I’m not sure if you ever watched it, but if you haven’t, you HAVE to watch the Handmaids Tale on Hulu. It’s one of those shows that you can’t stop watching once you start. Every episode ends and you feel like you’re addicted to seeing what happens next. It’s not a light hearted show at all, but it’s one of those shows that makes you wonder and think how far fetched the ideas really are. Kind of like Black Mirror in a way (another must watch series).
That being said, my brother and I binged Handmaids Tale months ago and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since. I mentioned how I wanted to read the book that the show is based on at a family dinner and my cousin was like, “omg I have the book upstairs, I’ll grab it for you right now.” It was that serendipidous.
I started reading the book yesterday and it’s obviously as good as the show, if not better. Part of me wishes that I read the book first, but, unfortunately, I haven’t learned how to go back in time yet..
But, while I was reading yesterday, there was a section of the book that made me stop and think for a second. The main character was describing how much she missed making choices and decisions for herself. She missed her old life where she was able think, act, and decide literally anything for herself. But then a few pages later, when faced with a decision to make, she felt overwhelmed.
And then I started over thinking. Per usual.
Do we all contradict ourselves?
I don’t mean this in a negative or pessimistic way, but do we all change our minds and opinions so fluidly that we don’t even really have opinions? Ok, yeah, that sounds negative. But in a positive light, maybe we are always learning and always shifting our view so we can understand and see all perspectives?
Or maybe we just never really know what we want, but we warp the past to make it seem like it’s what we long for even if we’re really wishing for something else — maybe even the future even though we don’t know what it holds yet.
And you know what? It’s ok.
Life is all about fluidity and changing our minds and learning from the past and hoping for the future and sometimes hoping for the past. Is that possible? To hope for the past? Maybe even sometimes we hope for the past and when it presents itself again we disregard it and mistake it for something it' no longer is.
Now I’m just rambling, but long story short, watch and/or read The Handmaids Tale