Reach
Depending on my mood and the situation, The Shawshank Redemption ranks as my fifth to third favorite movie. My second favorite movie is Planes, Trains, and Automobiles but I couldn’t figure out a way to work some of the best scenes and memorable bits of dialogue – the rental car counter scene? – into this column.
The premise of the movie The Shawshank Redemption, to me, anyway, is hope. Two men are imprisoned for life, accused of murder. Red is guilty of the crime and Andy is innocent. Andy has hope, Red is full of despair. Andy says, “Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.” Red says “Let me tell you something, my friend. Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane.”
I hope for an early Spring, but as I write this, it isn’t even 8 pm.
I had hoped that, by now, after over two years of sobriety, I might be free from the bars of temptation that had imprisoned me, but from where I stand today, it still looks like a jail to me. Perhaps Red was right. Perhaps hope is a dangerous thing. Perhaps I will drive myself insane with my hopeless hope.
I knew a day like this would come, and in a way, I was prepared because it was, after all, mid-November. I know that the Bible says to welcome temptations and that I am promised that I will not face unsurmountable ones. I also know that while Jesus did ask if it was possible for his cup to be passed from Him, He had previously turned the water into wine. Maybe, like the words from a song by T. Graham Brown, I’d be praying “Could You help me turn the wine back into water”, except in this case, it wasn’t wine.
I blame the dairy and the sugar cane industry. I went to the store Saturday morning to buy a grocery, and as I walked toward the back of the store, I had to pass an open cooler. An open cooler (for easier access?) full of the first cartons of this year’s eggnog. I found myself stopping and staring at them, thinking of things I had hoped to never think of again. I thought of my friend, Captain Morgan, and his gift to eggnog. Spiced rum. I thought how great it would be to once again spend the weekend with my friend. We had a lot of catching up to do, and I didn’t really have anything else planned for the weekend.
I had hoped that by now, after over two years of sobriety, I might be free from the bars of temptation that had imprisoned me, but from where I stand today, it still looks like a jail to me. I realized that I hadn’t been freed from the prison I had built for myself. I had only been granted parole. In the movie, The Shawshank Redemption, Andy isn’t released or granted parole. Andy escapes from his cell and finds his freedom. Red is granted parole, but even though he is outside of his cell, he still doesn’t feel like a free man. He only starts to feel free when he breaks his parole and heads down to Mexico to find his friend.
In the final scene of the movie, Red is walking along a beach, towards his friend Andy, the Pacific Ocean beside him. The camera pulls back, and you hear Red’s thoughts. “I hope to see my friend and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams.” The scene opens and you can see the vastness of the Pacific, you can see the openness in contrast to the confines of the cell that had kept Red hopeless for so long. And you hear Red’s last thought. “I hope.”
I stood by the cooler of eggnog and thought of my friend, Captain Morgan. I thought that I might have to spend the weekend fighting my friend. But that was okay. I didn’t really have anything else planned for the weekend. I hope he knows I plan on winning.
I hope for an early Spring, and as I write this, the rising sun is already halfway over the horizon.
I had hoped that by now, after over two years of sobriety, I might be free from the bars of temptation that had imprisoned me, and from where I stand today, I can see a lot more of the Pacific than I could see yesterday.
I hope.
