans so vehemently long for.