Petulant Sematary

Nature nurture and the likes.

Creepy memorial painting for dead child in fancy Maine mansion. If you know, you know.

I have spent the past five days in Maine, fully immersed into nature and had the world of Stephen king thrust into my wide Irish face. I have, lets say, many questions. Both rhetorical and question questions: How have there been a book and four films called Pet Sematary? Who continues to read Stephen King books besides the part of each human being that is the grotesque, violent and horny teenager inside our souls? Why are writers so obsessed with being lonely and angry writers who want to kill their wives? And, how many days a week do you break down from the cruelty and absurdity of the world we have to exist in right now? (Asking for a friend).

And I assume you may have actual questions in response to my questions above, such as: why are you so concerned about Stephen King all of a sudden that it turned into another obsessive talking point for a week? Ok, I can answer that one for you my friend. I had been holed up in a remote cabin an hour outside of Acadia national park. It had no wi-fi! (!!!) And that sounded much needed when booking it, but then it turned into a headache to maintain my rigid almost 6 year daily Duolingo streak (I’m a freak) and other zone out post hike television watching. I barely saw the news even as we left with the threat of the national guard coming into the city for modeling gigs and photo shoots around the Bean. (Not needed to state it, but I will anyways, fuck to all of this bullshit and needless cruelty. (And wait did you tell me your answer to how many times a week you randomly break down from our senseless reality? No? Oh, still counting I see)).

There was no tv but there was a very loud and very outdated dvd player supplied with a butt ton of Stephen King movies, 80s hits, John Wick trilogy and the classic Hugh Jackman robot buddy action film Chappie. Night one we watched the original Pet Sematary since we were apparently just down the road from the house in the film. So, by default, we were essentially famous for the week due to our proximity. (I don’t make the rules!)

An excellent scene from the Pulitzer Prize winning film that had me chuckling.

The movie was hilarious and contained not as many dead pets as you would think which was a huge plus. I remember not wanting to see that movie growing up because I assumed we would be seeing dogs or cats killed in the film (RUDE), and I had already witnessed my rabbit Gregor accidentally killed in front of me as a kid. He was being eaten by a neighborhood Husky that escaped, opened the rabbit cage in our garage, and camped out in our backyard eating Gregor unbeknownst to us, as we curiously watched what we thought was an injured dog cleaning blood off his paws (that was Gregor). It wasn’t until my mom slowly slinked out to get close to the dog for a better view, and she turned away and told us to get back inside quickly telling us, “that’s Gregor that’s Gregor”. Then in our tiny brains we mourned and my mom buried what remained of Gregor in our backyard the next morning. So I lived in a pet cemetery, man. I knew the rough streets of what it was like to live next to a pet cemetery, MAN. So I was not interested in seeing animals rising from the graves in Pet Sematary since then it would give me nightmares about Gregor returning from the dead in the shallow hole in my backyard. He’d probably be angry that we all hated cleaning his cage and the weird rabbit pee that looked like egg yolks. He’d probably be mad at me that I didn’t avenge his death and just accepted a pool day and ice cream from our neighbor to atone for his murder. RIP Gregor, you deserved better as my first pet cemetery.

Anyways, these were these thoughts running through my 8 year old brain when seeing the movie Pet Sematary advertised in 1989 and I said no I will not watch you, sir.

But 36 years later, my thinking has slightly matured, I think, and I was able to watch this seminal and convoluted film that is actually about grief. Well and about how fast trucks are terrible and lacking in any concern for life. But yeah mostly about grief and how no one knows how to talk about it or what to do with it or how to accept loss.

Not saying that this is a good movie or anything, but that out of the other three we watched in that cabin, it was the most cohesive and outlandish. It made me miss my cat. And miss my old cat whose ashes sit at the front of my house in a more civilized pet cemetery. The ashes sit next to the paw print of the former feral cat who lived in our backyard. And it made me wonder why there are so many Stephen King adaptations. Shoutout to a dude who just writes and writes though. That is just pretty remarkable to churn out weird ass often horny monster stories one after the next for decades. Novel prize in literature coming your way someday, bro. (My apologies to any of my 23 readers who might be closeted Kingheads. Please reach out to me to tell me more about why and what you read as you can see I am now a LIL obsessed with understanding Stephen King as a person and concept. Please, tell me more.)

But it’s another expression about how hard it is to actually feel. How much we work to attempt to avoid feeling, all of the defenses we use on a daily basis to avoid feeling the pain that is necessary to feel because we are afraid of feeling worse. Just kicking that can down the road, delaying the facing of that pain and ultimately making everything worse. In my job, I’ve realized how hard it is for us to just actually feel and just be, instead of jumping to actions, solutions, and finding any answers as temporary placeholders to give brief comfort.

So if I’ve learned anything from the three horror films I’ve watched while stuck in a cabin in the woods, it’s that you shouldn’t work to avoid feeling grief or disowning the complicated feelings of existing in this world. And also don’t bury pets and people in a special burial ground because they’ll come back scarier and thirstier for blood in ways that you were vaguely warned about by an old man who never freely reveals the truth to others but who is seen as totally credible and trustworthy without questioning his lack of transparency. Yeah, maybe don’t do that too.

But any of you 23 Kingheads out there can tell me more about what else I missed.

So here is an awkward picture that I made my good friend take in front of the house from Pet Sematary after he was hesitant to visit. I was hoping there would be more famous people there loitering and signing autographs.

Other takeaways from MAINE!:

1. We we’re kayaking on an empty bay near the cabin and turned around to see a head bobbing in the water. It was a seal watching us like a real creeper. Stephen King needs to write a 5,00000 page novel about this. STAT.

2. The Beehive hike is fun and dangerous and please do it if you have the chance! Don’t look down or dryhump the boulders to feel safer.

3. Nature rules. Stop fucking with it, you sick fucks. National parks rule. Stop fucking with them, you sick fucks.

4. I swam for a few minutes at the beach in Portland even though no one else was. The water was listed at 57 degrees. But don’t put water in front of me and tell me I cannot swim. RUDE.

5. A 12 pack of Busch N/A was not the right choice for me.

6. Most people were very chatty and nice in Portland. Really nice old human cemetery in the city too.

7. It’s my first day back at work and I’m eating my lunch at the beach downtown after doing my first extended open water swim. I really love this city. Stop fucking with it, you fucking sick fucks.

I swam down to that arrow and back. Cool!

Happy final days of summer friends. Hope you are doing and feeling whatever you need to right now.