What the hell I was thinking?

Everyone dies. Not in the movie, in general. I love that—no spoilers, just facts. Some of us go sooner, some of us later, and the commentary in both films, although touching on the same subject, sits on opposite ends of the spectrum. Where in The Monkey , the horrific tone was softened by a positive message of nihilism, here we get the opposite of that reality—at least until the end. It’s all about when and how , which remains your choice for the most part. Like the choice Jodie Comer's Isla made when she gave up because of the pain and the even more painful fate that awaited her. Knowing the when and how can certainly shorten the trip for many of us, and here Isla chose the easy way out, given the knowledge she possessed. Speaking of knowledge, some of the commentary was right on point. The ones who survived were the happiest—yet also more prepared—and those who lacked skills met death sooner. Did you catch the fat guys? They were slow, and their deaths were some of the quickes...

I lived in many places, but my mind always remained the most dangerous one. As long as I spent time there, I was not safe. My biggest enemy is me, and the only person responsible for the situation in my life is living inside my head. My mind sabotaged every chance I was given until that point. I ruined relationships like there’s no tomorrow, abusing trust and money, only to transform my reality into something more comfortable to suit my fears. I was held back in the same spot for years, thinking I was living — pushing the truth so far down I forgot what it meant: freedom. But how does a person escape this ongoing cage of lies that was built over years? They were so comforting. And they were working — for a while. I built a support system out of them, staring into feelings that should have been ignored, while losing time on people who didn’t lose time on me, leaving behind people who actually meant something. Thinking is a huge problem. The mother of all problems. Yes, we use our m...

One of my biggest fears is still becoming the monster my father was when he abused alcohol and used my mother as a punching bag. One of my earliest memories is of me standing in the corridor on the first floor of our house, crying. I had just seen my father slap my mother with animalistic speed and aggression. I admit, my mother can be a handful — I know this now, especially when I talk with her. She has a special talent for getting on people’s nerves. But she never deserved the horror stories I came to learn once I was old enough to hear them. Her ribs were broken. Her jaw. She was kicked and punched in front of guests. Once the town understood what kind of "entertainment" my father offered to visitors, the visits from friends and family stopped. But his beatings didn’t. He only stopped when she left him. They're not divorced — so technically, I'm not a child of divorced parents. I'm a child of escape, of anger, and of shame. I first realized I might become like ...

Just by discussing The White Lotus Season 3, you reveal who you are — and I'm so glad I waited for the whole season to stream because I ate this story up. So far, this season — with the exception that Tanya is still my favorite character — has been my best viewing experience of the whole bundle. I never found it boring, because for me, the story didn't stretch across many weeks waiting for new episodes to drop. Instead, I was able to dive into it over just four days, and because of that, I appreciated it even more. The director really pulls something special here and gets away with his raw and tough social commentary by showing us the lives of mostly rich people — yet in the end, I was able to recognize myself in so many of them. I think people fail to see themselves in these characters because they're rich, but I'm both cursed and gifted with the clarity and awareness of who I am as a person and how multifaceted a human being can be. Because of that, I saw not only m...

Chapter 20: Still Day 11: I sped up so I could get to the Arch and sit there for a while, to think about my next move. It took longer than expected—some things appear closer than they actually are, especially my goals. Every time I saw a hut from afar, thinking it would take just a little while to get there, it turned out to be at least two hours. Or when I saw a sign saying the hut was 30 minutes away, I prepared for an hour. I have to be careful—sometimes, setting a longer time limit makes me unconsciously fill that time to the last second, when in reality, a faster way existed. It's one of life's games we have to learn to maneuver—where and how to place our time, and for what or who. I was getting lazier. At this point, it was clear that I didn’t want to follow the book’s suggestion and get to Dobrila Hut. There were two huts before that, and I was stopping at the first one possible. I just didn’t feel like walking more than this, so I checked where Eagle’s Nest Shelter was ...

Chapter 19: Still Day 11: I probably got a huge energy boost from that cake because, from here, I was on. The lack of shadow and greenery didn’t bother me; the path had this ease. I enjoyed it immensely and played some music. Because the surroundings didn’t suggest a storm or a bear, I dived into my musical trance. Many people appeared, going in the same direction I came from, with a tempo that almost annoyed me. Probably for the cake. It turned out that those two huts were not that hard to access from the closest towns. People just came by car to the Arch of Freedom, and from there, they hit the road to here, drank a beer, and kept on with their lives. I went in reverse. I kept on with my life, drank a beer, and hit the road to the Arch of Freedom. While listening to one of my favorite songs —one that quickly became an anthem to this day and memory—I was jumping up and down the path like a goat. As I was giving way to the poor families who seemed like they’d never been to a mountain b...