_Rent_ original play written by Jonathan Larson, musical movie directed by Chris Colombus

"Forget regret or life is yours to miss"
"No day but today"
"Another day"
"520,600 minutes"
the songs that add up to give us another "carpe diem" theme... why do we only think about seizing the day, when we're faced with death? (aside from the fact that the movie's themes were good and worth thinking about, but that the movie as a whole was not a very good movie)

The movie made me cry... I think I started crying within twenty or thirty minutes of the film's beginning and kept crying until about an hour afterwards...

I remember standing up in front of a crowd and giving an impassioned plea for not pulling AZT, the psychological hope that it gave him and our friends was so important. At the time, back in 1992, we didn't know that AZT may have killed him faster. Maybe I would have responded differently had I known, but Bob's life was still really so precious. He cared so much about people. His love for other people was so great. I didn't know until later that all the bruises were something else -I just thought he was clumsy. At first he just thought he was clumsy, too. I remember the way we made our gifts each year... how I would search out the perfect and largest apples and he would find the perfect candycane. We made a point not to get things that were expensive or flashy and made a pont to take the time to talk about our lives. What I hoped to be someday.. and his asking me never to forget him. As if I could? I miss you, Robert. I wish you could see who I am now. How I've failed and how I've succeeded... you were so good at just loving without any expectations. My successes made you smile. Your gentleness and your stories made me happy. I found safety for a tiny moment there. When he shared the news I remember being devastated, but thinking he won't he can't die and then slowly struggling along with it a I realized he got weaker and weaker and I had to accept that he would die. That I couldn't ignore it and make it all go away. I lost one of my favorite people to AIDS on February 14, 1995.

I thought about my Angel, so like Mimi. I remembered how Angel strugggled with living and dying. She let people use her body like an object, because she never believed in her self-worth. Years of self-hate beaten into her head. How she struggled not to give into the druggies pushing and taunting. How she wanted to belog, to be loved, to fit in, and how she never could or would, because that was the lot life dealt her. Angel went from abusive boyfriend to abusive boyfriend occasionally being rescued by well-intentioned guy friends some of whom simply ended up using her, too. A few notable fellows who stayed above all that... at what sacrifice I can only imagine. I remember how she'd cry so easily and how she thought she was so broken she could never be fixed. The day she told me that she wished she could live her life over again and make different choices. The day she thought M. would somehow be her rescuer and how when he left her, she collapsed. So I cried for Angel, too -- the Angel in the movie and the Angel in my life. I remmeber how I dreamed because of Angel about opening a school where I could teach girls how to really know their self-worth how to struggle and work to love themselves in a disciplined and compassionate way and how to meet unconditional love in their lives. I wanted to teach the boys that the world requires respect and dignity. I dreamed of helping to make the world a place where Angel could have lived happily. Angel disappeared on NOvember 18, 1994. Sometimes in random places and at random times, I look up and I think I see her.

I thought of that band of friends and missed my cadre. I missed my previous life's band. The joys of how we lived and were are still so precious to me. Each day I remember that life is so precious we have to live for today. When I speak to people who speak like they live for tomorrow, I am sad, because I want to know what happens if tomorrow their loved ones are gone? In my mind, I say, "You. Did they know how much you loved them? Did you know what they meant to you?" When I say live as if this is your last, I don't mean shirk your responsibilities. I mean remember that people are so precious and our time with them is limited. When you speak with them, give deeply of yourself and be really there with them in your heart. TReasure them as if they might be gone tomorrow.

The clock ticks...
...
but "the bell tolls for thee..."

Life is too short to spend angry and remorseful. When our friends die we don't eulogize their Nobel Prizes or their Tony awards, we eulogize the human being, the love, the life, the warmth, the uniqueness, the laughter, the sense of humor, the character that they were. I would rather buy you a copy of _A Grief Observed_ then take you to see this movie, except I'd like to show you Mimi and Angel in the movie. How they were like people I have loved in my life and how they tap into soemthing I miss very very keenly even still today.