i love how much time we spend just watching bella explore and experience lisbon - and the ship only a few scenes later - because i feel like films are rarely given that special space to breathe and merely exist these days. a lesser movie (and one with more studio interference) would’ve cut those scenes out because they “don’t explicitly move the plot forward” to give it a “tighter edit” and “faster pacing.” but when you leave scenes like these…

last february, i killed myself.

or, i should clarify, i killed a version of myself - the only version the world had ever known, because it was the version that i’d (successfully) sold as my “truth” for 22 years. but, in reality, while it looked like something was lost to others, my real “truth” was that this version never even existed in the first place. it was something i had conjured up and projected - and at times, had forced…