Obselidia Page #2

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How did you find me?

-Phone book.

I mean, I hope you don't

mind, but you did say that--

-Yeah, yeah.

It's, uh, I thought you

were-- phone book, huh?

Well, I thought I was one

of the only people who

still used phone books.

-Well, phone book

online, but you know.

-Yeah.

-Is this a bad time for you?

-No.

-So could I come in?

-Sure.

Yeah.

-Wow, this place is cool.

It's like a museum in here.

-Everything old and forgotten.

-It's-- would you

like a cup of tea?

SOPHIE:
That'd be lovely.

-Um, Earl Grey?

-That's my favorite.

-Uh, milk, sugar?

SOPHIE:
You still use this?

GEORGE:
What's that?

SOPHIE:
The typewriter.

GEORGE:
Sure, it

works perfectly.

-Yeah, but wouldn't it just be

easier to switch to a computer?

GEORGE:
Into a computer.

It's political.

So what can I do for you?

-I'm interested in

your "Obselidia."

-My "Obselidia"?

SOPHIE:
Your encyclopedia.

Yeah, I decided you should

call it the "Obselidia."

O-B-S-E-L-I-D-I-A.

-Shouldn't it be

O-B-S-O, technically?

SOPHIE:
Yeah, I

know how to spell.

It just kind of looks

better with an E.

And you should definitely

put it online, believe me.

So did you interview

any fishermen yet?

-Uh, fishermen?

-Well, there's practically

no fish left, so.

What about Lonesome George?

-Uh, who's Lonesome George?

-You never heard

of Lonesome George.

Well, Lonesome George

is quite likely

the last giant turtle

of the Galapagos.

He's like 75 years old

now and he'll probably

last another 100 years,

completely alone.

-Wow.

Is that true?

[kettle whistling]

-I think that's the water.

-Yes.

-So I'm going to this

museum this afternoon,

and I wondered if

you wanted to come.

-Which one?

-The Museum of

Jurassic Technology.

Do you know it?

GEORGE:
Jurassic Technology?

That's ridiculous.

-Yes, it's kind

of a weird place.

-So is it a hoax?

-I'm not sure, exactly.

-I'm kind of busy

this afternoon.

-Reading about the

end of the world?

-I have to post a letter.

-You still use snail mail.

-I don't think Mr.

Fordham has an email.

-The author of the book?

So we can post it on the way.

Come on, it'll be fun.

My car or yours?

[music playing]

[bells tinkling]

-Wow, they're beautiful.

-I think that's a

Delias eucharis.

-I always wanted

to be able to fly.

-Hm.

-"Telling the Bees.

If a member of the family

dies, the bees in their hives

must be told, or they will die.

The procedure is that as soon

as the master has breathed his

last, a member of the

household must visit the hives

and whisper three times, 'Little

brownies, little brownies,

your master is dead.'"

-Hm.

SOPHIE:
They look so real.

I'd love to live

in one of those.

GEORGE:
I prefer the

feeling of permanence

a real home gives you.

SOPHIE:
But what about freedom?

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING): In his

three-volume book, "Obliscence,

Theories of Forgetting, and

the Problem of Matter"--

-Can you hear anything?

NARRATOR (ON

RECORDING):
Sonnabend

departed from previous memory

research with the premise

that memory is an illusion.

-Mine doesn't work.

SOPHIE:
Share mine.

NARRATOR (ON

RECORDING):
Experience.

From this perspective,

we, amnesiacs all,

condemned to live in an

eternally fleeting present,

have created the most elaborate

of human constructions--

memory-- to buffer ourselves

against the intolerable--

-Do you understand this?

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING): Of the

irreversible passage of time.

-Mm-hm.

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING):

And the irretrievability

of its movements and events.

Sonnabend did not--

-Do you think it's true?

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING):

Deny the experience of memory

existed.

-What?

-That it's forgetting

that saves us?

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING):

Was predicated

on the idea that

what we experience--

-I don't think that's

what he's saying.

-But do you?

Do you think

forgetting saves us?

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING):

Artifical constructions

of our own design, built

around sterile particles--

-No.

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING):

Of retained experience.

-I think if we forget

everything, we lose who we are.

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING): By

infusions of imagination.

-Don't you?

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING):

As the blacks

and whites of old photographs.

-I think I prefer to forget.

NARRATOR (ON RECORDING):

By the addition

of color or tints in an attempt

to add life to a frozen moment.

-I have to admit,

that was amazing.

Though you do realize,

most of it was made up?

--[gasp] Can't believe

you said that.

-No, it's true.

I mean, there is no

Geoffrey Sonnabend.

I would know.

-Why, do you know everything?

-No.

It's just-- well, let's see.

There's a Sonnu,

Sonya, Sonnek-- Oscar.

He was a jazz musician.

-What's that got to

do with anything?

-Well, they're just entries

in the encyclopedia.

And if there was a

Geoffrey Sonnabend,

he would come after them.

But he doesn't.

I think it's Sonnenfels.

Josef von Sonnenfels.

-Wait, you're

telling me that you

remember entire encyclopedias?

-No.

Just bits, hey?

I like to learn them.

-Why?

-Well, for fun.

I've always done it,

since I was a kid.

It's-- It's like a memory game.

-Did your parents

make you do it?

-No.

-Didn't get on with them, huh?

-Oh, I can't complain.

My mother died when

I was young, but--

-Oh, I'm sorry.

-Would you like that tea now?

[laughs]

-So have you always been

obsessed with old things?

-It's not old things.

I just don't understand why

people throw things away

that still work perfectly

well, just because they've

been superseded

by something new.

I mean, there's this common

illusion that new things make

our lives easier and

better, and they don't.

Not necessarily.

-So why do you use that

shitty old video camera?

-Because it costs

$50 and it works.

Now, with new things becoming

old in a matter of months, not

years, I just want to

slow things down a bit.

SOPHIE:
Oh, that's a

bit nostalgic, isn't it?

-Well, you-- I even

experience nostalgia

with things in the present.

I mean, because I know

that-- that these things will

become forgotten, really soon.

Can it-- can it be

nostalgia in the present?

-Maybe it's now-stalgia.

-Now-stalgia?

-Yeah.

Now-stalgia.

You know, that feeling

that everything that is

is gonna end.

-Well, it is all going to end.

SOPHIE:
I remember I once

had this leather coat.

It was the most money that

I'd spent on anything,

and when I got it home, I

remember just looking at it

and feeling so sad, because

I knew it would never

be better than it

was in that moment.

In a few years' time, it

would be worn and shabby,

and it kind of broke my heart.

-The Sioux Indians

used to say nothing

should be made perfect, because

then you become attached to it

and it causes you pain.

So if you have something

pristine and new,

you should damage it slightly.

-Really?

-I don't think we ever

really experience perfection.

It's an illusion.

Like your coat--

I mean, the fact

that it was doomed

to become old,

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