Month: December 2020

J.D. Vance’s memoir Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis was released in the politically intense year of 2016 (though not nearly as much it would seem as 2020 has been). Admittedly, I knew nothing about that until about half way through the film (which I will take all the blame; I suppose I need to get out more.)

From what I have heard, the book talks more about the tales of a young man who grew up in Middleton, Ohio, under the values of his family’s past when they lived in the Appalachia Mountains of Kentucky. From what I have heard, the book also manages to deal with the political climate of the country at large, which may explain some of why the book was a bestseller. I can say for certain that the film adaptation, Hillbilly Elegy, has nothing in it about the political outlook of any kind. In fact, there was more than political commentary that was lost in translation from page to screen.

Despite all the division that the year 2020 has brought us, one thing we all have in common is we all yearn for a form of escapism.

That feeling of “I need a break” has been in our fiber from the beginning (after all, God did rest on the 7^th day), yet we can sometimes forget the feeling happens for children as well. They will turn to books, imaginary friends, toys, or movies (guilty as charged to this day). It is told so truthfully in My Neighbor Totoro, easily a film I love to retreat to in times of anxiety and unrest.