Groundhog Day Rant

My brother Sam was watching Groundhog Day last night, so I watched a bit of it with him. Fun movie, I’m a big fan. The only thing I don’t like about that movie is Rita. Last night I finally realized what it was about her that I don’t like… she’s so completely normal it's nauseating. Why would anyone fall in love with someone so dull and boring? You think after Bill Murray has gotten to know everyone in the whole town he would have found someone with more life to them. I mean, the most interesting thing about her is that she studied French poetry!!!! And why would anyone ever want to study that?

Then one night while Rita is falling asleep cuddled up to him, this is what he whispers to her-  “I think you're the kindest, sweetest, prettiest, most wonderful girl I ever met in my life.” Really?! Come on! Is that all he’s got? Is that all she has going for her? After getting to know her day after day after day locked in an eternal time loop this is what he has dug up?… she’s  KIND and SWEET?!!!? Bleh! This makes my stomach knot up just thinking about it. Is that all guys want? Sweet? Kind? Pretty? If the answer is yes, then I will die alone in my parents’ basement with my cat.

Maybe this irks me because I have never had a goal ever in my life to be kind or sweet.  I’m just not that kind of girl. I hate sweet people, and sweet voices… they make me think violent thoughts and say vulgar jokes. To me these should be freebies anyway... shouldn’t we all be kind and sweet? Isn’t that our human nature? Even perverts and psycho paths can be kind. Sure, I’m grateful for kindness. Kindness is a terrific thing to value. But let’s face it, on the value scale - that one seems like the one most easily cultivated.

Give me diligence, integrity, virtue!!! Those are values worth complementing!!! Those are attributes worth aspiring to!!! But also spontaneity, creativity, optimism!!! Give me someone who has more to do on their lunch breaks than go home and take a nap! Or someone who has more to say about themselves than “I like to vacuum”.  Or someone who has just moved to Hawaii, and you ask them how it is, and all they say is “well, we still haven’t found a house, so we’re still living in a hotel” instead of “oh my gosh, I love my life, I live in Hawaii!” Or someone, like Rita (bless her boring heart), who aspires to have romance, a terrific husband, and a family of her own one day, but quit studying French poetry to work at a crappy tv station, and now is just a 30-yr-old fluff brain who has nothing interesting to say. These are real examples here, people, REAL.

Where is the passion? Where is the ambition? Where is the curiosity?

Example: You know when you’re asking for information about someone and they say “oh, she/he is really nice”? That makes me never want to meet that person ever. If that is the first thing that is on the list that describes you, you may need to make a complete life make-over.

If I am ever cuddled up with someone and all they have to say to me is “Whitney, you are just so sweet and kind”, I would punch him in his one-dimensional brain! I can’t imagine anything more ridiculous. And I would have to be a sweet kind soul to have spent any time with a guy who’s only looking for that! I hope that after an eternity trapped in one day that someone wouldn’t settle on just some boring Rita. They would want someone with a little more depth and excitement.

But maybe people don’t want depth. I do. The list I have for my future husband is more than just good and handsome. And I want the person I end up with to have a little more on their list for me to live up to than being kind and pretty.

So, yes, perhaps I will die alone in my parents’ basement with my cat. But I will have more on my shelf than a couple books of old French poetry. Sick.