Nature Walk 12/30/10

Lincoln Park, Seattle WA. 2:36 pm

clear blue sky

windy

freezing cold

Beautiful mountains, I can see them so well that it seems that I should be standing right next to them. They look amazing with their snow covered tops. My little camera can't quite capture the detail and the beauty of the mountains but I have never seen them this magnificent. I've walked along the upper path but still close enough to the shore to see the view once in awhile. I'm sitting enjoying the view and nature's music instead of my own. I've seen a couple runners, one sprinter, and many people with their dogs. A German Shepherd tried to attack me, I can see why they have them as police dogs. I saw a man engrossed with his cell phone and thought what was the point of him taking a walk to see a great view when all he looked at was his phone. I was greeted by an old man and his dog as they sat down to enjoy the view, right where I was also sitting. A mother of two walked by carrying one of them because the one was crying. I sat there and thought of how peaceful it was, how all of the daily stress was gone and didn't even cross my mind until I returned home. I sat there wanting to stay in that moment, not wanting to let go and go on with life with all its stressfulness. I would like to do that again, but possibly longer than just an hour.

Hamlet Video

It was a little hard to find a Hamlet video but I eventually got one. It was a modern day version with Ethan Hawke playing as Hamlet, Kyle Mclachlan as Claudius, Diane Venora as Gertrude, Bill Murray as Polonius, Liev Schreiber as Laertes, and Julia Stiles as Ophelia. I was a little surprised to see actors that I recognized in this film version of Hamlet. When it started out in the first scene it was only Hamlet by himself talking, then it went on to a press conference with Claudius and Gertrude announcing their marriage and how well the Denmark Corporation was doing. It displayed very well the love between Gertrude and Claudius as sensual and nothing more. Might has well called them friend with benefits. I can see how Hamlet would have been disgusted as an older couple displayed they love with too many kisses and a lot of not needed touching. It also portrayed the love between Hamlet and Ophelia very well. In that they loved each other but it was very easy to see that Laertes and Polonius did not approve of it in anyway. Both of the men would grab her and direct her away from Hamlet and showed disapproving faces when she would show notes to Hamlet of when they could meet by themselves. It was funny that they would do that even in front of Hamlet especially considering that he out ranked them being heir to Denmark Corporations. However, Hamlet didn't seem phased at all by this but I couldn't tell if it was because he was depressed and feeling withdrawn or because he knew his place and wouldn't let them bother him. When I first saw that it was a modern day version I immediately thought of how the dialogue would be done. I wondered how much of the original script would be kept and how much would be changed to modern speech. I found out that they kept most of the original script especially the beautiful flow of Shakespeare but mainly changed the thee's and thou's. Unfortunately that basically ruined the movie. It all sounded poetic but it looked and felt as if they were just saying what they had memorized. They said their lines with not a lot of feelings and when you watch a modern day film you usually expect modern day English but since it wasn't modern day English it felt very weird. It was almost as if I was watching a dress recital but not the actual movie. This completely ruined it and I decided to not watch they whole thing as they ruined speech after speech. It was horrible as I already knew the story of Hamlet and had read the original script. I have seen parts of Hamlet movies that weren't modern versions of it which were portrayed very well and acted very well. So at the end I'll just keep to reading Shakespeare.