Life imitates art
When we first got cable in the early ‘80s, we had HBO, and they were showing the movie Somewhere In Time over and over. The movie starred Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour and came out in 1981, when I was 10. I loved the movie as a child, the romance, the tragedy, and it didn’t hurt that I had had a huge crush on Christopher Reeve since the first Superman movie came out in 1978, and had also been to Mackinac Island, where the bulk of the movie was filmed. I cannot count the number of times I’ve seen this film. I own it now, and watch it at least once a year. I consider it one of my favorite movies ever.
At the risk of being a spoiler (if you haven’t seen it in the last 25 years, I guess you’re probably not going to, and I can risk it), I’m going to talk about the ending. The story is that an aged Elise McKenna (Seymour) comes up to young playwright Richard Collier (Reeve) at the opening of his first play, hands him a pocketwatch, and says “come back to me.”
Surprised and nonplussed, he forgets all about her until a weekend jaunt out of town, when he is captivated by a picture of a young actress in the Hall of History at the hotel, and in researching her, realizes she was the very same old woman who’d given him the watch, and that she’d died the next day after they met. He does more research, and finds a way to go back in time, all the way back to 1912, to be with her. Despite many obstacles, they fall in love and are blissful together. Right up until the moment he reaches into his pocket and finds a 1976 penny, rocketing him back to the present. He is desperate to get back to his love, but cannot manage to recreate the time travel experience. He is distraught with grief and longing. Ultimately, he holes up in his hotel room, settles into a chair by the window, and stares out it at the lake. Days pass. He hasn’t moved, hasn’t eaten, hasn’t taken any water, and when the hotel finally notices that their guest hasn’t been out of his room and forces entry, he is all but gone, slipping away to be with his love while they wait for the paramedics. A smile spreads across his ashen face, and the scene fades to Richard’s reunion with Elise on the other side.
I have goose bumps just retelling it.
I always cried at the end of this movie. It was so sad; his love was so great that he couldn’t bear to go on without her. But it was just a movie. Right up until the moment I found out my sweetheart had died. It’s heavy with pathos and symbolism now. And while it seems I’m going to continue to live for the time being, and go on with my life, I understand Richard’s silent vigil at the window, willing himself free of the bonds of this world. I understand it perfectly, that desire to be with the one we love that supersedes even the desire to live. I never imagined I’d have such a personal understanding of that, never imagined I’d feel such hurt that I’d wish to die. But then, who imagines a fraction of what comes to pass in our lives? And even though I’m not in that head space now, (and I’m grateful for that), I do not forget it. When I remember the worst weeks, I feel this hollowness in my chest, this emptiness of soul crying out with an echo I think I’ll always be able to hear.
We were so happy, so good, so right together. It was so easy. I wish I could go back in time, and be with him again. I wish this had never happened, and we’d gone forward in time together. God, I miss him so much.